Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by J.K. Rowling; various publishers including, but not limited to, Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books; and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

A/N: Happy Independence Day to all my fellow USers.

Shades of Gray

Chapter Four: Surprise, Surprise

Harry was awakened by a hand on his shoulder after what felt to him to have been only moments of blessedly dreamless sleep. Blearily opening his eyes, he saw that Neville was the one who was trying to wake him. "Huh?"

Neville handed Harry his glasses and sat on the edge of his bed. "You've been sleeping all day, Harry. I wanted to make sure you were okay."

Harry slipped his glasses onto his face and sat up, yawning. "Yeah… I'm okay. I didn't get to sleep until this morning. Your nose all right?"

Neville nodded, "Yeah. Madam Pomfrey had it fixed in a pinch."

Harry yawned again. The events at the Ministry felt like they'd happened in another lifetime; so much had changed in the few hours since then. "That's good. What time is it?"

"Almost six in the evening. You got a letter with the morning mail," Neville said, handing a plain, white envelope to Harry.

Shaking his head a little to clear the last cobwebs of sleep from it, Harry looked suspiciously at the muggle envelope. Recognizing the handwriting on it, Harry groaned and wished he were still asleep. "Harry?" Neville asked, his hand still holding out the letter. "You sure you're okay?"

Harry nodded, "Yeah. It's just…" he sighed. "Never mind, Neville." He took the letter and opened it. A single piece of notebook paper was folded inside.

17 June, 1996
Potter,

Vernon has won a trip to Fiji through his work. We've told your headmaster to find other lodgings for you until we return.

- Petunia Dursley

Reading the short note three times, it still made no sense to Harry. He beckoned to Neville to go ahead and read it, "Does this say what I think it does?"

Neville read it over and shrugged, "I don't know. What do you think it says?"

"That my aunt, uncle, and cousin were going on vacation without me."

Neville nodded, "Then that's what it says. Where do you think you'll be staying until they come back?"

The only place Harry could think of was the one and only location that he wanted to go less than the Dursleys' home. Number twelve, Grimmauld Place. Sirius' childhood home and his prison. Thinking of his godfather sent a peculiar twist through his chest. "I don't know, Neville."

Sensing Harry's sudden downswing in mood, Neville smiled brightly, "Maybe Gran will let you come and visit with me for a while, or you'll get to stay with Ron. How long do you think your relatives will be gone?"

"I don't know, they didn't say." Until Harry could figure out what Dumbledore had done to Ron, he doubted he wanted to stay with the redhead.

Neville's forehead wrinkled a little, he'd assumed that Harry had received other notes from his family and that this one was just to tell him that they'd told Dumbledore about the situation. Resolving to talk to Ron and Hermione when they got out of the hospital wing, Neville changed the subject. "I wonder what we'll be doing in classes this week, now that OWLs are over and all."

Harry shrugged, listening with only half an ear to Neville's chatter. They couldn't even tell me how long they were going to be gone… Why did they bother telling Dumbledore? Was Mrs. Figg busy this summer? I'd rather spend the time at her place than have to go back to… No. Harry, stop it. It's just a house, no matter how gloomy and depressing or how much it reminds you of… Christmastime. It's just a house.

"…get an earring?"

Harry returned his attention to Neville, "Sorry, what was that?"

"I said, 'Since when did you get an earring?'"

Harry smiled a little, grateful for the first time in his life for one of the bits of bullying Dudley had done to him. "It's always been pierced – my cousin did it with a safety-pin when we were in primary school," which Dudley had done, when he'd learned from Vernon that 'only faggots wore earrings' after Dudley had demanded a piercing; the safety-pin had left him with a small, round scar right were a piercing would normally go, and the clerk at the body-art shop had just repierced the lobe in the same place, though the clerk, as was customary with wizarding tattoos and piercings, had healed it immediately. "I've just never worn one here before."

"Oh," Neville replied. "Why not?"

"I wasn't sure if the dress-code would let me at first, and then I just got out of the habit," a little surprised at himself for how easy the lies were coming to him, Harry was forced to remember how the Sorting Hat had wanted him in Slytherin.

"Why now?"

Harry shrugged, "I just wanted to see if it had grown closed on me." Swinging his legs out from under the blankets, Harry located his slippers. "I think I'll go find the shower, Neville. Talk with you later, yeah?"

"Sure," Neville said, watching his friend walk away. He's hiding something, he thought. And it has to be big for me to have noticed it. I wonder what it could be, though?

Even though he'd showered the night before, he did so again. He never did feel wholly awake without a shower. Once he was dressed, Harry headed down to the kitchens, beyond caring if Filch or Snape caught him – at this point, what was one more detention in the grand scheme of things? Dobby, at least, was glad to see him, even if the elf's particular brand of enthusiasm had a tendency to grate on Harry's nerves. Harry was finishing up some of the leftovers from the students' dinner – shepherd's pie and treacle tart – when his relative peace was interrupted. "Mr. Potter."

Harry slowly looked up, over the rims of his glasses. Contrary to popular belief, Harry was not nearsighted. He was primarily farsighted, but the reason he wore glasses for more than just reading was because of the astigmatism in his eyes. Hence, when he looked towards the portrait portal, he saw a clear image of his Potions professor, surrounded by a warped-looking doorframe – even though the doorframe wasn't, in reality, as twisted as it appeared. Harry took a deep breath and let it out slowly as he sat his fork on his mostly-empty plate before standing. Snape was scowling at him. "What's this?" he sneered. "Too good to eat with the rest of the school?"

