Disclaimer: It all belongs to the wonderful J.K. Rowling

Please forgive the shortness of the latest chapter. It was terrible of me, I know, and probably some of you are a bit ill at that. Well, let's just say I'm trying to update sooner because I felt so guilty. Don't forget to R/r. (No rambling this time)

And I have to say this to kookyfaun3- this will be a mentor story about the pair. Thank you for the compliment. And as for quitting this story, as long as something terrible doesn't happen to me or a family member, I will continue this one. Promise.

So, here we go. Like I said earlier, please R/r.

Chapter 10: The Healing

Harry closed his eyes again, wanting to block out the hospital wing and everything about it, especially Snape, who stared at him with those beetle-black eyes. He could not feign sleep for long, though. He heard someone else enter the room, and out of curiosity, he opened his eyes to see Madame Pomfrey standing there, looking at him in a sad sort of way.

"Mr. Potter! You are finally awake!" the woman beamed. "You don't know how scared we were that you would leave us!"

"I'm not leaving yet," Harry croaked, giving a half-hearted smile. Madame Pomfrey didn't show any emotion as to his last comment, not sure whether or not his comment was a good thing. She instead turned to the table next to his bed, and fetched a light green potion that apparently had been waiting for him to take. "Swallow this, please," she said in her professional voice.

Harry attempted to raise his head, succeeding in only making himself ache more. "Oh, I am sorry about that," Poppy said. "I should have remembered how much pain you were in." So instead, she reached under the boy, lifted his head, and helped him to swallow the potion. "Try to stay awake, Mr. Potter. Dumbledore said that he wished to speak with you once you woke up." Harry nodded, but thought of how hard it would be to stay awake, being as his eyelids felt heavy, and sleep seemed to call to him from somewhere else. But he stubbornly refused to fall asleep.

"Could you help me sit up first?" he asked Madame Pomfrey before she had time to leave.

"Are you sure? It may be painful for you to move right now."

Harry nodded. "I'm sure. It will help me stay awake." Madame Pomfrey looked hesitant, but went over, readjusted pillows, and helped Harry scoot up in the bed so that he was sitting up. His eyes were still blurry, as his glasses were not on. Pomfrey, seeming to notice his squinting, handed him his glasses from the table nearby. He put them on his face slowly after first thanking her.

Pomfrey nodded, then turned and left the room. The silence was deafening, and Harry felt as though he should say something, but breathing itself hurt, and he didn't feel like putting forth the effort to talk to Snape. But then again, he did feel quite guilty. After all, Snape had risked everything to save his life. He turned his head slightly, although it was quite painful, and addressed Snape. "Thank you," he said simply. Snape looked surprised. But there was no time for a reply, for as soon as Harry's words had left his mouth, Dumbledore opened the doors to the hospital wing and walked in.

"Harry!" he greeted, smiling. "I'm so glad to see you awake! We were quite worried about you." Dumbledore's smile faded. "How are you feeling? Be honest."

Harry decided he would do as asked, and gave an honest answer. "I've been better. But it's not as bad as it could be."

"I wanted to talk to you to tell you how sorry I am. This whole thing was my fault. If I hadn't stuck you with your relatives, this whole thing may never have happened. I also should have listened more when you tried to tell me how it was to live there."

"It's not your fault. There was no way for you to know."

Harry looked closely, and saw pain wash over Dumbledore's face. "There is always a way to know what we desire. The only thing is, I was so set on the idea that you were safe with your relatives, I did not think to check and see if it really was the best place for you to be. And you were the one who had to pay for my mistake. You and Severus both," Dumbledore turned and acknowledged the Potion's Master. "I am so very sorry for both of your pain."

Harry was at a loss for words. He didn't know what to say. If you're honest with yourself, what do you say when someone has made that sort of dramatic confession to you? Instead, Harry decided it best to change the subject. "When may I see Hermione and Ron?"

"I'm afraid it will be a while. It is very tricky, keeping the two of you hidden from Voldemort and his crew. We risked a great deal to get you both here without anyone finding out, and to risk bringing more people to Hogwarts would risk being found. We cannot risk anyone noticing unusual activities here."

"Why were we brought here?"

"It is easier to treat you both here. After you are more recovered, I have rooms set aside for you to stay in until the start of term."

"Oh."

"I am sorry about that."

"How long do you think that will be?"

"Poppy," Dumbledore said, giving the mediwitch her cue to speak.

"Mr. Potter, the extent of your injuries is far. I'm afraid there are a great many potions you must take. It will take a long time to go through them all, because some of them cannot be used together. Also, your spine is apparently damaged. We must give you a restorative potion for the damaged nerve endings, and teach you to walk again."

"What?" Harry gasped.

"Have you not noticed?" Confusion was on her face. "Have you tried to move your legs?" Harry tried at that moment, and discovered that he couldn't. "It will be alright though. You needn't worry about moving for now. It will all come in time."

Harry sat back in the bed and sighed heavily, closing his eyes. "Harry?" Dumbledore asked cautiously. "Are you alright?"

"I'll be fine."

"Yes, you will. You have made it this far, you will make a full recover, and everything will go back to the way it should be."

Harry nodded. When his eyes had closed, the memories of his parents and Sirius came back. The timelessness of the place seemed overwhelming, and he suddenly felt curious to know how long it had been, and opened his eyes to ask the question. "How long have I been here?"

"About a week and a half. Why?" Poppy answered.

"It seemed so much longer, and yet so much shorter."

"You can leave now, Poppy," Dumbledore said. The sound of his voice left no room for protest, and she left as told. Dumbledore sat down on the bed between Harry and Severus. "Where were you, Harry?"

