Harry was not the only one to notice that a change had come over Hermione. Ron spent the better part of Slughorn's potions class staring at her, and Harry saw several other spellbound pairs of eyes following her as well. Even Draco seemed unable to keep his glance away from her, but for once, there was no malice in his eyes as they lingered on her. She was different, somehow, and suddenly disturbingly beautiful. There was a faraway look in her eyes, and a slight flush on her cheeks. She had abandoned every attempt at taming her wild hair, and it flowed freely over her shoulders. Harry thought to himself that she didn't look like a schoolgirl anymore; there was something about her that was new, sensual, and curiously mesmerizing.

Even Slughorn's glance rested thoughtfully on her for a moment, before turning hastily away. Hermione seemed oblivious to curious eyes; she carried out her assigned tasks mechanically, lost in some secret daydream, and gave an indifferent shrug when her potion began to smoke a little.

"Hermione, you forgot to add the hyacinth."

Hermione? Since when did Draco use her first name, and since when did he offer to help her with potions? But Hermione simply took the flower Draco held out to her, dropped it in her cauldron and kept stirring, apparently unaware that something extraordinary had happened.

At Harry's side, Ron had given up on his potion. He just stood there, looking at Hermione and crumbling a dried hyacinth between his fingers, grinding it into a fine, blue dust. Slughorn noticed, but after a glance at Ron's face, he merely walked by in tactful silence and offered a few words of advice to Seamus instead.

"You all right, Ron?" Harry whispered.

"Dunno." Ron's voice was hoarse, and Harry couldn't quite read the expression on his friend's freckled face, something like exasperation, or longing-?

"She's changing." Harry had to lean closer to hear Ron's soft whisper. "Everyone's changing, have you noticed? Even Snape is different these days. I wish I could change, too..."

"I like you the way you are, Ron."

Ron shook his head. "I don't. I'm tired of being me." He threw a few arbitrary ingredients carelessly into his potion, and the ensuing explosion kept the boys busy mopping up acrid blue liquid till the end of the class period.

"Harry, I have a message for you from Professor Snape." Slughorn stopped them on their way out the door. "He wishes to see you in his office right after this class."

A shadow of a familar grin passed over Ron's face. "What have you done this time, Harry?"

Harry thought about it for a moment. He honestly couldn't remember. Oh well. "Don't know," he said lightly. "I'm sure he'll tell me. See you when I'm done with detention."

...

"Have a seat, Harry." Snape's voice was unexpectedly gentle. Harry? What happened to Potter, and the tone of icy contempt that Snape usually reserved just for him?

Perhaps Ron was right. Perhaps something was happening to Snape; perhaps he was under some kind of spell.

"There is something I need to tell you, Harry." Snape's face looked kind, almost human. What had happened to him?

"Harry, there is something Dumbledore has been keeping from you. Something I think you should know." Snape hesitated for a moment. "Harry, have you ever heard of horcruxes?"

Harry listened in silence as Snape explained, as gently as possible, about Voldemort's horcruxes, about the fragments of the Dark Lord's soul left behind to dwell in earthly objects each time he committed a new murder. And Harry understood that it had to be true; he had seen the piece of dark soul that lived in the diary, and he had seen Dumbledore's blackened hand, destroyed by something powerful and evil... And Snape told him that there were other horcruxes as well: Something of Hufflepuff's, something of Ravenclaw's, Slytherin's locket, and possibly the serpent Nagini.

"But why... Why didn't Dumbledore tell me any of this before?" He looked at Snape in bewilderment. "How can I destroy these horcruxes if I don't even know what they are?"

"Oh, Harry." Snape sighed, his lined face looking older all of a sudden. " Harry, the headmaster wanted you to discover these things gradually, to adjust to the thought of destroying horcruxes before..."

"Before what?"

Snape was silent for a moment. Then he said, softly: "Before discovering that there is one last horcrux, Harry. The secret horcrux that the Dark Lord himself may not know. Dumbledore believes that he created it accidentally, the night your parents were murdered, that a part of his dark soul lives on in the only human being left alive that night..."

It took a moment for Harry to understand. But then the truth hit him, an icy stab to his heart. He did not speak after that, or cry, or give voice to the agony that was shredding his very being to pieces. He simply sat there, looking at Snape.

There was a glitter in Snape's eyes, as if there were tears hiding there. "I am so terribly sorry, Harry," he whispered. "I know this must be extremely painful for you. But I thought - I thought you needed to know. The headmaster, you see, has planned this out: He wants you to destroy the horcruxes one by one, until only one remains: You. And then he hopes that you will go to meet Voldemort and let him kill you... But I want you to have a choice. You deserve to have a say in the matter, Harry."

