Thank you for the reviews on the last chapter!

The title of this one, of course, entirely depends on one's perspective.

Chapter Thirty-One: Snape Is a Git

Snape was happily criticizing Hermione Granger's Draught of Peace—it was rare that the know-it-all Gryffindor made a mistake, and he thought it was beneficial for her to hear his opinion when she did—when Harry's cauldron exploded.

Snape whipped around, staring, though his eyes quickly narrowed. The atmosphere around Harry had grown more and more tense this week, building up to a physical and magical attack by several people Harry refused to name as he was coming back to the Slytherin dungeons on Wednesday. Harry had said only that he'd hexed them with results that wouldn't become visible unless they attacked him again. It was the kind of thing that threatened to drive Snape quite mad.

But if someone had made Harry's cauldron explode in the middle of Potions, where Snape could take House points off the perpetrator—

It seemed that no one had, though. Harry stared at the cauldron and wiped at the mixture of hellebore and powdered moonstone that covered him. Snape doubted he would have been so unobservant as not to see whatever trick or mismatched ingredient had dropped into the potion, and where it had come from.

On the other hand, the idea that he had made a mistake was even more inconceivable, considering that Harry had already mastered O.W.L.-standard potions, like this one, with ease.

"Potter!" Snape barked.

Harry looked up at him, still blinking.

"Do you know what mistake you made?" Snape said that even as he looked into Harry's eyes, instinctively using Legilimency as he did so, searching for some sign of a name. Harry looked down and broke the contact of their gaze, but not before Snape had seen intense, gnawing worry, of the kind that he'd had no idea Harry was feeling.

"I stirred in the moonstone in large clumps, sir, and didn't watch them well enough," said Harry quietly. "They stuck together, and then they reacted badly with the syrup. I'm sorry."

Snape frowned. It was the same error Finch-Fletchley had made five minutes ago, resulting in him having to leave the class. At least Harry hadn't taken the blast of the potion full in the eyes. "Clean this up and brew it again," he said, and turned away. He wasn't about to take points from Slytherin, especially when Harry hadn't made a mistake like this before.

The Ravenclaws in the back of the room muttered, but shut up when Snape glared at them. That House was still the most hostile to Harry, and Snape was of the private opinion that the people who had attacked Harry on Wednesday were Ravenclaws—though, of course, he didn't know that for certain, as Harry refused to give them away. Snape had tried to watch for subdued Ravenclaws on Thursday, but everyone was subdued in his classes, so that didn't help.

Now, though, he had a candidate for the mistake. Harry's own worry had probably caused him to focus more on internal matters than the moonstone clumps. Now Snape had only to find out what he was worried about. Harry was coming to talk to him after Connor Potter's dueling session that evening. Snape would be as patient as he could, but he was determined to get the truth out of Harry.

When he can't make Potions, something is seriously wrong.

"Come," said Snape, eyeing the door in resignation. The clock said five minutes after eight, and he had entertained the hopeful vision that Potter might not show up that evening. Then he could have the double pleasure of catching up on his marking and giving Harry's brother detention later.

I will take my pleasures where I must, he thought, as the door opened and Potter stepped inside. "You are late," he said. "Five points from Gryffindor."

Potter trembled for a long moment. Snape sneered and watched him. Strange how the son who looked less like the father had come to represent the hated James Potter more for him. Snape saw the same deficiencies in Harry's brother as in James—the quick enthusiasm at the start of a project that faded when he had to put effort forward, the tendency to sway to others' opinions, the foolish bravery that meant he dreamed more of going into battle than the training necessary to prepare for it or the consequences of what followed after.

Slytherins are more sensible. We think of survival before glory. Snape stood and drew his wand. "No explanation for your lateness, Potter?" he asked.

"I lost track of time," said Potter, and then added, "Sir," as if he had needed to think of the sentence in discrete pieces. Given how slow his thoughts moved, Snape thought that entirely possible.

"I see," said Snape. "Perhaps I should give you a means of keeping track of it, then." He flicked his wand, ignoring Potter's efforts to raise a shield. He was adequate at the Protego, but he hadn't yet learned the anticipation that should let him have it up before his enemy launched the spell it was meant to deflect. "Densaugeo!"

