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.

17. Chapter 17

Disclaimer: I have no ownership over the original idea/ concept of Harry Potter and/ or its characters. They belong to the talented Ms Rowling.

Thank you to everyone for reading the fic and a big thank you to everyone who has left a review. Your gesture and your encouragement are always much appreciated.

And of course a very special thank you to my Beta/ Editor-in-Chief/Compadre, Sepia, for her tireless efforts and her great ideas.

CHAPTER 17

Harry's knuckles turned white from gripping his wand so fiercely.

"It's been a while, hasn't it?" Bellatrix sneered at Harry.

An icy fury coursed through his veins. Any pain he felt was now forgotten as his power gathered and raged inside of him, testing his control, desperate to break free.

"Don't tell me you're still upset about me killing your dear old godfather," she simpered maliciously. "Aww, you are!" she cried.

Harry narrowed his eyes dangerously—but if Bellatrix saw the silent warning, she gave no indication of it.

"Yes, I killed your godfather. You killed my husband. I'd say that makes us even, wouldn't you?"

"You're not fit to talk about Sirius, let alone try to compare him with that piece of rot you called a husband," Harry said coldly, keeping his wand pointed at her.

It was true. He had killed her husband, but it wasn't an act of revenge. During the last war, one of his own informants had set him up to be ambushed by a group of Death Eaters. He had gone to the pre-arranged meeting place, but instead of finding his asset, he had come face to face with Malfoy Senior, Rodolphus Lestrange, and a whole platoon of Death Eaters.

Having no other option he ran, and brought the walls of the buildings on either side of the alley down on the Death Eaters behind him, burying them under tonnes of rubble. Whispers from the underground had confirmed that most of them, including Lestrange, had died – but some of them had defied all odds and had survived that ordeal, including Malfoy senior.

Hearing footsteps in the hallway, Bellatrix laughed viciously, looking for all the world as though she were control of the situation.

"Now this evens things up a little," the witch said smugly. "Three wizards against one little witch isn't very fair, now is it? Years ago you started a duel with me, Potter. Do you think you're man enough to finish it now?"

"I'll be fine here," Harry threw over his shoulder to his companions. "You two handle the others."

Severus nodded, rushing out to meet the intruders with Draco close on his heels.

The witch threw a hex at Draco and Severus as they rushed away, but the two wizards already had already anticipated her actions and her spells were deflected harmlessly away.

"How very predictable of you," Snape said condescendingly. "Do not linger," he told Harry. "We do not have time to…play."

Harry nodded at Snape who had already left.

"Did you know that the Dark Lord himself taught me how to duel," Bellatrix said, stroking her wand gently, as one might stroke a cat.

"Do you mean Voldemort?" Harry asked, taking some small pleasure in the way she winced at the mention of his name. "I've survived duels with Voldemort, so I wouldn't place too much faith in his teaching. I don't normally pick fights with people, but for you, I'll make an exception," he said, sending a flurry of fiery spells at Bellatrix.

She had managed to deflect the first few, but a sharp shriek confirmed that Harry had managed to hit her; a sharp gash appearing across her cheek. Harry advanced on her, his eyes blazing.

"You're a pathetic fool! My Lord gave you some small measure of power when you were an infant, but you waste his gift. Power is there to be used. With it, you can take what you want. You have the potential, but you refuse to realise it. You are weak, and the weak always die, just like your mother and father – and your godfather –"

"SHUT UP!" Harry cried angrily, casting a spell so strong that it shattered her shield and bludgeoned the bones in her wand hand. She cried out, clutching at her useless hand while her wand skittered across the ground and rolled away. Without giving her an opportunity to recover, Harry hit her with a spell so powerful that it literally knocked her off her feet, throwing her back across the room – where she landed heavily on a pile of broken furniture with a strangled gasp.

With his wand trained on her, he slowly inched closer to her, but he needn't have been so cautious. Bellatrix had fallen back onto a large pointed spear of wood and had quite literally impaled herself. She was clearly dead, her features permanently fixed into an expression of surprise – much the same way Harry remembered Sirius had looked as he fell through the veil to his death.

Severus and Draco had stunned the two intruders in the hallway who had managed to overcome the locking spell on the door – two young men, who couldn't have been more than twenty years old.

The two wizards quickly replaced the locking spell and headed back to the foyer. The fight was already over by the time they arrived and they could see quite clearly that Bellatrix had been skewered by a large piece of wood. Harry stood before her, staring at the body.

"Harry!" Draco yelled, following Severus to the front door, but Harry didn't move.

"Harry!" Draco yelled again, noticing. "We have to go!" Harry still didn't move. He couldn't take his eyes off the lifeless body in front of him.

"We do not have time for this," the Potions Master muttered. "Potter! Move! Now!" he commanded, in a tone of voice that reminded Harry so much of his days as a student that for a moment he felt like he was back in the Potions Classroom. Without a second thought, he followed the command and the three wizards left the building, pausing only to cast a strong locking charm on the front door.

ooOOoo

Arthur, Bill and Charlie rushed over to meet them, effectively stopping the three wizards from going anywhere.

"Are you all right? Why did you need to go back in?" Arthur asked, looking critically at Draco's and Harry's injuries. He tactfully refrained from giving the same attention to Severus whose expression was already as dark as a thundercloud. No good could come from angering the Potions Master further.

"We're fine. Bellatrix and a few of her friends tried to stop us from leaving, but we got out," Draco said, glancing quickly at Harry, "and we've sealed the building off to keep them all in there. Since Fudge's floo is broken, and no one can apparate or portkey into or out of the building, they won't be able to get out until your Aurors let them out."

"I see," Arthur said, thoughtfully.

"This is out of character for…our enemy," Severus said quietly, changing the subject. He glanced quickly about him before he continued. "If he were to organise an attack to the Ministry, his purpose would be to completely take it over. He would not have taken hostages; rather, he would have killed all who were in the building, starting with the current Minister. He would also have sent more than thirty…individuals…to breach the building. And, depending on how important the Ministry was to him, he might even have led the attack himself. What happened here today makes no sense."

"Apparently, they were looking for documents. Records. We heard some of them talking. They took some things from the Department of Mysteries, and some old court records. Oh, and they also took some files about you, Harry."

"Why has the Ministry got records on me?" Harry asked.

"They have records on everyone," Arthur explained. "Basic information like your place and date of birth, place of schooling, occupation, magical signature. Also, whether or not you've broken any muggle or wizarding laws. In your case, they haven't gone into anything more specific than that."

"Why on earth would…he…want that sort of information?" Harry asked.

"I don't know. There isn't much in there that they couldn't learn from some of the published materials about you," Bill said thoughtfully.

"What have they taken from the Department of Mysteries?" Severus asked.

"I really don't know. I only heard them say 'It was all there, just like he said it would be,'" Charlie replied.

"He need not have gone to such lengths as they did today to acquire information from the Ministry," Severus said. "He would have spies inside the Ministry who would be able to obtain whatever he needed."

"You're right," Draco nodded. "They wouldn't even need to work there. My father had access to a lot of the Ministry's secrets and all he needed to do was wave his money and his patronage under Fudge's nose."

"He has always taken what he wants through guile and cunning. He does not stage a show of force – like the one we saw today – unless it will serve a purpose," Severus thought aloud.

They were interrupted by the sound of loud protests. Tonks and three other wizards lay in a small tangled heap on the ground.

"I'm sorry," she cried, trying to untangle herself under the weight of the heavy glares she was receiving from the others.

"You fellows really helped us out of a tight spot. Thank you seems so inadequate, but I guess it'll have to do," she said, once she'd freed herself and joined the others.

"Er, no worries," Harry said, unsure of the appropriate thing to say in a situation such as this. "But if you hadn't got that message to us, we wouldn't have known anything was wrong."

Tonks looked bemusedly at Arthur, Bill and Charlie, who all looked back at her, equally confused.

"We didn't get a message out to you," Tonks said. "But I was on the second floor when it happened. Someone else might have got one out to you."

This time, Harry, Severus and Draco looked confused.

"An owl brought us a note saying that the Ministry had been breached and that you needed help. It was signed 'Tonks'," Draco said slowly.

"That note wasn't sent from me," Tonks said looking concerned.

"If you didn't send it, then who did?" Harry asked, utterly confused.

'They're here!" one young witch cried, pointing at a group of witches and wizards in Auror robes hurrying up the path to the building.

"I would hardly say that we are all the Aurors who weren't in the Ministry at the time of attack," Emmaline Vance explained when she reached the small group. "But we have our own methods of contacting each other. The rest should be here very soon. From what I understand there are approximately thirty armed intruders in the building, is that right?"

"Yes," Arthur nodded. "Though, not all of them are armed anymore."

