Disclaimer; I don't own any of the intellectual property rights to the characters within.
Since he linked to me, I'll return the favor. Everyone should go check out Kinsfire's latest story that he's writing for NaNoWriMo. It's called "Burning Day" and it looks to be an excellent addition to his catalogue.
I'm not nearly as happy with this chapter as I am with the others, but it sets up a few things for later in the story so I just had to grin and bare it.
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Just before noon the morning after the battle, Severus Snape stumbled into Hogwarts' Hospital Wing. In addition to the broken left arm from being used as a club and the minor cuts from exploding trees, the Dark Lord had chosen to make his displeasure known quite forcefully. It was a sure sign of Voldemort's anger when he stopped using the cruciatus. With the torture curse, there was only pain, and no physical damage. When the curse stopped, so did the pain, but when Voldemort was truly angry he made sure that the pain stuck with you. Right now Severus had a flesh eating curse on each of his feet. The dark curse would slowly make his flesh rot and fall away until it was stopped, causing immense pain the entire time. The points behind casting them on his feet were to make moving painful and slowly devour him starting with non-vital parts to prolong the experience. The potions to remove the curse and reverse the damage were no problem for Snape, but they took time to brew. He would have to live with the pain for at least another day.
Poppy Pomphrey was able to patch up his arm and the cuts and scratches with ease. She gave him a potion for the pain and listened intently to his instructions about what materials he would need for his potions. Snape was determined that as soon as his arm was solid again, he would brew the potions to rid himself of the curse from his bed in the Hospital. It would mean he was under the fussy Matron's eye longer than absolutely necessary, but he really did not want to walk to the dungeons on feet that were only half there. It was not long before Snape fell into an exhausted sleep.
When he woke up late in the afternoon, he found Albus Dumbledore sitting in a purple leather wingback chair beside him. The aged Headmaster was absorbed in a book and had apparently not noticed that his colleague and spy had awoken. It was only after Snape finished drinking a second pain potion and set the empty vial on the tray beside his bed that Albus closed his book.
"I am glad to see you are still with us Severus. After your signal last night, I was very worried that you didn't return." Dumbledore said with a look of sympathy on his face. "Poppy tells me that you were in pretty bad shape when you arrived."
Snape nodded but did not say anything.
"I understand your hesitancy to speak with me right now, but I must ask. Is your position as a spy for the light compromised?"
"No, something else upset him last night." Snape told him.
Mentally, Dumbledore breathed a sigh of relief. "What happened last night? You signaled an emergency but the Order saw no sign of trouble last night. Was it a false alarm?"
"No, it was no false alarm," Snape said with an odd look in his eyes. "The Dark Lord lost almost half his army last night."
"How? There was has been fighting reported anywhere in Britain in the last week. If something big is happening I need to know about it." Dumbledore pressed.
"I can't say."
"Severus, I need to know."
"You don't understand, I really can't tell you. He'll kill me if I tell you!" Snape grabbed Dumbledore by the front of his robes with the strength of a man possessed.
"Severus, calm down. You know I am discreet with the information you give me. Voldemort will never know that you have told me whatever it was that happened." Dumbledore cast a slight cheering charm on the unsettled Potions Master to help him regain control.
"He'll know. I'm not worried about…" Snape suddenly changed direction entirely. "I just can't tell you, I'm sorry. When was the last time you went by Godrics Hollow by the way?"
Dumbledore frowned in thought. "I haven't been back there since the Potters died. Does this have anything to do with last night?"
"No, nothing at all Sir. If you'll excuse me, I have some potions to prepare so I can get back on my feet." Snape smiled when the Headmaster walked away thinking. He got his message across without breaking his word. The oath wasn't magically binding, but if he told Albus the change in attitude towards Potter would be a dead giveaway. Then after Potter talked his way out of it, Snape knew he would be dragon dung. It was far safer to send the old man to his doom completely unaware.
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Harry had been working hard all day. When he woke up after the battle, Harry immediately started the cleanup efforts. Following his master's instructions, Harry levitated the bodies and dismembered parts down into the cellar of the former Potter house. He would need them later when he started studying the undead and other aspects of necromancy, but did not want them rotting all over his front lawn. He stacked them in the cellar and cast a stasis charm on the room before sealing the cellar with a colloportus.
He couldn't do anything to repair the trees, nor the slowly cooling lake of fire. The tree trunks he levitated out into the plain before the Tower. They could be used to target practice or a source of transfiguration material. He took two of the trees over to the lake of fire and began to transfigure a bridge to cross the seven meter gap. There was no real purpose behind the bridge, but this was also supposed to be Harry's spell practice for the day too and so far it was just moving stuff around. It was quickly obvious that Harry did not know the first thing about building a bridge. His first two attempts were too short or too fragile. When he lowered them into place, the first one just fell and broke the thin crust of thin rock before bursting into flames. The second was long enough but snapped in the middle and it too caught fire and burned.