Harry closed his eyes again, bringing the memory closer. "Home," he whispered. "I was home, and I was happier than I have ever been." He opened his eyes and turned to Dumbledore.

"It was your paradise, was it not Harry?" Harry nodded, swallowing hard. "It is a place that waits for us all in the deepest reaches of our minds. It is the place we are truly happiest. For you, it was with your family, where they are safe and so are you." Dumbledore turned to Severus. "For you, it was a place of solace, where you had none of the worries you do in life." He smiled mysteriously. "For me, it is a field of lemon drops and other sugary sweets."

Harry couldn't help but to smile a little bit at the comment. "The point is, Harry, we all have this place. But I want you to remember something, no matter how happy that place was, there are things that are worth living for. There are pleasures in life that you cannot enjoy in your paradise, no matter how perfect it may have seemed. For instance, did you ever ride a broom there?"

Harry frowned, trying to remember. He shook his head. "I don't think I ever went outside."

"That's because paradise only takes one happy time in our lives, or one strong desire, and gives it to us."

"Is that what death is like?"

"No. Paradise is a place the living go to only. Death is different. It is difficult to explain, for I myself have never seen death."

"I think I understand, though. My parents told me of it."

"They were really there, Harry. Don't ever doubt it. They were with you. They are always with you. The ones we love are always with us. We carry them with us in our hearts, and they feel the love we have for them even beyond this world." Dumbledore rose from the bed. He addressed Snape. "Your paradise has to be one of the strangest one ever told to me," Dumbledore said. "I have never before heard of a paradise where one was alone in a dark place."

"It was, in my mind, pleasant," Snape said.

"Perhaps." Dumbledore turned, and with a swish of robes, was gone from the hospital wing. Harry's eyes, that had strained to stay open throughout the conversation with the Headmaster, now started to drop. He did not even have time to try and lie back down. His top eyelids seemed almost to collapse, and he was asleep in a matter of moments.

Unlike when he was unconscious, Harry's mind was now filled with torment. He saw terrible things, which he could not remember the second they were gone. At first, they were dreadful nightmares. Ones where people fell behind veils, spares were killed by ugly henchmen, and dungeons met nothing but cold and torture. These nightmares led from one to the other, quickly and relentlessly. But these nightmares did not last long, before other images began to find their way into Harry's mind. Images that were foreign to him, but images that someone else knew were there.

"Potter…" a voice called from a distant place. The name was repeated, this time closer. The voice sounded as though it were coming closer to him, as though the person from whom the voice came was walking toward him at a steady pace. "I will find you, Potter. You are never safe from me. I will find you, and kill you with my own wand. Try as you might to escape me, you will never succeed."

Images filled Harry's mind of people being tortured. At first, they seemed to be random witches, wizards, and even muggles. But after the first few images, they became familiar faces. Ron and his family. They were screaming out, and death eaters laughed, led by Voldemort. Hermione, her throat cut with a silver dagger, and her life's blood spread quickly onto the ground. His own fate, killed slowly by Voldemort himself.

Harry tried to wake up. He strained to pull himself from Voldemort's images. But try as he might, the harder he pulled away, the harder Voldemort kept him focused on the images in his mind. He couldn't bare to see them anymore. Voldemort turned his wand on Harry and yelled "Crucio!" Harry felt as though he fell hard onto something, and screamed out, his whole body protesting. The curse lasted forever. As it ended, he became aware of someone shaking him, "Potter!" He recognized that voice. From the place where Voldemort tortured him in his own mind, he could hear a voice calling to him.

"Save me," he called. But whoever it was, he still could not see them. He was stuck in his own mind, still a prisoner of Voldemort.

"No one can save you," the voice hissed in his ear. His scar flamed against his head, splitting his skull into a million pieces.

"Potter!" the voice called, louder this time. Harry focused on the voice, trying to block out the scene around him. He pulled it closer to him, focusing only on the voice, and the hospital wing. The shaking became rougher, and more real. He felt more animate now, more alive then his dream had felt, although his dream had felt considerably real. Dream faded to reality, and when he opened his eyes, Snape was in front of him, trying to awaken him.

Snape stopped shaking him once his eyes opened. And oh his eyes! They were tired, and looked tortured and scared, like those of a deer being hunted, and old, like they had seen too much before his time. "Potter?" he questioned.

"He found me," was all Harry could say. He realized he was on the floor next to his bed, and guessed that he must have fallen off during his dream encounter with Voldemort. Snape was kneeling in front of him, dressed in his customary black robe. Harry guessed that he had slept through the night and into the next morning.

"Get up," Snape said, pulling Harry onto his feet. Harry tried, but fell, his legs useless for now. He shook like a leaf in the autumn wind. It had been so real!

Snape gave a huge sigh when he realized that Harry couldn't move at all on his own. He picked him up and set him back on the bed. Harry didn't want to ever close his eyes again. He didn't ever want to have to deal with anything like that ever!

Snape left, and when he returned moments later, he had Madame Pomfrey with him. "Drink these, dear," she said, handing him three bottles of potions. He obliged. The fourth she handed to him after, and he was hesitant about drinking it. He recognized it. Dreamless sleep. But did dreamless mean that Voldemort could be kept out? He didn't know.

"Go on," she insisted.

"But…"

"What you need now is sleep. Go on, now." Harry had no choice. He had the sinking feeling he would be force-fed if he did not comply. Harry's worry had been waster, for when he fell asleep this time, no dreams found him, and he rested comfortably.

Next chapter, Harry must learn to walk again. (Wow, I think this was my longest chapter ever!! Anyone surprised?)