A/N: At long last, the muse is back in full force! Nothing like a holiday home with Mum (and food) to get the creativity flowing again. Many thanks to everyone for all your wonderful reviews! Please keep 'em coming!

Chapter Five: Familiar Stranger

"Ginny," Ron said, his expression incredulous. "What…the…HELL…are you talking about?"

Drawing a shaky breath, Ginny repeated herself, holding Headmistress McGonagall's gaze. "Professor Snape is telling the truth. That's not Harry, or…at least, not only Harry."

As the others started to choke out protests or questions, the Headmistress motioned for silence. Meeting Ginny's eyes, she said gently, "Go on, Miss Weasley. What happened?"

Forcing herself to ignore the horrified faces around her, Ginny said, "He asked me to help him break out of the hospital wing and run away. At first I thought he was just upset at being locked up, but…there's something else. It's in his eyes." Finally looking at Ron and Hermione, undeniably closer to Harry than even she had ever been, she explained softly, "I'm not surprised you didn't see it. I don't think I'd have caught it—on its face, Harry's just upset and irrational, but…I recognized it. It's deep inside him; I don't think he even realizes it, just like Snape said." Panic, grief, and old nightmares were trying to overwhelm her. Focus, girl! Concentrate! You have to convince them! For Harry! "I've seen it before," she whispered.

Comprehension dawned on Hermione's face, and she turned pale. Ginny's siblings and parents too realized what she was trying to say. "When I was writing in Tom Riddle's diary my first year, toward the end, when I really stopped being able to…resist him, I could actually see him. Face to face. A boy, just like Harry saw. It wasn't until I was under his control completely that I realized what was in his eyes. It's red, and it's just…evil. Calculating and manipulating and not caring at all about anyone else." She looked at them all and insisted hoarsely, "It's inside Harry. I tell you, I saw it. I've never forgotten it."

Professor McGonagall came around the Head Table quickly and steered Ginny to a chair. "Sit down, Miss Weasley." She pressed a glass of ice water into Ginny's hand, and looked at the others while Ginny sipped it and tried not to be sick. "I cannot take this report lightly. This young lady may be the only person besides Albus Dumbledore and Harry himself who has been in close contact with Lord Voldemort."

"There's one other, Minerva," said Remus Lupin quietly. "As much as it scares me to say it. Severus Snape. He's been closer to Voldemort than any of us, Albus included."

"No," Ron breathed. "Harry can't be…"

"Every second we waste denying it is a second that thing has to take over him!" Ginny hissed.

"Hush! Everyone!" the Headmistress ordered. "Alastor, the first thing we had better do is ask Severus to repeat his claims under Veritaserum."

Moody nodded and started to get up, but Ron protested, "Harry offered to do that too!"

"It's out of the question!" Madam Pomfrey snapped. "Physically and magically, he is far too weak to safely administer that potion. It could damage his mind permanently."

Very quietly, as if she didn't want to really say it, Hermione murmured, "Harry would already know that. We spent three days on dangerous Potions in Slughorn's class last year: if a person's had any kind of head injury or suffered magical shock recently, Veritaserum is too powerful. It's one of the riskiest Potions in use. He would have known even when he offered to take it that there was no way Madam Pomfrey would agree."

Ron's mouth was open, but he couldn't seem to think of a thing to say. He just stared at Hermione and Ginny as if he couldn't believe they were doing this. "Ginny?" Mrs. Weasley said in a small voice. "Are you absolutely sure?"

Ginny turned to her mother and nodded. "He's inside Harry. I saw it. I felt it. If it's true that Harry doesn't even know, then he wouldn't expect me to recognize anything."

Remus turned to Ron and Hermione. "And the two of you saw nothing…suspicious, in his behavior or in his eyes?"

"Honestly, nothing that stands out, and I keep thinking through the whole conversation," Hermione said miserably. "He looked tired, and kind of sick…I didn't get much of a look at his eyes because he didn't really look at us."

"I wonder," said Tonks, "could he have been more cautious with the two of you? Knowing him as well as you do?"