Harry was standing on the edge, watching the fires crackle and pop when a sharp crack drew his eyes to the opposite shore. Standing across the patch of scorching hot rock, Albus Dumbledore and his phoenix companion Fawkes had just apperated in. Fawkes sang a few bars of phoenix song and swooped down to bask in the flames and hot rock. Harry looked a Dumbledore with a calculating stare. How should he handle this? What had Snape told him? When Dumbledore started to close the gap, Harry raised his hand to stop him. He decided to pretend nothing at all was off.
"You don't want to do that Sir." Harry yelled to him. "There was a slight magical accident and the black rock is still very hot."
Dumbledore walked around the hot patch and looked at the state of the Hollow. From this vantage point, the approach to the Tower was clear. Dumbledore looked the Tower over with an appraising eye. Through years of practice he could see that it was built with magic but the exact process eluded him for the moment.
"It's good to see you sir. Why don't we go inside and I'll get you a drink before we talk about whatever brought you here. My err, instructor insists that I always have a few bottles of good red wine available for when he is here." Harry motioned for the aged headmaster to precede him through the forest of stumps.
"Happy Birthday Harry, I see you've been practicing." Dumbledore's eye gave an annoying twinkle as he waved his hand idly at the stumps.
"Well I've been thinking about putting in a garden soon. I just had to clear some space for my potions ingredients and other plants." Harry explained.
"And naturally you practiced your explosion and bone breaking spells on the trunks." Dumbledore nodded.
"Exactly," Harry confirmed.
Suddenly Dumbledore stopped and looked very cautious. He pulled his wand and waved it in a sweeping arc. Suddenly the area atop the hill lit up with the after images of the curses that had impacted last night. A variety of colors and intensities shone forth.
"It happened here," Dumbledore murmured to himself. His head turned to give Harry a speculative look. "The Dark Lord was here last night."
Harry just nodded, immensely grateful that he had removed all the bodies already.
Dumbledore stooped to place his fingers over a patch of bloodstained grass. "Something unspeakably evil was here. The earth is scorched but the blood remembers the one who spilled it."
"Can you think of a better way to describe Voldemort sir? There are a few secrets I am honor bound to keep, but I can safely say that my instructor and I were able to repel him." Harry decided to cooperate but tread lightly around his Headmaster.
"No, this doesn't feel like Tom. I felt him at the ministry, he has changed from when he was young, but whatever this was had no hope at redemption. What aren't you telling me?"
"Considering you haven't even asked me what happened, a lot. They came just after midnight, arriving almost in the same place you did. There were around seventy or eighty people here last night. They tore through my forest making an awful racket and I fought them from atop the tower," Harry pointed up at the Tower where some spells had scarred the magically strengthened rock. "I held them at bay for a while before my mentor and I repelled them. I can't tell you how exactly, that's one of those things, but we're both quite alright."
"I see. Harry surely this shows you that you are not safe here. Come along and we'll take you to your relatives." Dumbledore sighed dramatically.
"Actually I think it proves I am quite safe here. I'm still alive and my home is still standing after all."
"But the wards at your relatives' home will protect you better." Dumbledore insisted.
"Remind me again about these wards. They are impenetrable so long as I can call my Aunt's house home right?" Harry asked politely, refusing to get worked up.
"That's right, no one wishing to do you harm will be able to enter the property."
Harry developed a pensive expression. "Unless they were already living there that is. My relatives never had any problems with the wards. Besides, there are two very important reasons that I can see why that won't work. Firstly my relatives told me very clearly that I was no longer welcome in their home. Secondly, I have my own home now. Since I cannot call it my home, I'd be shocked if the wards were still there at all."
"Oh Harry…" Dumbledore said sadly. "I fear you have no idea the amount of trouble this will bring. We'll have to make other arrangements for your safety now."
"How about right here?" Harry asked. "If you could do me a favor and put a Fidelis charm on my tower, no one will be able to find me. If you cast the charm I can be my own secret keeper and then I'll be perfectly safe."
"We can't just leave you alone Harry. It wouldn't be safe. You are still so young."
"Sir, I ran my Aunt's house since I was old enough to take orders. I cook, clean, and maintain everything here already. My mentor has arranged for lessons in the evenings, but even with my responsibilities I have more freedom than ever before."
"I wish Harry, truly I do, that you would have had a better childhood." Dumbledore put his hand on Harry's shoulder in sympathy. "Why don't you tell me about your time here and I'll make up my mind about what I can do to help you."
"Alright, come on inside, if we're going to talk for a while we might as well be comfortable." Harry escorted his Headmaster into the living area on the ground floor of his home and poured him a glass of Raistlin's wine and grabbed a soft drink for himself. Dumbledore examined the front room with interest. The furniture was simple but comfortable and the decorations sparse. Settling into a chair near Dumbledore, Harry began his account. "The first couple days were tough, my parents home was in very bad shape. I don't think anyone ever tried to stop it from falling apart, but that's understandable with my relatives. Eventually I built this tower and salvaged what I could to make it livable. Once I had a place to live, it was all down hill from there. I go into town for groceries or company every few days. There is a nice old man in the park there who fought in the Great War, we talk or play chess in the park some afternoons. Other than that, I've got lessons in the evenings and an hour or two of work in the mornings."