The curse, of course, hit Potter, because when did he ever have a shield up in time? Snape was glad, for the first time, that he was not teaching Defense Against the Dark Arts, though he was sure he would have prepared the students better than Lestrange, who concentrated too intensely on philosophy. He could not have stood to see Potter fail day after day.

He watched clinically as Potter's teeth enlarged, extending almost down to his chin before they stopped growing. "A simple curse, Mr. Potter," he said. "And yet it prevents you from intoning some spells clearly. Your enemy can use it to stop you while he finds a stronger spell that you may be not prepared to counteract. And to insure that you pay attention, you will be left like that until the end of our class or until you manage the countercurse, whichever comes first."

Potter glared at him again, and Snape felt the first hatching tingles of power attacking the air around him. He raised an eyebrow. He had not thought the boy capable of wandless magic at all, and perhaps he was not. This could be the instinctive anger response of any wizard of this age cornered in an unfair situation, provided he was powerful enough to leak anything beyond his body.

The boy does have potential. But he refuses to exercise it. He wants to argue, to have a sense of fair play, to work through demonstration after demonstration instead of realizing that I am training him for war. Snape clamped his teeth together to keep from saying something about that.

Potter muttered something, carefully keeping his tongue back from his teeth, and a Tripping Jinx formed and flew at Snape. Snape created a Haurio shield without a thought and captured it.

"Stronger spells," he said. "Unless you are content to make your enemy dance a jig while he tries to slice you open. Confundo!"

Potter promptly staggered, eyes going glassy. Snape felt free to shut his own eyes and give a long, gusty sigh, since he knew that Potter, under the influence of the Confundus Charm, was in no state to notice. Stars above, how in the world am I going to train him? Much fun as mocking and taunting the Gryffindor was, much as he sometimes wanted to hurt him for having grown up with love in the same household where Harry had known nothing but manipulation, he wanted a strategy that worked. Trying to humiliate him didn't inspire Potter to focus his wandless magic. Offering explanations did nothing; Snape had explained over and over in every session the importance of creating a shield at once, and still the boy didn't listen. Insults and belittling, the technique he used in Potions, self-evidently didn't work.

I want to succeed at this, he realized abruptly. Just as I wished to act on emotions rather than my grudge against James Bloody Potter. I want to be able to train Connor Potter for Harry's sake.

Grimacing, sickened at the thought of how sappy that sounded, Snape turned back to Potter. He would not remove the Densaugeo curse, for now; he had said he would leave it on, and he didn't want Potter to think he didn't keep his word. But he lifted the Charm, and Potter blinked in several directions, then blushed hotly.

Snape ignored that. "You see that a spell does not have to be an Unforgivable to confuse the victim," he said. "Many people, when Confounded, will do things that they otherwise will not do. There is a shield that can be worked into the hair around the skull to defeat such mental magic. It is difficult, but I believe you have the raw power to do it." And how that galled his tongue, but it was true. Snape could have been more patient if Potter was weak. He was not, though nowhere near as strong as Harry or Draco or even the Granger girl.

Instead, he was strong, and did nothing.

Snape stopped the path of that thought. Potter was already looking at him as if he had grown a second head. A moment later, he said, voice slightly blurred by his elongated teeth, "But why would you do that? You hate me."

"I am doing it for the sake of the war," said Snape, deciding that Potter did not need the comparison to his brother for right now. See, Harry, I can be careful of the brat's feelings when I try. "I will show you the spell. I know that we can work together, Potter," he added, throwing caution to the winds. "You proved that when you showed me the letter your father had written to you, and said that you wanted me to use that as evidence in charging your parents with the abuse of your brother."

Potter shook his head. "That was about Harry," he said. "This is about me, and I don't think you're really trying to get over your hatred of Gryffindors. At least Harry's in your House."

Snape had never responded well to self-pity in Gryffindor voices, and he did not do it now. "I want competent students to train, Potter," he said. "I know that I am not going to get them in Potions. Most of you are too impatient, too unintelligent to respect the finer points of the art."

Potter had the nerve to roll his eyes at him. "And I suppose that's why you criticize Hermione all the time, too," he said. "Because she only thinks she's smart, and not because she's a Gryffindor."

