Chapter 18 – Blackpool
About five minutes later Harry and Voldemort came back into the main chamber where Snape was waiting. Or at least Voldemort walked back in and Harry shuffled slowly in behind him with his head down.
Before they had got even half way across the room Voldemort called across the room. 'Severus! I think we need to have a chat about your son.'
Harry cringed as Snape turned round to glare at him but then turned back to Voldemort and bowed slightly in acknowledgement.
Voldemort gave Harry a none too friendly shove further into the room. 'You stay there. Severus, follow me.'
Voldemort turned back around with a flourish, expecting Snape to follow him, his robes billowed out behind him very much like Snape's did. Harry wondered for a moment if this was where Snape had got this from but then remembered just how much trouble he was probably in and slid down the wall of the chamber to sit on the ground with his head in his hands.
Harry heard the door close but did not look up, even though he knew he was alone now. He just sat, huddled up with his legs pulled right up against his chest, very aware of his own shallow breathing as it was the only noise he could hear in the room and it echoed around the narrow chamber.
What had he just done?
If Voldemort didn't kill him then Snape certainly would. After everything they had been through, all the effort Snape had gone to to ensure that Harry knew the appropriate way to act around the Dark Lord, he had to go and say something so amazingly stupid. No matter how much Voldemort patronised, irritated and lied to him Harry knew he should never have said what he did. He had crossed a line big time and Snape would be so disappointed in him.
Harry's head snapped up at the realisation.
Snape would be disappointed in him.
Harry's breathing finally slowed and evened out a little as he stared up at the damp ceiling. He could now hear the drip dripping of water not far off and the clinking sound as it hit the floor and dispersed. He rested his head back against the wall as he thought about this new development.
It wasn't the thought that Snape would be disappointed with him that had got to him. Merlin knows this would not have been the first time that this had happened. No, what got to him was the way this made him feel. Knowing that Snape would be disappointed in him made him feel … guilty? Upset? Sad?
He couldn't quite work out his feelings but all he knew was that he had never really had someone to feel disappointed in him when he did something wrong. No one had cared about him enough, in that way anyway, to feel that Harry had let them down at all.
Okay, so there was that one time with Professor Lupin when he found out Harry had sneaked into Hogsmead when he was not supposed to in third year, but that was the closest to this feeling he had ever come to. Sirius was always too much of a child himself and would actively encourage Harry to do things most parents would think of as irresponsible.
Mrs Weasely also tried to make Harry feel a part of the family but it was clear there was something holding her back from really treating him that way. She had sent a howler to Ron about stealing the car in second year but nothing to Harry even though he had been as much a part of it. It was as if telling Harry off would have been crossing some unspoken line about how you treat your children's friends. And Harry knew that was really what he was to her.
Did he care about what Snape thought of him that much? Did he really think of Snape as his father? Someone who could show pride or disappointment in him like a parent normally does. And most importantly did he care if Snape felt these things about him?
The door slammed open, hitting the wall with such force that it almost slammed back shut again, if it wasn't for the fact that Snape had got in its way and was now striding menacingly towards Harry.
Harry scrambled up as fast as he could and turned fearfully towards his father. He saw Voldemort exiting behind him out of the corner of his eye but was too intent on Snape to take much notice. Snape looked as if he was going to murder him!
Snape strode straight over to him, lips pressed in a firm line, as if he knew he would say something he would later regret if he spoke. Although he never meant to Harry started instinctively backing away but before he had got very far Snape grabbed his arm and yanked him forwards with such force Harry thought he might dislocate his shoulder.
Harry knew better then to speak and let Snape drag him out of the cave, making sure not to look at Voldemort as he was dragged past him.
Harry had hoped that this might have all been an act for Voldemort's sake but when Snape did not release or lessen the hold on his hand as he marched them back up the hill Harry had to concede that Snape was truly angry. In fact he doubted he had ever seen Snape this angry before and that included the time Harry had invaded his memories. That time Snape had thrown a glass jar at him. This time did not bear thinking about.
As things normally do when you want time to slow down, it sped up and in no time Harry found himself at the top of Spinners End after the not so sickening apparition. Harry assumed that it was probably because he was too focused on what Snape would do to him to realise he was apparating until it was done.
