Remembrance and Renewal by Avatar Arkmage and Nigel Tatsuya
Chapter Three: A Tumultuous Past

Although the full moon was currently at perigee, making it appear roughly 12 larger in the sky, the night was dark for Albus Dumbledore. It seemed as though the moon, which usually reflected about 7 of the sun's rays, had lost its albedo altogether, and that the universe itself had expanded to the point where neighbouring stars could no longer be seen.

Or perhaps it merely felt thus to Albus Dumbledore, as he stood watch over the still form of Harry Potter. Had the wounded boy, or the werewolf asleep on the floor been conscious, they would have marvelled at how the aged headmaster seemed to give off a glow in the near darkness of the hospital wing, as though the man were an extension of the beams of moonlight piercing the room from the Westward facing windows; beams of moonlight the old man himself could not see.

Albus strode to the window facing the East end of the grounds, watching for the first rays of sunlight. In truth, many people throughout his roughly 156 years of life had been like sunlight to him, warming, comforting and nurturing.

One of those people, was Severus Snape. Although many would compare the dour potions master to the destructive dark matter of the universe, Albus had come to love him like a son. He looked anxiously toward the fringes of the Forbidden Forest, hoping to see Severus emerging unharmed. Tired... perhaps, angry..most assuredly.

At best, Albus knew that Severus would return grouchy, though no worse for wear. Often, the potion master would traverse the grounds trembling, a direct result of having the Cruciatus Curse applied to him too often, of for too long. Many times, Albus would have to order him directly to the infirmary; Severus's body badly marked by the signs of a recent beating.

Of late, Severus would return to Hogwarts both beaten and trembling.

There was also that ominous thought that one day Severus might not return at all, as the Cruciatus curse can cause insanity, or in the worst case scenario, death.

Voldemort, who had been merciless to his followers in his first reign, was completely abysmal to them now. When Death Eater raids were anything less than successful, he tortured all of the minions directly responsible. Sometimes, even when the raids resulted in the deaths of all the muggles, and muggle sympathizers in a given town, the Death Eaters were still punished for any infraction Voldemort accused them of, whether real or merely perceived.

Yet Professor Severus Snape rarely failed to bring back valuable information on Voldemort's movements, often resulting in a large number of muggle and half- bloods being spared. That the was sole reason that Albus even allowed the potions master to risk his life at all. A necessary, yet no less painful, evil.

"Severus, my child." Albus mouthed, so as not to rouse the room's occupants. "Please return safely..."

Albus seldom slept on nights when Severus was summoned to the Dark Lord. He would often venture onto the grounds personally to await his return. Occasionally, Albus would end up carrying the potions master back into the castle; the latter being unconscious or too injured to walk.

On many nights, Hagrid would sense something was wrong, and crawl out of bed to help. Dumbledore wondered if Hagrid also stayed awake on the nights Severus was summoned to The Dark Lord.

Dumbledore looked almost wistfully toward the Forest, as though torn on whether he would rather await the return of his son in all but blood there, or to watch over Harry Potter, the hope of all the magical world.

The elderly man turned from the window to face Harry again, and noticed an unearthly effulgence over the boy's body. Whether the illumination could be measured in photons, or was purely visible on another plane of existence, even the aged wizard could not determine. All he could see, was that the dim light seemed to be emanating from Harry's temples and intersecting over his scar.

"Harry?" the Headmaster leaned closer to the boy, who still appeared to be in a deep slumber. "Harry?"


"Harry?" came a baritone voice from behind the boy.

Harry Potter unwillingly turned from his mother's apparition to stare into...his own face! At least that's what he thought at first, until he noticed that the figure seemed somewhat older, and had more angular facial features. His nose was slightly more narrow, and his verdant eyes were conspicuously absent. In its place, were equally bright eyes the colour of hazel. The man's hair looked like Harry's would if he had spent hours of Quidditch practice in a low category hurricane.