"She responds to the pushing," said Snape coldly. "In this class, I know that you can do more than you are doing right now. I insist that you do it. Have a shield raised when you come through the door, you stupid boy. Accept the help of specific spells. Be aware that I will strike at you, and strike again and again, and that my strikes are still more measured than you will encounter in battle. Part of any wizard's duel, or a meeting between two wizards in the field, is creativity. Some call it by other names, speed or imagination or intelligence. But I have seen quite dim wizards take out stronger and more intelligent ones—" luckily, he wanted to say, or you would have no chance at all "—because they were better able to anticipate their opponent's spells, and come up with ones that they had no counter to."

"Like Quidditch," said Potter. "And anticipating the dodges of the Snitch."

Snape beat down the urge to roll his eyes in turn. Whatever analogies the brat needed… "Yes," he said.

"But I have instincts there," said Potter. "I don't know what to do in a duel yet. That's what you're supposed to teach me." He gestured at his long teeth. "Not just curse me and leave me like this."

Snape laughed, and saw Potter flinch. Well, he'd meant to make him do that. His laughter was not a kind thing. "Death Eaters will leave curses on you that will make this look like a love tap, Potter," he said. "And they will last days, not hours."

"That's why I'm here!" Potter shouted at him, and Snape really had to repress a snort at the way he sounded. "Because I want to know how to resist that. You're supposed to be teaching me that, too."

Snape drew in one breath, and then another. When he spoke, his voice was cold and soft, and Potter leaned closer to hear in spite of himself. "I know what I should teach you, Potter. I am perfectly aware of how to survive a war. I fought in the first stage of the one you seem so determined to win. And I will teach you with the methods that I deem to have the best chance of success."

"Really?" Potter folded his arms. "None of them seem to have worked well so far."

Snape told himself that Harry would not understand if he Transfigured the stubborn imbecile into a stick of celery and cut him up for use in a Fresh-Breath Potion, no matter how tempting it was. "Stop being afraid of failure, you stupid boy," he said. "Stop thinking you know everything already. Stop concentrating on your hatred of me, and instead trust that I know what I'm talking about. So long as you have some other goal in mind than mastering this magic, your wandless power remains caged, and your focus is poor."

Potter perked up. "I could do wandless magic?"

"Perhaps," said Snape, stressing the word. In truth, he was not sure that the power hovering around Potter's body indicated the ability to work wandlessly. Sometimes the magic never did manage to narrow down to the single point needed to do even the simplest of spells. Potter might just have raw potential instead, meaning that his curses would be unusually powerful, or a talent like Parseltongue hiding and waiting to be discovered. "But you will never know if you do not trust me and work with me."

"Can you do wandless magic?"

Snape was not about to entrust a secret like that to a loose-tongued Gryffindor. "I have seen Dumbledore do it," he said instead. "And Harry."

Potter's eyes lowered, but not before Snape had seen the conflicting emotions in them—love, and jealousy, and longing.

Envies his brother, does he? Snape fought the urge to snort. I imagine he has forgotten the details of the abuse. He sees only the end result. Something should happen to remind him shortly.

He saw no point in bringing it up right now, though. He wanted to actually accomplish something with this training session, so that irritation with it would not clog up his mind when he spoke to Harry at nine'o'clock. "Shall we continue?" he asked, picking up his wand.

"How did it go?"

Snape kept his back turned to Harry for the moment, while he ordered tea through his fireplace. He could hear Harry settling into the chair on the other side of the room, and then shifting uneasily around for a moment. Harry always did that when they met in his private rooms, as though he were bewildered by the lack of places to hide.

Snape turned around and met his ward's eyes, though he saw nothing as revealing on the surface of his mind as he had seen in Potions. Harry had his Occlumency shields up now, hiding his thoughts. Snape resisted the impulse to snarl. He was the one who had taught Harry to do that, after all. "Your brother is impatient, and wants to join battle already," he said.

"Yes, I thought of that after Sunday." Harry leaned back in the chair with a pensive frown. "He sounded as though he wanted to go along to battle without really understanding what it was about. And I thought he would have got some idea, after he went with us to the beach."

