All I Crave is a Normal Life

by cazgirl

R for later chapters. (HarSev) Harry has defeated Voldemort at great personal loss and has fled the wizarding world. Circumstances force him to return and he must face all that he left behind, including his greatest enemy - and his greatest fear.

9. chapter 9

 SEQ CHAPTER \h \r 1Disclaimer: I don't own the concept of Harry Potter or any of the characters. Only the plot is my own.

Thank you to everyone who reviewed the story. A big thank you to my beta, Sepia, your efforts are greatly appreciated. J

Thank you to Maxwell Demon who has lent her artistic talents to the fic.  Her pictures have been uploaded onto her website. I can't upload her website address on FFnet but her website address is on my author profile page. I'll try and think of another way to get it in here. If anyone has any suggestions…

Follow the link and then click on "Lady Assassin's" Link. Her pictures correspond to a certain section of the text, so if you'd like to wait till you reach that part, I'll let you know where it slides in with a double asterisk.

CHAPTER 9

"What on earth has happened?!" cried Poppy as she rushed forward and motioned for the group to lead Harry to one of the beds. "And who are you?" she exclaimed raising her wand at the strangers as she realised that she didn't recognise any of the people who had come in with Harry.

"Poppy, it's me, Minerva," answered the professor impatiently as she made the pre-determined signal to indicate that they were in fact Hogwarts Professors, with one of her hands. The others also made the same gesture to Poppy, who nodded her head and turned back to her patient.

"What happened to him?" she asked crisply as she moved brusquely to her store of potions and then returned with several vials. She poured a small amount of the contents of one of the vials into several cups and offered them to each of the members of the small group except Theresa, who was still looking with concern at her Professor, who was now lying on the bed, breathing shallowly, his torso and clothing covered in blood. The five witches and wizards drank the potion, which would remove the illusion created by the metamorphmagus potion.

"He was shot. A few times," replied one member of the group as the illusions began to fade and the five people eventually began to look like themselves again. The process would take a couple of minutes.

"Good Heavens, " cried a startled Madam Pomfrey as she hurried back to her store of potions and returned with a few more vials. She revived Harry who immediately starting yelling at everyone in the group, for doing something so despicable as stupefying him after they had reassured him that they wouldn't. He would have directed his comments to the person who actually stunned him, but he had no idea who did it. 

"You stunned him? What on earth for?" asked the medi-witch as she tried to calm her patient down.

"Madam Pomfrey," said Minerva quite loudly and suddenly, "do you perhaps have a calming potion for young Miss Chan? She has been through quite a lot and I'm sure she could do with some rest," said Minerva with a pointed look at the nurse and then at the group gathered around her. This conversation could wait until the student was asleep in one of the beds on the other side of the ward. Once Poppy had settled her into a bed a significant distance from where the group was and had urged them all to keep their voices down, Draco revived their former topic of conversation.

"We stunned him because Captain Stubborn wouldn't let us put him on the stretcher. And, incidentally Jason, none of us said that we wouldn't do that. Minerva just said that she understood what you were saying, that's all," said Draco heatedly.

"She didn't understand too well if she allowed it happen," replied Harry, coolly.

"All things aside, you should have just let us do it in the first place," said Ron, leaping to Minerva's defence. "It shouldn't have been a big deal."

Harry looked at him for some moments before responding very quietly and gravely. "It was personal. You wouldn't understand." He lay back down on the bed and looked away from the group.  The silence was tense and, in an effort to do away with the awkwardness, Madam Pomfrey showed Draco, Ginny, and each of the professors to a bed, which were quite near Harry's own bed. The side effects of the metamorphmagus potion would be setting in soon and they would be needing pain numbing and sleeping draughts to get them through the rest of the day and the night.

"As for you," she said when she returned to Harry's side, "those bullets will have to come out, and I'm sorry, but this is going to hurt," Minerva said in a firm business like voice as she approached Harry with her wand. Harry groaned. Same old, same old, he sighed inwardly.

*****

Harry watched – and winced quite a bit – as Poppy opened up his wounds and then muttered an extraction spell to pull the bullets out. It still hurt, even though he'd taken a couple of doses of the pain numbing potion that Poppy had provided for him. He watched as she carefully healed the damaged tissue and cleaned the wounds, speaking the spells softly and swiftly, barely pausing for breath.  Her hands moved with a finesse that came from years of experience, and they moved with a gentleness that spoke more loudly of the care with which she looked after all of her patients than any words ever could. "There. Now stay still while I just…there," she said as she pulled the wounds together again and cleaned them before making them disappear entirely, leaving nothing but a faint scar.

"Now you listen here," she said more sternly. "I wasn't very happy that one of the professors stunned you before, but now I'm glad that they did." Before Harry could protest, she held up one hand to silence him. "Aside from the fact that the bullets in your shoulder damaged some of your ligaments and muscles, one of those bullets in your chest grazed your lung. The damage was easily fixed…this time.  But if you had tried to walk to the castle you might have made it worse, and if that was the case, I would have been very put out with you."

"Poppy, I – "

"I don't want to hear it," the medi-witch spoke over Harry. "I'm going to give you a couple of potions to for the damage to your shoulder, a blood replenishing potion and a sleeping draught. You need to rest for a little while. Once the potions have worn off, I'll just check you over one more time, but I think you'll be able to leave. There was no lasting damage, no thanks to you."

"Thank you Poppy. I appreciate it." And Harry meant it. He had spent many hours in Poppy's care when he was younger and none of the medi-witches and wizards he had met since he left Hogwarts had ever made him feel as thoroughly well looked after as she did. She left, but returned shortly with a shirt for Harry to wear, since his other couldn't be worn and an arm full of potions. Oh boy, does this bring back memories. I've been down this road before. He accepted the shirt gratefully but protested about the taste of the potions, more out of habit than anything else. Poppy left, shaking her head in mild exasperation.

"The man gets shot, tears God knows how many ligaments, has a graze on his lung, bleeds all over my floor, but it's the sodding  potions that bother him. I give up!"

"Thanks Poppy!" Harry called after her, as the sleeping draught started to work its magic on him.

***

"Tell me everything," said Albus quietly to the members of the Order as he approached them in the hospital wing. Albus found them sitting in their beds talking quietly among themselves. None of them would take their sleeping draughts until evening, because they knew they would need it to get them through the night.

It took Minerva the better part of three quarters of an hour to explain what happened.  But Minerva wasn't aware of everything that had transpired and so she was unable to inform Albus that, in the midst of the confusion and smoke, two wizards had apparated into the pharmacy and rescued the blond man that had threatened Theresa.

"Where did he get the knife from?" asked Albus, curiously. "Was it his?"

Ron shrugged helplessly. "I've got no idea. It might be his."

"Why did he throw a knife when – " Albus began to ask.

"I don't know," Ron repeated. "I was watching the blond fellow. He looked like he was trying to grab Theresa…I wasn't just standing there doing nothing, Albus. I tried to help, but I couldn't get my wand out. The people I was hiding with just latched onto me and I couldn't shake them…I think it was because I made the mistake of telling them not to worry and that they'd be fine as long as they kept low. They must have thought I was the walking paragon of wisdom after that because about five of them clung onto me…."Ron trailed off, looking embarrassed that he wasn't able to do anything to help.

"It was the same with all of us, Albus. We were trying to help the people we were with and they just...sort of…clung on," Hermione offered. "We really were stuck."

"I'm sorry. If you had let me finish, I was going to ask you why he threw a knife when he could have thrown a spell? He is a wizard, after all."

After a short pause, Ginny spoke. "Maybe he didn't want to expose himself as a wizard."

"Was there really enough time to be thinking of that under the circumstances?" asked Albus, with a frown.

"Well, no, but…" No one else could offer any other suggestions, so they just looked at each other.

"And, why on earth did he attack the men with a gun, instead of using his wand? I think under the circumstances, he could have been forgiven for exposing himself, couldn't he?"

"But if we were exposed, we wouldn't have been able to obliviate everyone in the pharmacy. The police arrived too quickly for that."

"That is true, but we could have worked something out."