"Dad?" Harry said hesitantly, recognizing the face as an older version of the one he had seen inside of Snape's Pensieve.

The apparition seemed to be rendered silent and stared in awe at Harry. Lily's form moved closer and gazed at him with eyes that Harry had seen many times in his own reflection.

"My son." Harry heard Lily's voice at last, but her mouth had not moved.

A flood of unfamiliar images fell upon him like a great wall of water. Vague memories of a red-haired woman singing softly to her infant, his father seating him in a baby swing and pushing it lightly; a green flash... And then...he saw another man, almost in the background of the hazy images. Harry did not recognize him at all, yet he seemed familiar somehow. The man had eyes the colour of the night sky, and flowing, waist length black hair; he was staring sadly at Harry, as his parents pushed him in a carriage along a well kept path in a fragrant park.

Once more the memory of Lily sitting in a hand-fabricated rocking chair materialised, and began singing softly a song that Harry knew was meant especially for him. The phantom Lily presently in front of Harry began singing as well; the same song. Harry remembered all of the words, though the memory had been relegated to obscurity for almost seventeen years.

"Mom!" Harry cried out at last, and dove into the spirit's arms. To Harry's shock, he did not go right through his mother's body as he suspected he might, but instead lulled into her embrace and felt nothing but the purest love.

Harry tried to hold back, but found that he had no control over the deluge that formed behind his eyes, and had weighed him down for nearly sixteen years. He turned to his father and pulled him into his arms as well and cried fervently. If the weight of his own tears had been heavy while he was still encumbered by his flesh, it could not be contained at all now. Harry held his long-missed parents for what seemed like hours, and seconds at the same time; moments lasting the duration of a heartbeat, and a lifetime. All the while, Lily and James held him, both silently expressing their joy at being united with their baby, who had aged 15 years since that horrible night when they were ripped from their lives.

"But..." Harry began, wiping his eyes on the sleeves of his white hospital gown, "...you're both dead, aren't you? Where is this place?"

James sat' next to Harry, although when Harry made to sit as well, he saw that there appeared to be nothing beneath James. Lily sat a short distance away from James, leaving a space between them for Harry.

"Come, son." Lily's voice rang out in Harry's mind again.

Harry mimicked his parents, and found that if had fell back to assume a recumbent position, some unseen force broke his fall and supported him. James and Lily each put an arm around Harry, and sat in silence for a time, as though they were bereft of words.

Harry took the initiative. "Did I...I...I died? I'm with you because I've died?"

"No Harry," came a hearty voice in his mind that he recognized instantaneously. Out of the whiteness in front of him walked Sirius Black, dressed in almost the same clothing Harry had watched him fall through the accursed veil in.

"Sirius!" Harry said, throwing his arms around his godfather and feeling tears forcing their way out of him again.

"If you had died, I'd most certainly have had to kill you!" Sirius said, tousling Harry's hair.

"But..." Harry started when he broke away from the headlock Sirius held him in. "I don't understand, if I'm not dead, and you're not alive..."

"Remember what you were doing before you came here?" James spoke softly.

"Yes," Harry said, cringing from the memories of what he had seen. When Harry looked up, he saw the three adults cringing as well.

"GODS!" Sirius shouted, punching his palm with his other fist. "Snivelly might be a git, but he doesn't deserve that!"

"You can see my thoughts?" Harry asked, trying to push the images of the pressurized hose out of his mind.

"Yes son," Lily stated, rubbing Harry's back. The red-headed woman then turned on Sirius. "And his name is SEVERUS, Sirius!"

Sirius scoffed at that, but his expressions no longer had the same intensity they had when he had been living. "I think you're here because you wanted so badly to escape. You didn't want to watch anymore, I guess. Your spirit just fled."

"Weak, though your body is, you're still alive, Harry. You may return at any time." James said comfortingly.

"How long can I stay?" Harry asked, secretly praying that he could tarry forever with these beings who loved him. Perhaps the only people, besides Hermione and Ron, who had ever loved him.