"But what would we have seen? We've never met Voldemort—though I guess if his eyes were red or something we'd have caught that," Ron said.

"You might have realized he wasn't himself—in a serious way, more than just ill," said Bill, sitting down next to Ginny and putting an arm around her. "It makes sense, you know. When a person's been cursed to change their behavior, what usually clues others in is that the victim's loved ones see the change in personality, the victim doing things he would never have done. Sometimes it's reflected physically, in their eyes or in another way, but not always. If Harry's not aware of anything changed in his eyes and didn't think Ginny knows him well enough to catch onto his behavior, he might have been willing to risk looking at her."

"Buggeration," muttered one of the twins.

Ron dropped into another chair. "I can't believe this is happening." But he no longer vehemently denied Ginny and Snape's claims.

Moody opened the door then, and peered through at them. "Headmistress?" he jerked his head to beckon her out.

"I will be back presently," she told the others. "No one—not even you, Poppy—is to go anywhere near the Hospital Wing." Ginny noticed that she flicked her wand as she said it, making Ginny suspect that there would be some kind of extra ward or enchantment enforcing the order.

Minerva followed Alastor down the hall a ways. "Well?"

The old Auror nodded to her, "He's telling the truth. I left him while the stuff wears off, but I gave him the full three drops and got the whole story again. Every word. Man's always been brilliant at Potions, but even he can't fool Veritaserum. He's convinced the boy's got a Horcrux fragment in him, feeding off his soul, and after what the Weasley girl said, it's fairly obvious that he's right."

Minerva sighed quietly and closed her eyes. "So it comes to this. The worst possible explanation. Poor Harry."

"Potter most likely doesn't realize what's happening to him. But Snape's got a point—that boy's powerful enough that if he goes dark on us…" Moody's face was grim. "Can't let it happen, Minerva. Whatever the cost."

Taking a deep breath, she said, "Then let us release Severus. I refuse to consider harming a hair on that boy's head until we have exhausted every possible resource in the wizarding world. And Severus may yet be the best resource we have."

"Right. I'll get him." Moody started back down the hall, but glanced back at her with a wry expression. "It's interesting. He definitely hates Potter with a real passion, but he's taking his word to Dumbledore seriously. He'll save the boy or die trying."

Minerva shook her head. "The motivations of Severus Snape have always been a source of great confusion."

Moody came back into Snape's room and gave him a Potion to alleviate the last effects of the Veritaserum. Once it wore off, Severus shook his head and looked at the older man. "Well?"

"Follow me."

Severus was led into the Great Hall, to his surprise. He had hoped that his statement under Veritaserum would help his case, but he hadn't expected them to release him completely. But it was clear that he had been, from the uncomfortable expressions of the Weasleys and Potter's other friends assembled in the room. The reason remained a mystery to Severus until a solemn Ginevra Weasley stepped away from her family. Then he put two and two together.

"You saw it in him?"

The girl nodded. "You did too."

"I did."

"Do you know how to help him?"

"I have had time to consider many options, but at the present, they are all theoretical."

She glanced around at the reluctant faces of Potter's admirers, and looked back at Severus. "Then we have work to do."

Half an hour later, there were volumes from every section of the library—Restricted Section included—littering the tops of the tables in the Great Hall, along with piles of musty scrolls, a few wax and stone tablets, notebooks, and Potion ingredients. No one had felt much like eating dinner, and while it was already late evening, no one felt much like sleeping either.

"How do you think Harry will react when he finds out we know?" Granger asked them as she jotted down notes from a massive text she was searching.

Moody shrugged. "May still deny it—he's unaware anything's happened to him. Or may drop all pretenses."

"You may prepare yourself for a good deal of unpleasantness, in that case," Snape told her. "Potter's behavior took a decidedly sadistic turn while in my company." The girl stared at him, and her face went slightly green.

"I guess you'd know all about sadistic people," Ron Weasley muttered. Granger had the grace to hiss and elbow him.

"That's not helping!"

