MUSIC OF THE NIGHT (T; Romance/ Drama/ Mystery; HP/SS)
Warnings: see Prologue. Additional: No Beta. All typos are my keyboard's fault.
Disclaimer: see Prologue
A/N: Another update! I hope you enjoy this chapter. Please do not hesitate to leave a review and let me know what you think. Although if you'd rather be rude about it, do not do it ANONYMOUSLY. I will just delete reviews from Trolls and stupid people who have nothing better to do. –C.
LEGEND:
"Dialogue/ speech" 'Thoughts'Notes/ flashback
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Music of the Night
By C.M. Oliver
©2013
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Chapter 6: Wandering Child
"Do you know the difference between a dream and an illusion, Harry?" The Phantom asked, poising his hands over the keys. The sleeves of his white button-down shirt were rolled up to his elbows. His arms were as pale as his hands. Harry could see the tiny hairs covering the man's forearms. He shook his head.
"No."
The Phantom eyed him momentarily before nodding in understanding.
"The mind creates the illusion. The heart begets the dream." The masked man's hands began moving and Harry found himself listening once more to the anthem of his soul, Music of The Night. The Phantom played softly, as if not wanting to take away from the stillness of the night itself. "Remember the first time I had asked you to play?"
"Yes," Harry nodded, still not taking his eyes off of his maestro's hands.
"This sing is about escape, Harry. It is about freeing your mind of burdens, the mundanity of everyday life. It is about letting go of what you know is real, what you know is there and letting your imagination take you to a place that does not exist." The Phantom spoke as his fingers continued caressing the piano keys. "Your mind creates the illusion of things that you think you should see, what you think you should feel… things you think that should have happened." He closed his eyes. "And when your mind is in chaos, it only begets a chaotic illusion, as it should. You feel something that is missing –you find your heart missing something that never was because your mind makes you do so. It is only when your heart is stronger than your head that you manage to escape reality –only when your dreams become more vivid than any vision, when you manage to return to the unburdened ways of a carefree child that you are able to be free, wander and take flight. It is the emotions, Harry, that make music truly magical as it is supposed to be."
Harry stayed silent for a while, as if contemplating on his master's words. Were they still talking about music though? "I don't understand," he admitted, biting his lip. The Phantom stopped playing.
"Who is this man –the one you see in your mind?"
Harry looked taken aback by the question, but answered truthfully still. "A hero, a master like you." he shrugged. "At first I thought you were him, but –" A deep sigh escaped his lips. "He died in my arms many years ago."
"Is that so?" The Phantom clarified, a mixture of caution and awe evident in his eyes. Potter did see it in his vision… "And you blame yourself for his death?"
Harry averted his eyes and instead, stared at the moving shadows on the walls. "Yes."
"Are you to blame?" The Phantom asked. But when Harry moved to answer, the masked man stopped him. "No, Harry, think hard. I would like you to let go of all the illusions of his death and tell me what it is instead that you see. I will ask you again, are you to blame?" Harry met his eyes. There was a challenge issued in that tone; those dark eyes on him were no different. Harry looked away. His own emerald gaze latched onto an unseen tableau, far off to his left. The Phantom began playing again. "What is it that you dream about, Harry?" The question cut right through the young man's stupor. He looked at his maestro inquiringly.
"When I'm asleep, or do you mean like goals in life?'
"Those that you call 'dreams' when you are slumbering are mere illusions, if you take into consideration what I said earlier," the Phantom explained. "Your subconscious mind creates them. I am pertaining to aspirations." With this, Harry looked thoughtful for a while. "Well, I want to develop a cure for lycanthropy someday. I want to publish as Potions Manual for those who are challenged like I was before –"
"Challenged?" The Phantom clarified. He had stopped playing again. Harry actually smiled at his confused tone. "Yeah, who would've thought? I am a certified Potioneer now, but five years ago, I didn't even know the difference between 'chopped finely' and 'minced'." He chuckled lightly. "Add that to the fact that my Potions Professor hated me with a passion and all the Slytherins in my class would always sabotage my potion when I'm not looking –no wonder my work always ended up exploding or just utterly useless."