"Perhaps," said Professor Snape, who had remained silent up until now, "he would have used magic if he had no other option, but simply didn't feel that he was pushed to that last resort. When we think to resolve a situation, we react in terms of magic and non-muggle methods. By his own accounts, he has spent some time in the muggle world. Perhaps, he reacts by using both muggle and wizarding methods. Albus, he reacted very quickly. Perhaps he was simply able to see an opportunity to control the situation without the use of magic because of the time he has spent with muggles." Snape offered his explanation hesitantly. He wasn't sure what to believe himself, but this was the only way he could explain Professor Green's behaviour.

"Jason told us that we were being observed, and it turned out that he was right," Ron told Albus urgently.

"Yeah, and in the pharmacy, Theresa was yelling out for Professor Green – and the blond fellow seemed really interested in that. He wanted to know who they were. I think someone's looking for one, or all of you," said Ginny, looking at her brother, her eyes widening in fear. "I don't think you should be policing London anymore. It's obviously becoming too easy to spot you all. And I don't think you'll be able to find anyone willing to continue doing that while taking these awful potions. I've got cramps in places I never knew existed," she whined.

"Concealment spells?" offered Hermione, her eyebrows creased in thought.

"They're too transient. They don't last long enough, and, if you know the right spell, you can see through them," said Ron quietly, shaking his head.

"I didn't mean those ones. I mean the ones that they were looking into years ago. Those ones that you're not supposed to be able to see through which you can leave on until you're ready to remove them," said Hermione quickly.

Minerva punctured whatever hope Hermione had at that point when she said, "They were never fully developed. There were too many flaws that couldn't be worked out of the spell."

"Oh," Hermione said, disappointed.

After a momentary silence, Albus addressed them all. "I think that we should wait to find out what Jason can tell us before we discuss this further. In the meantime, I will leave you all to rest while I speak to Theresa.  The group of five watched as Albus walked over to Theresa's bed.

"Be careful you guys," said Ginny quietly, looking directly at her brother and her sister-in-law.

*****

Harry was woken up by the sounds of voices near his bed.

"I sent you back to your rooms earlier Theresa," said Madam Pomfrey in a no-nonsense tone of voice.

"Please, Madam Pomfrey...please.  I just wanted to see if Professor Green was awake. I really need to tell him something."

"Surely whatever you have to tell him can wait until morning."

"Well, I guess so, but, well...I – I wanted to tell him before I lost the nerve. Um, I did something to make him angry, and I really have to apologise…and, well…I just thought it might be easier if I saw him now instead of waiting for him after one of my classes," said Theresa in a shaky voice.

"Who's there? It's still dark…gotta be too early to get up, " Ron said groggily as he was awakened by the voices.

"I'll say.  It feels like I only just now got to sleep," Draco complained. He looked over to the bed next to him and saw his wife stirring as well.

"Would you stop making so much noise, Ron?" asked Hermione, yawning widely.

"It's not me! It's them!" cried Ron, pointing at Theresa and Madam Pomfrey who were standing a short distance away from their beds.

"For Merlin's sake! Will you cease your chattering so that I may get some sleep? You're all behaving as if you're at a first year slumber party!" said Professor Snape, irritably.

Minerva ignored the brunt of his outburst, but decided to keep her voice down all the same.  "I wonder what she could want at this time of the night."

"Morning," Draco whispered sourly. "At this time of the morning. It's about 12:30 am."

"Theresa, I have to insist that you – " began Madam Pomfrey but she was cut off.

"It's o.k Poppy. I'm awake," Harry raised himself up into a sitting position in his bed.

"And so are we. Thanks," muttered Ron, but only just loudly enough for his wife and his sister, who were in the beds on either side of his, to hear.

"Ssh," hissed Hermione.

"What can I do for you, Miss Chan?" asked Harry, stifling a yawn and motioning for Theresa to pull a seat up next to his bed.

Madam Pomfrey looked at both of them and shook her head before heading over to another part of the room  where she would sit and keep an eye on them, muttering something about 'stubborn professors who won't do as they're told' under her breath.

Harry grinned cheekily at her before she left, and turned back to his student who was nervously looking around the room and wringing her hands.

"Um, sir? Um...well, I have something to tell you. But you won't like it. And, I guess that…well…I wanted to tell you while you were here so that you wouldn't be able to yell too much, being a hospital wing and all," said Theresa quickly, already cringing away from Harry.

"This should be good," Ron whispered excitedly, leaning over in his bed so that he could listen to the conversation.

"Ssh. I'm trying to listen,  Ron," whispered Ginny without shame.

"Me too," added Draco, who was trying to crane his neck as far as it would go in an effort to hear the conversation. In fact, everyone in the infirmary, including Severus – who had given up any hope of getting back to sleep any time soon – all tried to listen in on the conversation. They were all curious to know what Theresa could possibly have to say to her professor at this time of the morning.

Harry looked carefully at Theresa, who already seemed on the verge of tears. "Have you ever heard me yell at anyone?" he asked his student seriously.

"Um, well, earlier today when Madam Pomfrey woke you up just after you were brought to the hospital wing, you yelled at all of us…."

"Oh. O.k, you have a point. But, I'd just been shot and my adrenalin had kicked in when we were in trouble at the pharmacy and I hadn't really calmed down by the time I woke up in the hospital wing. And then, on top of all that, I was a little cranky that nobody listened to me when I was trying to talk to them just before I

was stunned." He'd had to stretch the truth a little bit there. He had been injured many times during the war and was still able to think and act at least semi-rationally even when he felt that he would like nothing more than to pass out from the pain and when his adrenalin was pumping so hard that he could hear his own heart beating loudly in his ears. Harry stopped and looked at his student. "Other than today, have you ever heard me yell at anyone?" he asked gently.

Theresa considered this question carefully. "No, sir. But I still think you'll yell at me," she said, edging her chair back from Harry, who sighed and just leaned back against his pillows.

"How about if I promise not to yell at you?" asked Harry, in an effort to encourage Theresa to tell him what she needed to.

"Um. Are you sure?" she asked, cautiously.

"Yes."

"You promise?."

"I promise. Seriously. Just tell me."

"Well, you know how you were really cranky because you were stunned today?" Theresa began cautiously.

"Yes," said Harry slowly, wondering where she was going with this.

"Well…I was the one who stunned you," Theresa said, quietly.

"Did she just tell him that she stunned him?" asked Ron, who couldn't quite hear Theresa's last sentence.

"Yep," said Draco, still straining to hear.

"Oh man. He went off his nut because he thought we did that to him," whispered Ron, shaking his head.

"Well, he said wouldn't yell at her," offered Draco.

"No. He'll kill her instead," whispered Ron as he tried to lean even further out of his bed.

"You did that?" asked Harry, quietly, staring at Theresa.

"Sir, I was worried about you because you were hurt and there was so much blood, and you seemed to be stumbling a bit and I didn't think you should walk all the way to the castle." she explained very quickly, as if it wouldn't sound so bad that way. "And then one of the professors tried to stun you so they could carry you to the castle and you wouldn't let them, but I thought it was a good idea. I didn't want you to hurt yourself any more, and you might have if you'd tried to walk…Professor, I'm so sorry. I had no right to do that," Theresa couldn't continue because she crying so hard by now that it was impossible for her to talk.

Harry didn't say anything. To any onlooker, it might look like Harry was overreacting. After all, Theresa and the others there were only trying to help him by carrying him to the castle. No one knew that by carrying him, against his will, they were violating something very personal to him. He had made a decision a long time ago, to face everything standing up, like his father. Standing like a man, to the end. The world had taken so much from Harry but he was determined that no one would take that from him. And today, they had. But no one was aware of just what they had violated, and Harry wasn't going to tell them. He clenched and unclenched his jaw a few times, breathing deeply to calm himself down before turning to look at Theresa, who was looking down at her hands in her lap and trying to silent her tears.

"Thank you."

"What!" gasped Ron. "He looked like he was going to kill us, but he thanks her!"

"Shush Ron!" snapped Hermione.

"Sometimes I'm a little too stubborn for my own good," Harry said gently. Theresa was only doing what she thought was right; and truth be told, he was quite touched that a student thought so much of him that she would want to help him,  then tell him what she had done –  even though she knew that he had been upset about it all.

Theresa looked up, surprised. "Really?"

"Really. And that was a really good hex that you threw too. You've been practicing," he said, encouragingly.

"Well, yeah, I have. Sir, I really am very sorry. I'll understand if you don't want to give me any more tuition."

"We can't stop your lessons now. You're really improving. Now tell me, were you still a bit shaky when we landed after we touched the port key?" asked Harry, lapsing into professor mode.