Severus was not in the slightest bit fazed by the boy's hostility, but for amusement's sake, cast a surreptitious glance around the room and spotted resentful glares from several other members of the Weasley clan, the mother and the twins, and merely uncomfortable reluctance from the father and the two older boys. Interestingly enough, only the daughter seemed completely amenable to working with Snape. Then again, perhaps that was not at all surprising; the Weasley girl was the only person in the room who arguably knew precisely what they were up against, apart from Severus himself. She and he had both had the misfortune to experience the Dark Lord's more appealing persona—the manipulative and enticing, rather than the merely threatening.

That side of the Dark Lord was, in Snape's opinion, far more dangerous. No doubt Ginevra Weasley knew it too.

"You're looking at a lot of information about Legilimency," she observed, coming toward him with a very old volume about demonic possession.

Without looking up from the text he was reading, he replied, "I believe it will be necessary in the process of discovering a treatment for Potter." From the corner of his eye, he saw Granger perking up, and coming toward his section of the table, along with Lupin, the Aurors, and McGonagall.

"What's your theory?" Moody asked bluntly.

"I have no definite theory as yet on how to remove the Horcrux fragment from the boy's soul," Severus said. "But I am convinced that we will need Potter's cooperation to do it."

"But you said Harry himself doesn't know that thing is inside him," said the eldest Weasley son.

Severus nodded. "Therefore, we must endeavor to determine where the Horcrux ends and Potter begins. And find a means of separating the two—isolating the alien soul from his—at least long enough for Potter's original personality to emerge. Once that is done, provided we can avoid damaging his mind or his memory, the boy will be aware of what has happened, and in a position to assist us."

"That's why you got these," Granger said, pouncing on a book about magical treatment of split personalities and other mental disorders in wizards.

"And that is why we will need to employ Legilimency," Severus finished. "If I can find the boundaries between the two souls, I will be able, at least temporarily, to Occlude between them. Or rather assist Potter's own mind in Occluding."

"Have you ever done Mind Healing?" the Weasley girl asked, reading the mental book over Granger's shoulder. "It says they're all Legilimency Masters."

"I have no formal certifications in those subjects, but I am confident that my level of skill at Mind Magic is that of a Mastery," Severus replied. Granger looked uneasy, but Miss Weasley nodded.

"It says here that the barrier between two personalities is easy to find."

"That is in the case of a wizard suffering from a mental disorder. Those are confined to the brain, Miss Weasley. Potter's case involves the soul, the very core and source of all individuality, magic, reason, and emotion in a human being. The lines between an individual's traits are blurred there, overlapping and layered. Deep Occlusion has been used to remove a curse from the soul of an individual, but a curse remains foreign magic. To isolate the Horcrux, I shall have to distinguish between two souls. Even in two individuals as un-alike as Harry Potter and the Dark Lord, there is no understating the difficulty.

He was surprised at how steadily the girl met his eyes and accepted the facts without flinching. "But you think you can do it."

It was not a question. It was an observation. He could not deny a respect for her. There was an understanding between those who had stood in the full force of the Dark Lord's influence that could never be ended or denied. And so he found it easier than expected to speak plainly with her. "I do."

Ginny insisted on going with them to the hospital wing the following day, when Snape and the Aurors decided that the preliminary research was as complete as they could make it. "We'll know better how to proceed once Snape gets a look at what's going on in Potter's head," said Moody.

Hermione, Ron, and the rest of the Weasleys came as well, but only Ginny went all the way to Harry's room. At first, the others had protested, until Snape informed them, "You would be well-advised to stay clear if you cannot stand the idea of force being used on your beloved Potter."

"Force?" Ginny's mother had repeated, her tension increasing.

"The boy will not cooperate when he realizes my story has been verified. He will resist, Madam. How hard will determine how much force must be used to subdue him so that I may proceed with the Legilimency."

Hermione took it surprisingly well, although she did not ask to go to the room. Ginny had assumed correctly that once Hermione couldn't deny the truth of the situation, she would manage to apply her intellect to the problem and push her emotions, however intense, to the background. That was a good thing; they needed Hermione's brains in full working order. "Will you just Stun him?"