"I see," the Phantom said plainly, although he had a pondering look in his eyes. "What about dreams for yourself? These are noble aspirations that would certainly benefit other people –anything for your own selfish gain?" Harry raised an eyebrow at the phrasing of the question but said nothing about it. He shrugged. "I've never given it much thought." The masked maestro frowned as he resumed playing.
"Why did you take up a Mastery in Potions if you hated it?"
"I didn't," Harry told him. "Potions hated me, but I never hated it. I've always found it fascinating." The Phantom looked quite surprised at first, but quickly recovered. "Will the same thing apply for the professor you speak of?"
"I –Yes," said Harry quietly, looking away again. "I never hated him. I was afraid of him, yes. But ever since…" His voice trailed off, leaving the sentiment hanging. The room was enveloped with silence for what seemed like hours, until the Phantom stood up from his seat. He picked up his cloak and unfurled it like a cape. He then draped it on his shoulders. "Ninety-five percent of the time, feelings are reciprocated. Do remember that, Harry." Harry stared at him.
"Are you leaving?"
"I have errands to do," the Phantom smiled. "Even spectral masters need to pay bills and such."
"Should I close my eyes?" Harry offered. The masked man actually laughed at his words. "Someday, my protégé, I will teach you my disappearing act –but not now." Harry nodded and closed his eyes.
"Goodnight, Phantom."
A swish of a cloak was heard, then a whisper.
"Goodnight, Harry."
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Harry's schedule was the least hectic on Wednesdays. He only had one third year class after lunch. Thankfully, there were no exploding cauldrons that day. Monday's 'Points-Off Palooza' was probably still fresh in people's minds. The young Potions Master decided to head down to his personal lab right after his last class. The Hospital Wing needed a new batch of Calming Draught. Barely five days into term and the homesick firsties have already upended the supply he had brewed last summer.
He had six cauldrons going in a matter of minutes. He set the timer to alert him on its completion while he washed and prepared the opaque crystal vials. As he had yet to issue a detention to a wayward student –surprisingly –he was stuck with the hopelessly mundane task of washing and cleaning up. Not that he minded though, it was something that he was effortlessly good at, Potions Master or not. He certainly had much practice with Snape…
Harry found himself thinking less of the man lately –and whenever he would find himself doing so, it seemed to not hurt as much as it did before. He almost felt guilty about it, but ever since the Phantom had invaded his nightly dreams…
'Illusion,' he corrected himself. The Phantom was an illusion –something his mind had created to fill in the void of something that never was –how could he not be? The masked man seemed so real. But as Harry had learned along the way, his maestro was as real as he would make him. And in his mind, the Phantom was as real as Harry himself.
The timer went off and the young professor began to bottle the Calming Draught and Pepper-Up Potions he had brewed. He carefully stoppered each vial, sealed it with emerald melted wax and labeled it with the brewing date. He added his initials 'HJP' on the bottom right corner of the label as was customary. He found the whole procedure quite relaxing.
He wasn't lying when he'd told the Phantom of his fascination for the art of Potions-Making. He was already hooked even before Snape had finished his Welcome Speech in Harry's first year. He wasn't lying about his dream of inventing a cure for lycanthropy and publishing that instructional manual for beginners…
But what about for himself? Did he really not have dreams for his own?
He never thought much about it –that was the truth. When you expect to die facing an evil madman before you even turn eighteen, you tend not to make plans for your future, let alone dream.
Was there anything that he wanted for his 'own selfish gain'?
Harry cast a 'Tempus'. It was half-past seven in the evening when he had finally finished all the vials. He could still catch a late dinner in the Great Hall if he wanted to, but he decided against it. He called instead for Odin and asked for a plate of sandwiches and a bottle of German wine. He poured himself a generous glass.