Then Snape let go of his arm at the same time as pushing him roughly away from him.
'Stupid, foolish boy.' He muttered as he pushed past him and started off down the hill. Harry had no other option but to follow.
The front door of the house slammed open of its own accord as Snape walked up to it and he strode through, not even checking that Harry was following. Of course he knew that he was following.
Get into your room. I will come in a minute.' Snape said as he went into his room, again not checking if Harry was doing as he was told.
Harry walked sullenly into his room. It felt like Snape was grounding him, something Harry would never have thought would happen, as it was a very muggle thing to do. He sat on the bed nervously, running his hands through his hair for lack of anything else to do with them.
He didn't have to wait long but when Harry saw what Snape was carrying he wished it had been longer, much longer. Before Harry had a chance to react, Snape grabbed him again, pushed him back down onto the bed face-down and brandished his whip as if ready to strike.
'Ten lashes should do it. I'm sure you'll have learnt your lesson by then.' Snape's voice was emotionless.
Harry couldn't help but start hyperventilating again but knew better then to move from his position. He just buried his head more into the pillow trying to unsuccessfully calm his breathing. But when he felt the whip moving towards him he could not help but whimper pitifully and started choking through lack of air.
He felt the crack the whip made as it reached its target but realised he felt no pain. He stayed in his position for about a minute but no further sound or movement came and he finally turned his head to look up at Snape.
Snape however wasn't looking at him. The whip was hanging loosely in his left hand and he was staring vaguely in the direction of the fire but not really looking like he was seeing anything.
'S-sir?' Harry finally got up the courage to speak.
'When are you going to start calling me Severus?' Snape said, still not looking at him.
'What?' Harry's breathing was finally slowing now and he propped his head up with his hand to get a better look at Snape, although he still never sat up.
'You know you don't have to call me Sir here and I also know you still think of me as Snape. I want you to get out of the habit of thinking of me as your teacher and more like a mentor.'
Harry was very confused. 'Well you were about to whip me. What did you expect?'
Snape let out a strangled kind of laugh as if he was trying to keep himself from going hysterical and then finally turned to look at Harry. 'What did you have to do that for?'
'I'm sorry.' Harry repeated. It was all he could think of to say.
Snape—no, Severus sat down on the edge of the bed next to Harry but still did not say anything. They both stared at anything but each other.
Finally Severus sighed and looked back at Harry. 'I am going to have to whip you. The Dark Lord asks of it. I have to punish you and this is the punishment he chooses.' Severus stopped but Harry knew he wasn't finished yet so stayed quiet and waited.
'He told me to do ten lashes and he will want to see the marks. Not only that but he may want to look at the memory of it also which was why I was just going to go ahead and do it without telling you anything so that it would look as real as possible. But when you started … well … getting a bit overexcited I couldn't go through with it.'
Harry tried to hold in a laugh. 'Overexcited? I've never heard it put that way before.'
Severus nodded, still looking like he was in a daze. 'But I just wanted you to know that although I have to do this, it would not be my choice of punishment. I am extremely angry with you. After all our preparation I can't believe …'
'I know, I just—'
'It doesn't matter now. Just know that I will be punishing you in my own way as well.'
'But—'
'But what?' Severus said testily.
'Nothing.'
'Good. I don't want you to think of this as a punishment, think of it more as another lesson on pain.'
'A lesson in pain? I can't. I mean the whip is so painful I—'
'It is no more painful than cruciatus, probably even less so.' Severus countered. 'It is only that you are used to crucio now and can block the pain. You can learn to do this with the whip just as easily.'
'Yes, I know.' Harry said, but it didn't make him feel any better.
'I want you to find your white room again and float away in it like you do with the cruciatus.'
'But won't the Dark Lord be expecting me to scream?'
'No, not particularly.' Severus replied. 'I don't scream when he inflicts pain on me and I can tell that he respects me for that. I am sure that not only will he also respect you for it but he will expect me to teach you.'
Harry nodded.
Severus sighed and looked around the room for a while, as if deep in thought. 'I think we will just do it as before, that would be best. I will drag you into the room, chuck you on the bed and then just do it.'