Snape shook his head. "He must be conscious. Fortunately, the boy never learned to Occlude even on the smallest level. Only physical restraint will be necessary."

That statement had unpleasant implications, of course; no doubt everyone was seeing a mental picture of Harry being tied to a chair. The magical equivalent would probably be necessary.

Ginny was the first into the room. Harry jumped up with a sly smile at the sight of her…but turned dead white when Snape followed her in. He seemed to freeze up completely when Moody and McGonagall came after them.

His gaze fell on Ginny again. Words flitted through her mind like bees, buzzing around too quickly for her to catch, so she said nothing. It was Snape who broke the standoff. "A nice try, Mr. Potter."

Harry lunged. What good he thought it would do, Ginny didn't know, as Headmistress McGonagall smoothly pulled her behind Snape and Moody to the doorway. A mild hex from Moody knocked Harry back, and the two advanced. "We can do this the easy way or the hard way, Potter!" Moody snapped, but Harry was in no mood to listen.

"Get away from me!" he snarled, and grabbed the lamp on the table beside the bed, ready to use it as a weapon.

Snape took dead aim with his wand. "Mesmerus!"

White light flashed through the air, illuminating Harry's body for a split second, and then he stood motionless, holding the lamp, a dazed look on his face. Ginny realized she was clutching McGonagall's arm, with the Headmistress's hand firmly covering hers. "Entrancing Spell—good thinking," muttered Moody. "I was going to try Imperio, but he's resistant."

Snape went forward and took the lamp out of Harry's hand. Harry's brow furrowed, as if he were trying to drum up the will to fight, but he seemed unable to focus enough to react. Then Moody marched up to him and led him by both arms to a chair, pushing him into it. Ginny swallowed hard. Harry's eyes were half-lidded, and he seemed slightly limp as he moved, his head hanging forward. Moody did a spell that bound him in the chair, then motioned to Snape.

"Your show."

Snape knelt in front of Harry and raised his wand. "Finite." The trance lifted, and Harry blinked, but Snape began the next spell so fast that he had no time to react. "Legilimens!"

Harry's eyes went wide, but Snape had seized the sides of his face and was staring intently at him, no doubt probing his mind with more strength than Harry could hope to counter.

Ginny gasped, realizing only then that she'd been holding her breath. Moody glanced at her. "How long?" she croaked.

The old Auror shrugged. "No way to know. Go on, lass. Nothing you can do here."

Making the entrance into Harry Potter's mind was easy; the boy had always been too emotional for Occlumency, and the influence of the dark soul fragment upon his personality had rendered him even more unstable. Severus plunged deep into thoughts and memories, through a doorway of sheer rage.

He had to search deeper than conscious thought. Layers of awareness were between him and his objective, and he had no knowledge of the time that passed. Seeking a specific memory or determining whether a subject was lying was easy—such things were always in the outermost regions of the mind. He was not certain exactly what he would see, going all the way into the core of an individual's being, and he felt an apprehension about it, not unlike a swimmer diving deeper than ever in unknown waters, armed with oxygen but still wary of what hazards might lie in the depths.

The subconscious was a place of dreams and vague impressions, a few repressed memories. A Legilimens always found it difficult to explain to laymen how one navigated the realm of the mind. Thoughts, emotions, memories, and character traits could not be described or distinguished in any way comprehensible to the five senses. One had to experience them to understand—and perhaps that was the crux of a Legilimens's art: the ability to experience the contents of another's mind without being overwhelmed by the foreign thoughts and emotions, to keep oneself separate and whole in the process.

As he moved deeper still, beyond the realm that held the layers of thoughts and open emotions into the essence of Potter's being, he wondered briefly what his subject was experiencing. He knew that a person being Legilimized saw and felt the memories that the Legilimens was searching, but what impression would Potter have of his own subconscious? Of his own soul? Would he recognize what Snape was doing or would it be nonsense to him?

