Remus looked down at the cryptic note he had received once more before shrugging his shoulders and saying the word to activate the portkey, not surprised when he ended up at what appeared to be Snape manor. Poppy had been keeping him filled in on his godson's progress and he had expected a summons after he had heard the press conference.
He walked up to the massive doors and knocked hesitantly. He had never been to Snape manor before but the building could be nothing else. It looked exactly how he had always envisioned Snape's family home—wealthy but not ostentatious. An impeccably dressed house elf opened the door and ushered him into the library where he saw his godson and his lover, Snape, Malfoy, Hermione and Ron awaiting him, books spread throughout the room.
"You came," Tallis said with open happiness and relief. He didn't give him a hug but his joy at his arrival and the lopsided grin was enough for Remus.
He smiled down at him, looking at the mounds of books that surrounded Tallis as he sat on the floor in front of the fireplace. "What are you doing?" he asked, settling down near him and Bill on the floor, not bothering to pull up a chair.
"Research. We've decided to make a golem and I've never done one before. Have you?" Tallis asked, impatiently brushing his hair back off his face again. Bill reached over and tied it back for him, earning him a smile of thanks.
"I've done it a few times but never for as long as you are going to, if I understand correctly. I've never had to make one as realistic as you either," Remus explained, gearing up for a long explanation.
Hermione grabbed a fresh tablet and pen and settled down next to Remus, ready to take notes.
"We could all sit on chairs," Draco reminded them.
"This is better," Tallis said, still flipping through some books even as he waited for Remus' explanation. "You can spread more books out like this."
Draco rolled his eyes and pulled his seat closer, Ron and Severus following suit.
"Tell us," Hermione demanded.
"Well, the best guide I've ever found for it is Ahmad ben Ismail's book."
"Supernatural Life?" Tallis asked, rooting through the books to find that one.
"It is better translated as Unnatural Animation. Have you read that yet?"
"I've been struggling with the translation."
"It is difficult since most of the words have multiple meanings. You need to understand the literal meaning as well as the implied meanings and to do that you need to understand the culture and the shifts in meanings and usages of the words that have occurred over the past centuries. As you can see with the title, the word that he uses can be simultaneously translated as 'life' and as 'animation' but the meaning that he intended was 'animation.' At the time, an entirely different word was used for 'life' that fell out of usage about two centuries after he wrote this book. The translation that you used was relying on the modern words, not the seventh century ones."
"I see. The same with 'unnatural,' I suppose?"
"Somewhat. That is more of a culture change than a word change though. 'Supernatural' implies something that is out our realm of understanding and knowledge. 'Unnatural' implies something that is against Nature herself. Ben Ismail saw such creations as movements against Nature, a creation of artificial life that was a mockery of true life. He pursued his studies further than anyone else ever has, before or since, in an effort to understand how to better create an imitation of life."
"I see," Tallis murmured, looking at the book with new eyes.
"You need to always keep in mind his constant fear of this power as well as his desire to learn more. He was fascinated by the ability to create a simulacrum of life but he also recognized the fact that as a mortal man he should not have the ability to create life in this manner. He believed that he was siphoning the ability from God himself rather than from his own reserves. As such he was filled both with the heady feeling of power and the terror that he would be punished for his audacity."
"I see," Tallis repeated. "So when he talks about gathering the power from elsewhere he was speaking of his own beliefs instead of literally?"
"Precisely. You will gather your power from within yourself. He believed that if he reached deeply enough that he would reach the heavens and pull from a higher being. It was undoubtedly the struggle that he faced with coming to terms with his own immense power that he seemed to have difficulty tapping into with regularity. His natural skill must have been in this branch of magic, making it easier for him to access his full power while performing this class of spells. Because he couldn't access it doing other types of spells he believed that the magic was not his own."
"Fascinating," Tallis murmured. "The twelve small fires?"
"Mmm…better understood as bowls of incense. He assumes that you will know that you need to purify the room in order to call forth a golem."
"You say 'call forth' and not create?"
"Well, you are in truth doing something that is in between the two. You are not strictly creating the golem but you are also not entirely calling it into being from another realm. You are doing both at the same time in a way. The being will feed off of your magic while it is here but it is not entirely created by you alone."
"So the more powerful you are the better representation you will be able to make?" Severus confirmed.
"Yes. We are all able to call into being the same life force but we are not all able to sustain it or to mold it into a believable representation. I can only create a golem that looks like a person, I cannot provide enough power or control to make it speak or think like a person and I cannot hold it for more than a few hours. I believe that Tallis will be able to hold a nearly perfect golem for a week or so."