"Yes," Theresa replied honestly.

"So, can you tell me how you went about trying to focus your magic when you were still a bit scared?"

"I don't know, sir. I've had trouble focusing on the spells during class but I don't think I really thought about how I was going to cast the spell that time. I think I just did it…"

*****

"How come he yelled at us, but he was nice to her?" asked Ron, who was still a bit sore at having been yelled at.

"Well, I expect it's because she's a student. Would you yell at one of your students?" asked Hermione, wisely.

Ron thought about this and grudgingly conceded her point. "Fair enough."

"Was he giving her extra lessons as well?" asked Draco, grinning wickedly. "She's a lucky girl. Extra tuition from Professors Green and Snape." He looked over at the potions master who was glaring daggers at him.

"I don't get it though," continued Ron. "Why was it such a big deal? I mean, we only wanted to get him to the castle. If I'd been shot I'd be quite happy to let someone carry me around."

"I have no doubt about that, big brother," Ginny interrupted dryly.

"But, he looked ready to kill us. I just don't get it…" Ron trailed off, deep in thought.

Professor Snape looked over at Harry and Theresa, who were by now engaged in a quiet conversation about hexes and counter hexes. "He said it was a matter of pride."

"Yeah, but – "

"Pride means very different things to different people," Professor Snape offered quietly, almost speaking to himself.

"Sometimes, it's all you have," Draco said absently, also looking at the professor who was speaking to his student.

*****

Harry woke up to find Albus sitting in the chair that had been occupied by Theresa a few hours before.

"Good morning.  How are you feeling, Jason?"

"Fine, Headmaster.  In fact, I'll probably be joining everyone in the Hall for breakfast."

"Good, good.  I'm glad all of the excitement hasn't diminished your appetite." The humorous expression left his face at that point and he said, "But before you go, I wonder if you would mind me asking you a little about what exactly transpired yesterday.

"I assumed you would've spoken with the other Order members about that," he replied, fidgeting with his blanket and  trying to gauge how much Albus already knew.

"Yes, I have spoken with them, but there seem to be considerable gaps in their knowledge and I was hoping you'd be able to fill them in." The Headmaster sat back in the seat and clasped his hands comfortably in his lap, waiting for Harry to begin.

Harry described everything that he saw and heard for Albus because he didn't think that there was anything that they didn't need to know. Of course, he didn't tell them that he had stunned several people in the room and created a protective shell for Theresa wandlessly.  Harry had provided Albus with a lot of information that the other Order members, who were presently sleeping in their hospital beds, hadn't given him.

"I was curious when the others told me what happened last night, and now that you're awake, I'm hoping you can clear this up for me. Why did you throw a knife at the fellow?"

"He was going to grab Theresa," Harry explained. **

"Yes. But why did you throw a knife when you could have thrown a spell? I understand that you might not have wanted to expose yourself as a wizard, but under the circumstances it would have been reasonable, wouldn't it?" asked Albus as he attempted, once again, to finally get an answer to the question that had been bothering him since he had heard the other Order members give their account of the story the previous evening.

Why am I constantly explaining my actions? If I actually had used my wand I'll bet I'd still have everyone questioning me and chewing me out for exposing myself as a wizard. Man, I just can't win, Harry thought to himself, and heaved a great sigh before he answered.

"I was actually going to throw a spell at him, Albus. I was even reaching for my wand, but when I was checking the pharmacist over to see if he was alright, I turned him over, almost all the way onto his back to see whether the bullet had gone straight through. Something in his back pocket was jabbing into him and he asked me to shift it around so that it wouldn't make him uncomfortable. It was a knife, Albus. One of those types with the flip blade. So, as I was reaching for my wand I remembered that the pharmacist had a knife on him and one of my arms was still on his back. I just reached in for it and threw it."

"I'm surprised you had enough time to do that, if the fellow was reaching for Theresa," Albus noted.

"The guy was moving slowly. Like…oh, I don't know…like a tiger stalking its prey. He just sort of moved in slow motion, so I had enough time to change my mind." Harry answered honestly, though he knew it sounded lame, even to his own ears.

"Why did you change your mind at all, Jason? Why not just continue and throw the spell?" Albus asked, curiously.

"Because it would have been a hell of a job to erase everyone's memories afterwards. I didn't know when the police would have arrived and we would've had to find everyone – and there were quite a few people in there – who was hiding in the pharmacy, assuming that they didn't all run out first, and erase their memories. And then, if anyone who was looking into the pharmacy from outside in the crowd had seen me throwing a spell we'd have had to track them down, and anyone they may have told, and erase their memories. We wouldn't have been able to do it before the police arrived, so I was really looking to avoid that."

Albus nodded while Harry was speaking, agreeing with his reasoning. He looked thoughtfully at Harry and said, "From what the others tell me, it was a precision throw and a great aim. I'd imagine that it would take some skill to be able to throw like that."

"I've had some military training," Harry answered smoothly. You should know, you and your Order. You all had me sent off to be trained…I wonder if you have any idea just how well trained I really was, and still am, Albus? 

"Ah, yes. You've spent some time with muggles," Albus reasoned to himself.

"Yes," Harry replied, deep in thought.

"Is that the reason you dealt with the other men without magic?" asked Albus carefully.

"Same sort of reason. I would have used my wand, but no one was moving after the blond fellow who was trying to grab Theresa passed out. I saw an opportunity and I just grabbed it.  Um, unfortunately, I didn't move out of the way quickly enough. I was trying not to hurt them too badly."

"Did you  hurt any of them?"

"I don't think so. I was firing the gun at the floor."

"I'm a little puzzled. Why did they all simply pass out. I would have thought they would be able to bear the sound of gunfire and the thought of bullets being fired so closely to themselves since they were doing the same thing only a short time before." Albus asked Harry, giving him a piercing look.

Harry looked straight at Albus and replied in calm and slightly puzzled tones, "I've absolutely no idea."

Both men sat in silence for a short time before Albus moved their conversation along.

"So, two men apparated into the pharmacy and dragged the blond fellow out?"

"Yes."

"Did you recognise them?"

"No. I was lying on the ground and didn't really get a good look. But I definitely heard them apparate in. The 'crack' was pretty loud."

"Do you know if anyone, aside from yourself, saw them?"

"They apparated into one of the corners of the pharmacy. I was lying near them, so I could see them, but I don't know if anyone else saw them because they created a lot of really thick smoke when they arrived. It dissipated pretty quickly and by the time we managed to get out, it had just about filled the whole pharmacy."

"And you're sure that they referred to Professor Snape and Draco by name?"

"Yes. They said, 'Did you see Snape or Malfoy around.'"

Albus' brows creased in concern. "Did they mention why they were looking for them?"

"No. They didn't say anything more about either of them." Both the Headmaster and the professor lapsed into silence at this point.

"I don't know Draco or Professor Snape that well, but why would anyone be looking for both of them specifically?" He had a pretty good idea why they were attacked. but it still didn't make any sense.  Since Death Eaters were involved in the incident, he was quite sure that someone was looking for them because they worked as spies during the war, but the war had been over for about eight years now. If anyone was going to target them for being spies they would have done so before now. And even then, their roles as spies had been a very closely guarded secret. It would have been no mean trick to discover it.

"I don't know," Albus muttered, still deep in thought.

You wouldn't tell me even if you did know, would you? Just like old times.  Harry thought bitterly. During the war, people had continually withheld information from him under the pretense that he didn't need to know, or that knowing might affect his ability to perform his tasks, and he'd hated it. It would have been a gesture of mutual respect to allow him to be privy to certain information, particularly since he was passing information to the Order and he was required to kill Voldemort, but this gesture was always withheld. Harry hated being treated like a child, when he was quite obviously not a child in the conventional sense of the word during the war. And he still hated it. He shifted around in his bed, grinding his teeth in frustration.

"I wasn't trying to pry, Headmaster. I only ask because, I've been able to give you quite a bit of information and I've lent all of you my skills on a couple of occasions now, so I would think that it's only fair that I know whether there might be a reason I seem to be continually putting myself at risk in circumstances where people are specifically looking for Draco and/or Professor Snape," Harry said from between clenched teeth.