He had gone very far, deeper than he had ever searched another's mind before, when he found himself "hovering," for lack of a better description, above the plane that was his objective: the paradox that was both the roots and core of an individual and the end result and essence of a lifetime of experiences, both conscious and unconscious. The "soul."

And in that place, looking, seeing, feeling it, he found it easier than expected to locate the signs he was seeking. For that matter, he discovered what it was that made the search easier—something he had not begun to imagine possible.

It was almost four hours later, after dark, that Snape emerged from Harry's room. Ginny, sitting on a hospital wing bed next to Ron and Hermione, perked up. "Professor? Are you all right?"

Snape was swaying slightly and looked exhausted. "Fine," he said, waving aside the concerns of the Headmistress and Mrs. Weasley.

"Find anything?" asked Moody. Snape nodded. "Up to telling us?"

Hermione and the others gathered round once Snape was settled in a chair and received a Pepper Up Potion from Madam Pomfrey. "Is Harry all right?" she asked.

"Asleep. The experience is as draining for the subject as for the Legilimens," Snape said, rubbing his eyes. But he straightened in the seat. "As expected, the perceptible boundary between the two souls is very deep within him. But it was easier than I expected to find it, and I have also determined the cause of Potter's physical and magical illness."

Madam Pomfrey pushed past the others. "How so? What is it?"

Snape sounded as though he couldn't quite believe what he was saying. "He is fighting it. At a level deeper than subconscious, his magic, his physical energy, the very essence of his life is struggling to arrest the spread of darkness from the Horcrux fragment. Energies that normally go to sustain his health are instead devoted to fighting the thing. And so on the surface, he is weakening."

"And you found the boundary between the evil soul and Harry's soul because that's where the fighting is taking place," Hermione concluded, wide-eyed. Snape nodded.

"Potter remains surprisingly untainted by the darkness he has faced." The look on Snape's face suggested that he found the idea of Harry's purity distasteful. Ginny found herself smiling. "The line between the light and the dark is clearer than I expected. But before you celebrate too soon," he added, seeing their delighted expressions, "I should caution you that I could also perceive the darkness's advance." The listeners looked at each other in confusion, and Snape went on, "Make no mistake: the Horcrux fragment is winning. It is consuming him. He is fighting literally with all the strength he possesses, to the point where his physical condition is just short of life-threatening, and still the darkness is advancing. I do not know any explicable reason for the relative strengths of Potter's soul and the Horcrux fragment, but those are the facts of the matter. If we cannot stop its progress and expel it from him, he will fall."

What excitement Ginny and the others had felt at Snape's initial revelations died a quick death as the enormity of what was happening to Harry sank in.

"Professor," Hermione murmured, her face anguished but her voice thoughtful, "the darkness. Is it…covering Harry's soul up, or actually consuming it?" Snape frowned, and she shrugged. "For lack of a better description. The part of Harry's soul that's already been taken over, is it just…gone? Will we be able to get it back?"

Snape figured out what she was trying to say and tilted his head in thought. "Descriptors are problematic. A more apt explanation would be that the 'soul' is not solid, as an object or a landscape would be." He raised his wand and conjured a sphere of misty white light to hover above them. Then he flicked the wand, and a smaller sphere of black smoke joined it, just touching the other.

"The Horcrux was implanted in Potter when the Dark Lord was in the process of trying to create it through his death. It was dormant while it went undiscovered, and while the Dark Lord was alive. Potter attempted a self-exorcism…" A crackling, sizzling mass of golden sparks wrapped themselves around the black smoke and seemed to eat it away, "…but it was incomplete. The fragment remained."

A small spot of blackness remained attached to the white smoke. "Either at this point, or at the point of the Dark Lord's death, the Horcrux remnant sought another means of survival by attaching itself to Potter's soul. And as is the natural course of life, it attempted to grow."

"You make it sound like it's alive," Ron said in confusion.

"There are forms of life, magical and non-magical, that humans have difficulty perceiving. A soul grows and changes with age and experience. It is from the soul that human self-preservation springs. A soul can be injured or destroyed," Snape told him. "It is not at all surprising that what remained of the Horcrux would begin to spread into the host soul, as a parasite or a virus."