'But can't you just feed him a false memory.' Harry asked.
'I could, but it is always better and less dangerous if I don't have to. I never feed him a false memory, I just shut away the ones I don't want him to see.'
'Fine. Let's get it over with.' Harry said more bravely then he felt.
Severus made sure that Harry was already occluding as best he could and then seemed to easily get into character as he dragged Harry into the room and threw him onto the bed. It was actually quite scary to see how easily Severus could change his whole demeanour so easily and it was very disconcerting so Harry gave the two personas different names to separate them. This harsh, brutal one was Snape, while the other, more gentle one was now Severus.
Snape was so quick with the whip that Harry didn't have much time to prepare but that may have been a good thing so there was less anticipation. He was already occluding and, after the first stroke, which was too painful to stop the choked scream, managed to push the pain away. He felt it in the recesses of his mind but managed not to think of it. Why could he not have known how to do this the first time it happened?
He lost count of the number of times he was whipped but it fortunately seemed to be over quite quickly. When he came back into himself though, Harry was wracked with pain as it all came to him in a brutal strike. He was about to scream at the fire that seemed to be rippling across his back when he felt something cold and smooth being rubbed into the fire to calm it. Harry took a deep weary breath and let the cool cream do its work.
Unfortunately something else was happening though, something Harry had no control over no matter how much he tried. He wasn't quite sure what it was but knew that finally his mind was telling him it had been through too much.
When Severus was finished Harry heard him walk across the room and deposit the cream back in a cupboard but he didn't roll back over. He couldn't.
'Harry?' He finally heard. 'Are you alright?'
When Harry still didn't move Severus came over and rolled him over himself to find tears streaming down his face in a never-ending cycle.
'What? It doesn't still hurt does it?'
Harry shook his head but still did not speak.
Finally Severus pulled Harry up into a sitting position and then sat down beside him on the bed. Severus didn't make any move to comfort him but that was all right with Harry as he didn't think he could handle Severus trying to hug him. He doubted he would be any good at it anyway.
'I'm sorry.' Harry finally said. 'I don't know what's come over me.'
'Idiocy?' Severus said. 'Oh no. That's a constant problem of yours.'
'Oh shut up.' Harry replied, but with no real venom in his voice. 'I just…' Harry had to stop there as he really thought he might start crying again.
He waited a few minutes until he got himself under control and Severus kept quiet and waited with him.
'I think I've just realised.'
'Realised what?' Severus asked.
'How much my life is fucked up. I mean I knew that before of course but I think I just pretended that it all wasn't happening. That I was just at your place over the summer while you helped me train and then, you know, I would go back to Hogwarts and be with my friends and everything would go back to normal.'
Harry stopped and sniffed a few times, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand.
Then I met him and said one of the stupidest things I could imagine and now I see that this is not a game and that I can't pretend anymore. We could both have been killed. We still could. I can't deal with any of this, I just can't and … I shouldn't have to.'
Harry stopped and realised with embarrassment that he was crying again but could only turn his face away from Severus as if that would ensure he would not see.
Severus didn't say or do anything at first and Harry just waited for the assault to start. Then he decided he could not deal with Severus turning back into Snape again and cut him off as he was about to speak.
'I know what you're going to say. "Stop feeling sorry for yourself, the world doesn't revolve around you and blah, blah blah." But I really don't need that at the moment okay, so just save it.'
Harry turned back to look at Severus then but he was looking away from Harry, towards the door.
'I wasn't going to say anything like that.' Severus said, still looking away. 'But at the same time I have nothing else to say. I can't make this all go away and I'm not going to pretend that I can. I thought you had accepted it but I guess that was asking too much as you did seem to accept it rather too quickly and I should have realised.'
Severus stopped and sighed. He got up and started towards the door. 'It's late and you need to get some sleep but tomorrow after breakfast I'll show that things do not have to be as bad as you think they are.'
What—'
'Tomorrow.' Severus said again from the doorway. Then he left.
-------------
'Pancakes?'
'Yes, why?'
'Nothing, just that we've never had them for breakfast before.'