"And did absolutely nothing," Snape pointed out, taking his own seat on the couch. A house elf appeared a moment later with two cups of tea, one of which Snape accepted with a grateful sigh. Harry shook his head when the elf tried to offer him the other one. Snape frowned, but let it pass. Harry was in one of his vates moods, that was obvious.

"Maybe that's it, then," Harry said. "Maybe he wants to prove himself, not just get glory. Connor's always more stubborn about making up for a past failure than about making a new stride." Snape listened in silence to the fondness in his voice. He had to wonder if Harry would have cared about Connor at all without the forced affection from his training. They were simply too different, and Harry spent most of a conversation about him forgiving or excusing his brother's faults. "How is he progressing?"

"Not well," Snape said. "He wants to do more than he is currently able to. He accuses me of being unfair. He thinks he knows better about what I should teach than I do."

"And you're never unfair?" Harry asked that in a wry tone, but his gaze was anxious. Snape knew Harry would accept what he said, and so he answered with the truth.

"I very often heap insults on his House in my mind, but only in my mind. The worst I have ever called him is a stupid boy."

"Professor—"

"You came to me for help in training your brother, Harry," Snape broke in. "That does not mean I can change my nature."

Harry sighed. "I know. Just—I think I should speak to him. I assure you he is trying, but he probably doesn't think the same thing about you. May I mention some of the knowledge you have to him, so that he knows you're definitely the best candidate for teaching him?"

"Do not mention that I can do wandless magic when I am angry. That is a weapon I prefer to keep to myself."

Harry nodded. "I won't." His hand moved down to pat a pocket of his robe in what looked like a habitual nervous gesture. Snape's eyes narrowed. If that is a nervous habit, it is a newly-acquired one.

Harry drew his hand back in the next moment, and said, "I suppose we should work on blocking the scar connection. I'm still getting flashes of dreams from Voldemort—nothing definite now, but for all I know, he could overpower my mind whenever he wants. And he's getting stronger again." His face reflected grim resignation for just a moment, and then that dropped away and he simply looked anxious. "What do you suggest I envision for a shield, Professor?"

"Something light and flexible," Snape murmured, staring at Harry's robe pocket as if that could make the cloth transparent. A small object; it didn't make the pocket appear unnatural. "Perhaps the quicksilver of an Occlumency pool will be best."

"Grass?"

Snape brought his eyes back to Harry's. "Why that?"

Harry hesitated too long, and then said, with too much force and brightness, "We flew over long grass when we brought the brooms down near Woodhouse. I keep remembering the way it swayed in the wind, but hid the werewolves crouching in it. I want a barrier that can move, but will conceal what's on the other side of the scar connection from Voldemort."

Reluctantly, Snape nodded. He wondered if the association with grass—or the memory of the werewolves springing?—was what troubled Harry, but he would not yet ask. It was absolutely imperative that Harry block the scar connection first. Then, if that relaxed him enough, Snape would try to get him to talk about whatever was bothering him.

"Legilimens," he murmured, eyes locked on Harry's, and then he slid forward and into the welcoming darkness of air around a steel skeleton covered with the thick, bushy leaves of emotions.

Harry showed him the scar connection, a twisting void between two of the metallic branches, communicating the dimensions of the tunnel and how hard it was to block without words. Snape answered in the same way, showing, rather than explaining, how to weave a thin, flexible barrier across the opening. It was similar to an Occlumency pool, but Harry could retrieve his emotions from those at a moment's notice. This had to be a little less responsive to the Occlumens's will, so as not to open and expose the thing it barricaded during normal dreaming. Now that Snape thought about it, a visualization of grass would work very well. It moved with the wind, but it took a lot of wind, or the work of digging hands, to uproot it.

Harry spun soil into being, and lowered the long blades gently into place, spanning the whole of that starless pit that bound him to the Dark Lord. Then the skeleton shifted a bit, reaching out and grasping the sides of the hole so as to provide a resting place for the grass. Snape nodded. It was a good practice, one of the reasons that wizards' minds were so often of a piece, like a single house or forest, rather than a hodgepodge of unconnected pieces; if the barrier looked too unnatural, it would be harder for Harry to imagine and maintain.