He continued with another wave of his wand. The blackness began to expand, mixing with the white light, turning the smoke gray. Ginny felt short of breath. "He is fighting it." In the places where the blackness was swirling, the whiteness brightened, seeming to push it back. "But he is failing." The blackness broke through in places, continuing to spread into the white light, and the darkness expanded.

Snape concluded, "I believe our best, and probably our only chance of stopping the spread, is while some of Potter's soul continues to fight, and while a boundary still exists between the essence of Potter and the essence of the Horcrux. When they are fully merged," the blackness took over and the entire sphere turned dark gray, "there will be no way to tell them apart, and no means of separating them. Ever."

With a wave of Snape's wand, the smoke vanished. Someone stifled a sob behind Ginny, and she realized in surprise that it was Ron.

Hermione's voice cracked as she said, "So…if you can Deep Occlude and separate them," she conjured a smoke ball of her own, "They'll be two distinct things again?" Red sparks sizzled to life at the boundaries between the dark smoke and the light smoke.

Snape nodded. "That is my theory. But the Occlusion will be drawing from Potter's magical power, rather than mine. I can only serve as a subconscious 'guide,' if you will. That is why the effect will be temporary; in time, the power sustaining it will weaken and fail."

Ginny shivered. "If the Occlusion works, what will Harry remember?"

"His mental capacity is unaffected; it is only his personality that has been altered. He should remember everything." There was actually a ghost of a smirk on Snape's face, as though relishing the thought of Harry's horror when he realized what had happened. Ginny wasn't the only one who noticed; Hermione and Ron were glaring at him.

Headmistress McGonagall chose that moment to break in. "I think that is enough for today. We could all do with a rest to refresh our minds for what must come next—and I expect everyone," she narrowed her eyes at Snape, then Ron and Hermione, "to get one. Let us adjourn for the evening."

"Professor," Hermione jumped up. "May we see Harry? Just for a minute?"

"He's asleep, Hermione," said Madam Pomfrey.

"I know. I won't wake him, I just want to…see him," Hermione finished in a small voice.

Madam Pomfrey looked at Professor McGonagall, and the Headmistress's face had softened. "Very well. Take care that you don't wake him."

"Yes, ma'am," Ron said softly. He took Hermione's hand, and the two of the walked down the wing with Madam Pomfrey at their heels. McGonagall raised her eyebrows at Ginny, and she hesitated for a moment before deciding to go as well.

Under Madam Pomfrey's watchful eyes, Hermione made her way quietly into the room. Harry was indeed sound asleep, looking as if a ten-wizard duel right there in the room wouldn't wake him up. Like this, Ginny would never have guessed what was inside him. She's seen him this way many times in the past year, heavily asleep, patently exhausted. A lump rose in her throat.

What if we can't get the Horcrux out? The thought she'd desperately tried to hold back shoved its way to the front of her mind, along with an icy wave of fear and grief. Harry…

He would die. He would have to die. There was no other way around it if the evil took his soul. Practically-speaking, that would be the moment of Harry's real death, but…her stomach lurched. STOP IT!

Hermione bent over the bed and kissed Harry gently on the cheek. When she turned back and joined Ron, tears were sliding down her face. Ron guided her out with an arm around her waist, his own eyes very red. Ginny lingered for a moment beside the door, then quietly went out after them.

The next morning, a frazzled-looking Tonks and Madam Pomfrey came to breakfast from the Hospital Wing. "What happened?" Mrs. Weasley exclaimed.

"Nothing we couldn't handle. Harry woke up and made his displeasure at being forcibly Legilimized known," said Tonks.

"I had to threaten to force-feed him—and I DO know the spells to do it—if he didn't eat breakfast," added Madam Pomfrey. "And it is hardly the first time I have had a tray thrown at me, tending children as long as I have. Don't distress yourselves."

"'arry attacked you?" Fleur gasped.

"Not really," Tonks said. "He's realized that without any magic at his disposal, it doesn't do any good. Let's just say he had a Voldemort-sized tantrum."