Albus looked up at Harry who was fiddling with his bed sheets while he continued.  "I mean, apparently I'm a member of the Order of the Phoenix now. Draco and Professor Snape are as well. If there's something that the rest of you know that I don't then I would think that I might have earned the privilege of knowing, since I've been directly involved in these sorts of incidents twice now." Though his conscience wouldn't let him stand by and allow someone to be hurt if he could prevent it, an attack on either one of those two men felt oddly personal to him and he wanted to be able to help them. Professor Snape had saved his life on countless occasions and had turned spy for Albus at considerable risk to himself. Draco had defied his entire family and all of his friends when he had volunteered to spy for Albus, also at considerable risk to himself. Each of them carried a large part of his history with them – even if their history evoked some less than pleasant memories – and Harry would help them if he could.

Harry stopped fiddling and looked at Albus who looked calmly back at him.

"You're right. You have earned that privilege. I can't tell you anything at the moment because I simply don't know. I could speculate but I would have to ask the permission of Professor Snape and Draco before I could tell you what those speculations are."

Harry couldn't fault his reasoning, so he settled himself back against his pillows, waiting for Albus to continue.

"Finally, how did you know that the Order members were being watched in the mall? They all said that they were unaware of this until you alerted them," Albus asked, with obvious interest.

"Well, I saw them from the pharmacy and I thought I might just head out and say 'hello' to them, and I was still looking at them and thinking about this when I saw a big beefy fellow with piggy looking eyes and no neck, walk right past the group, behind them all. He nodded right at them as well. I think he was looking at someone else when he did this because it looked like he was trying to point them out. It looked out of place so I had a bit of a look around to see who he was looking at and I noticed that there were a heck of a lot of people sitting down reading magazines and newspapers and just sort of glancing up at them every now and then. I didn't notice anything myself, up until that point.

"And you told them to come back to Hogwarts?" asked Albus.

"Yes. They'd been recognised, and too many people were watching them for it to have been a friendly sort of recognition. I just suggested that they come back here and let you know that someone was looking for them and that they'd been spotted. I didn't know that they weren't going to listen to me, or that they could change their appearance the way they did."

"Hmm…Yes, they can be quite stubborn when they all put their minds to it," Albus agreed, good-naturedly.

"Who's stubborn then?" asked Ron, stirring in his bed and rubbing his eyes groggily with one of his hands.

"Good. You're all awake," Albus cheerfully addressed the others. A couple of them were awake and were waking the others.

"You know I don't sleep well when someone's talking about me, Albus," Draco said teasingly as he gently woke his wife.

"I'm surprised you get any sleep at all then," Ron  muttered just under Draco's radar.

"I hope that you'll all join me for breakfast this morning," Albus said as he swept past them, looking for Madam Pomfrey. He joined them a moment later with the medi-witch by his side. "Severus, Draco, I'd like to see you both in my office after breakfast."

The two men looked at one another. The look that Albus was directing both of them was serious and they silently nodded their agreement that they would be there.

Albus looked back over at Harry and nodded once to him before he left. Harry didn't notice though. He was too busy looking at Draco and Professor Snape. The two men had followed Albus' gaze back to Harry and were silently looking at him, puzzlement and confusion evident in their eyes, while Harry's reflected only the concern he felt for both of them. He was the first to break the eye contact and he looked over at one of the bare walls on the other side of the hospital, deep in thought.  

*****

Madam Pomfrey sent the others on their way to breakfast before she turned her attention to Harry.

"And I don't want you to strain yourself. I've done as much as I can, but your body really does need time to adjust after the damage and repairs that have been done to it. A couple of days of light tasks are just what you need," she told him sternly before leaning closer to him and pointing her wand right at his newly healed chest. "If I find out that you've been exerting yourself,  you'll answer to me, young man. Now off to breakfast with you."

Harry grinned at the way she could make him feel like a little boy, even after all these years. "Would I do something that would make you unhappy, Poppy?" he asked with exaggerated innocence. The medi-witch stared at him and then laughed. "Go on with you then." she said, pushing him out of the door with her wand.

He turned around and called out to her, "Thanks  Poppy! You're the best!" The medi-witch watched him leave with a smile, and then put her hands in her face and groaned when he tripped over his own two feet half way down the corridor.

"It's alright Poppy. I'm o.k. Nothing to see here," he called out to her as he winced slightly, picked himself up off the floor and dusted off his clothes. "How can he be the same man who did all of those things in the pharmacy yesterday? He's a danger to himself!" she muttered as she turned back to her hospital wing.

*****

After breakfast, the group who had were patrolling the mall the day before decided to see Albus together in his office, which gave Harry the perfect opportunity to leave the castle. He had been worried about Tony since he had left the pharmacy yesterday. Even though he had no doubts that the police would have made sure that he had received the proper medical attention, he couldn't help but be concerned. But on top of all this, he was angry that he hadn't been able to prevent Tony from being hurt and that he was only able to give him minimal assistance.

Since Draco and Ginny and the professors were in a conference with Albus, Harry was sure that no one would be looking for him for some time. It was a simple matter to discover which hospital he'd been taken to.  He left the castle with a small bag full of things that he wanted to be able to give Tony, and apparated to a quiet road just behind the hospital, remembering to remove his concealment charms just in time before he entered the hospital. Good grief! This double identity thing is hard to keep a track of sometimes!

Tony was in a private room, sitting up in bed and watching the television.

"Aren't you too old for cartoons?" he asked his friend from the doorway.

"No way. You're never too old for this. This is quality television right here…come on in," he said motioning for Harry to come inside.

Harry entered the room and pulled up a seat beside the bed. "First of all, how are you feeling? And don't lie to me. I don't want to hear what you're telling the nurses. I want to hear how you're really doing," Harry said seriously.

Tony looked at his friend for a moment before he said, "I'm doing o.k. Really. I mean, I've been better. Much better, but it's not too bad."

"You were shot. How can that not be too bad?" Harry asked in amusement.

"Well, it was a clean shot. In and out. No shards or anything left behind, and I had a transfusion yesterday so I'm not in any real danger anymore. The doctors are supposed to be coming in to do a blood count and check to see whether I need another one. They said that I might be able to get away with not having one, but it'll all depend…How did you know I was here, anyway?" asked Tony. "I was pretty groggy yesterday, but I don't remember telling them to call you."

"I saw the news report about what happened at the mall and called you to see if you were o.k. You didn't pick up all night so I just started ringing the hospitals and I found you here,"  Harry lied.

Tony blinked up at his friend. "Wow Jason. I honestly wish I were gay right now and that you were my boyfriend, just so I could come home to someone who'd look after me like that every day. Thanks, buddy."

"Any time. Now. I have a few things for you," Harry told him, opening up his bag and getting down to business.

"Oh no," Tony groaned. The last time his friend had visited him in hospital, he had brought a good supply of McDonalds food with him, because he was convinced that the hospital wouldn't serve decent food to him. Needless to say, he had been in a lot of trouble from the staff when they discovered this.

"It's not more fast food is it, because the last time you brought that stuff into the hospital, I got into so much trouble…"

"No, I haven't got any food in here, though I really should have brought something. It's just not right that you should have to eat that garbage that they call 'food'. Reconstituted eggs are not 'food', my friend. In any case, I've got something else for you. Behold," he said with a grand gesture as he brought several vials of potions out of his bag.

Tony's eyes nearly fell out of his head. "Bloody hell! Jason, what is that stuff. This is a hospital! You can't bring that sort of stuff in here. How did you even manage to get past the front desk? Hang on, it's not drugs is it?" He asked nervously.

"No! It's not drugs! What kind of person do you think I am?" Harry asked, slightly offended that his friend would think such a thing.

Tony blinked. "A pharmacologist?

"Oh, yeah. Well – anyway, this is some of that 'alternative therapy' that I was talking to you about before," Harry told his friend, by way of explanation.

"Jason," Tony began, disapprovingly, "You know that this fine establishment is called a hospital, right? And in a hospital, there is a good supply of medication. And the doctors don't take too kindly to people who self-medicate with alternative therapy…concoctions."

"Trust me, buddy. This'll help. It really will. I promise. Have I ever let you down before?" Harry asked. "Look. I'm not going to ask you to have all of them. I just brought them because I didn't know how you were feeling today. We'll just try a few. Just a few. You'll only have to take them once and then never again. I promise. And the doctors won't know. I swear," Harry pleaded with his friend in earnest. C'mon Tony. Let me help. I feel bad enough as it is, Harry silently begged his friend.

"…Alright." Tony relented.