"Enough of us will be arriving to take care of them. The three of you can go and get those injuries looked at, we'll be all right from here," the Auror suggested.

"Very well. We have some matters to attend to ourselves," Severus said, following Harry who had already rushed off.

"We must talk, but we cannot do that here. Apparate to the street we arrived at when we portkeyed out of the school this morning," Severus said quietly as they headed out of the yard.

ooOoo

"That house elf, Dobby. He is free, is he not? Would you say that he can be trusted to follow your instructions?" Severus asked the other two wizards after they had safely apparated to their meeting place.

"Of course," Harry said without any hesitation. "His loyalty is unquestionable."

"I only ask because it is strange that the rest of the Order did not come to our aid when you gave him specific instructions to find them and send them to us," Severus said, narrowing his eyes in thought.

"He's absolutely loyal to Albus and his cause. If he didn't carry out those instructions it's because he couldn't," Harry said firmly. "But that raises a lot of unpleasant possibilities relating to why he couldn't."

"I shall question the house elf when we return to the school –" Severus began.

"I'll ask him. You'll end up making him beat himself in a corner somewhere and then he'll never tell us anything," Harry interrupted.

Severus glowered at Harry, opening his mouth to speak.

"Well, Dobby is quite fond of you, so maybe you should be the one to talk to him," Draco said quickly before an argument could erupt.

"Perhaps Dobby's disappearance is linked, in some way, to the false note," Severus thought aloud. "Our best course of action at this stage would be to return to the school. We can discuss things more freely there. Before we do that, however, we should have our injuries seen to – and you should find another shirt to wear," Severus said, looking critically at the bloodstains on Harry's shirt. "We do not want people who are not affiliated with the Order to leap to any conclusions about our activities based on our…appearances. There is a healer who sees to Draco and me. He will see to you too. He presents himself to the world as the owner of a small potions shoppe in Knockturn Alley. Do you know of it?" Severus asked Harry.

"No, I don't, but I'll find it," Harry said.

"His store is next to an old book store that sells rare and hard to find books. Perhaps you are more familiar with that shop?" Severus said in that tone of insufferable smugness that Harry was so accustomed to hearing from him.

Draco looked sharply at the professor.

"I'm not a hopeless case, Snape, I can find my way around," Harry said, rolling his eyes. He wasn't about to admit to Snape that he knew that part of Knockturn Alley he had just described quite well. The book store Snape had referred to was in fact Josh's store. Josh had often told him that the wizard who owned the Potions store next door was a crotchety old wizard who would lace whatever potion he sold you with poison if he didn't so much as like the look of you. Harry started to have serious doubts about his capabilities as a medi-wizard.

"There is a hidden entrance in the alleyway next to the shop –" Severus began.

"I'll meet you there," Harry said, apparating away before Severus could say anything else. He wasn't in the mood to tolerate the Potions Master's cynicism.

"I don't think he understood," Draco said mischievously.

"I beg your pardon," Severus drawled.

"I think he missed your point," Draco replied. "He thought you were trying to imply that he couldn't navigate his way out of a wet paper bag, let alone Knockturn Alley. I'm not convinced that's what you were doing."

"Potter's mood swings do not concern me," Severus growled. "Now if you are ready, we –"

"That book store wouldn't happen to be the one that Harry's friend owns, would it? That Josh chap?" Draco asked, looking suspiciously at his old friend.

Severus said nothing, but made a show of putting his wand away and dusting off his clothes.

"How interesting."

"I have no control over who owns that particular book store, nor its location. You are being ridiculous," Severus said brusquely.

Draco grabbed the older man's arm before he could apparate away. "Not at all, I'm just very interested in what I'm seeing."

Severus narrowed his eyes dangerously at Draco, who released his grip on the older man's arm before it was removed for him – painfully. Without a word, the older man apparated away. Draco shook his head and apparated after him.

ooOoo

Ivan, the Healer, was a large, heavy set fellow with small beady eyes and a nose that looked like it had been broken several times and had never healed properly. His head had been waxed clean of any hair and a picture of a snake had been tattooed onto his scalp. Harry could see why people did their best to stay on his good side.

With a no-nonsense efficiency, he literally dragged them into the back room of his shop.

"Wait here," he commanded of the three wizards in a strangely guttural accent that Harry couldn't quite place.

"He's going to empty his shop. He can't be caught with us in the back of his shop, for obvious reasons," Draco explained.

"Won't it look a little odd if he just empties his shop in the middle of the day?" Harry asked doubtfully, looking about the room. It looked like a small muggle kitchen from colonial times. He took a seat at the wooden table that sat in the middle of the room. In a corner, a wrought iron stove sat making the occasional rattle, perhaps so that nobody forgot that it was there. Pots and pans and various utensils were lined up neatly on tiny hooks and a large old fashioned portable washtub-come-washbasin was leaned up against the back wall. The room had an ominous chill about it, much the same way the Hogwarts dungeon seemed to.

"Ivan's a bit…eccentric and well known for it. No one's going to think there's anything odd about him shutting the shop in the middle of the day," Draco assured Harry.

"Are you sure he can be trusted?" Harry asked, looking dubiously in the direction of the front of the shop where Ivan was busy pushing loudly protesting customers toward the front door.

"Yes. He has as much reason to despise the Dark Lord as we do. His wife and children were executed by Death Eaters. The Dark Lord kept him alive and took him into his service as one of many healers for his servants and associates. We discovered him during our time with the Death Eaters. He needed very little persuasion to assist us to pass information to Albus about the Dark Lord's activities and plans. He can be trusted," Severus explained flatly.

"… Wife and children?" Harry asked, his voice extremely subdued.

Severus looked at the young wizard for a few moments before he replied. "He had a wife and two daughters. Lucius Malfoy made Ivan watch while he used the killing curse to kill them. He threatened to kill the rest of his extended family and his friends as well if he did not co-operate with them."

Harry heard a low growl and was surprised to find that it didn't come from him. It came from Draco, who looked at least as furious as he felt.

"You are not your father. Calm yourself, Ivan is returning," Severus said quietly to Draco. "And Potter, you should be aware that Ivan demands absolute honesty from each of his patients. Do not hide your scars, any of them. He will know. He reads people extremely well," Severus said a little more loudly for Harry's benefit.

"Hang on, how do you know about my-" Harry began.

"I told him about them," Draco whispered quickly as Ivan entered the room.

"I will not ask what you have been doing. I know who you are, but I do not know who you are, understand?" Ivan asked Harry, shutting the door behind him.

"Yes," Harry nodded. Although he was somewhat amused by the cloak-and-dagger approach, he was not at all disturbed by the abruptness of the introduction. Having his movements publicised for all and sundry to read about would only hinder the work he was doing for the Order. Ivan had just assured him that he would guarantee his secrecy – as far as he was able to – and that was all Harry could ask for.

The healer moved quickly to the cupboard at the back of the room and removed a large black bag from it.

"Bring the washbasin to the table," he commanded, nodding at Severus who, to Harry's surprise, followed the instruction without question. He found himself revising his opinion of the eccentric healer. Anyone who could have Snape follow orders – without receiving a mouthful of attitude from said person – was a man to be respected.

Ivan emptied his bag onto the table, neatly arranging an assortment of instruments and potions. "You will be first," he said, grabbing Harry's shirt and undoing the buttons.

"I can do it myself," Harry said quickly, trying to yank his shirt out of Ivan's grasp. Ivan simply slapped his hands away and continued undoing the buttons.

"I see. I thought it might be something like this," was all he said when he pushed Harry's shirt off his shoulders, exposing all of the scars Harry bore on his chest and arms. Harry looked away. He could just imagine Snape's delight at the sight of them, and he could practically feel his smugness. It must have been gratifying for him to imagine how he had earned them. A more skilled wizard wouldn't have allowed himself to become like this.

Had he not looked away, he would have seen that there was no smirk on the Potion Master's face. It remained impassive, save for the intermittent clenching and unclenching of his jaw.

"You understand the situation very well. You may come to me again in the future. I will see to you," the healer nodded, laying Harry's shirt across the back of a chair and grabbing his wand.

"I beg your pardon?" Harry asked, confused.

"You do not understand," the healer confirmed with an impatient sigh. "Very well. The people I am…retained by are not of…good repute. As such, I am tainted by association. I am required to set up my shop down here so that I can meet with my affiliates and conduct business with them. People do not come to me unless their choices are…limited. People who come to see me have secrets to keep and have things that they hide from others. As a token of appreciation of the risk I take for my clientele, I ask that they take the risk of keeping no secrets from me. Of hiding nothing from me. It is difficult for people to expose themselves to such a degree, just as I expose myself to such a degree when I treat people such as yourselves."