Snape floated backward, withdrawing from Harry's mind, and then caught another glimpse of that dark worry again, thrusting through the Occlumency pool that had tried to contain it like reeds through shallow water.

He hesitated, then reached out and explored the edges of it. He would not try to learn specific details, like the names of the students who had attacked Harry, he promised himself sternly. But if more than one problem troubled his ward, then he should know about it.

All the worry focused on one thing, though. The moment Snape let his own awareness brush the edge of that volatile emotion, he knew what it was.

He snapped open his eyes and held out a hand, his rage acting to fuel his wandless magic, even as Harry desperately clapped his fingers over his robe pocket. "Accio letter!" Snape snapped, and the little ball of paper rolled out of an uncompressed corner and soared across the room into Snape's palm.

"Stop it!" Harry shouted, leaping to his feet. Uncontrolled rage blazed in his eyes, and a wind whipped the fire hard enough that it went out, leaving only the torches to illuminate the room. "You have no right to read that, no right—"

Snape ignored him. Until and unless Harry actually attacked him with magic—and having seen how well Harry had restrained himself after the arrests of his parents and Dumbledore, he really had no fear of that—he did not need to defend himself. Instead, he unrolled the letter from James Bloody Potter and read it.

October 6th, 1995

Dear Harry:

I know that you won't want to hear from me. But I have something very important to tell you. I can only hope that you read this letter through to the end, because of how much it matters to me.

I've learned a little information about the trial; they tell us if we ask, and sometimes legal books on child abuse are among the ones that appear on the shelves in my cell. And I've learned that sometimes it's possible for the accused to be tried on partial charges. That means that some of the charges against me could be dropped, even though not all of them would be. I wouldn't ask you to try to get all of them removed, but there are thirteen charges of neglect against me. Even dropping six or seven could mean the difference between death or the stripping of my magic, and simple imprisonment.

Could you try, Harry, please? For me? I know that I haven't done right by you in the past. I'm very sorry for that, and I'd like to try anew. If I went to Tullianum for five or ten years, then we could talk, and as long as I still had my magic when I got out, we could try to lead a somewhat normal life. I have messed up my second chances before, but I swear, I swear to you in the name of Merlin, this time I won't. But the thought of dying or losing my magic weighs on my mind every day. I can't do much but sit here and shiver. It was an effort to write this letter. As long as I knew that I would live, and get out of prison someday, then I could make plans for that future, and be happier and healthier and more productive.

Please, Harry. Try. For the sake of the family we could be together someday.

Your loving father,

James.

Snape realized his hands were shaking as he finished the letter. There was no danger of some sappy emotion being the reason they shook, of course. He was in that dreamland beyond fury, where his anger expanded beyond his body and rattled items on the shelves. When he had entered this mood as a Death Eater, then he killed, efficiently and painfully and with a bloody, wild joy. The tension building up within him now could be released only by death.

"You had no right to read that."

Snape came back to himself long enough to notice that Harry had taken his seat again and sat with his head hanging. His voice was dull and resigned, and he flinched when Snape stood, the concern he bore somewhat counteracting the urge to cause pain and draw blood.

"You hadn't read it yourself," Snape said. "Why?"

"Because I knew I would have had to write back," said Harry, jerking his head up and snarling at him, the resignation vanished. Fury lit his eyes a complex green, and his lightning bolt scar flared on his forehead, as though they hadn't blocked its connection after all. "And I promised Mrs. Malfoy that I wouldn't communicate with my parents."

Snape felt a distant surprise that Harry had managed to keep that promise. The letter rang in his head, though, and he had to bite out the next words. "And why didn't you come to anyone and tell them about this letter? Draco? Me? Your brother, for Merlin's sake?"

"Because I knew this would happen, damn you!" Harry stood. "I knew you would get angry! And some of it would be at me, and some of it would be at James, and either way results in someone getting hurt, and I'm so angry at him for writing!"

Snape jerked himself to a stop. This was the first thing he could remember Harry voluntarily confessing about his feelings for his parents, other than his insistent desire to forgive them. Snape breathed slowly, even as he kept his voice cool. "And you could not have put the letter in a drawer? Someplace it would be safe?"