"We are existing outside of time now, son." James said, but his lips did not move. "You can leave now, or a thousand years from now, and no time will have passed."

The three adults suddenly aged' roughly 15 years. James developed patches of white in his messy black hair, while Lily's hair seemed to lose some of its intensity, and also showed strands of white. Sirius appeared exactly as Harry remembered him in life. The three of them of an age with Professor Lupin and Professor Snape. Harry was startled into silence, but at the same time, was greatly comforted by the older forms.

Even after talking with his parents and Sirius for a considerable amount of time, Harry found the present matters harder and harder to grasp. Lily seemed to sense her son's thoughts. "Spirits are not prisoners of linear time, my son. In life, time moves in an ordered way, a straight line from birth through death."

Harry furrowed his brows, trying desperately to follow.

"But spirits are not bound to that linear path. We stand just outside of it, and can jump onto random points at will. Come..." with that, Lily took hold of Harry's hand, and soon they were standing before two wizards who were busy perusing parchments scattered on the table before them. One, Harry did not recognize at all; but the other, who had long chestnut coloured hair, and the beginnings of a beard in the form of wispy sideburns, also had twinkling blue eyes!

"Albus Dumbledore?" Harry sputtered. "Sorry for intruding on you and uh...uh...Nicolas Flamel?"

"They can't see or hear us." Sirius sighed popping into the room and taking Harry's hand.

The scene changed once more, and Harry realised that he was now in number 12 Grimmauld Place. But the time must have been slightly different, because he saw Remus Lupin seated across from...Sirius Black!

"I tell you, Sirius." Remus said in his familiar hoarse voice, as he shook the liquor bottle before him for emphasis. "It could not hurt for you to try and talk to your mother's portrait once in a while. She might not be so angry..."

"You don't know the woman, Moony!" Sirius retorted, snatching the bottle back, and taking a long swig.

The scene changed on its own, when Harry randomly wondered what Ron would think if he had been here, and he was transported to he burrow, where he saw Ron, the twins, and Ginny flying low on their brooms and tossing a quaffle about.

Naturally, Harry's thoughts wandered to Hermione, who he rarely saw away from Ron during the school year. He was instantly transported to what looked like a muggle library, and a short distance away, Harry saw the bushy-haired girl, seated at a desk amid stacks of texts. Hermione was engrossed in her reading, staring at the pages as though they would run off at the slightest trace of inattention.

Harry thought of how uptight Hermione seemed most of the time, in sharp contrast to another girl, who seemed to express her emotions more freely. Sometimes too freely. This girl knew how to play, as well as work...even if she had the annoying habit of crying whilst engaging in either. Strangely, the delicious smell of almond cookies filled Harry's nostrils. And soon he saw Cho, dressed in a red silk dress with matching red ribbons in her hair, stoking the fires of an old wizarding oven.

"Grandfather!" Cho said, smiling lovingly at the aged wizard, who was skulking ever closer to a plate of almond cookies cooling nearby.

The man, who Harry noted had chestnut brown eyes which twinkled about as much as Dumbledore's usually did, smiled at Cho innocently. When the girl turned away to put the next batch of cookies into the oven, her grandfather swiped two of the cooling cookies and ran off before Cho could react.

Harry felt a certain warmth at seeing Cho with the smile back on her beautiful face, even if it faded soon after. She started sniffling as she closed the oven door. Cho was still grieving. Was she still weeping over Cedric, or perhaps over how badly things had turned out between them?

In flesh, Harry had been too wrapped up in his own problems to be sensitive to the feelings of anyone else. He had sulked nearly all the previous year; spoken harshly to those around him, including his closest friends; and had all but destroyed Headmaster Albus Dumbledore's office in his rage. In spirit however, Harry realized that taking even a few moments to discuss Cedric's death with Cho could have lifted some of the weight from her heart... as well as his.