"Now I understand, thank you," Harry said, beginning to understand that as much as Ivan was eccentric, he was also ruthlessly practical. His crotchety nature, his peculiar need for people to reveal things about themselves to him that they weren't ready to reveal to others were all part of a survival instinct that had kept him alive, in the face of the risks he'd taken for Snape and Draco, for many years.

"Yes, yes. I cannot do very much about the bruising and swelling. A salve will help the healing process, but it will heal soon enough if left alone," he said, waving his wand over Harry's scrapes and contusions. Unlike Poppy, who would use a gentle hand when healing her patients, Ivan would roughly poke and prod his patients and the whole experience gave Harry a new found appreciation for the motherly medi-witch.

"Who did this?" he asked, coming to the large gash that Harry had attempted to heal himself.

"I closed the wound –" Harry explained.

"I think not. Some of it is still open."

"It'll do," Harry said, defensively.

"You are not a healer. You do not understand. It is an art. You see what I have done here, and here," he said, poking at two cuts that he had closed for Harry. "I follow the line of the wound and I close it in one motion. There will be minimal scarring. This, is no good," he said, murmuring a spell which reopened the wound so that he could close it more neatly, earning a pained grimace from Harry.

"Had the same attention been given to some of your older wounds, they would have left less prominent scars. I could have assisted you in this regard," Ivan added, peering professionally at some of Harry's more glaring scars.

"I'll remember that for next time," Harry grunted, rubbing his newly closed wounds.

"Very good. Now, you may remove your pants," Ivan instructed.

"What?" Harry asked, quickly putting his hands over the button on his trousers so Ivan couldn't remove them himself.

Ivan remained stone-faced. "You have nothing I have not seen many times before. Kindly remove your pants."

"I don't have any other injuries. They were all aiming a bit higher than my trouser line," Harry said, still holding desperately onto his trousers.

"You are sure?" Ivan asked, narrowing his impossibly tiny eyes even further.

"Yes. Very sure," Harry said quickly.

Ivan appraised him for a few moments. "Very well. In the cupboard behind you, you will find shirts. This one is presently not fit to be worn," he said, gesturing at Harry's blood stained shirt.

"Thank you," Harry said, getting up and hurrying away.

"I will see you next," he said, pointing to Draco.

There must have been at least twenty shirts, of various sizes and colours, hanging neatly in the wardrobe. He chose the first one that looked like it fit and threw it on.

"Look, I'm keeping my pants on too. Every time we come in you try to get our kit off," Draco said, leaping out of his seat once Ivan had finished with his ministrations and retreating to the relative safety of the back of the room, where Harry stood, leaning against the apothecary's small wardrobe.

"How are you doing?" Draco asked quietly.

"Sorry?" Harry asked, watching with some amusement as the Potions Master protested to being undressed like a child. "A little sore, but that's a given, all things considered, right?"

"That's not what I meant. I know that Lestrange killed your godfather," Draco said carefully.

"Fine. I'm doing fine," Harry said automatically. Draco stared at him, looking completely unconvinced.

Empty. That's how he felt. He might have killed Lestrange, but it wouldn't bring Sirius back, and that left him feeling more empty than before. If things had been different, he could have felt sorry for her for the way she'd chosen to live, and the way she'd died, but thinking that way made him feel guilty, as if he were being disloyal to his godfather.

Harry shook his head to stop himself from dwelling on the subject any longer. He didn't want to think about it any further – at least not until he could lock himself in his room with a large bottle of fire whiskey.

"You should consider the use of illusion spells if you do not want others to see your bruises," Ivan advised them as Snape put his shirt back on.

"Of course," Severus said, nodding his head.

"Your shirt," Ivan said, holding Harry's shirt out to him.

"Thank you," he said, taking it from him and transfiguring it into something that was a little easier to carry, and much less conspicuous. "I'll bring this one back when I can."

"Do not bother. It is safer that you keep it. I have plenty. You may leave now. Do not permit yourselves to be seen leaving here," the eccentric healer said, cleaning up his equipment.

"Thank you," Draco said, nodding to the healer on his way out of the room.

"I am grateful," Severus said, doing the same.

They left the shoppe through the door that led out into the alley, and apparated to the village near the school before anybody could discover them.

"Well?" Harry asked Severus as soon as they arrived at the village, daring him to comment.

Severus raised an eyebrow. "Bee in your bonnet, Potter?"

"You saw it – all of it – the scars, the burns, everything."

"I have nothing to say on the subject," Severus said calmly. "If that is all, there are things we must attend to at the school."

"You're kidding, aren't you?" Harry asked with obvious disbelief. When had Snape ever passed up an opportunity to insult him?

"Unlike everybody else in the wizarding world, my world, Mr Potter, does not revolve around you. I have better things to occupy my thoughts. Now, if you are done with this childishness, we have matters to attend to at the castle," the Potions Master said impatiently, hurrying off in the direction of the school.

"I'm really not looking forward to seeing Ginny," Draco confessed. "If she throws me out of the bedroom – which she's probably going to do for the next month – can I crash on your lounge?"

"Er, yeah, if you need it," Harry replied, a little surprised. "But, I thought you would have stayed with Snape."

"I've done that a couple of times, but to tell you the truth, I get a bit nervous staying in his rooms. He's got booby traps everywhere – and he thinks it's funny not to tell anyone about them," Draco said, shaking his head and hurrying to catch up with the Potions Master.

"No surprises there," Harry muttered, following behind him.

ooOoo

Professor Sprout met them out the front of the school, flushed and looking more than a little wild.

"Professor Snape, you're back!" she cried. "The Weasleys appear to be trapped in your rooms. There was yelling and…screaming. None of us can get in to help them –"

"I will deal with the matter. Thank you," Severus said, hurrying up the steps and sweeping through the castle to the dungeons.

"Wait a minute." Harry put his hand on the arm of the professor. "I'm going to see if I can contact Dobby."

Harry summoned, but the house elf did not appear. "Dobby!" Harry called again, feeling the bottom of his stomach shift uncomfortably. The elf still did not appear.

"Leave that task for now. It may take some to find the answers we are looking for. We will free the Weasleys and then search for Dobby."

Expecting to hear the Weasleys bellowing at the top of their lungs, he was surprised when he reached the dungeons and heard nothing but the sounds of students moving about the castle.

"This isn't good," Harry said quietly.

"I know. They've moved passed yelling and now they've gone silent," Draco said in the tones of someone who knew all too well what that meant.

They braced themselves as Severus threw open the door to his room. Ron, Hermione and Ginny had been magically bound to any available flat surface in the room. Hermione and Ginny had been bound to the wall on one side of the main sitting area, while Ron had been bound to the floor in front of the offending potions cabinet. They glared furiously at the three wizards.

"See what I mean? Booby traps everywhere," Draco said, shaking his head.

With a sigh, he stepped into the room. This was the first time he'd had actually seen Severus' personal rooms for himself. When he was younger, he always imagined that his professor lived in a room that resembled an actual dungeon. He would imagine that the man kept a large cauldron permanently brewing into which he fed various potion ingredients, and the occasional Gryffindor.

The Potion Master's room didn't look anything like a dungeon though. In fact it looked very striking, in an aristocratic kind of way. A black leather lounge setting was arranged around a simple black marble table which was completely bare save for a single Potions text, several pages of which had been flagged for future reference. A large bookshelf, which held an impressive collection of books and journals lined one entire wall of the living room and on the opposite wall hung a large glass display cabinet which was filled with row upon row of bottles, vials and decanters of Severus's potions, all neatly labelled and tidily grouped. The grey carpet and grey walls softened the otherwise entirely black décor and lifted the atmosphere of the room from sombre and dreary to elegant and handsome. The colour scheme seemed to suit the owner of the room very well, though Harry privately thought that his imagined decorations of stones and cauldrons also suited certain aspects of his personality.

"I trust you have not damaged my cabinet," Severus quirked, shutting the door behind Harry and Draco.

The three captives glared even harder, if possible. For all of his skills as an elite spy and a master of deception, at times Severus had all the diplomacy of a rampaging Hippogriff.

"Your family is safe," he said, pulling his wand out of his robes and releasing their restraints. Hermione and Ginny fell to the floor, and Ron moved his arms and legs gingerly, as if he didn't quite believe that he was free.

"Your muscles have been locked in stasis for quite some time. You will need to let them relax and contract, otherwise you may strain them," Severus informed them, moving to his potions cabinet and casting a few quiet spells over it, presumably to re-set the trap.

"I can't believe you left us behind," Ginny grated through clenched teeth, massaging the muscles in her leg. "They're my family; you had no right to keep me from them."

"Your emotional ties with your family may have pushed you to act in a way that might have endangered us. That is not a risk we could not take. You will recall that we have made the same decision on many occasions during the last war with the Dark Lord," Severus replied, before Harry or Draco could say anything. "In any case, we do not have time to discuss this matter. We must locate Dobby," he continued, turning and heading for the door.