His mind traveled back to the words of the Phantom. He knew the spectral man was right. His mind was in chaos. He was living in the past, amongst the shadows, for something that never was…
Was it really an illusion that led him to this? He just wanted to make sense of a man's useless death, a man that deserved so much more than a post-humus recognition… was that sp wrong? Were his methods wrong? He wanted to realize what it had meant to dream, to feel for himself, but how? He had been existing in this reality for so long. Is there still a chance to break away? Will he want to?
Maybe that was why he could not play 'Music of the Night' the way he thought it should be played –the way Snape, or even the Phantom, played it. The song spoke of trust, passion, and an underlying promise –in exchange for leaving the past behind. Whenever he played it, his mind would almost always instantly hold on to that image of Severus Snape in front of his piano… then dying in his bloodied arms…
But how to let go? How do you let go of the one thing that mattered to you? How do you forget the very thing that brought you to where you were right now?
Was all this… nothing but a big mistake?
All his life, Harry had been repeatedly told that his greatest weapon was love. He only realized now that he might have actually wielded it without really knowing or understanding what it really was. He set his glass of wine down.
Was love the secret to playing the song? He knew that Snape loved his mother. Was the dark wizard thinking of the only woman he had ever loved whenever he made music? If only Harry could ask the man his secret…
'What is your secret? Will you tell me? Will you teach me? Will I ever truly find out?'
But Snape was dead. And even if the dark wizard's ghost was indeed haunting him, there was no way that the man's specter would reveal anything of his emotions to Harry.
What about the Phantom then? Until now, Harry could not clearly define the man: illusion, dream, ghost, alter ego? If he existed only to Harry, and was a product of his mind… what gave the masked man his fire, his life? If Harry's own mind was at a loss, how was he creating this surreal, passionate yet seemingly rational being? Was the Phantom a depiction of what he could have been… what he could be? Was his maestro a reflection of his deeply rooted desire for a mentor? For Snape? Did he actually dream the ghost of his one true hero, his inspiration, to life? Was that even possible –even with magic?
He poured another glass of wine and downed it in one go. The sandwiches lay forgotten.
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About the same time that Harry was having a dinner of wine, another man was enjoying his own glass of the crimson liquid, perched on an old worn-out couch in the darkest part of Shrieking Shack's cellar. His thoughts were hovering somewhere far away.
"What is it that you dream about, Harry? What is it the keeps you going?"
If he were to be honest with himself, he did not expect the young man's answer.
"I never hated you. I envied you at one point, yes. But I never hated you." He took a long sip from the glass goblet in his hand. He let the bittersweet liquid stain his thin lips, slowly permeate his tongue, before letting it smoothly run along his throat. "You were a part of her –you carried the one thing that made me fall in love with her the first time I saw her –how could I?" He set his glass down and stood up from his seat. He crossed the room in three strides, towards the moonlit corner of the space that had been a huge part of his world in the past five years.
"She died –I held her in my arms as he had died –and I felt the world stop spinning. What sense was there in dreaming? I had asked myself countless times since that night. My heart died the night she was killed, and together with it, the dreams I have built since I've realized what it meant to do so." The pale light caressed his bare face as he turned his back on the shadows.
"Then came you. Dumbledore asked me to help protect you –he asked me to help train you and keep you alive. Suddenly, I had reason to hope, to live, to dream again." He shook his head, his dark eyes shining. "I told him that I would do it for her. In my mind, I had wanted to hold on to that very last part of her that existed. I had wanted to make more of, what in my mind, was a senseless death. I vowed to live for her; I vowed to help you live for her. I had thought that it was the right thing to do. I was so vested on holding on to something that could have been, something that never was… Don't you see, Harry? Do you not see how frighteningly similar we are? I blamed myself for her death like you keep on blaming yourself for mine. Every night that I sat down in front of the piano, I called forth that image of her, pale, dead in my arms, I did not realize –" A soft sigh escaped his lips. "How was I to know?" His pale hands reached for a familiar object from inside his robes. The stark white mask glinted in his grasp. Carefully, he placed it on –it fitted like a well-worn glove. "Her eyes haunted my every waking moment, even well into my sleep." His hands then landed on a golden chain that hung around his neck. He absently toyed with it for a moment, before he had tackled the task of putting on his black outer cloak. It was a well-rehearsed routine that came almost like second-nature to him.