People needed to grieve, Harry concluded. Even he needed to grieve, many times over, but he had never been allowed that luxury. The Dursleys would have gagged him if he had wept aloud for his parents; and as a teen, he had never allowed himself to think much on his reaction to seeing Cedric Diggory killed right before his eyes. He certainly hadn't allowed himself to grieve the death of his godfather Sirius Black, even though the paralysing and hurtful memory coursed like a scorpion's venom through his bloodstream several times a day.

Harry's mind meandered to some one who had also not been given the opportunity to grieve properly. Neville had never had such a chance. Harry raged. Who had thought that obliviating a child who had lost his parents was a sound means of helping them endure their grief?

Harry was subsequently transported from Cho's sweet smelling kitchen, to Neville Longbottom's proximity shortly thereafter. The boy was almost unrecognizable from the awkward and forgetful boy he had met in their first year. In Neville's eyes, he saw a determination not even Hermione at her most ambitious had rivalled. Due to the stringent rules against underage wizards practising magic away from Hogwarts, Neville could not practice any of the new skills he had learned from the D.A. in the previous year, but that did not seem to hinder him. Harry watched Neville repeatedly going through the motions with an ordinary cylinder of wood, and an arsenal of spells to rival Hermione's.

As the moments flowed by, and Neville's exhaustion began to set in, Harry entertained the thought of having the determined youth lead a few sessions with the D.A. himself. Harry decided then to revive the club in the upcoming school year.

"Professor Snape says that no one ever recovers from being cursed into insanity." Neville shouted as he executed a defensive manoeuver with astounding agility. "The bloody git doesn't know how to stop being so ruddy mean! He'll come to a sticky end someday, mother, father! But I STILLbelieve you both will recover someday."

It was then that Harry noticed a wizard picture sitting on the table next to Neville's dragon hide gloves. It was one of jovial wizard parents with a baby in their arms. The Longbottoms, they had to be.

"Good on you, Longbottom! Don't let Professor Snape tell you otherwise! Professor Snape is nothing more than a..." Harry paused, genuinely wondering why Professor Snape would have ever said such a cruel thing to Neville. No, Harry decided, he already knew the answer. Professor Snape was just a cruel and snarky git by his very nature. Making people who were already distressed feel worse was something the old bat enjoyed.

Harry paused once more. This seemed too cruel, even for Professor Snape somehow. Still, how would he know that no one typically recovered from being cursed to insanity? He was a potions master, after all. What the hell made Snape such an authority on the matter?

As if in reply, Neville's face receded into a highly accelerated blackness, and presently Harry found himself facing a wall which appeared to have been spelled to feel soft to the touch; like a padded cell. From the smells in the air, and the muffled sounds he heard through the nearby door, Harry deduced that he was in Saint Mungos Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries.

Harry turned from the padded wall, and was startled by the black, fathomless eyes of a woman, who seemed to be middle-aged, prematurely aged and very young at the same time. How that was possible, Harry couldn't ascertain. Her ashen skin was smooth, yet riddled with bruises and wounds at varying stages of healing. Some scarring around the woman's left eye made her skin appear more weathered than it actually was. The woman's nose could best be described as hawklike, although it did not detract from the matronly beauty which Harry was sure that no amount of time could fully erase. Yes, there was no other way to describe her than matronly. Her hair was black on first glance, but it luminesced red in the bright lights of the hospital room. Were it not for the occasional strands of white, Harry would have described her hair to be the colour of glowing coals.

Intermittently, the woman's whole body spasmed violently, and Harry was painfully reminded of his days recovering from his first experience with the Cruciatus curse. Could it have happened to this woman also?

Her crystal black eyes drew his attention once more. They were so familiar. Where had he seen such fathomless..?

It was then that Harry noticed a boy, either in late adolescence or early adulthood, seated on the floor beside the woman's wheelchair. The boy, whose almost waist-length hair was black and glossy, rested his head in the gaunt woman's lap.