Mrs. Weasley laughed aloud, along with several of the others at the table, then abruptly broke down in tears. Hermione felt her own eyes burning, but forced a grin. "That may not have anything to do with Horcruxes. He's always had a dragon temper."

"Good point," said Ron, in a cheerful voice that fooled no one. "Remember fifth year?"

"Vividly," she replied.

"Wasn't a week went by that he wasn't screaming his head off 'bout something," Ron explained to his puzzled-looking parents. "You two must have heard him a few times."

Mrs. Weasley dabbed at her eyes. "Oh, I suppose so. It was only natural." Hermione heard a snort down the table and glared at Snape. Mrs. Weasley said more loudly, "When I think of the stress that boy was under, knowing Voldemort was back, being ridiculed and slandered, afraid for his life…" She shook her head.

Professor Lupin spoke up, "I always thought Harry kept himself together remarkably well, considering." He ignored Snape's disgust. "Oh, he made some foolish judgments, just like all teenagers, but it takes a strong boy to not fly apart at the seams when his life is constantly in danger, either hated, adored, or feared for things beyond his choice or control, never certain of who he can trust." Snape stiffened at that, and Hermione was surprised. No one had missed the jab.

But more than a few eyes were still watering in the room, and Headmistress McGonagall quickly took control. "We will destroy the Horcrux," she said determinedly. "We will free him."

By that afternoon, Severus felt ready to attempt Occluding Potter's mind against the invading darkness. Moody and the Headmistress accompanied him again, as did the youngest Weasley. Severus did not object to her presence in the room; unlike her brother, she would not panic if things got messy, and unlike Granger, she would not pepper Severus with questions while he was trying to think.

Potter did not get violent this time, although Moody still had to shove him into a chair. Severus and Madam Pomfrey had discussed the boy's condition at length, and were hopeful that the minutes or hours of Occlusion would give Potter's health a chance to recover. On the other hand, that would make dealing with him while he was under the evil's influence much more difficult, the stronger he was.

"I don't know what you're expecting to accomplish," Potter sneered as Severus approached him. He glared over Snape's shoulder at Ginevra Weasley. "Guess I really can't trust anyone."

Severus looked back in spite of himself, and felt his respect for the girl go up another notch when she neither flinched nor looked wounded, but returned Potter's gaze steadily. Minerva was also looking approvingly at the girl, and remarked to Potter, "I think soon you will discover just how many people you can trust, Harry."

The boy snorted. "Look at me," Severus ordered him.

With a heavy sigh, Potter obeyed. "Not like I have a choice, is it?"

"No. Legilimens!"

And corporeal reality fell away. Potter made a weak attempt at Occluding, so that it took Severus roughly five seconds longer to break through than before. Hate sizzled all through the boy's psyche—the majority of it for Snape. It made penetrating his mind easy.

He returned to the place in the core of the boy's thoughts and emotions, where a battle was raging between Potter's soul and an intruding force. This time, he went closer, into the heart of the storm—an apt description. Two different energies, one recognizable as Potter's for the ridiculous goodness and youth it exuded, the other the very essence of evil, seething with a cruelty and malice that made Severus seem innocent by comparison. It was not pleasant to place his own mind in the midst of it.

As pure of heart as one might call Harry Potter, the darker emotions within the boy were present even here. It was those aspects of the boy's persona, the hate and anger he could not or would not stifle, that seemed to be giving the Horcrux footholds into his soul. As with Occlumency, uncontrolled emotion was his failing. It prevented him from blocking intruders into his mind or soul.

Severus would have to show him how.

He had placed his own mental presence directly in the midst of the battle, among and between the souls of two people. They were as different as night and day, but it took all of Snape's will to keep his focus as he was buffeted by waves of sheer power. Emotion, magic, life energy, physical energy: the source and essence of life and humanity. At the heart of the battle, it was as if he stood at the center of a cyclone of lightning. It seared, sizzled, and roared, pushed and pulled.