"I don't think I can get up right now," Ron grimaced, "my arms and legs feel all cramped up."

"So do mine," Ginny agreed.

"Before you do anything, you're going to tell us what happened while we were locked up in here," Hermione commanded them.

"Very well," Severus began a little impatiently. "The note we received this morning indicated that the security of the Ministry had been breached and that the Ministry required assistance. It was signed by Tonks, so we assumed that the matter needed to be handled discreetly and by the Order. We asked Dobby to contact a few key Order members in the school so that they might alert the others to the problem and we arranged to have them meet us at the Ministry. We waited outside the Ministry for some time, but nobody arrived, so we entered the building –"

"On your own?" Ginny cried, with a panicked look at Draco.

"There are places where three people can go that a group cannot," Severus said, cutting across their argument before it had a chance to start. "Once we freed the hostages, we discovered that the message we received in the morning, warning us of a breach to the security of the Ministry, had in fact not been sent by Tonks at all."

"So who sent it?" Hermione asked quickly.

"We do not know. If Tonks did not send that message, that means that the situation regarding the Ministry may have been nothing more than an elaborate trap, which we walked directly into. I am at a loss to explain how we managed to survive," Severus thought aloud.

"I see your point. If you had been set up, why did they let you survive the trap at all? There were only three of you, and how many people were in there?" Hermione asked, picking up Snape's train of thought.

"About thirty. Maybe a few less," Draco supplied helpfully.

"Thirty!" Ginny practically screamed. "On your own? Damn it Draco, I could have lost you!" she said, on the edge of tears.

"Ginny," Draco began.

"Don't 'Ginny' me!" she said, her voice shaking a little more than she'd intended.

"And you said you gave Dobby direct instructions to alert the other Order members, didn't you?" Hermione asked, her brows furrowed in thought. It was a look so familiar to Harry that he felt his heart contract a bit; reminding him of their school days when he and Ron would gather around Hermione, while she puzzled their way through the mysteries they had found themselves in.

"Mr Potter did," Severus clarified.

"It's not like Dobby to disobey an order from a school professor, particularly when it came from Harry," Hermione said, sounding worried.

"I tried calling him when we got back, but he didn't come," Harry said, equally as worried.

"It was our intention to search for Dobby once we had relieved you of your…indisposition," Severus said. Harry could have sworn that he saw the Potions Master's lip curl, before it was quickly hidden under his characteristic impassiveness.

"Indisposition?" Ron spluttered. "We were held here like prisoners, even though it was our own family that was in danger –"

"The idea to leave the three of you here was mine, so if you wish to argue about it I will be more than happy to accommodate you," Severus said sternly. Ginny, Hermione and Ron kept quiet.

Harry looked at the Potions Master, a little surprised. The idea had been Draco's, and though they all agreed with him, it was unlike Snape to take the blame for something that he wasn't responsible for. In fact, in Harry's opinion, it was unlike Snape – and it went against Slytherin principles entirely – to take the blame for something one was responsible for. It did seem to head off any arguments that might have erupted, though. None of the Weasleys seemed to want to pick a fight with the Potions Master.

"What's done is done," Hermione said crisply, glaring at Severus, Draco and Harry in turn, though Harry thought she seemed to glare a little longer and harder at him. "We need to find Dobby. But first thing's first. Are the three of you all right?" Hermione asked quickly, looking at them closely. "I don't know what sort of concealment spell you're using, but I don't believe that you walked through a building full of hostile witches and wizards and came out without so much as a scratch on you."

"The illusion is for the benefit of the students and others in the school. We do not wish to raise unnecessary suspicion about our activities," Severus explained sternly.

"But you are all right, aren't you?" Ginny pressed.

"We are fine. We sustained only minor injuries." Snape looked slightly awkward, as though he wasn't used to genuine concern.

"That's a relief, but yours aren't going to stay minor, Draco, because I'm going to kill you when we get back to our rooms," Ginny said. Her voice had started to shake a little again.

Harry and Draco helped their friends up. Hermione wouldn't look at Harry as he helped her up but Ginny literally bristled under Draco's touch. The young man looked slightly pained when he let his wife go.

"I'm fine!" Ron said bluntly when Harry offered his hand to him.

"I know that," Harry sighed, grabbing Ron's hand and pulling him to his feet. Ron was just as stubborn as he'd always been. If he hadn't grabbed Ron's hand, Ron would never have taken it.

"We need to talk," Ron said gruffly, looking at Harry.

"Are you able to move?" Severus asked, cutting across the impending argument.

"Sort of," Hermione nodded, looking curiously at Severus.

"Very well. Whatever you need to do can wait Mr Weasley, we have more pressing matters to attend to," Severus instructed, ignoring the glare Ron had levelled at him.

"What a horrid time for Albus to be away," Hermione complained. "All things aside though, we must find Dobby. If he didn't answer a summons it means that he's in trouble, and something tells me this is all connected."

"It could take ages to find him, if he's even in the castle," Ron said grimly.

"The Marauders Map!" Hermione cried. "I mean -" she clapped her hand over her mouth, her face colouring at the fact that she'd practically shrieked the suggestion.

Nobody needed to ask if Harry still had the map. It was a Marauders keepsake, a cherished memento. One of the few things he had left of his father's. Of course he still had it.

"A childish application of magic," Severus huffed dismissively.

"I disagree. I think it's an ingenious application of wizarding skills, and it'll certainly come in handy right now," Harry replied. "But it's up in my rooms, so I'll run up and get it. Rather than coming all the way back down here, I'll just meet you all up there," he nodded, turning and heading out of Severus' rooms. He flew through the corridors, somehow managing to avoid barrelling over any innocent students who had the misfortune to find themselves in his path.

He was forced to stop so that he could properly "disarm" the door to his rooms, and once the more dangerous spells had been removed, he stepped inside, leaving the door unlocked that the others could get in.

It took some digging to finally retrieve the map. It was odd that he hadn't had occasion to use it since he'd arrived, and it sat at the bottom of his largest suitcase, wrapped up in robes belonging to Sirius that Remus had given him just after Sirius had died. Harry hadn't been able to bring himself to wear them, even once, but he couldn't bring himself to part with them either, so they lay, carefully folded, at the bottom of his suitcase, and they went with him every time he moved.

ooOOoo

"Hey, there weren't this many photos up there the last time we were here," Hermione said, once they had all gathered in Harry's sitting room. She stood looking curiously at the mantle piece over the fire place. "There was only one, two at the most," she said, picking a photo up off the mantle piece and looking closely at it. Harry's mother and father stared back at her from the frame. James stood behind Lily with his arms wrapped tightly about her waist. He kissed her lightly on the neck before he looked up and waved at the camera. Lily laughed at James' antics but joined him in waving to the camera.

"They look so happy. His mum was beautiful and his dad looked –" Hermione began, but stopped when she caught Severus glaring at her.

Hermione picked up a muggle photograph and looked at it curiously. Harry was posed with a group of people outside a muggle pharmacy, dressed in his pharmacist's uniform. "I wonder who they are."

"Didn't Harry say he became a muggle pharmacist? This is probably a picture of where he worked, and the people he worked with," Ginny replied, peering at the photograph over Hermione's shoulder.

Hermione carefully replaced the photo. "I wonder who took this one. It looks like it was taken during our fifth year, when we were spending so much time with Sirius at his house, but I don't remember anyone having a camera with them," she said, pointing to a wizard photo of Harry and Sirius having a food fight in the kitchen at Grimmauld Place.

"Remus had one. He was trying to make an album for Harry, but he couldn't get enough photos together," Ron grunted. "It was going to be a joint birthday present from Remus and Sirius. Remus was going to give Sirius a copy of all of the photos as well. Sirius hated the house and he was going bananas being cooped up in it all the time, so Remus thought it might help him a little bit if he had photos of us all having fun in the house."

"How did you know about this when we didn't?" Hermione asked.

"I heard Remus talking to mum about it once. I was going to tell you, but a lot of stuff happened after that, what with Umbridge coming to school and everything, and I guess I just never got around to it. Afterwards, it just didn't seem important anymore."

"Speaking of Sirius, you might like to know that Bellatrix Lestrange is dead. She was killed at the Ministry today," Draco said.

"Good, but did Harry…er –"

"She and Harry duelled, and she died. We didn't see what happened," Draco replied. The others looked to Severus who nodded his agreement.

"We shall have to cut our conversation short. I do believe that is the sound of Mr Potter thundering down the hallway toward us."

ooOOoo

With the Marauders Map in one hand and his father's invisibility cloak in the other, Harry rushed into the lounge room.

"Sorry I took so long. I had to dig a bit for it," he said, taking a seat on one of the couches and spreading the map open on the coffee table in front of him.