Harry sat down and pulled a dish full of pancakes towards him, grabbed the jug of maple syrup and proceeded to drown the pancakes in it.
Severus watched with ill concealed disgust and then went back to cutting his pancake up into little pieces.
Harry saw all of this and smirked at Severus, not caring in the least anymore what he thought of his table manners.
'Feeling better I see.' Severus remarked.
Harry just shrugged. 'I just want to know what we are doing today, you seemed so secretive about it yesterday.'
'That was partly because I wasn't quite sure what we were going to do but I know now.'
'Well?' Harry asked.
'Well, finish your breakfast.' Severus replied and smirked.
Harry didn't think he had ever eaten so quickly and was sure he would have indigestion because of it.
'It would serve you right.' Severus had replied when Harry mentioned this.
Harry then rushed off to take a shower even though he would have rather skipped it just now. He didn't know what had come over him. Only last night he felt as if his world was coming to an end and this morning he was almost jumping up and down in excitement like a child, wanting to know what his surprise was.
Harry then went skidding out into the hallway only for Severus to tell him to go back and get a jumper as it may get windy.
When Harry came back out, this time a little more reserved, Severus had sneered at his Weasley jumper but wisely kept silent. Harry found it hard to keep quiet himself, seeing Severus dressed in muggle clothes, even if they were black.
Harry still couldn't keep the excitement at bay as he wrenched the front door open in his haste to get going, even though he still did not know where that was. He was just about to step out when Severus grabbed him by his jumper from behind and dragged him back away from the door.
'You are not occluding.' He hissed dangerously.
Harry gulped guiltily when he realised that Severus was right. 'Sorry.' He squeaked.
'You can not let your guard down for a second.' He said. 'You share a deep bond with the Dark Lord and don't you ever forget that. No matter that it is not a strong as the other children's are. Do not underestimated how much control the Dark Lord has over that scar of yours.'
Harry nodded mutely, all excitement gone for now. Severus made sure that Harry was indeed occluding this time and then shoved him none to nicely out the door before following.
They walked up the hill in silence and once they had reached the top of the road Severus took hold of Harry tightly before he apparated them both away.
Harry didn't fall this time and he didn't even feel that sick but he did notice a strange texture under his feet and almost fell over when he realised what it was. He looked down to see that he was standing on Sand, in fact he realised as he looked around him that they were on a beach. Or at least they were standing underneath a peer on a beach. You had to make sure you apparated to somewhere that muggles couldn't see.
'Wow.' Was the only thing Harry could manage to say.
'Yes indeed.' Severus said, looking around haughtily. They walked out from under the peer into the bright sunshine. The beach was fairly busy, with sun loungers everywhere and lots of people in the shallows of the water, with a few people further out at sea.
'Do you know where we are?' Severus asked.
Harry turned towards Severus and tried not to laugh at the picture he made, standing on a sunny beach, dressed all in black. If Ron and Hermione could have seen this they would think it was a hoax. Severus and beaches just did not seem to go.
'Um.' He started trying to remember what Severus had asked him. 'Oh, yeah. Are we in Brighton?'
'No Harry, Brighton does not have sand, it has shingles.' Severus said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.
'Well I don't know do I? It's not as if my relatives ever took me on holidays to the beach is it? I had to stay at Mrs Figgs, looking at pictures of her many cats while they went off all over the country.'
'But surely you recognise that tower over there.' Severus said pointing to a tall structure near the other end of the beach.
'Well of course I do. It's … uh … um … it's …'
'For Merlin's sake it's Blackpool Tower. We are in Blackpool.'
'Blackpool.' Harry repeated under his breath as he tipped his face up to the sky and closed his eyes to let the sun warm him.
'Anyway there is this awful muggle theme park I'm sure you'll want to go to somewhere around here, although for the life of me I don't know what you'll get out of it you can't get from flying on your broom but …'
Harry however was tuning him out. With his eyes still closed he focused on the heat of the sun and the sounds all around him. He could hear birds overhead, people laughing, children screaming and the smell of the sea and fast food. It was a wonderful sensation and for the first time since this whole mess started Harry let himself smile, really smile.