"I always wanted it with me." Harry ran his hand through his hair and paced back and forth. "I was afraid someone would find it if I left it behind. But I hated that, too. It feels like he's a chain around my neck, always with me. Why can't he leave me alone?" Those last words sounded as if he'd scraped his throat raw in saying them.

"He can, Harry," Snape said softly, treading as carefully as he could. "He will. When Scrimgeour learns that the letter somehow got out of James's hands when he was already in custody—"

And Harry swung towards him, and Snape knew he had pushed too far. The glimpse into Harry's emotions vanished as he sealed the crack that had produced it. He glared, and the letter soared from Snape's hand to his without a word spoken. Then Harry bowed his head and read it. Snape did not quite dare to interrupt him.

"Typical," said Harry when he finished, with utterly no emotion in his words. He rolled the letter up again and put it back in his pocket.

"Harry—" Snape began.

"No, I'm not going to try and get the charges dropped," said Harry. His voice was wooden. "And I promise that I won't send a letter back. I promise to you, as well as Mrs. Malfoy, that I won't do it." He made for the door.

"I am not as concerned about that as I am about your mental health," Snape said to his back. Since he knows what I'm after already, I might as well bare all my motives. "When you begin making mistakes in Potions, Harry, then something is badly wrong."

Harry swung around. "I won't do that anymore," he said, with the force of a vow. "I'm sorry for doing it today." Snape nearly flinched, knowing Harry meant he was sorry for providing any hint of his emotions at all, rather than as an apology for disrupting class. "It's fine now."

"It is not," said Snape forcefully. "This is why I wanted you to speak to someone, Harry. I am willing to fetch anyone you wish, except one of your parents or Dumbledore. Regulus would—"

"Fetch who you want," said Harry, locking himself down behind the calm mask that Snape remembered from his first year at Hogwarts, and had always hated. "I'm not talking about it."

"Why?" Snape asked.

"It's mine to keep," said Harry. "I told you that. Everyone knows what happened. That's fine." The choke in his voice immediately afterwards revealed how much he still hated it. "But they're not going to know how I feel about what happened. That's mine."

Snape could think of nothing to say. He had never been good at this part of comforting. When Harry had been more unconscious of his own reactions, he thought as he watched his ward leave the room, even insistent that he hadn't been abused, things were actually easier. That meant he exposed all sorts of telltale signs with a careless word that to him meant something else, or a flash in the eyes that he didn't know he was giving out, or his simple expectation that someone else would agree with his twisted notions of love, sacrifice, and forgiveness.

Now, though, Harry knew how other people saw him, and he had partially healed, and he knew the cost of that healing. Now, he was jealously guarding his secrets, and Snape didn't know how to get through the walls. Manipulation and lying were distasteful to him where Harry was concerned—he had gone as far as he ever wished to in that direction with his lies of omission about possessing Dumbledore's memories and what he intended to do with them—but he knew of no direct assault that would work.

He sat down and stared into the cold hearth.

Must I hurt him again, if that is the only way to get him the help he needs?

How dare he?

Harry was halfway back to the Slytherin common room before that thought, or a variation of it, stopped running through his head. He halted, leaning his brow on the cool stone, and breathed carefully. Wet scents came and curled through his nostrils. Harry forced himself to think about them, about what would happen if water came flooding through the dungeons—would anyone even notice the difference in scent in time to escape the torrent?—and finally, gradually, relaxed.

Then he went about the more difficult process of reconciling himself with what had happened.

He saw it. It was probably inevitable that he would the moment I invited him into my head to firm up the Occlumency barrier. And I was slipping more than I thought, if I let my worry affect my behavior in Potions. Harry sighed. He'd fobbed Draco off with the idea that he'd slipped in Potions because of a flash of a vision from Voldemort, and told him that he was going to Snape tonight to block the scar connection—which did happen to be true. He felt bad about lying.

But the fiery panic that he felt at the mere thought of sharing any of his true and churning emotions overruled even his scruples there. He would tell Draco anything else, including his worries about how well Snape and Connor were getting along in their extra dueling lessons. This was the one thing no one else could have, though, the one thing no one else would ever have.