The others crowded about the table to have a look at the map for themselves, though Harry noticed that Ron kept his distance.

"If he's in the castle, where could he be that he couldn't come to you when you called for him?" Hermione asked, poring over the map.

"I have been wondering the same thing myself," Severus said, his eyes darting every which way about the map, as though he were trying to take it all in at once.

"He could be anywhere – in one of the passages, or maybe he's stuck somewhere, or maybe…hey, where do Hogwarts's house elves go to sleep, anyway?" Ginny asked.

"He is here," Severus said, pointing to a spot on the map.

Almost as one, they all moved in for a closer look.

"The Room of Requirement," Ginny whispered, looking at the small banner bearing Dobby's name that floated casually over the plan of the small room.

Harry picked up the map and dashed out of the room, with the others close on his heels. Taking the stairs two at a time he reached the third level in no time at all and was surprised to find the corridor empty, save for a young witch, who Harry recognised as a friend of Theresa Chan's. He turned his back to her, rummaging through his pockets, desperately searching for a reason to send her away. A small piece of parchment in his pocket gave him an idea.

"Excuse me, Miss Thomas," Harry called politely. "I wonder if you'd do me a favour?"

"Of course, sir," the young girl replied, looking up at Harry with bright eyes – and a slightly love-sick expression.

"I wonder if you might give this to Professor Flitwick for me," he asked, holding out a freshly sealed scroll.

"No, not at all," the young girl replied, taking the scroll from Harry and practically skipping away.

"What did you do to her?" Draco asked suspiciously, coming around the corner and watching the young witch skip past him, grinning as though she'd just been hit with a rather strong cheering charm.

"Nothing. I asked her to leave, that's all," Harry replied.

The rest of them looked unconvinced, but Harry just shrugged and turned to the magical room.

"How on earth are we going to get in there? I have no idea what type of room we need to wish for," Harry groaned

"Easy," Hermione said excitedly after a moment's thought. "All you need to do is wish to find yourself in a room that has Dobby in it."

"All right," Harry nodded, pacing the hall and concentrating his thoughts on the room he needed.

"Though, you need not take all day letting the room know what you wish to find," Severus added after several moments had passed.

Ignoring the Potions Master, Harry opened the door and stepped inside.

"Bloody hell," he blinked in surprise. Dobby lay curled up on the floor, looking for all the world as if he were asleep, his body rising and falling gently with the rhythm of his breathing.

"What? What did you find?" Ginny cried, rushing in after Harry. Severus ushered the others into the room and closed the door quietly behind them.

"He looks…peaceful," Draco noted incredulously, moving to get a closer look at the elf. "Like he's sleeping."

"He wouldn't have fallen asleep after I asked him to do something," Harry said defensively, pulling out his wand and crouching on the floor by Dobby.

"Enervate," he murmured.

Dobby stirred, but didn't wake up.

"Enervate," Harry tried again, a little more forcefully

Again Dobby stirred, but he still didn't wake up.

"It's powerful magic that can knock a house elf out so well," Draco said grimly.

"Sorry Dobby, this is going to hurt a little bit," Harry apologised quietly before he pointed his wand at him again. "Enervate," he shouted, sending a powerful surge of magic at the house elf.

"Augh!" Dobby cried, bolting awake and leaping up into the air.

"Sorry, Dobby," Harry apologised again.

"You didn't hurt him did you?" Hermione asked, looking anxiously at Dobby.

"No. Well, only a little bit, but we can't afford to wait for him to come around on his own," Harry said, defending his actions.

"You were assuming that he was going to be able to come around on his own," Severus clarified.

"Harry Potter, sir! What are you doing here?" Dobby cried. He'd stopped hopping about the room and had kneeled down in front of Harry.

"What are you doing here, Dobby?" Harry asked carefully.

"Dobby is supposed to be here!" Dobby replied, cocking his head and looking curiously at Harry.

"In here?" Harry asked, gesturing around the room, which was completely bare, save for the chamber pot in the far corner.

Dobby looked about himself. "This is not the kitchen, Harry Potter sir! Where is 'here'? And what is Dobby doing here?"

"Do you not remember?" Severus asked him.

"No, Professor Snape, sir. I was preparing lunch in the kitchen sir, and now I am ending up here. Dobby does not understand what has happened, but Dobby must be running late for lunch. The other elves will be angry if Dobby is not there to do my work and they may tell Professor Dumbledore and Professor Dumbledore may fire Dobby, and Dobby doesn't want to be sent away, sir. Dobby likes to work!" the little elf babbled, getting to his feet and heading for the door.

"Hang on a second," Ron said, grabbing the little elf's arm before he could leave.

"I just want to talk to you. Don't worry, Professor Dumbledore won't send you away. You're his hardest working house elf," Harry said as Ron brought Dobby back.

"Professor Dumbledore really thinks so of Dobby?" the house elf asked.

"Of course he does," Harry said. "Now, what was the last thing you remember doing today?"

"Dobby was helping to prepare the lunch meal. Winky had spilled a whole bottle of cider on the floor and Dobby was helping her to mop it up," Dobby replied.

"Is that where you were when I called for you?" Harry pressed.

"Harry Potter did not call for Dobby. Dobby would have come right away if he had," Dobby said, looking confused. "Perhaps Harry Potter did summon Dobby and Dobby did not answer his call and now Harry Potter is angry at Dobby. Bad Dobby! Bad Dobby!" the house elf cried, striking himself about the head

"No, no, Dobby. I was confused. I didn't call you this morning. I must have been thinking of something else. Please stop doing that," Harry said, grabbing Dobby's head in his hands to stop him from hurting himself any further.

"So Harry Potter called a house elf who was not Dobby?" Dobby asked, stricken. He struggled against Harry's grip, trying to free himself presumably so that he could inflict more injuries on himself.

"No, no I didn't," Harry said quickly, keeping a firm hold on the house elf. "You know that I wouldn't do something like that, right?" Harry asked, turning the tables on his little friend and taking the advantage in this little struggle for himself.

Dobby stopped struggling almost immediately. "Of course I do, Harry Potter, sir. Harry Potter is special to Dobby," he said with his big round brimming eyes.

Harry was, touched by the little elf's rather enthusiastic declaration. "Anyway, we came looking for you, because…er…Ginny has something she wants to give you," he continued, checking the house elf over carefully now that he wasn't struggling anymore.

"I do?" Ginny said, looking rather like a deer caught in the headlights.

"Miss Ginny has something for Dobby?" Dobby asked, getting excited.

"Er…yes…er…I do…" Ginny stammered, coming to kneel by Harry on the floor.

"Can you give me a few minutes? I don't want him to hear what I'm going to say," Harry said, leaning over and whispering into her ear. Ginny's nod was barely noticeable.

"I have a couple of things for you, Dobby," Ginny said, rummaging through her pockets, looking slightly desperate.

"I need a word," he said quietly to Severus.

The Potions Master looked a little surprised but nodded and the two men moved far enough away from Dobby that he wouldn't hear what they were saying, but not far enough to rouse his suspicions. Draco, Ron and Hermione followed them, looking a little miffed that they might have been left out of the discussion.

"Someone's put a memory charm on him," Harry said grimly.

"Which raises the questions of who and why," Severus added, looking just as grim.

"And how," Hermione said. "House elves use their own type of powerful magic, and they're perfectly capable of protecting themselves."

"Dobby will have the answers," Severus said quietly.

"It's possible to break through a memory charm," Draco said, breaking the brief silence that had fallen over them. "How badly do you want the answers?" he continued, ignoring the harsh glares of Ginny, Ron and Hermione.

"Very," Severus replied.

"The only way I know of to break through a memory charm is to torture them until their mind breaks, and I won't let you do that to him," Harry hissed.

"Someone has sent us a note to lure us to the Ministry and then attacked a house elf. Would you still feel that way if to do so would be to compromise the safety of everybody in this castle?" Severus asked.

Harry looked away. He couldn't answer the question because he honestly didn't know what he should do. On the one hand, Severus was right, but on the other hand, he couldn't bring himself to do that to Dobby.

"In any case," Severus continued, "There is a less severe method to break through a memory charm than to torture someone until they break. A memory concealed by a charm leaves a very faint tell-tale signature in a person's, or elf's as the case may be, memory. It is difficult to detect unless you know what you are looking for. As we know where the memory should have fit into Dobby's sequence of memories, it should not be too difficult to find the concealed memory. It is possible to isolate the memory and exert magical force or pressure onto the charm until it yields, revealing the concealed memory. However, it is very precise work."

"What would happen if someone were to exert too much force on the charm, or if they didn't isolate the specific memory properly?" Hermione asked, her concern showing on her face.

Severus paused. "As I have said, it is very precise and delicate work. There are consequences to making errors."