Dumbledore wants me to die... Harry's thoughts whirled as the last remnants of the fabric that had been his reality unraveled. Dumbledore planned my death all along. I am a horcrux. I am Voldemort; I am his soul. Why did I not see that till now? In my dreams, I have seen through his eyes, and in my waking hours, I have felt his joy, his fear, his anger, as if his emotions were mine. All these years, I have fought against the dreaded Dark Lord, and I never knew that he was me. The evil I feared was not outside me, but within.

He got up, slowly. "Thank you for telling me, Professor Snape." He walked towards the door.

"Harry!" Snape hurried after him. "Harry, are you all right? I know that this must have come as a terrible shock to you..."

"I suppose." Harry wanted to get away from Snape all of a sudden, to abandon himself to the pain that was screaming in him, away from Snape's eyes. "I always though Dumbledore loved me..." He couldn't keep his voice from trembling.

There was a strange expression in Snape's black eyes as he said, softly: "The headmaster does not know anything about love, Harry."

...

Harry waited in bed until midnight. He listened to the regular breathing of the sleeping boys around him. Ron was moaning in the bed next to him; apparently he was dreaming again.

Harry wondered if he should bring a flashlight. No, no light; there was a comfort to the darkness.

He felt his way down the stairs from Gryffindor Tower, along familiar corridors, until he reached the stairs for the astronomy tower. Tonight, I will kill Voldemort, destroy a piece of his soul. Surely, Ron and Hermione will be able to find the other horcruxes. Perhaps Neville will be the new Chosen One.

A sudden sob tore through him at the thought of his friends. His friends... But no, he was no longer one of them; he was separated from them by the terrible knowledge of who he was. Of what he was. There was only one way out.

Harry sensed a sudden fear, but it seemed to come from somewhere far away, to belong to someone other than himself. Somehow, it did not concern him. He found his way up the dark, winding staircase, up to the top of the tower. He welcomed the icy kiss of the night air against his burning face. There were no stars in the inky sky above him, no sound, no wind. Just darkness. He felt his way in the dark until he touched the rough stones of the battlements. The agony that was tearing his very soul apart seemed to lessen as he hauled himself up on the edge. He tried to look down, but there was nothing to see, just blackness. The dark abyss seemed strangely comforting. It would be fast; he would feel nothing as he dashed against the ground hundreds of feet below. It would be over, mercifully over.

Strangely calm, he reached out for the darkness below and let himself fall into it. No fear, no terror, just a sudden rush of wind against his body.

But a cry rang out, somewhere nearby. And before Harry understood what was happening, he felt himself slowing down, midair. Something was breaking his fall, no, someone... He found himself swept up in a pair of strong arms. He was no longer falling, but flying, held tenderly by someone he couldn't see. And he heard a voice speaking to him out of the night: "I will not let any harm come to you. You are precious to me, for now I can feel what you are. You are my very self, my soul..."

The tenderness of the stranger's voice made something break in Harry's heart, and he felt all his icy resolve vanish in an instant. He began to cry, and found he could not stop. And the stranger held him while he cried, cradling him gently, like a child, as they moved through the air. It must have felt like this when his mother held him, long ago.

When he had cried himself out, the stranger lowered him softly to the ground. Harry held on to the stranger's cloak, suddenly terrified of being alone again, of losing the comfort of the stranger's arms.

"Don't leave me." His whisper was almost inaudible, but the stranger heard him anyway. Harry felt himself folded in a gentle embrace, and a voice whispered in his ear: "I will never leave you. But you need to rest now. Where shall I take you?" The voice was silent for a moment. Then the stranger said quietly: "Perhaps it is best to take you back to Gryffindor Tower. But you need to tell me how to get in."

Harry suddenly realized that he felt tired to the bone. "Past the portrait of the Fat Lady," he whispered sleepily, nestling into the stranger's arms.

A soft laugter in the dark. "No, I don't think I can enter that way. Too many protective charms and spells. But if you will just tell me the password, I can work some magic of my own..."

And a few minutes later, thanks to the secret Gryffindor password, a few odd spells in a language Harry didn't recognize, and a mysterious stranger who could fly, Harry entered his dormitory through the window. He found his bed in the dark, and sank exhausted into it.

"Don't go away," he whispered into the night. And a soft voice spoke beside him: "I will be right here with you, the whole night. And every night after that if you want me to."

Harry reached out and found the stranger's arms. He curled up against the unknown body, feeling warm and tired. "But what if someone finds you here?" he asked sleepily. "You are not supposed to be here, are you?"

"Oh, they won't see me. No one will wake up till the morning; I have seen to that." A hand stroked Harry's hair gently. "You won't see me in the morning, when it's light, but I will be here every night if you need me. I will never let any harm come to you."

Comforted, Harry closed his eyes and slept. For the first time in months, he didn't have any nightmares. Instead, he dreamed of being carried through the air by an angel.