"Excellent. Now, just take this one first. It's just going to help your blood count," Harry explained to Tony as he gave him the blood replenishing potion. "Hopefully, you won't need a second operation." Tony had had transfusions before and he had picked up nasty infections on a few occasions.

Tony drank it and handed the empty glass back to Harry. "I'm glad that it didn't taste as bad as it looked."

"No, it's got some glucose in it, so it shouldn't taste that bad," Harry told his friend. During his spare hours he had brewed himself a supply of the more common potions.  Professor Snape customarily brewed the potions for the hospital wing, but unlike the potions master, Harry had included ingredients to try and improve the flavour of the potions. A large part of his younger years had been spent in the hospital wing and he still vividly recalled the…lasting…flavours of the potions that he had taken there. "Right, now this one's just a general pain reliever. I know you're being given tablets for that, but – unlike the tablets – this won't make you feel nauseous or dizzy."

Tony tipped the contents of the glass down his throat and wordlessly handed the glass back to Harry who just as quickly replaced it with another glass. "This one is very important. It'll stimulate muscle and tissue regrowth and regeneration," he told his friend, who drank the potion.

"Ick. That one was really bitter," He told him, wiping his mouth with his shirt sleeve.

"Good grief. How old are you? Three? You're a grown man. You shouldn't be complaining about the taste." Hang on a second, I don't think I'm in a position to be able to say anything. I complain about the taste all the time!

"So, what on earth happened?  How did you end up getting shot?" Harry asked, more out of politeness than anything else. It would have looked strange if he didn't ask about what happened to his friend. He listened patiently while Tony explained his own, if slightly inaccurate, version of the events that occurred at the pharmacy.

"Geez, I thought that if you ever managed to get shot, it'd be because of your big mouth, not because you were in the wrong place at the wrong time." Tony laughed easily at the friendly joke at his expense.

"Yeah, go figure," Tony replied, wincing slightly at the pain that shot through his shoulder when he laughed. "So, what's new? What have you decided to do about that company? You know, that one that only wants you for 'just one thing'," Tony asked, waggling his eyebrows suggestively.

"Well I finally just decided to work for them…" Harry and Tony spent the rest of the morning in quiet conversation and Harry finally left his friend alone when the nurse told him, in no uncertain terms, that visiting hours didn't include lunch times and that Tony needed to be able to eat without distraction.

"Yeah, you'll need to concentrate pretty hard to be able to keep that hospital food down. We wouldn't want anything to distract your attention away from those reconstituted eggs, would we? I might head off to the KFC down the road and pick something up there," Harry whispered to his friend as he got up from his chair and made ready to leave. Tony gave Harry a glare that would rival one of Professor Snape's before Harry quickly left the room, flashing his most charming smile at the nurse who was also glaring at him. He felt like indulging in junk food and weighed his options as he stepped outside the visitor's entrance of the hospital.

Hmm…KFC or McDonalds. Tough choice, he thought to himself with a smile as he headed off to lunch.

*****

Harry walked through the hallways of the castle back to his room, his greasy lunch sitting a little heavy in his stomach, considering how to spend the rest of his day; he was more than a little surprised to see Professor Snape waiting patiently at the door to his room, a heavy book in his hands.

"Professor, what can I do for you?" Harry asked, recovering from his moment of shock.

"Professor," greeted the Potions Master as he held out the book for Harry to see. "I've been doing some reading. I borrowed this from Mrs. Weasley, who I believe borrowed this from you. I hope you don't mind," he said in a calm and even voice.

"Not at all," replied Harry, who recognised the book as the one he had lent Hermione. The complex purification spells that had dispelled the dark creature that had attacked Professor Snape could be found in the book.

The Potions Master regarded Harry for a moment before he continued. "I have some…questions regarding the purification spells that I was…hoping…you could answer," the Potions Master ground out grudgingly, an odd expression on his face. 

Having to ask Harry for help was an enormous blow to his pride. In fact, Harry thought he might need to sit down after hearing this. Snape is asking for help? I'd love to see his face if he knew that he was asking Harry Potter for help. If it's anything like the look on my face right now, it'd be a laugh! He thought, amused.

All things aside, the Potions Master had compromised his pride considerably in approaching Harry today. Professor Snape was a man who prided himself on the fact that he was a skilled practitioner of the Dark Arts and in defence against them; partially out of interest, but mostly out of necessity. He had been constantly honing his defence skills from the time when he volunteered to spy against Voldemort. The threat of a long and lingering death at Voldemort's hands, and the painful deaths of those he had volunteered to protect were powerful incentives to develop this talent. He was rendered helpless when he was attacked by the shadow creature. Neither he nor any of the other staff member, with the exception of Harry, knew how to defeat the creature.  And if there was one thing that Professor Snape loathed, it was feeling helpless and not in control.

Since then, he had endeavoured to find out as much as he could about shadow creatures and the spells involved in vanquishing them, without much luck, until he borrowed the book on Dark Arts that Harry had lent to Hermione and Ginny.  But even after reading the relevant chapters he found that he still needed Professor Green's professional help.  The fact was almost more than he could bear . He, Severus Snape, was reduced to asking a young…upstart…at least twenty years his junior, and who had only just begun teaching, for…assistance. The sour expression on his face made Harry think that maybe he'd just swallowed a lemon.

"I'm sorry Professor," Harry apologised for his momentary pause. "But I'm just surprised. I mean, we've never really been able to have a polite conversation, have we – not that I care, mind you.  And you've always given me the impression that you don't think I'm really qualified to teach my subject."

"I am simply asking you a professional question – one colleague to another," Professor Snape replied. He couldn't deny the truth of what Harry was saying. None of their conversations had ever actually been civil. In fact, most of them were quite hostile. And he really hadn't thought Harry was qualified to teach the subject when he had first arrived, but he had been steadily changing his mind. He had watched the professor as he tutored Theresa Chan on Christmas Day and had to grudgingly admit that the man knew his subject. He had shown unending patience and encouragement when faced with the struggling student and had taught her simple strategies to avoid being hurt by a potential enemy. Furthermore, only a fool would doubt that the man had shown considerable skill when he calmly dispelled the shadow creature that had attacked him on that same evening, and again when he took matters into his own hands in the pharmacy. Professor Snape had had to re-evaluate his professional opinion of Professor Green, but that didn't mean he was happy about having to ask him for help.

Harry nodded his acknowledgment of Professor Snape's observation and began to discreetly unlock – and 'disarm' – his door before responding. "Of course, Professor."

"Excuse me, but I'd rather not have this discussion in your rooms," the Potions Master coolly stated. Harry turned to look at Snape and saw that his face was impassive and revealed nothing. It didn't matter though, because he could guess the reason for the objection.  Professor Snape was, by nature, a careful and intelligent man. He needed to be to survive as a spy among Voldemort's Death Eaters, but Harry had long since observed that Professor Snape didn't trust him– actually, most of the staff were still dubious of him – and held a suspicion that Harry had only saved his life so that he could lull him into a false sense of security for a more sinister purpose. Under those circumstances, it would make sense that Professor Snape would not want to have a discussion alone with the professor in his own suite of rooms.

"You're right. It'd be too easy for me to try to kill you in there," Harry lightly observed. "Why don't we go to the staff room? It's a nice public room, and it would be harder for me to try anything with people around."

"I said nothing about –" Professor Snape objected, in an effort to appear civil. He had come to Harry because he wanted his help, so it wouldn't do to insult him.

"Professor, we've been through this. You don't trust me. I understand that, in fact, I don't blame you. You'd be a fool to trust someone you know so little about. Let me just put my bag away and I'll be right out," Harry said to him as he ducked into his room, threw the bag into the living room, and then ducked out again, discreetly setting the locks and spells on his door.

The young man looked at Professor Snape. "After you, Professor," he offered as they both set off down the hallway in the direction of the staff room.

*****

The two men walked stiffly together, neither one feeling comfortable in the other's presence and when they arrived at the staff room they found only Minerva sitting by the coffee pot, preparing her notes for her classes tomorrow. She looked up when she heard the two professors enter and her eyes widened as she looked from one to the other.

"Good afternoon…er…Severus…Jason…" she stammered, trying – unsuccessfully – to contain her surprise as the unlikely pair approached.