"What sort of consequences?" Hermione asked nervously.

"Insanity, permanent brain damage, perhaps even death," Severus replied.

Ron gave a low whistle. "Bloody hell. Is there any other way to get the information from Dobby?" he asked quietly.

"I do not think so," Severus shook his head.

"Have you ever retrieved a memory like that before?" Harry asked the Potions Master.

"Once," he replied.

"And what happened?" Harry pressed.

"I was…moderately successful."

"Moderately?"

"The subject had been tortured considerably and his mind had been affected. It was difficult to navigate and, while I succeeded in retrieving the suppressed memory, I am uncertain as to whether I caused him any further harm. Given the state he was in, I could not be sure."

"If his mind hadn't been affected, do you think you could have retrieved the memory without injuring him?" Harry asked, looking at Dobby who was happily talking with Ginny and apparently oblivious to their conversation.

"I believe so," the Potions Master replied, after several moments careful thought.

"Dobby's an elf, though. That's going to make a difference, isn't it?" Hermione whispered urgently.

"It will make some difference, however, house elves think in similar terms and concepts as humans..."

Harry looked his former professor right in the eyes. "Do you think you could do it without injuring Dobby?"

"Yes," Severus replied confidently, and Harry had no choice but to believe him. Snape was not the type of man to give in to false bravado. If he thought that the task was beyond his capabilities he would have admitted it – however reluctantly – and searched for another solution.

"I'm not happy about this, but I don't see any other way to do this. Just please be careful, Professor Snape," Hermione pleaded.

Severus nodded once before drawing his wand and stunning Dobby just as he was about to accept a pair of socks that had come from Ginny's own two feet.

"Augh! Why did you do that?" Ginny cried as Hermione dragged her away to explain.

"We must break the memory charm placed on Dobby. It will be less painful for him if he were not conscious while I did this," Severus explained, coming to sit beside the stunned house elf. As much as Harry wanted to stand over the professor and make sure that Dobby was alright, he held himself back. If Snape made a mistake because he was in the way, he wouldn't forgive himself.

Nevertheless, Harry watched Snape closely as he delved into Dobby's unguarded mind. With his eyes closed, and his wand moving only very occasionally, Severus was the very picture of concentration. Difficult as it generally was to distinguish between the Potion Master's various expressions, his countenance lacked its usual disdain. Now that Harry thought about it, he'd seen the same expression of untainted concentration on his former professor during the Order meetings he'd attended.

And then it was over. Severus opened his eyes and lowered his wand. "After Mr Potter spoke to Dobby, he was summoned. When he answered the call he blacked out and remained unconscious until Mr Potter woke him up. He must have been attacked from behind, as he saw nobody when he answered the summons."

"Will he be all right?" the others asked all at the same time.

"I will not know until he wakes up. I believe he is uninjured, though he will have a severe headache for the next three or four days," Severus said, getting to his feet and dusting off his clothes.

"Could you recognise who summoned him?" Hermione asked the professor.

"I did not recognise the voice of the wizard—or witch—who called him, and as I have already mentioned, Dobby did not see who attacked him."

"Realistically though, there are a lot of people in this school who would support Voldemort. For a start, half of Slytherin have family who openly supported him, if they didn't actually serve him," Draco pointed out.

"Not many people would risk attacking a house elf in the school where there is such a large risk of being caught," Severus added.

"Do you think whoever did this was after Dobby in particular? I mean, it's no secret that Dobby's closer to Harry and Albus than the other elves are," Ginny asked.

"I cannot be sure. Considering that Dobby's attack was one of a series of suspicious events, it is doubtful that eliminating Dobby was their sole purpose. However, it is as you say; his fondness for the Headmaster and Mr Potter is not a secret. As such, getting rid of him may be one of their purposes."

The others looked stricken.

"On the other hand, Dobby may simply have been a casualty of circumstance," Severus added.

"You don't believe that, do you?" Ron asked him dubiously.

The older man paused. "No."

"Neither do I," Harry added.

"We don't have to worry too much about Dobby. He can take care of himself. When he wakes up, put him on his guard. Let him know that something's going on and that he'll need to have his defences up until we can get to the bottom of it. He'll know what to do. He survived being in service to the Malfoys after all and that was no easy task in itself. My family kept all manner of dark and unusual things in the house, and I was none to nice to him myself. Now that I think about it, we lost quite a few elves, but Dobby was very good at avoiding all of the traps that my father set about the house. He may look clumsy, but he's really quite skilled," Draco suggested.

"We should let the rest of the school's staff know that someone has attacked Dobby, and ask them all to keep an eye on him as well. We can explain everything to the school's Order members later, but we can let everyone else think that it was an attack by someone who just didn't like house elves. There are plenty of those sorts of people out there," Ron added.

"That's what I've been saying all along," Hermione began, her eyes bright. "If we made people more aware of the –"

"Please don't start in on S.P.E.W now, sweetheart," Ron groaned.

"That is all we can do for the moment," Severus said, surprising Ron by agreeing with him. "We left the Aurors to question the Death Eaters and other Dark Lord supporters who were sealed inside the Ministry. As there were a number of them, it may take some time for them to finish their task. I would imagine that by tomorrow they will have some information to share with us," Severus said, turning to leave.

"During the last war, did students ever attack other students, or creatures that were living in the school? I know that Voldemort recruited students, but I don't know what he used them for," Harry asked suddenly.

"Voldemort used his student recruits as spies. He needed information about what was happening inside the school. He used Severus to find out what Albus and the other teachers were doing. He used the students to recruit others, and to find out what was happening at the student level. He wouldn't risk having his students openly attacking anyone, or anything. If they were caught, they would be too easy to garner information from. Students are too young to have properly learned the art of Occlumency so that they can keep people out of their minds, and they're too young and self-centred to protect his secrets under the threat of more forceful – and painful – methods of questioning," Draco replied.

Hermione looked at Harry. "You really didn't know that, did you?" she asked softly.

"No. It was dangerous for me to come back here, so I sort of lost touch with what was going on out here," Harry said quickly. "If there's nothing more to do, I'll take Dobby to the infirmary and let Poppy take care of him."

"Dumbledore didn't mention anything about that to us. He told us that you needed more training than what you were getting, and that he wanted to make sure you were ready for when things came to a head with Voldemort," Ginny said quietly. "Why was it so dangerous for you to stay with us? You'd been with us all along up until then."

The summer after his fifth year at school was a particularly unpleasant time for him. Having been separated from his only friends and given over to a group of elite instructors to begin a period of intensive wizarding training, it had taken some time to adjust to the circumstances he had found himself in. He didn't remember much about those first few months, aside from feeling angry and upset and empty all at the same time.

"You're avoiding the question," Ron growled. "I've been meaning to have a word to you about all of this for a while now."

"A word, huh?" Harry asked, dubiously. Ron had never been the type to have 'a word' with anybody when he was angry.

"I'm sick of having to say this time and time again. I don't need to explain myself to anyone. I'm not a child," Harry said flatly, feeling his temper start to flare.

"When you start hurting the people around you, that's when you need to start explaining yourself. I don't think you even realise how much you upset Hermione and Ginny. They cried for months. Even Dobby went missing for weeks at a time every now and then so that he could look for you," Ron cried, angrily.

Harry snorted and made to leave, but Ron grabbed him and punched him in the jaw, sending him crashing to the floor.

"Ron!" Hermione and Ginny cried.

Nobody interfered with the two of them, but Severus drew his wand and levitated Dobby out of harm's way.

"Not to mention how I felt. It would have been less painful to lose a limb! You just picked up and left – without saying a word – like everything we'd been through together meant nothing! You lived this whole other life, all the while we were left wondering whether you were even still alive. You talk like you were all alone during those last few years of the war, but you were never alone. We were always with you, even if we couldn't be standing next to you, you idiot!" Ron lunged for Harry again, but Harry grabbed his arms and pushed him back across the room.

Harry rubbed his jaw, noting with some concern that his jaw now clicked whenever he opened and closed his mouth. He hoped that this wasn't permanent.

"I'm really tired of feeling like I have to keep apologising for everything that happened. Yes, I lived a whole other life and yes, I kept it all a secret from you. But to be completely honest, I wanted nothing more to do with this place – including you!"

Hermione and Ginny gasped and Ron clenched his fists.

"Voldemort and his Death Eaters were doing everything they could to kill me and swing that sodding Prophecy in Voldemort's favour. 'Neither can live while the other survives'," Harry spat, "Voldemort can't move forward until he kills me, and by the same token, no one has a greater interest in killing Voldemort than I do. But they found that – for whatever reason, but mostly because of sheer dumb luck – I wasn't as easy to find and kill as they thought, so they started killing the people around me. It wasn't just my friends; they killed anyone who was even suspected of being associated with me. Dumbledore promised me that he'd protect you, and I asked a few friends to keep an eye on you as well – just to be sure."