"You really only need it to be perfect for a day or two. Then you can pull back some, giving it just enough power to sustain it's existence," Hermione reminded Tallis. Her unspoken words were understood by all. After a matter of hours the golem would be dead or else beaten into a nearly unconscious state. It would no longer matter if the golem could truly speak and act like Harry since it probably wouldn't be capable of speech.
"That is true as well," Remus agreed. "You will need something of Harry's to bind the golem to his form. Something very personal and important. Do you have something you can give up? It will be completely destroyed in the process."
Tallis nodded slowly. "Yes, I can find something."
"Would it be possible for Tallis to siphon some excess power from us to help to maintain his levels?" Bill asked.
Remus looked thoughtful for a moment. "I never thought of that. I've never tried to combine the two spells. Theoretically it should work."
"I should be fine," Tallis argued. "I don't want to tire you all out either."
"I know you have more than enough power to do it on your own but can you maintain it, possibly for a week or two?" Bill countered. "Can you do that and appear in public?"
"We'll be on holiday," Tallis argued back. "It won't matter."
Severus cleared his throat. "Although you will not need to be teaching classes or actively present at Hogwarts you will still need to appear in public a few times. We still need to keep it firmly established in everyone's minds that you are not Harry Potter. If you disappear at the same time that he goes home then they will start to doubt you if Dumbledore brings it up in a trial. He is no doubt hoping to use this as further evidence for his side in case people don't believe him. We need to head that possibility off."
"Oh. I guess you're right. We won't really know how draining it is until we do it though, will we?"
"I'll look into the theory just in case," Hermione said, jotting down a few more notes. "That way we'll be ready if we do need it."
"In the meantime, reread that book keeping our conversation in mind," Remus told Tallis. "If you have any questions come talk to me and we'll work through it. I'm not certain I ever attained a perfect translation but talking through it might help us to stumble onto the true meaning."
The group sat quietly reading for a bit before the silence was broken hesitantly by Hermione. "Can we talk about what happened in the Great Hall yet?"
"No," Tallis said immediately and coldly without looking up from his book.
"Relax, mate, she's only trying to help," Ron said.
Tallis shrugged his shoulders and grabbed another book, still refusing to look up.
"Please Tallis. You need to talk about it, about what happened and what you did. You can't lock your feelings up on this. I don't understand—"
"What part of 'no' confused you?" Tallis snapped.
"Fuck you. We need to talk about it!" Ron snapped back, temper flaring.
Tallis finally looked up, his eyes blazing dangerously. "Fine. When every single member of your family has died and you are all alone in the world, come back and talk to me about how it felt to watch your last remaining relative die."
Ron was completely taken aback. "I…I…" he stuttered, trying to get a grip on what to say. "I'm sorry mate. I don't know what was wrong with me. You don't have to talk about anything. I'm sorry. I'm sorry."
Tallis stared at him, the fire still visible in his eyes, completely undiminished. He forcefully turned himself away from his friends and focused on his books again to calm himself.
Severus stood from his chair and walked over, placing his hand on his son's shoulder. He glared the rest of the people from the room, knowing that he needed to deal with this. Tallis was burying himself in another research project to deal with his emotions rather than facing them head on. While the research project did need to happen this needed to be dealt with first.
When the door closed firmly behind them he sat down on the floor next to Tallis. "Find anything good?" he asked lightly.
Tallis shrugged his shoulders, fully aware of what his Father was trying to do.
"I think you're making some headway with that book of yours."
"I don't have to talk about this, you know," Tallis said defensively. "I'm doing fine."
"Of course you are," Severus soothed him. "I don't mean to imply that you aren't. I'm just thrown a bit is all. It's strange to realize that you were dead." Severus prayed that his son didn't see past the ploy and refuse to talk to him. He hoped that if Tallis thought that he was the one who needed to talk that he might actually get some of his emotions out rather than locking them back up.
Tallis looked up at him, searching his eyes deeply. "Are you ok?" he finally whispered.
Severus shrugged himself, then nearly smiled. He had never noticed before now that he did that. Guess that was where Tallis got the damnable habit from. "I don't really remember anything. I just remember a cold blankness and then a strong call to return. That's it."
Tallis nodded solemnly. "It wasn't very long. It felt like eternity but it wasn't long," he repeated, reassuring himself as much as his Father with the words.
"Bill told me it wasn't. He thought I was truly gone."
Tallis' fingers nervously paged through the book although his eyes were not taking in a single word. "You were," he finally whispered. "I felt for your soul. It had left me." He sat quietly for a moment. "You left me," he said so softly Severus had to strain to hear him although he sat only a few feet away from him.
"I didn't mean to, Tallis. You know that, don't you?"
"You shouldn't have gone. You shouldn't have tried to fight him."
"He would have found me even if I were sitting up at the head table with you, Tallis."
"Well maybe you shouldn't have gone to the damn feast to begin with!" Tallis snapped, finally raising his voice.