"I'm so sorry, mother..." The boy began, his voice muffled partially by the fabric of the woman's robes. "I've failed you."

The voice sounded very familiar.

"Mother?" the boy said, looking up into the woman's blank face.

Although spirits could fly, levitate, or apparate at will, Harry lost his footing and fell on his backside when he saw the boy's face. It was the same face he had seen in Professor Snape's pensieve. This was indeed Severus Snape. He seemed to be a few years older than when Harry had seen him in the pensieve; on that fateful day on Hogwart's grounds, when Harry's father and friends had scorned and humiliated him. But it was young Severus Snape's hair that garnered a fair portion of Harry's attentions. If Snape's hair had been greasy both in Harry's present, and the past he had seen in the pensieve, not a vestige of said grease remained. Instead, Severus's hair was so clean that it appeared almost iridescent, and reflected the moderate light in the room like strands of black onyx.

Harry's gaze moved past the veil of black hair, and saw that the younger version of Snape was also wearing a hospital gown and robe. His bare feet were covered in bruises, and his breathing was very laboured. "Please, Mum," there were the beginnings of tears in Snape's eyes, and his lower lip was quivering so much that he bit it before continuing, "can you not respond?"

Professor Severus Snape's mother, Mervidith Snape, remained unresponsive. She just stared blankly, her dark eyes unfocused on anything in particular. There was no movement or even a twinkle to indicate that she was aware of her son's presence at all.

"Mum!" Snape shouted in a way Harry found almost surreal. "Mother! What have they done to you? What can I do to restore you? What potions can I brew?"

No response.

"It is I, Severus." Severus spoke the next words as though they grated on his nerves, "your little Sevvie.'" Snape took a moment to recover, as though he had just insulted himself. "I am your son! You do not even know I'm here, do you? You don't even know who I am? Mummy! I am your son!"

The boy's lips quivered even more as he folded his arms in his mother's lap, and rested his head on them once again. Because Harry had not risen from the floor, he was at eye-level with the young Severus, who was facing sadly in Harry's direction. Harry found it nearly impossible look away; to believe that the cold glares from his bitter potions professor, and these lachrymose, despairing eyes that held his attention now, were one in the same. Severus chewed on his lower lip and blinked his eyes more times than Harry thought was necessary to lubricate his already teary eyes. Severus then wiped at his face many times with those slender fingered hands, which Harry was more accustomed to seeing measuring liquids, and cutting up potions ingredients. He had never seen those hands trying so desperately to quell the flood of emotions that threatened, even though there was no one in the room who would witness it. Snape's eyes only glistened more for his efforts and soon, the potion master's facial muscles twitched around his mouth, causing his lower lip to tremble without the slightest bit of consideration for its owner's desire to appear invincible at all times.

In concession, the younger Severus finally shut his eyes tightly, and tears rolled over his nose and into his hair as he lost the struggle not to cry. He bit his lower lip so hard that Harry thought it might start bleeding, but he released it when a forceful whimper escaped him.

"I thought father would never have found you there." Severus choked out between sobs. "..and...and... those accursed followers, they're nothing but a mindless group of oafs who would burn their own homes to the ground and kill their own siblings if the Dark Lord commanded them to do so."

Snape speaking ill about his own colleagues?' Harry mouthed to himself in disbelief. More questions appeared at the event horizon of his mind, but he forced them back momentarily. As much as Harry disliked Snape, he did not want to be transported to another moment, or location in time. He wanted to better understand what was directly before him.

Harry found that he could no longer despise his lugubrious professor with the same degree of severity as before. All he had been able to see before the excursion into this man's pensieve, and this journey into a plane reserved only for souls, was a bitter, cruel and acrimonious shadow of the man he saw before him. It never occurred to Harry before that this man could be so vulnerable.