Severus pushed back. He was an eye of calm at the center, calm that spread outward to become a wall, pushing the combating energies apart. Or rather, he calmed the energies here in Potter's soul, helping it to form a barrier against the advancing darkness. The darkness remained within Potter, but it was, at least briefly, separated from Potter's identity. Severus began to rise back up, leading the wall's growth. If this worked, the boy would more or less have a temporary split personality, but so long as the personas controlled his body one at a time, it would be possible to communicate with Potter himself. They could not expel the remainder of the Horcrux from him without his cooperation. It was his own soul, his own life energy, his own magic that would have to be the weapon.

It was exhausting, and Severus badly desired to leave this foreign mind and return to himself, but he forced himself to continue Occluding, building the wall up through Potter's subconscious into the conscious awareness, forcing the two identities apart. By the time he reached the outermost regions of the boy's mind, he felt like a swimmer who had dived deeper and longer than he should, desperate to reach the surface and breath again.

And then it was done. Two identities, two souls now inhabited Harry Potter's body, separate at least temporarily. There was no way to know how long the Occlusion wall would hold, for the evil continued to batter it, trying to break back through and continue its destruction of Potter's soul. But at least for now, they could speak to him.

Severus returned to himself with a gasp, dropping backward to a sitting position on the floor in front of Potter's chair. He heard voices behind him, and shook his head as he tried to get his bearings. Moody was helping him up as someone else came into the room, apparently alerted that Snape had finished.

Blinking wearily, he looked at Potter. The boy was trembling, his head hanging, moaning faintly. From the wrenched way Snape's brain felt, Potter undoubtedly needed to recover himself for a moment. He glanced over his shoulder to see Minerva and the Weasley girl stepping forward, watching Potter intently.

Moody was as well. "Did it work?"

Severus nodded. "I think so. The Occlusion held; they're definitely separate."

"Give him a moment," the Headmistress advised. "It can't have been pleasant."

Potter's eyes were squeezed closed, and he shook his head, badly disoriented. After a few minutes, the trembling stopped, and he began drawing deep breaths of air. And then…

The boy raised his head, and his eyes flew open.

"Bloody hell!" Moody shouted.

Severus reeled back in alarm. Harry Potter's eyes blazed with red.

Oh, shit.

"Well done, Severus," Potter hissed, his voice hoarse and mocking, fraught with madness, his face twisting into an ugly smile. "Very well done!"

There was a thud behind Snape as Ginevra Weasley retreated backwards to press against the opposite wall. The movement attracted the creature's gaze, and his grin widened, baring his teeth. "What's the matter, Ginny? You loved me once. You poured out your soul to me, remember?" His eyes seemed to burn brighter, and Ginevra looked away, her face tight with barely-suppressed panic. "Then again, you've poured your soul out to him too," he—it—observed, tilting its head as though listening to a voice whispering in its ear. "You've loved us both, Ginny. Isn't it a gift to have us both in one handsome body?"

Moody leveled his wand at it. "Shut up!"

The creature with Potter's face merely hissed like a snake and lunged at Snape, laughing. It was a high, cold, cruel laugh, all too familiar to Severus. It froze him completely.

"STUPEFY!"

A Stunner from Moody missed and hit the wall, but the one from Minerva's wand caught Potter in the chest, throwing him backwards against the wall to drop limply to the floor. Severus stared at the crumpled, unconscious figure, breathing heavily. He could hear more ragged breathing behind him.

Moody turned the boy over, satisfying himself that he was well Stunned, then looked back at them. Minerva still had not lowered her wand, and Ginevra Weasley remained pressed against the opposite wall, her jaw set as if holding in nausea.

Moody raised his eyebrows at Severus.

"Well. That didn't go quite right, did it?"

To be continued…

Coming next week: Snape managed to separate theVoldemort's lingering evilfrom Harry—but the evil has taken control! Our heroes struggle to come to terms with the danger the monster within Harry poses, and with their own inner demons, and Snape battles within his mind to bring back the Harry everyone knows and loves in Chapter Six: Through The Looking Glass!

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