"For so long, I thought that it was her eyes. I thought it was the past that pushed me to move forward." The Phantom smoothed the creases on his clothes before moving towards the foot of the bed that had occupied most of that dimmed room. A hidden circular trapdoor was his destination. Gently, he lifted the latch and pulled it open.
"Then that night, at the Welcoming Feast… your gaze met mine. I then realized that there was such a thing as a future for me…"
The masked man then descended into the dark hole in the ground that would take him back to the light –back to the life he thought head already gladly given up.
"No spell can reawaken the dead. But since when did you ever follow the norm, Potter?"
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As it was last night, Harry sat in front of the piano, waiting for his masked maestro to arrive. There was no definite time that the Phantom showed up –all that he knew was it was always in this room.
"You are thinking too hard, that is quite unhealthy." The voice, sinful as dark chocolate, smooth as silk, deep as the ocean, emerged from the shadows.
"Have you ever been in love?" Harry asked, meeting the eyes of the Phantom. The man looked as he did, whenever the young professor would see him –cloaked in midnight, masked in daylight. Harry no longer questioned what lay behind the half-mask. Honestly, he could say to himself that it wouldn't have mattered to him at this point if he did find out.
The Phantom paused in his steps, evidently startled by the question coming from his protégé. Harry noticed his master's reluctance and gave him a small smile. "Sorry, it was a rather personal question. You don't need to answer. It's just that I've been repeatedly told that my greatest power was love –and what you've said last night made me realize that I don't actually know what that meant." The emerald-eyed man sighed. "I reckoned that for me to be able to properly play 'Music of the Night', I would have to tap further into my emotions. If what you said was true, then I have to learn to understand what exactly it is that they claim to be my one true strength."
The Phantom quietly took his customary spot to Harry's right. He radiated the familiar warmth that Harry had begun to associate with the masked man. The maestro undid the clasp of his cloak and slid it off, revealing his usual white button-down. Harry noticed something else though.
"You've not worn that locket around your neck before," he gestured at the golden chain. The Phantom followed his line of sight. A pale hand reached up and fingered the circular pendant. His finger traced the engraved symbol of what appeared to be a flower that Harry was unfamiliar with.
"It's called 'Fleur-de-lys'," the masked man said, seeing Harry's inquiring gaze. He released the pendant. "I've always had it on. It is just the first time you've probably seen it."
"I suppose," Harry admitted, though he was fairly sure that the Phantom did not have the necklace on yesterday.
"Love is too encompassing," the masked man then said, his dark eyes catching the glow of the candlelight as he stared off into space. "It is enduring. It is eternal. It comes in many forms. Because of its nature, no one can ever say that they truly understand it…" HE turned to Harry. "However, if you are pertaining to romantic love –" he looked away again. "Once. Only once before."
Harry sensed the deeply-rooted emotion in that simple pronouncement. He tried to look at his maestro in a different light. How human could unrequited love get? Suddenly, the Phantom had just become more real to him. Did illusions fall in love? Did they feel? Did they get hurt? Harry tried to see through those deep dark eyes… What made up this enigma of a being? When their gazes met once more, the young professor decided to take the plunge. He looked the man in the eye and asked.
"Will you tell me how it feels like?"
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-END OF CHAPTER 6-
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A/N: How was it? Up next: Chapter 7: All I Ask Of You will be up sometime next week. The Phantom serenades our darling Professor Potter, and the protégé learns of yet another life lesson –in love, perhaps? Three chapters to go, then an exciting epilogue awaits you. Don't miss it!
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P.S. Please bother me. I'm always bored at work. –C.