"Albus had us practically house and school bound for a long time. After we finished school, Albus wouldn't let us go anywhere unaccompanied. I thought it might have been because we were so young, but now…" Hermione thought aloud.

"I can't say I was worse off than anyone else. Everyone who had any part of that war risked their lives. So much had happened. People change if the situation demands it. I changed. I didn't even realise it until I looked into the mirror one day and found that I couldn't recognise the person looking back."

Harry sighed. "I didn't even feel human by the time the war ended," he muttered so quietly that the others had to strain to hear him.

Harry ran his hands through his hair in frustration.

"Voldemort gave me some of his power the first time he tried to kill me. At first, I didn't think anything of it…but the more I learned, and the more I did, the more I started to see him in me—in the things that I was doing, and the person I was becoming. By the end of the war, I swear I could feel him alive inside me."

"He's evil right to the core. You're nothing like that," Ginny insisted, fiercely.

"You think so, do you?" Harry asked her in a voice that held no trace of warmth or feeling. "Do you know what I did to Voldemort during that final battle? I set a spell on him that tore him apart from the inside out. It ate away at him until there was literally nothing left. Well, there was supposed to be nothing left. I even stood there and watched until the last part of him had disappeared. It was savage. Absolutely brutal, but do you know what? I didn't feel anything. Not a thing. In fact, I remember thinking how alike we were, because if he had developed that same spell, I could see him using it on me and watching me die, just like I'd done to him."

Ron, Hermione and Ginny looked taken aback, while the two former Slytherins looked impassive. He didn't expect them to be surprised. It would take a lot to shock somebody who used to serve in Voldemort's own inner circle.

"After Voldemort had died—well, after I thought he'd died, I couldn't stay here. I didn't want to see another witch, wizard, or magical item as along as I lived, so I moved to London. Muggle London. After a while I noticed that the Voldemort inside me started to disappear. I stopped seeing him when I looked in the mirror. I was free of all of that, but now he's back. I can feel it.

"Damn! If Voldemort hadn't given me that bloody headache the day he came back, no one would never have known I'd come back. I was only going to be here for a year. Just a year and then I would have been able to move on."

Harry carefully picked Dobby up and headed for the door.

"So you can see that it's best if you all stay away from me. I don't know what's going to happen," he said, coming to a halt before Severus, who was blocking the doorway.

The two wizards stared at each other in a silent battle of wills. "Before you leave, I have one question. In your fifth year, the Dark Lord attempted to acquire the only copy of the Prophecy in existence. Dumbledore told the Order what the Prophecy said. As I recall, though, the copy of the Prophecy was lost before the Dark Lord could learn what it said. How did he learn what was predicted in the Prophecy?"

Harry silently debated whether he should lie to his former professor or not. At this time, with things looking like the world was about to be plunged into another war, there was nothing to be gained from keeping this from the Order.

"I told him," he said finally. "Now let me through."

"Harry, why?" Ginny asked incredulously.

"Never mind," he said, brushing past Severus and leaving the room.

The others looked at each other, unable to speak for several minutes.

"Given all that has happened, I do not have any objections to the method Mr Potter chose to use in his last attempt to dispose of the Dark Lord. In fact, I am disappointed that I was not afforded an opportunity to see it myself," Severus said finally, breaking the tense silence.

"Me too," Draco nodded. "I'm concerned about what he told Voldemort though."

"As am I. We will need to discover what other information he gave to the Dark Lord," Severus agreed.

ooOOoo

The shadow creature bowed reverently at his master's feet.

"What have you to report?" Voldemort asked, beckoning the creature closer. "Did Potter take the bait?"

"He did, master. He arrived, as you said he would, but he brought the traitors, Snape and Malfoy, with him," the shadow creature reported, keeping his head low as he inched forward.

Voldemort looked "I certainly did not expect that," the Dark Lord remarked. "And how did he perform?"

"It took them more than ninety minutes to free the hostages. More than two thirds of our force was incapacitated and two were killed. Bellatrix Lestrange was one of the ones who died, master; the other was one of the initiates."

"Bellatrix was a fool. Still, she was loyal. I suppose I must commend her for that. Were you noticed?"

"No, my Lord. I moved through the shadows and the portraits. I was invisible to their eyes."

"What became of Messrs Potter, Snape and Malfoy?"

"Potter, Snape and Malfoy only received minor injuries, whilst the remainder of the hostages remained relatively uninjured."

"And the documents I requested?"

"Here, my Lord," the shadow creature replied, handing the documents to his master.

"Thank you, my pet," Voldemort hissed to the shadow creature at his feet, "you have served your master well. I will call upon you when I have further use for you."

The shadow creature kept his head bowed low as he backed out of the room.

"Forgive me, my Lord, but I cannot see the purpose of this morning's exercise at the Ministry," an older wizard said timidly. The Dark Lord had been supervising the brewing of an experimental potion when the shadow creature had interrupted them and it was more than his life's worth to stop brewing and spoil a whole batch of potions. "Er, forgive me, my Lord. It – it is not my place to question you," the Death Eater stammered nervously, wondering what sort of idiocy had pushed him to ask the question in the first place.

"You are right. It is not your place to question, and if you were not such a fool you would not need to ask such a question," Voldemort said, drawing his wand.

"Crucio," he murmured, watching with satisfaction as the Death Eater writhed and screamed under the effects of the spell.

"Potter is joyously predictable. If he believes somebody is in danger, he cannot stop himself from running to their rescue. He and I have been…out of touch…for many years now. I created a situation, that he could not help but respond to, so that I could gauge his abilities, and I had one of our own from the school make sure that he could not call others to his aid, though I notice he had Snape and Malfoy to help him. Still, it is easy to see that he has grown weaker in my absence. I filled the building with third rate witches and wizards – novices and candidates for positions among my circle of followers. He should not have had as much trouble freeing the hostages as he did."

The Death Eater, bowed low at the feet of his master, touching his head to the ground in front of him. "No, my Lord."

I also left a handful of Death Eaters in the building, people he should be able to recognise, so that he would know who orchestrated this morning's little exercise. I would not want him to think that I have stopped thinking of him, that I am neglecting him."

"No, my Lord," the Death Eater repeated.

"Get up. I will not have you ruin my potion," Voldemort snapped at the grovelling figure in front of him.

"Yes, my Lord. Of course," the Death Eater mumbled, leaping to his feet and getting back to stirring potion.

"My Lord," a Death Eater announced from the doorway. "I have prepared the subject. He is ready to test the poison."

"Take the brew down and make sure you document the results thoroughly," the Dark Lord commanded the Death Eater who was still trembling noticeably and doing his best to stir the brew.

"Yes, my Lord," he bowed, before he grabbed the large cauldron and practically ran out of the room, with the other Death Eater close on his heels.

"I admit that you do have some measure of power, Potter. Though that is really not too surprising. You did take some of my power when you were but a child," the Dark Lord pondered aloud, sifting through the documents until he found the one he was looking for. "It is as I suspected," he said, pleased with what he had discovered.

ooOoo

Several of the beds in the infirmary were already filled with students by the time Harry arrived with Dobby.

Unable to explain what had happened earlier that day for fear of being overheard, Harry simply handed Dobby over to the medi-witch and left instructions about what had transpired, and for his safe guarding. She nodded grimly and set about making Dobby comfortable on a bed, while Harry headed out of the infirmary and off to his rooms.

Several piles of student revision exams were waiting for him on his desk when he arrived. He had left them there this morning, intending to get to them after he finished teaching his classes for the day, but he ignored them and headed straight for his liquor cabinet. Much of it was still filled with his and Greg's favourite muggle drinks, but he'd added a few bottles of firewhiskey and other wizarding drinks to it some months ago, when he'd started to feel a little more comfortable in the wizarding world. He pulled out a couple of bottles, retrieved an old shoe box from the back of his wardrobe and settled himself on the floor in his sitting room, with the box on his lap.

When he'd moved to the muggle world he'd stored all of the photographs he had of his family and his friends in an old shoebox and hidden them away. Hagrid had put together an album of photographs of his mother and father for him when he was in his first year, and he'd shrunk it and stored it in the old shoebox as well. In all the time he'd been away from the wizarding world, he hadn't looked at them. The idea had always been too painful to entertain.

When Greg had moved in with him, he'd been extremely careful to keep it out of sight. But Greg had had a talent for finding things that were supposed to be hidden and, in the end, Harry had to resort to magical methods to make sure it stayed hidden.

His meeting with Bellatrix and his argument with Ron had reminded him of just how much he'd missed everyone, and how much he still missed his mother and father and Sirius. Looking at his old photographs almost made him feel like he was with them, even if they weren't here any more.