"I'm glad everything has been going well. So what have you been learning in your lessons?" Dumbledore asked politely.
"I've been learning a lot more about this power of mine. It's really just a different way to use magic, and it all builds on itself. With a gesture I can make a small flame; that is a very simple spell. Just a little more complicated, but still fairly similar to the first, is a spell I can use to light my hands on fire without being burned. Another step up in the same vein, just a little more complicated, creates a small ball of flame a few feet across that I can control from a distance. Last week I took the next step in this progression. Now I can cast an explosive ball of fire over a hundred meters."
"It can't all be about fire, have you learned anything else?"
"Oh sure," Harry muttered something under his breath and an invisible minion brought him another soda. "I can do illusions much better now without a wand than I can with. I'm currently researching a spell to make me invisible and another to let me see the invisible. Learning both opposites is supposed to make it a little easier. I've also learned how to see magic, a spell to read other languages, one to protect my mind, and another to make me invisible to divination magic. The most useful spell I've learned is also one of the simplest. It can clean, heat, cool, levitate, join, flavor, and color anything I might want. It is the basis for almost our entire charms curriculum. The root from which wand magic grew if you want to call it that. The downside is that it takes a lot longer to cast a single spell and if I get distracted the magic can backfire with unpredictable results."
"Fascinating, really it is. You've mentioned your instructor or mentor several times now. I can assume that he does not wish to be named correct?" Harry nodded and gestured for him to continue. "Well may I at least ask how you met him? That has been bugging me since you first mentioned him. You were the first person I knew of able to perform magic in this way and now just over a month later someone who is skilled enough to teach others has appeared from nowhere."
Harry smiled, a predictable question. Dumbledore needed to know the allegiance of this mystery man but didn't want to ask outright. "As you said in my first year; we kept everything that happened a secret, so naturally everyone knew. Before I had even left Hogwarts, he and I came to an agreement concerning my tutelage."
"And what are your plans concerning your education once September comes again?"
"Actually I was hoping to get some additional tutoring from anyone in the Order who is willing to teach me. I will be returning to Hogwarts, but now that I know the prophecy I must work harder to catch up." Harry snapped his fingers and the invisible servant refilled the Professor's glass.
"The Order will do everything we can to help you Harry." Dumbledore assured him with a sigh of relief. Harry leaving Hogwarts was unthinkable, but there was very little he could do to force the issue without becoming the "bad guy"
The two talked for quite a while, and slowly began to heal the rift of mistrust and anger that had been spawned over the last year. Harry's eyes were open however to Dumbledore's fallibility and couldn't be closed again. In his mind, Dumbledore could be a powerful ally but he could not be allowed control again. He was careful not to say it, but Harry knew that ultimately he would only take orders from himself.
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After their friendly chat was over, Harry had convinced Dumbledore that a Fidelius was the best solution for Harry's safety since he could no longer return to the Dursley home. Dumbledore was unwilling to compromise the Headquarters with the unknown of Harry's mentor, but likewise they could not prevent him from developing what may be the power that ends the war.
They decided to hide everything within the circular hill with the charm. Albus asked Harry to write the secret to be hidden with his own blood on a sheet of parchment. Meanwhile Dumbledore was drawing the ward lines. Harry nicked the inside of his elbow and let a small amount of his blood flow onto a saucer. Picking up the quill he carefully wrote "The Tower of High Sorcery is located in Godrics Hollow" in crisp perfect letters. Dumbledore came back inside and together they climbed the stairs to complete the spell in the open air.
Dumbledore took his wand and traced glowing runes in the air while reciting a sentence in Latin over and over, "Semper paratus fecisti nega!" With a flick of his wand he sent the first rune flying through the air towards the ground below and began the second part of the spell. "Ultra posse nemo obligatur." Finally he took the parchment with the secret and set it ablaze, using his wand to make the ashes circle Harry's head. The next time he took a breath, the ashes entered his lungs with searing heat. Dumbledore surrounded Harry with several threads of magic and thrust the last rune into his chest and finished the spell. "Totum dependeat semper fidelis!" There was a bright flash and Harry felt the magic permeate his being.
"Professor, I might not be great at Latin, but that spell sounded a bit odd."
Dumbledore smiled a bit guiltily. "Well it wasn't invented by the most scrupulous wizards."
"So you're saying the almighty Fidelius charm was created by criminals looking for a place to stash their loot?"
"A place to hide until the aurors went away actually, but you got the point."
Harry escorted Dumbledore back downstairs and over to where Fawkes was still basking in the heat of last night's explosion. "I don't mean to be rude, but it is getting late and I need to make dinner before my lessons. Fawkes, you are welcome to come back any time."
Just as Harry disappeared from sight, hidden by the charm he had just cast, Dumbledore realized something very important. "Harry, you never told me the secret!"
"I'll see you in September Professor!" Harry yelled back with laughter in his voice.
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I case you can't read latin, here's my translation of the "gangsta" version of the Fidelius charm.
Always be ready to deny you did it. No man is obligated beyond his abilities. Let it all hang out, always be faithful. In other words "Admit nothing. Don't do the crime if you can't do the time. Don't rat out your homies."