Harry felt guilty for yet again invading his teacher's private memories, but he was compelled to remain. Although he knew that he could do nothing for this person on the threshold of adulthood in this time, he began to wonder if he could offer some comfort or empathy to the man who existed in the same time as Harry's physical self did. He knew that Snape would probably give him detentions lasting until Harry was older than Dumbledore by about five years if the potions professor were to find out about Harry's being here. But Harry found it was not in his power to leave.

"I tried so hard to keep you safe...to save you from that brute who beat us for so many years. To save us both from the The Dark Lord and his accursed Death Eaters..." Snape said, tears still flowing down his cheeks and soaking into the white collar of his hospital gown. "I...I've...worked for so many years, hid my potions studies from father, and for what? How could things have gone so wrong?"

Snape's voice became so inundated with sobs and sniffles that Harry could not understand most of what he said. Harry, however, did make out the words prolonged cruciatus,' because of me,' and 'repeatedly.' Harry shivered at the possible meanings.

Just then, a knock was heard at the door to Mervidith Snape's room. Snape tried so desperately to destroy the evidence of his uncharacteristic display of emotions, that he nearly abraded his skin when he scrubbed his tears violently on his sleeves. The door opened a crack, and Harry recognized the form of Albus Dumbledore immediately.

"Severus?" The Headmaster begin with the twinkle in his eyes somewhat dimmer than normal. "I thought I might find you here. How is your mother?"

Severus immediately put his bitter mask on, or at least attempted to do so. Apparently, the look was not effective at all when presented with red, puffy eyes. "How the bloody hell do you think?"

The headmaster appeared completely unshaken by the younger man's outburst and sat beside him. Albus looked up into Mervidith Snape's unseeing eyes. "She will be cared for the by the best medical staff in the magical world, Severus."

"I have full confidence that her physical injuries will heal." Severus said in a sharp voice. "Mother has had more than adequate experience in healing from physical injuries ." The intensity of Snape's voice trailed off, becoming barely audible. "But will her mind...will her mind..." He couldn't continue.

"It is too soon to tell, my boy." Dumbledore said, gingerly placing a hand on Snape's back, and rubbing comforting circles when he felt no sign of resistance from the younger man. Snape jumped when Dumbledore's hand came in contact with an apparently sensitive area on the lower part of his back. "For now, you must go back to your room. You're not well enough yourself yet."

"But..."Snape began, but he could not continue. Dumbledore slowly wrapped an arm around the trembling youth's shoulder, careful not to exacerbate his injuries, physical or otherwise. Snape made a half hearted attempt to pull away, and then he made some very out of place comments about the weather outside.

Judging from the extent of Snape's wounds, Harry concluded that Severus would not been allowed outside for quite some time. In all likelihood, Albus Dumbledore knew that as well.

When Severus began to talk about the wallpaper, and the different types of wallpaper adhesives available, Albus took Severus fully into his arms. "It is all right, my boy. It is all right."

Albus comforted Severus as he covered his face and began to cry again, this time with more intensity and fervour than before. Unbeknownst to Severus, the aged headmaster cried as well, in utter silence.

Albus Dumbledore listened to everything the boy had to say, when Severus had regained enough of his composure to speak coherently once more. Albus listened, but forestalled Severus if he made any self depreciating, or slanderous comments against himself.

The door opened again, and this time, a few of the mediwitches and mediwizards from both the Spell Damage and Severe Injury wards entered the room. "We've been looking for you Severus, you must go back to your bed now! You've still some treatments and potions to..."

"Go away, you incompetent, ineffectual, gauche, unskilful and negligent gathering of ignoramuses!" Snape shouted, as he blotted his face so hard on his sleeves, that Harry was sure he must have removed a layer or two of skin. The ensuing red colour made it look as though he had taken a shrivelfig grater to the area under his eyes and down his cheeks. Albus put a hand comfortingly on Snape's arm, causing Severus to wince again. Harry began to wonder about the true extent of Snape's injuries, when Albus and the staff tried to help the young man off the floor. Severus could hardly stand, let alone walk on his own. He grew paler with each of the three steps to the wheelchair the staff had brought for him.