Professor Snape nodded his greeting but Harry cheerfully sang out a "Hello" as he made himself a cup of coffee and followed the Potions Master to a private corner of the room, who sat down stiffly on one of the cushioned seats, placing the book on the table before him. Harry took a seat opposite him and leaned casually back in his seat, waiting for the other man to begin.

The other professor pulled the book toward him to open it up to a tagged page. He had methodically tagged several pages for ease of reference when questioning Harry, and was about to begin when he was interrupted by Minerva.

"Forgive the interruption, but is everything alright over there? Is there something going on that I should be concerned about?" said Minerva, her voice slightly raised.

Harry had to work hard to stifle a laugh. She's concerned about our safety! Or maybe her safety! We're grown men for heaven's sake!  "Er, yes. Thank you. We're fine."

"Very well. If you don't mind the intrusion, may I ask what you two are doing over there?" she called out cautiously.

"We're discussing the subject matter of one of the Professor Green's books, and we would be grateful if we could return to it, or at the very least, begin,," snapped the Potions Master.

Minerva couldn't respond for a few moments. "It's just the two of you over there?"

"Yes." Harry responded good naturedly.

"And you're having a discussion?" she asked, her eyes narrowed at the both of them.

"Yes." Harry replied innocently. Professor Snape sent an irritable glare her way which made the Transfigurations professor reconsider asking any more questions. With another cautious glance at the two of them, she gathered up her materials and moved to a desk at the far end of the room, as far away from them as she could get while still being able to keep an eye on them.

Professor Snape simply sniffed at Minerva's antics but Harry had to struggle not to crack a smile at the Transfigurations professor.

"Now, Professor, I notice that in this paragraph the incantation that is used to raise the creature is printed, but in the final line of the incantation…" Harry leaned forward so he could see the book as well and the two colleagues spent a few hours deep in discussion. The young man could understand Snape's confusion. When he was studying the same subject during his training, he was also left feeling confused by the passages in the book, and his instructor had spent the better part of two days explaining the theory and research to him. Harry gave as much of these explanations as he could remember to the other man who took copious notes for his own references.

*****

The figures robed in black kneeled in the damp, dark room before the screen which shielded their Master from view.

"I have been informed that you failed me yesterday," the voice hissed softly and  in threatening tones.

"My Lord," one of the cowering figures responded, "one of the men in the pharmacy caught us off guard. We – "

"Silence!" the voice boomed and the room seemed to reverberate around them. "I will not accept excuses. Tell me how you came to be injured," demanded the form behind the screen, stirring in irritation.

"One of the men in the pharmacy threw a knife and – " the frightened figure responded, not daring to raise his eyes.

"You allowed yourself to be injured by a filthy muggle! You're an embarrassment not only to me, but to the entire Wizarding race." Their Master nodded to the figure who was standing to his left. The figure raised his wand and pointed it at the man who had just spoken before crying out, "Crucius!"

When the curse had run its course through the blond man's body, the screened figure spoke again.  "Let that be a lesson. I do not reward failure. Now go. I do not wish to see you any longer." The robed witches and wizards rose slightly, still bowing intermittently as they made their way out of the room.

*****

Snape looked over his notes as Harry got up to refill his cup of coffee. He had thoroughly enjoyed the intellectual discussion he'd had with the young professor, though he'd never admit that to anyone, because he was still embarrassed that he had been reduced to asking the young professor for help. He was almost to admit that it was worth swallowing his pride to discuss the book with the Defence Against the Dark Arts professor because he had found him to be a well of information on the subject.  Minerva had long since left the room and they had been left alone for some time now. Hmm…Perhaps I've underestimated him. He certainly seems well informed…perhaps a little too well informed. Where would someone go to learn something like this?…Why would someone learn something like this?…

"Do you have any other questions, professor?" asked Harry, absently stirring his drink.

The other man looked up from his notes and looked at him. "No…Thank you…for your time." Thanking people didn't come easily for  Snape, and this was the second time he'd had to thank the young professor.

"Don't mention it," he replied.  He picked up his cup, blowing on his coffee before taking a sip, giving the other man a questioning look when he realized that he was watching him.

The older man leaned forward, a thoughtful, almost painful expression on his face. "Actually, I do have another question." he said, his voice barely above a whisper.

"Yes?"

He paused briefly before beginning. "Why did you save me the other night? You could have easily let me die, and no one would have been the wiser. After all, no one else seemed to be able to assist, and you said yourself that you have wanted to 'wring my neck' on any number of occasions. I am curious to know why you did it." The Potions Master had been wrestling with this question since Christmas evening. He was honest with himself to admit that he had made life very difficult for the young man from the first day he arrived at the school and he had come right out and openly accused him of having a sinister purpose for being here. And herein lay the core of the problem.

Professor Green had arrived with scant background and the Ministry of Magic had no record of his existence. Add to this he is well versed in the dark arts, including the obscure teachings that date back to the medieval era and which are illegal to teach now. On top of this, he had a number of illegal texts in his possession. There was a certain stigma attached to people who were well versed in the Dark Arts. The types of people he had met in his lifetime that had such a depth of knowledge about the subject were the types of people who could not be trusted. They were moody, quiet, cunning and they were fascinated by dark magic. Voldemort was one such person., but the young professor didn't seem to be fascinated by the subject at all. He seemed knowledgeable but not…obsessed. The young man was certainly an enigma.

This all made Professor Snape wonder why the young teacher had saved his life. Was he setting him up for something more elaborate? That's just the type of thing a dark wizard would do and he wouldn't let himself be caught. There was a reason Severus had survived for so long as a spy for the Order. He was an overly suspicious man, but that overborne sense of caution and suspicion had saved his life on more occasions than he could remember, and he had been suspicious of Professor Green since he'd arrived. 

Bloody Hell, if he had such a problem with the whole thing he should have just told me to sod off when I pulled my wand out and I'd have left him there, if that's what he wanted. Harry gazed into his drink, pausing before answering, "It was the right thing to do."

"Are you sure?" the other man countered, without missing a beat.

"I beg your pardon?" asked Harry, not quite understanding the implications of the question.

Professor Snape leaned back in his seat, his notes resting on the table before him and his fingers steepled beneath his chin. "I merely wondered if you were sure that it was the right thing to do. All things aside, professor, you don't know anything about me. For all you know, I could have been the person who raised that creature, and I could have bungled my instructions for it to attack one of the students. If that was the case, do you think you would have done the right think by saving me?"

"I don't know." Harry replied hesitantly.

"So, I ask you again, are you sure you did the right thing?" Professor Snape looked calmly at Harry, waiting for an answer.

Harry paused to think before he spoke. "If I had been attacked by the creature, and you were the only one who was in a position to be able to help, would you save me or would you let me die?"

The other man took his time to think carefully about this question. "I would save you." he finally replied.

He raised his eyebrows and looked surprised. "Oh, why? It's clear that you don't trust me, and, let's face it, we're not exactly on good terms with one another. Yet you'd save me anyway. Why is that, professor? Are you sure you'd be doing the right thing?" he asked, prompting the professor to explain himself.

"I would rather risk saving a man who wasn't worth saving, then risk letting a good man die," The Potions Master replied, looking at Harry unflinchingly. Harry returned the look and nodded once to indicate that he'd understood.

"Exactly." Harry had subtly shifted the focus of the question. Harry knew Professor Snape as well as anyone could really know the man, and he knew that he was, essentially, a good man – albeit with terrible people skills! The problem was that "Jason" didn't know Professor Snape at all, so by letting the older man think that his actions on Christmas evening were a generic question of why one person would save another person, even if they didn't know them very well; rather than why Professor Green would save Professor Snape the irritable and sour potions master who favors his own house above all others, he had managed to ease his suspicions a little.

There was a momentary silence as the two men thought deeply about the implications of their conversation, before Harry drained his coffee and used his wand to send the empty cup over to the sink where it was washed and put away.

"If there's nothing else I can do for you today professor – " Harry began. 

"Actually, there is…one more thing I'd…ask…of you,…if you wouldn't mind, of course," said Professor Snape haltingly, trying to swallow his pride for the second time that day as he rose from his seat and collected his notes and Harry's book. "Would you mind…showing me…how to perform the spell that you used to dispel the shadow creature?"

Harry groaned inwardly. Oh man,. I've already spent three hours with Snape. Now he wants to spend even more time with me? I'm being punished. I know I am. This is some sort of cruel and unusual punishment. Outwardly, he appeared nonplussed.  "I wouldn't mind professor, but I have to warn you that there were actually a couple of spells involved and the sequence is quite difficult to perform. I only mention this because it's getting close to dinner time, so you might want to think about doing this next weekend, when we have more time."