"We never thought I would be the one in danger," Severus said reasonably, not rising to the bait and snapping back. "We were all convinced that if he attacked anyone it would be you."
"Well that was fucking stupid then, wasn't it?" Tallis yelled, tossing the book aside. "You and Draco were the only ones in any danger. He doesn't have a damn clue who I am. Why did you go to the feast?" he yelled, fighting back tears.
Severus felt helpless in the face of his son's rage and soul deep pain. "We didn't know. I'm sorry. I can't do any better than that, Tallis. I'll be more careful in future. I promise you, I won't leave you again." He pulled Tallis to him, hugging him tightly. Tallis fought the grip wildly, punching his broad chest as hard as he could given his Father's firm grip.
"You left me alone, just like them. You made me love you and then you left me." He finally broke down sobbing, giving up his token fight against his Father's embrace.
Severus stroked his hair softly, trying to calm him down. "I'm sorry, Tallie. I won't leave you alone again. You're my son—my family—I'll always be with you, I won't ever leave you," he said, trying to comfort his hysterical son. "I'm so sorry."
Tallis' sobs finally lessened and he leaned into the warm embrace. "What did I do?" he said softly, his voice muffled against Severus' chest.
"I don't know," Severus said equally quietly. "I believe that you have tapped into either a dead branch of magic or else an unknown one. What you did was like some form of necromancy but it lacked every single characteristic of the Dark arts."
"Are you sure?"
"Absolutely. If you had truly used necromancy then I wouldn't truly be here—there would just be an animated shell lacking my true soul. I would no longer have a pulse or a beating heart. I would be one of the walking dead. It is very clear that whatever you did, it was not necromancy."
Tallis gave a sigh of relief but he still refused to look up. "I thought that maybe I had used them. The Dark arts. I thought maybe I used them without meaning to."
"No son, I'm quite certain that you are safe on that account."
"Do they all hate me now?" Tallis asked, looking warily toward the door.
"If they do then they don't deserve you," Severus said firmly. "They had no right to pressure you about talking about anything. You'll tell us more when you are ready to."
"More?"
Severus faltered for a moment. "Someday you may wish to tell us what the magic felt like—what it felt like you were doing, if it felt any different from any other magic you have used, how you accessed it…there are still a lot of unanswered questions. I'm in no rush to find out the truth though. We'll do this on your schedule or not at all."
Tallis nodded gratefully. "Thanks dad. Sorry about…well, about before. I didn't mean to hit you."
Severus shrugged. "I understand. Are you going to be ok though? Are we better now—you and I?"
Tallis nodded slowly. "I'm not sure why I was mad at you. I know it wasn't your fault. I just…I was scared. I was so scared."
"I understand, Tallis. I felt the same way when I brought you home. I didn't think you would ever wake, or if you did that you would ever be the same. I was terrified."
"I'm sorry," Tallis said softly, wringing his hands once more.
Severus bit back a sigh. Damn it, he was usually better about editing his words near his son, or at least wording things more carefully so his meaning was clear to Tallis. "You weren't any trouble at all, Tallis," he said, going immediately to the root of his son's fears.
Tallis looked up hesitantly, his fear evident. "Was it very bad?"
"It was fine, Tallis. It was actually nice in a way, getting to see a bit of what you were like as a child." Tallis shuddered involuntarily. Severus hurried to clarify. "I got to spend the day with you as a relatively carefree six year old. The rest of the time you were an ocelot but I will still treasure those few hours I got to catch a glimpse of what I missed."
"You didn't miss much," Tallis said quietly, studying his hands intently.
Severus grasped his chin firmly and tilted his head up to look him in the eyes. "What I missed I will never forgive myself for. I was a complete failure as an even remotely competent adult who should have noticed the signs and as a Father who never should have left you in their care to begin with. I am trying to redeem myself now but I fear I can never undo the hurt I did to you by my actions toward your mother. But for my careless words that last night with her, you could have been mine and I could have raised you at the manor."
Tallis scootched closer to his Father once more. "It wasn't your fault—any of it. Mum should have told someone. She shouldn't have kept it from me and she certainly shouldn't have kept it from you. I don't really blame her either since she surely couldn't have known how it would all turn out. It's just…it's nobody's fault. No one had any control in it, aside from Dumbledore. We're together now and you're not leaving again," he said, once again reassuring himself of his Father's presence as he looked down at his Father's potion stained fingers, staring to feel that the world was righting itself again.
Severus wrapped his arms around his son tightly, pulling him into his side. They sat together in silence for a long while, simply watching the flames dance in the fireplace. "I love you too," Severus finally said quietly. Tallis smiled softly and leaned more heavily into his Father, closing his eyes to rest.