"Go gently, my boy." Albus coaxed, helping the orderlies seat Severus back into the chair.

"Arrgh!" Severus jumped to his feet once more, and that was when Harry noticed that one of Snape's legs had obviously been broken and was splinted in thick bandaging materials. As the staff and Albus Dumbledore tried to seat Snape in the wheelchair again, he shifted repeatedly, as though he could not find a position that didn't cause him great pain. The bottom of Snape's robes rode up in the process, and Harry saw that Snape's other leg was covered almost entirely in bruises and scratches, with the greatest concentration of bruises being up his inner thighs. Snape suddenly shifted forward in the wheelchair, causing the gown to slip off his shoulders , and Harry saw similar bruising, incisions, lacerations and abrasions all over Severus Snape's chest and back.

Harry wondered what in the world had happened to his future potions professor as he watched Albus cover Snape's shoulders with a white blanket. Having only seen Snape in black before, he looked like a different person entirely. The red, puffy eyes, and fearful expression only made him less easy to recognize. Harry couldn't help but wonder what events led up to Snape's mother being tortured to the point where she relinquished her sanity, as well as what happened to Snape. As cruel as Snape could be, not even he deserved the torture he had evidently received.

As though in a pensieve containing the memories of the entire universe, the scene before Harry changed yet again.

Harry was now standing in a comfortable living room which looked as though it belonged to a moderately wealthy wizarding family. The walls were done in muted green tones and was furnished lavishly with paintings, furniture, sculptures, and other artifacts one might expect to see in Lucius Malfoy's house. Yet the place looked slightly poorer than one might expect of the Malfoy's Mansion, and that was when Severus Snape entered the room dragging two large trunks. He began packing things with a sense of great urgency, filling the trunks with books, some of the milder looking paintings, moving photographs, and a sewing basket filled with balls of yarn and knitting needles?

At the sound of uneven footsteps behind him, Harry turned around, and came face to face with the woman he had seen in the St Mungos hospital room. Although she still had the appearance of a woman who had been battered at least several times a week, she wasn't unresponsive and mute now and her eyes were wide in wonder. "Sevvie? What are you doing?"

"Mother, remember before I departed to go to Hogwarts for the first time? And I said that I'd see to it that you'd never have to endure father's beatings again?" Severus said, throwing some albums and framed portraits into the trunk, much to the horror of the picture's occupants. "Well I never make promises I can't uphold, and today I am honouring that promise."

Severus, while emptying the contents of some nearby cabinets into the trunks, went on to explain that he had secured his mother a modest home in a remote, muggle village in Alsace, France. She would have the opportunity to work, make new friends, pursue interests, and otherwise live unencumbered by her overbearing husband.

"I-I"

"Fear not, mother. You'll not be without contact with the Magical World, for there is a wizarding village a few kilometres beyond Alsace." The best part of all, Severus continued, was that there were members of the Rogue family in that wizarding village, who were distant relatives on his mother's side of the family.

"But Sevvie, you've only left Hogwarts a year ago, and been at the University until now! How did you ever afford to purchase a house?" Mervidith Snape asked, as she joined her son packing.

"Remember that money you secretly sent for me to go on Hogsmeade weekends?" Severus began. "Well most of the time I never went, and set every knut I could spare aside. When I did go to Hogsmeade, I spent the money on potion ingredients, and later sold the potions. I've been freelancing in much that way for years."

"Without a potions master license?"

"The apothecaries couldn't resist the bargains I offered for the potions. Once they tested the purity of the potions I made, I could hardly keep up with the demand." Severus said, relishing the pride he saw on his mother's face. "Even though I sold my potions for far less money than any of the apothecary supply companies charged, I was still paid a respectable sum each time I filled an order. Soon I was collecting bribes and kick-backs from apothecaries in wizarding Japan and America to develop and test new potions, and being that they are the world's largest economies, the exchange rate into galleons was very handsome. "

"My precious, boy." the woman with glowing coal coloured hair said, as she took her grown son into her arms. "To think I would ever be deserving of such a gift."