It was some time later when a loud knock on the door interrupted Harry. He checked his watch and was surprised to find that it was already late evening. It was unusual for anyone to disturb him at such a late hour. He made his way to the door a little clumsily and, remembering what happened to Dobby, he drew his wand and unlocked his door, peering cautiously around it. Draco stood on the other side.

"Relax, it's just me," Draco said, noticing Harry's caution. "Is that offer still open to crash on your lounge?" Draco asked, looking just a little sheepish.

"Yes, of course. I didn't think that Ginny would be kicking you out though. She didn't look like she was too angry with you when I last saw her." Harry replied, putting his wand away and opening the door to let him in.

"Thanks. Ginny has this idea in her head that given what I used to do and the type of people my own spies and contacts are, and the type of people some of my friends are, that I'm going to go off one day and do something stupid and get myself killed. She thinks that if she's there with me, she might be able to keep an eye on me so that doesn't happen. She gets upset whenever I go off on my own and leave her behind. Something about being scared that I won't come back."

"I guess she's got a point. I mean, now that you've been found to have betrayed Voldemort, there are a lot of people who would like to see you dead," Harry thought aloud. "But I'd imagine that there are times that you have to leave her behind. She understands that, doesn't she?" Harry said, heading back into the sitting room.

"Yes and no. She understands, but she still gets angry when it happens. Like today."

"Ah, that sounds like her," Harry nodded knowingly, heading into the lounge room and leaving Draco to shut the door behind him.

"Er, you've either suddenly forgotten how to coordinate your left and right feet, or you've been drinking – without me," Draco said, sniffing the air and watching the little bit of clumsiness that had crept into Harry's movements.

"I think it's a little of both actually," Harry admitted, looking at almost empty bottle of firewhiskey on the floor next to his photographs. He turned back to find Draco also looking at the photographs scattered across the floor, looking almost wistful, but almost angry at the same time.

"You might have started without me, but I'm sure I can catch up. Here, I came bearing gifts," Draco said with a grin, pulling two small bottles of scotch, enlarging them and offering them to Harry.

Harry put them on the coffee table, next to his other bottle of fire whiskey. A small voice in the back of his head reminded him that it wasa school night and that he had classes to teach tomorrow, which he couldn't very well do with a hang over. It was difficult to listen to that voice with a shoe-box full of memories and three bottles of alcohol staring at him.

Draco dropped down to the floor and picked up one of the photos. "Ginny's shown me a couple of pictures of your mum and dad, but they were only old school photos that she and Hermione found in some old year books. They didn't do them justice though. Your mum is really beautiful, and your Dad, I really had no idea how much you look like him," he said quietly.

"I know," Harry said sadly, finding his spot on the floor again. "Sometimes it gets a bit hard to look in the mirror."

"I'm the spitting image of my father as well, except that he had long hair and I deliberately keep mine short. You know how much of a monster my father was. My reasons are a little different to yours but I find it a bit difficult to look in the mirror as well. Ginny says that all my problems will be solved if I dyed my hair red, though. Then I'd look nothing like my father. Maybe you should do the same," Draco suggested lightly.

Harry snorted. "Duck your head," he instructed his friend, drawing his wand. "Accio two drinking glasses."

Two drinking glasses whizzed over Draco's head and flew into Harry's outstretched hands.

"You could have taken my head off!"

"Your head was perfectly safe," Harry said dismissively. Now what did you want to drink?"

"Whatever you're drinking is fine," Draco replied, looking at another photo.

Harry poured what was left of the firewhiskey into the glasses and handed one of them to his friend as a loud knock interrupted Harry for the second time in about ten minutes.

"You're certainly popular tonight," Draco said, sipping his drink and looking at the photo in his hand.

Harry put his drink down and re-traced his steps to the door. Drawing his wand he opened the door carefully.

"Hi," Ron said, shifting his weight from one foot to the next, looking extremely uncomfortable and blushing to the roots of his hair. "I…er…was…um…I found my old chess set, the one we used to use in school, and I thought…well…did you fancy a game?" Ron blurted out nervously, holding up an old chess set that looked like it should have been thrown away years ago.

"Um…sure. Come on in," Harry said, surprised. It took him a moment to recover himself and remember to let Ron inside. A game of chess was the last thing he was in the mood for, but he would have died before he turned down Ron's peace offering.

"Listen, Harry. I'm…I'm…" Ron stuttered.

"I don't need to hear it," Harry said dismissively. And he meant it. He and Ron had a bond that went beyond these sorts of fights and squabbles.

"But I need to say it. I'm sorry –"

"I understand," Harry said quietly.

Ron extended his hand to Harry and Harry shook it. A weight lifted off his shoulders. He and Ron were all right again. Now if only everything else could be resolved so easily.

"What are you doing here? Did Ginny kick you out again?" Ron asked Draco, taking a seat on the floor.

"Yep," Draco sighed.

"Are we interrupting anything, Harry?" Ron asked, looking at the photographs Harry had scattered about the floor.

"No, not really," Harry sighed, grabbing another glass from the kitchen and bringing it to the sitting room. They had interrupted him, but he didn't mind. It had felt good to be able to talk about his family with people.

"What'll you have?" Harry asked Ron, pointing to the selection of drinks on the coffee table.

"Anything is fine," he replied. "Bloody Hell, we look young!" he exclaimed, picking up a photograph of he, Harry and Hermione in their second year of school.

"Well, you were twelve," Draco pointed out helpfully, ducking a playful swipe from his brother-in-law.

"You know, we were told that Bellatrix Lestrange died in whatever went on at the Ministry today," Ron said, picking up a picture that Hermione had taken of him, Harry and Sirius during the Christmas of their fifth year. They were all too busy trying to tangle each other up in tinsel to pay much attention to the camera.

Harry looked at Draco, wondering how much of his duel with Bellatrix he and Severus had actually seen, and how much they'd told the others. He handed Ron a glass of scotch and settled back down on the floor with his own drink.

"Yeah. She did," he said, throwing his own drink back in one gulp.

"Good," Ron said simply, sipping his own drink. "How did it happen?"

Harry rolled his glass about in his hand. "We were duelling. I hexed her and she fell back against some broken furniture."

"And what? Did she get a nasty knock on the head?" Ron asked, expectantly.

"No. She landed on the furniture and, well, skewered herself," Harry explained.

Ron's eyes widened in surprise. "Couldn't have happened to a nicer…witch. She deserved it for what she did to him," Ron said, looking at Sirius' picture.

Harry said nothing.

"Hey, about what you said before about feeling like you resemble Voldemort –" Ron began.

"I don't want to talk about it. In fact, I don't know why I even mentioned anything at all earlier. I don't even want to think about it," Harry insisted vehemently.

"All right, Ron nodded. "But if you do ever, you know, want to talk about it – I don't mind," he offered.

"Thanks," Harry murmured.

An awkward silence fell over the small group.

"I just realised that you've watched Draco and I get horrendously drunk –" Ron began.

"Several times," Draco added helpfully.

"But we've never actually seen you get drunk," Ron finished, looking at Draco.

"That's right. I've never seen you even drink in front of anyone else," Draco agreed.

"Well, I was keeping quite a big secret back then. I may as well not have gone to all the trouble of disguising myself if I was just going to get drunk and tell the first person I saw who I really was," Harry told them.

"Good point," Ron conceded.

"There's nothing to see anyway. I'm not a very interesting drunk. I don't have any sexual dysfunctions to tell people about," Harry said, looking meaningfully at Draco.

"Yes, well, if I'd been thinking clearly I wouldn't have said anything at the time, but there's a reason they call it 'drunken ramblings'," Draco pointed out, emptying his glass and pouring himself another one.

"Hang on a minute; you're not one of those flirty drunks, are you?" Ron asked suddenly. "I mean with you being gay and us being blokes and all…"

Draco choked on his drink.

"That really bothers you, doesn't it?" Harry asked mischievously.

"No, no, not at all. I'm just wondering whether we need to put some furniture between you and ourselves or not," Ron said quickly.

Draco was still laughing and it took all of Harry's self control not to join him. He knew that Ron didn't have a problem with his lifestyle choice, but he couldn't resist giving his friend a hard time about it.

"Ah, but you're not seeing the big picture," Draco said to Ron in between chuckles. "I mean, realistically, who wouldn't want to be able to say that Harry Potter hit on them?"

Harry glared balefully at Draco. "I've never actually worked out why straight men seem to think that they're all irresistible to gay men. It doesn't matter who they are, they seem to think that if there's a gay man in the room, they aren't going to leave the room with their virtue – or certain other things – in tact. Don't worry Ron, your body is safe from me," he said, sending Draco off into gales of laughter. Harry threw back his drink. It was going to be a long and interesting night.