The Potions Master leveled a chilly gaze at the younger man. "Professor Green, I am a fully trained wizard, and not without some skill in the art of Defence. Today will be fine, if it is convenient for you."

"Fine, but we can't do this here. We'll need to go somewhere with more room. How about my classroom?" When Harry noticed the look that the other man was directing at him, he rolled his eyes and added, "And I promise I won't try to kill you while we're down there."

The other man sniffed at Harry's sarcasm and strode out of the room toward the Defence Against The Dark Arts classroom, leaving Harry to catch up with him.

*****

"Hi guys. Have you got a minute?" Ginny asked Ron and Hermione.

"We always have time for the two of you. Come on in," Hermione said as she opened the door to hers and her husband's suite of rooms to let Ginny and Draco in. Ron and Hermione were just going over their notes for their classes tomorrow. Actually, Hermione was just double checking hers because she'd had them organized for a while now. Ron, on the other hand, had left it until the end of the Christmas break to prepare for his classes and was now pushed for time.

"Ronald Weasley, don't tell me you're still leaving things until the last minute," said Ginny with a disapproving shake of her head.

Ron didn't look up from his writing table, but he did snap irritably at her. "Yes Mum, I do, so what of it?"

Ginny seated herself next to her husband on the couch and turned to Hermione.  "I thought you would have broken him of that by now."

Hermione seated herself on one of the single arm chairs which sat off one side of the sofa. "I tried, Merlin knows I tried," she sighed in exasperation, throwing her hands up in the air and shaking her head. "Every time I make a suggestion he just tells me to leave him alone because he does his best work under pressure and that's the way it's always been. Anyway, what brings you both here? Not that you need an excuse to drop by though. I mean, we don't nearly see enough of you."

"Ron, could you come over here please?" asked Ginny seriously.

"Can't you see that I'm a little busy over here?" he asked, shooting a grumpy look at her. He faltered when he saw the grave expressions on her face though.

"Please Ron," Ginny pleaded.

"Er, sure. Just a sec," he replied as he stacked his materials up on one side of his desk and put away his quill and ink before he seated himself on one end of the double couch near his wife.

"What's up Ginny?" Ron asked, concerned at the gravity of Ginny's demeanor.

"We were actually going to be leaving this evening, but…we've had a change of plan," Draco began, looking at Ginny.

"What sort of change of plan? What's happened?" asked Hermione, very concerned about her friends.

"It's nothing too bad, we think." Ginny assured her quickly.

"No. Do you remember this morning that Albus told us that Jason heard two of the guys in the pharmacy asking after Severus and myself?" Draco asked, just to establish a context more than anything else.

"Of course," replied Ron quickly.

"Well, after the meeting, Ginny and I stayed behind to talk to Albus and he agreed with me that it might be best if we were to stay here, at the school, for a while, at least until we find out more about what's going on and who's after me," Draco explained to his brother and sister-in-law.

Ron and Hermione looked at one another, and then shifted their gaze back to Ginny and Draco. They didn't say anything for a few moments, but Hermione eventually cleared her throat and said, "I agree. I mean, I've already told you that the news about people looking for you worries me and I'm glad you're taking it seriously."

"It's not so much for me." Draco rushed to explain. "I'm more worried about Ginny." He looked fondly at his wife.

"Draco…" began Ginny in her 'don't be so silly' tone of voice.

"No, Ginny. Look. I've got a pretty high profile. I mean, I run a number of companies and I'm the director of certain other companies. So, even though I'm never really in the one spot for a long time, anyone who was serious about finding me wouldn't have a hard job. I mean, I have to be at one of these places at any given time during the day.  If something happened to me and no one was keeping an eye on Ginny, she'd try to look for me, or something equally as stupid...and she could end up getting hurt – or worse. I don't want that to happen.  And, Ginny's either working alongside me or helping her Dad at the Ministry and a lot of people know this. Ginny doesn't move around as much as I do and she'd be really easy to find. I don't want anyone hurting her just to get to me," Draco explained to his brother and sister-in-law.

"Thanks Draco," Ron whispered, looking at Ginny. She was his baby sister and he couldn't bear the thought of anything happening to her.

"Don't mention it, Ron. I love her too." He picked up the hand that his wife had laid on his thigh and gently kissed the back of it.

"So, what will you both be doing while you're here? I know you both hate to just sit around doing nothing," Hermione asked both of them, ever the practical one.

"Well, we actually came here to offer our services to you. We were going to go around to all of the staff and offer to help them with their classes. I thought maybe we could help with the research, or grading papers or things like that, but we thought we'd ask the both of you, and Severus and Jason first," Ginny replied.

"Well, now that you mention it, I've been working on a few things for the university, and I'd be so grateful if you wouldn't mind marking some of my papers and maybe even teaching a few of my classes for me so I can just finish up the journal articles that I'm writing."

"Er, Hermione, neither of us actually studied Arithmancy," Draco said with a wild-eyed look, hoping to be able to avoid teaching one of the most boring and difficult subjects on earth.

"Oh, don't worry about that. I'll write everything out for you so all you'd have to do is read from the notes. It'll be easy."

"Oh.  Good." Draco choked, grinning weakly and  mentally cursing himself for offering to help Hermione.

"Meanwhile, you and I are going to go and finish the notes for your classes tomorrow," Ginny said sternly, getting up from her seat and dragging Ron over to the writing table that he was sitting at earlier.

"Wow, do you mean it Ginny? Thanks! Gosh, you know you're my favorite sister, don't you?" Ron  babbled as he let himself be dragged to the other end of the room by his sister.

"Idiot," Ginny muttered under her breath.

Draco watched his wife and his brother-in-law as they bantered with one another, thanking Merlin for blessing him and letting him marry into the most wonderful and loving family on earth. Reluctantly tearing his gaze away from his lovely wife, he said, "I need to find Jason, so I'm going to head off guys, but I'll see you at dinner."

"Bye dear," called Ginny from the writing table, where she was standing over her brother, helping him with his work.

"We'll see you at dinner," said  Hermione as she accompanied him to the door.

*****

"I did tell you that this wouldn't be easy," reminded Harry as Professor Snape tried but failed once again to cast the complicated purification spells. The Potions Master had been trying, under the supervision of Harry, for the last two hours to perform these spells and had been growing steadily more irritable and cranky as each effort had been met with failure. "We could just call the lesson over and pick this up again when... " Harry began to suggest. He quieted himself when the other man threw a particularly venomous look at him. With an infuriated sigh Harry said, "I only suggested it because using your magic non-stop for a couple of hours without rest is going to tire anyone out.  That's all."

"I am fine to continue. What am I still doing wrong? I am casting both of the spells but they are not working as they should," Professor Snape snapped as he wiped the sweat off his brow.

"Fine then. The spells need to be cast almost simultaneously. One straight after the other. They should only be a split second apart. You said yourself that you thought I'd just used the one spell when to dispel the shadow creature, and that's the way it should look. Your second spell is following too slowly after your first one. You can't give the first spell even a second to take a proper hold because it's not the important spell. The second one is, but it needs the first one as a guide, or a focus point."

"I don't think that I can cast the spells any more quickly than I have been doing. How am I to do such a thing?" Professor Snape asked him, still breathing a little heavily from the exertion of the last couple of hours.

Harry thought about this. As with anything, it was difficult to explain exactly how he did something, because he just did it. It was a learned skill and he didn't think too closely about it. "O.K. I think you're still trying to visualize what you're doing as two separate things. Am I right?"

The Potions Master crossed his arms over his chest, wand still in hand, as he thought about the question. "I think so, yes. But I am casting two separate spells, how can they be thought of as anything else?"

"Picture very clearly in your head exactly what you want to happen, but instead of thinking of it in two distinct parts, think of what you want to happen as a single fluid motion. One motion with two movements. Two parts working to achieve one goal. Now, when you're reciting the spells, once you've finished the first spell, don't release it, just move straight on to reciting the second spell. When you've nearly finished reciting that spell, release your first spell. By the time you do this you should have finished the incantation for the second spell, so you can release it straight away. It should happen very quickly so you'll need to practice a bit to get your timing right."

The other man nodded, thinking about the instructions.