"Everyone deserves a life without fear and oppression every day, mother." Snape said, stopping to lock the filled trunk. "It is not a gift, but a right."

"No my dear boy. I was referring to you." Mervidith said, wiping at her dark eyes with a handkerchief. "What did I ever do to deserve the gift of a son such as yourself?"

For once, Snape was too moved to speak.

Even if he did have a reply, it was cut short by the Elder Snape's early return. The sound of the door crashing open against the foyer wall was all the evidence anyone needed.

"Quick, mum!"Severus shouted, tossing a handful of floo powder into the fireplace. "Leave now! I shall deal with father."

"But Sevvie...!"

Severus chose not to argue, and gently pushed his mother, and a suitcase he had packed earlier, into the fireplace. He then shouted the location, and Mervidith Snape vanished in the green flames.

Harry stared after the woman, in awe of what he had just heard. He was ripped from his reverie by the ghastly sound of a fist striking flesh.

"Confound it, boy!" Harry saw Lucien Snape standing over Severus, who lay sprawled on the floor, rubbing his bloody jaw. "Where the bloody hell is your mother!"

"Gone, you whoreson!" Severus retorted, rubbing his aching jaw.

"You...will...not...take...that...disrespectful...tone...with...me!" Lucien screamed, emphasising his every word with a coinciding blow of equal intensity to his dark-haired son.

Harry had to look away when the pale man dove onto Severus and pummelled him mercilessly.

The Elder Snape then hauled his bleeding son off the floor, and struck him again and again. Harry, momentarily forgetting that he was not really on the same plane of existence, ran to them and attempted to pull Lucien off Severus. His hands passed right through the pair, Harry did not possess a solid form.

Oddly, Harry noticed a lurid grin on the potion master's face which seemed sickeningly out of place considering the circumstances. As the subsequent blows landed, and more bruising and blood appeared, Snape's smile grew even wider. Almost like a grin of pure, unadulterated triumph.

"Mother is where you can never hurt her again!" Young Snape whimpered, his tears mingling with the copious measure of blood on his cheeks. Severus looked as thought he was starting to say something else, but Lucien's fist smashed into his mouth, knocking two of his son's lower teeth loose.

"Stop it!" Harry said, once again trying to pry Lucien Snape's hands off of Severus's collar.

"No more!" Severus sobbed at last.

"Look at you, crying like the milksop you are!" Lucien sneered. "Very well, if you will tell me where your mother is, perhaps I'll not whip you for your insolence as well."

"I have already told you." Severus screamed. "She's safe from you!"

"How dare you? She's my wife!"

"How dare YOU!" Severus whimpered boldly. "She's my mother!"

"You WILL tell me precisely where she is!" The Elder Snape shouted at his son as he began removing his belt, then thinking better of it, summoned a bullwhip he reserved for the times when he felt Severus deserved it most. "You're not too old for the lash. You'll tell me where your mother is even if I have to beat it out of you."

The look of pure terror at the sight of the bullwhip was something Harry had never thought he would see on his professor's face. Severus was literally petrified in fear, as was Harry.

Harry leaned close to Severus's face. "Prof-- Snape! You've got to get away! Go! Go now!"

Something flashed in Snape's eyes as though he had somehow heard Harry's words. He then bounded out the maple doors, across the lawn, and through the tree containing the wards leading to the muggle street, dragging two of the packed trunks behind him.

When the faces began to appear in the windows of neighbouring houses, Severus turned back to find the livid man still in pursuit.

"You'll not hurt us again!" Severus hissed through his swollen, cut lips; the blood from his face and body making grotesque red florets on the pavement.

And with that, the eighteen year-old Severus Snape apparated away.

End Part Three