Snape keeps urging me to be a little more selfish. You'd think he'd be pleased.

Harry gave a rusty chuckle at that, and smoothed the ground where he'd buried his feelings one more time. So. Someone knew about the letter from James now, and he didn't have to worry about keeping that secret. He'd be all right. He would. He would still ignore the temptation to write back. Anchoring the promise to Snape, who was here with him in Hogwarts, would help with that.

But he would not ignore the temptation to hope. James had learned, it seemed. He no longer spoke of being set free entirely. He just didn't want to pay an unfair price for his crimes. He wanted to make sure that he still had a future when he got out of Tullianum, so that he could dedicate his life to his sons.

Harry let his stiff shoulders fall back into position, and sighed. He had changed his mind about going to the Slytherin common room, though. He wanted to fly. Granted, it was after nine at night and he wasn't supposed to be outside the walls after dark, but he wouldn't go beyond the wards. This would help clear his head and make him an easier person for Draco and the others to be around tonight.

He slipped easily through the halls, wrapped in a Disillusionment Charm, and Accio'd his Firebolt once he had reached the Quidditch Pitch. When it came to him, he climbed onto it and kicked off, rising swiftly into the night. He shivered as the high cold burned through him. He hadn't brought Quidditch gear or a glove, of course.

But that was all right. He wouldn't stay out long. He lay down along the broom, stabilizing himself to compensate for the loss of his hand, and turned his face up to watch the waning moon. The Firebolt flew in lazy circles.

He kept his mind on physical sensations, on the cold and the sounds, both odd and natural, that drifted up from the Forbidden Forest. His breath plumed in front of his face, and Harry watched the clouds of steam as long as he could, until the darkness insisted on breaking them up. The moon hunched like a crabbed old man, and Harry counted the craters he could see on his face. He almost remembered a fey tale he'd learned as a child, about Merlin and the battle he'd fought with the man in the moon, but he refused to remember it. That would drag up memories of Lily and James and—the other things.

He was yawning and thinking he should go down when he saw a small shape circle through a beam of moonlight. Harry blinked and sat up. Had someone come after him? Draco was the only one likely to, and he would have called out before he reached that height.

The other flyer sped past him again, and this time Harry could see that it was far too small to be a wizard on a broom. In fact, it had visible wings, and was about the size of a phoenix. He hovered, watching in interest as it drew nearer and nearer. Was this a species of magical creature, perhaps, come to ask him a question as vates?

The creature finally came close enough, and seemed determined enough, that Harry thought he could risk calling a ball of light into his palm without frightening it. The moment the golden glow winked into being above his hand, the creature altered its path and came straight for him.

Harry recoiled. This close, he could see that the creature was unnatural. It did look like a bird, but its beak had teeth, and each feathered wing, twisting with iridescent colors like the shades spilled on a patch of oil, bore a crown of three claws. Its feet folded close to its breast, powerful, clawed things bigger than most raptors' talons Harry had seen. Its long tail was a lizard's.

But it was the aura around it that really made it ugly. Harry could feel its magic spreading out beyond its body, invisible but very present. That magic was a vicious, violent thing, seeking to rend and kill.

He swerved. The bird swerved with him, impossibly fast, and lashed out as it soared just above his head, setting Harry coughing with the foul musk from its feathers. The claws scored five ragged lines down his left cheek.

I like/hate you, snarled a voice that resembled a Dementor's as much as it resembled anything, drilling like a spike of cold into Harry's head. I love/loathe you.

"What are you?" Harry insisted, no longer doubting it was intelligent. He shivered as the blood stopped flowing from the cuts almost at once; they were freezing shut. He whirled back upright, and saw the bird turn in the night to face him, using its tail for balance. Its eyes were red. It laughed at him.

Guess, it said, and then it flew straight up into the sky and vanished in the darkness and moonlight. Harry scanned for it, flying into the space where it had been, but found nothing. It might have been a purely magical creation.

Harry shivered, and gingerly touched his face, wincing when his fingers encountered icy scabs. He supposed he should go see Madam Pomfrey, and then would come the multiple explanations.

He sighed, and circled back down towards the school. At least it's reminded me that there's a world beyond myself again. I can be grateful for that.