"Oh, but don't divide your magic between the two spells. You need to think about them as two parts of the same…I don't know…mechanism, Harry supplied.  If you think about them as one spell, your magic will respond to your intention and it'll divide its strength between the two spells."

Professor Snape nodded, indicating that he understood the instructions, and then glared at Harry.

"What?" he asked in annoyance.

"Why didn't you tell me this before. We've been here for quite some time and this information would have been very useful earlier," Professor Snape snapped, moving back to the center of the room to begin again.

Rolling his eyes, Harry called out, "I've been saying something along those lines for the last hour and a half. If you've chosen to ignore me that's your problem."

As the other man raised his wand he called out over his shoulder, "You weren't clear in your meaning until now."

"Whatever," Harry muttered under his breath as  Snape began practicing again.

They were disrupted by a knock on the door. "Hey, am I interrupting anything?"  Draco asked as he poked his head around the corner of the classroom door.

"No," spoke Harry at the same time as Professor Snape said "Yes." The older man glared at the younger man who just rolled his eyes and looked at Draco.

"Are you looking for Professor Snape?" Harry asked politely.

"Actually, I was looking for you, but I also needed to speak to Severus." he said, coming over to stand in front of him. I have to say, that with everything I've heard and seen I didn't think I'd find you both in the same room together without outside supervision."

"Did you have a reason for being here, Draco, or were you simply looking for an excuse to exercise your juvenile wit."

"Are you sure I'm not interrupting Jason? It looks like you really were in the middle of something," Draco observed.

Before Harry could answer the question directed at him, Professor Snape addressed Draco, "Professor Green was showing me how to perform the spells he used to dispel the creature that attacked me three weeks ago."

Draco raised his eyebrows and looked at Jason.  "How's it going?"

Harry glanced at the other man who simply crossed his arms over his chest and glared in irritation. "It's going alright. The professor just needs a lot more practice. I'm sure it'll come to him." 

"Oh." Draco said, as he observed that the Potions Master looked very frustrated. "Do you think you could show me?"

"Um, sure. We'll just need to set aside a good half day though. But that'll need to wait until the next time you come to visit, right?" asked Harry.

"Actually, that's what I came to talk to you about.. Albus told us that when we were in the pharmacy yesterday, you heard someone say they were looking for Severus and myself, and I just wanted to let you know that, since that's the case, Ginny and I will be staying in the castle for a while longer. Albus and I think it'll be safer that way."

"I agree," said Harry. "But, why are they looking for the both of you, anyway?"

Draco threw a quick look at Severus who silently and almost imperceptibly shook his head, instructing him not to voice their speculations. "Er, we're not entirely positive," Draco said evasively. "In any case," he rushed on, attempting to smooth over the awkwardness of the moment, "I just wanted to let you know, and Ginny's already planning after dinner drink parties and all manner of other things that'll involve you." Draco grinned.

"Oh, well, the school term's about to start up again and I think we're all going to be– " Harry started to say, but he was interrupted by Draco.

"Yeah, that reminds me. We're not going to have much to do while we're here so we're offering ourselves up as assistants to the professors. Ginny and I wanted to ask Ron, Hermione, Severus and you whether there was anything we could do for you before we asked the other professors, though."

"I require no assistance at the moment," Professor Snape answered. "Though I may ask you to find some potion ingredients for me from time to time, if you wouldn't mind."

"Sure thing," Draco agreed before he turned to Harry. "What about you?"

Harry had been thinking very carefully about Draco's proposal. "Actually, if you wouldn't mind, and if it isn't too much work for you, I could use a second person to help me teach my practical lessons."

"Really?" asked Draco with interest.

"Yeah. It's funny you should mention that because I've just recently been tossing over the idea of giving the students a class on duelling. I mean, most of them have started to get the hang of the hexes and counter spells they've been studying, but it'd be great if I could give them a new way to practice the spells they've been learning. And it'd be really helpful to have a second person to go around and help me correct the student's spell work during the practical lessons because the lessons aren't usually long enough for me to get to everyone and I have to extend the lesson over two classes instead of just one. Would you or Ginny mind doing that?" Harry asked.

"Not at all. In fact, I've got a keen interest in defence so I'm going to volunteer for the job before my wife can," Draco said with genuine interest.

"Half of all my lessons are practical classes. Don't feel obligated to help me with all of them. Just help with as many as you want to."

"I don't think I'll have too much else to do so I'd be happy to help you with as many as I can."

"Really? Well then, come to my rooms later and we'll re-plan tomorrow's classes."

"Sure. If you'll excuse me though, I'd like to have a word with Severus."

"Oh, well, I might head over to the Hall for dinner then. I'm starving! I'll see you later," he said, as he left the classroom.

Draco watched him walk  away and then turned to Professor Snape. "Why didn't you want me to tell him? That's not normally something I'd tell people either, but he's a member of the Order now, and he saved our necks yesterday, even though he might not know it. Someone was looking for us and they found us yesterday. Not only that, but Ginny, Ron, Hermione and Minerva were with us when we were being watched. What if something had happened to one of them?  If Jason hadn't warned us that we were actually being watched, who knows what might have happened."

"Regardless of what you say, this…piece of information…is not to be shared lightly," the older man hissed, looking around to make sure that nobody was nearby or able to hear them and quickly casting a strong silencing spell on the room. "He does not need to know, and I do not wish for you to tell him."

"I know we haven't known him for very long. In fact, you've known him longer than I have, but do you remember what he said during that meeting that we had in Albus' office just after Christmas? He said that nothing was ever as straight forward as 'good' and 'evil', that they aren't isolated concepts. He also said that sometimes good people end up doing bad things and vice versa. He understands things about the nature of people and about the nature of good and bad that very few people really understand, Severus," Draco argued.

"You are still naive, Draco. Perhaps he was simply repeating something he'd read in a book somewhere." Professor Snape sneered. Privately, though, he too had been affected by what Harry had said in that meeting. "Perhaps he is secretly working to gain our trust as part of a more sinister and elaborate scheme. This isn't so farfetched. You and I did the same thing during the war, if I recall."

Draco considered his former professor's words. "Maybe. But I don't think that's the case. I'm pretty good at being able to tell when someone's lying Severus, but he seemed absolutely sincere."

"Blind trust will get you killed," the professor said ominously.

"I don't trust blindly. I wasn't going to tell him everything. I was just going to tell him that we were spies without going any further than that," Draco replied, just as serious.

"I don't think that would be wise. We cannot know for certain what his motives and intentions are..." Professor Snape commented, but before he could say any more, Draco was already responding.

"We don't necessarily need to. He's saved your life at least once already, and he almost got himself killed helping his student in the pharmacy yesterday. He might have secrets, and he might even have a checkered past Severus, but we're not exactly in a position to be able to point fingers, are we? I mean, we're generally considered to be two of the least trustworthy people on the planet but you and I know that isn't entirely true."

The older man weighed his words and carefully said, "What you say may be true, but something does not feel…right about him. And I stand by what I said before. I do not wish for you to tell him about our former…status…or even hint around it."

Draco sighed. "Fine. I'm not so narrow-minded that I can't admit that you do have a point. In any case, it's getting late and I'm getting hungry." As Professor Snape lifted he silencing spell from the room, Draco steered the conversation to another topic. "So, you've been getting lessons in Defence Against The Dark Arts? I've read the chapters in that book that Jason lent to Hermione and Ginny and I have to say that I think I was more confused after I finished reading than I was before I started reading, and I thought there was only one spell involved, not two…."

The two men left the room, carrying Harry's book and Severus' notes between them.

*****

"I have not called you. Why are you here?" the formless figure behind the screen inquired coldly.

"My Lord, we have broken the curses surrounding the body and arrangements are being made to move it as we speak." The man spoke excitedly as he stayed on bended knee before the screen.

His master stirred and hissed excitedly. "Excellent. Have the body moved to this room and I shall make the necessary preparations."

"At once, my Lord."

"There is one thing that must be done before I can use the body."

"Yes, my Lord?" inquired the kneeling figure.

"Find the traitors, and kill them! They will know, and they will ruin my plans. I cannot have that," the Master said in cold, steely tones.

"Of course, my Lord."

"And do not fail me," hissed his Master.

"No, my Lord," the man spoke as he bowed and left the room.

** For artwork, follow the link  on my author profile page. Please have a look at it. Well worth the tour.

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