Harry clenched his jaw, repeating, Don't get angry, that's what he wants, over and over in his head. "No," he ground out "sir."

The corners of Snape's mouth quirked inwards, though even the headmaster couldn't have called it a smile. "So why are you lurking in the kitchens, Potter? Last time I checked, this area was out-of-bounds to students."

Still speaking through clenched teeth, Harry's tone remained somewhat forced and robotic. "Sorry, sir. I was just leaving." He had yet to look from Snape's eyes. Don't get angry, don't get upset. It doesn't matter that he's a prick who helped contribute to Sirius' death. Don't get angry. Don't let him get to you.

Snape smirked, "You know what I think, Potter?"

Harry shook his head minutely. "No, sir. I don't go poking about in people's private thoughts, so I couldn't possibly know what you think." He took a couple of stiff steps in the direction of going around the table to reach the door even as a muscle in his cheek started to twitch from the strain.

A cold facsimile of a smile surfaced on Snape's visage. "I think, Potter, that you have finally learned not even the Boy-Who-Lived can save everyone; that your actions have consequences. You realize, do you not, that had you actually practiced what I have been trying to teach you all year, the Dark Lord would not have been able to lure you out last night? That, had you not gone, your ever-faithful mutt would still be among the living?"

Harry had been doing all right with keeping a reign on his temper until Snape brought Sirius into the conversation. Something previously held in – even when he had yelled at his friends the summer before this year-from-hell, even when he'd trashed the headmaster's office – snapped. In a single, fluid move, Harry vaulted over the table and had his hands wrapped in Snape's collar and lifted. Though the professor was a full six feet, two inches tall, and Harry was a mere five-foot-eight, the toes of Snape's boots barely brushed the floor.

Severus hadn't known for sure what sort of response he'd been aiming for – tears wouldn't have been unexpected, nor would shouting, perhaps even a hex or two – but this was definitely not a logical Potter-reaction. He hadn't had time to react to the singular experience of seeing Potter as fast and graceful on the ground as he normally was only on his broom, nor had he the time to even think about reaching for his wand, let alone do so. Potter's eyes were bright, almost glowing in the dim light of the kitchen, and his hair stood out on end. Snape could feel the raw magic leaking from the teen, even as he absently noticed something cold on the boy's right arm digging into his neck.

"I'm going to say this once, and you are going to fucking listen to me," Potter's voice resonated from deep in his chest, reverberating with fury, magic, and something unidentifiable that demanded attention. "I am not my father, no more so than you are yours. Quit hating me because you hated Dad. I don't give a fuck if you hate me, but hate me, and do so for some other reason than Dad was a fucking asshole when you went to school together!" With each stressed word, Potter shook Severus a little, making the back of his head hit the doorframe. "I am not the only one to blame for what happened last night. Voldemort may have orchestrated it, and Bellatrix may have been the one to actually cast the curse, but equal parts of the blame can be apportioned out to me, you, the headmaster, Sirius, and even the fucking Ministry itself!" Potter's arms finally seemed to grow tired, and Severus was slowly lowered to the floor. Letting go of his collar, Potter took a shaky breath and stepped back, though the magic pooled around him didn't dissipate at all. "Don't you get it, you fucking bastard? You've won. Dad and Sirius can't hurt you any more. Wormtail is Voldemort's bitch. Remus is alone. You've outlasted the Marauders; good-for-fucking-you."

Harry took several steps backwards and breathed deeply for a moment, his eyes closed. Severus cleared his throat, but didn't get to say anything. "Go ahead and take points, Snape. I don't fucking care. Assign detention. Try to convince Dumbledore to expel me – not that I think you'll get far with that. It's not going to matter in the long run, so do your worst."

Though Severus dearly wanted to take Potter up on his offer, he changed his plan and reached for his wand.

When Harry didn't hear his professor say, 'That will be a thousand points off Gryffindor for defamation of a professor, use of crude language, and physical assault of said professor and detention with me for a year,' he opened his eyes.

That was what Severus had been waiting for. "Legilimens!"

Severus had no problems insinuating himself into Harry's memories and thoughts. The uppermost levels of the teen's mind were little more than chaos. Who gives a fuck about house points? Sirius… Toujours Pur… I wish the shepherd's pie here had fewer carrots in it… Dobby's a good elf, if rather enthusiastic… 'Truth is universal, perception of truth is not.' How could my relatives just off and leave me? …Department for the Regulation and Control of Interdimensional Threats… 'Either must die at the hand of the other, for neither can live while the other survives…' I'm so goddamned weary, so tired of all of this; I just want to sleep… 'To sleep, aye there's the rub, to sleep – perchance to dream, for in that sleep of death what dreams may come?' Pushing past the confusion, somewhat curious that he only figured marginally in Potter's thoughts – almost an afterthought in conjunction with house points – Severus wormed his way deeper into Harry's mind.

Instead of fragmentary thoughts, Severus found himself standing in the midst of a whirlwind of memory, small blips of images flitting past almost before he could recognize them for what they were. An image of a pair of old, worn out sneakers landed in a trash can… a white envelope was held out by a concerned-looking Longbottom… a thesteral nuzzled Potter's hair… Black flew backwards through a stone archway… Silver gadgets lay in twisted heaps on the floor of the headmaster's office; Fawkes perched on Albus' shoulder… Fawkes on a burning day, suddenly bursting into flame… The Sorting Hat… Darkness and a voice, 'Slytherin can help you on your way to greatness'.

With a disconcerting suddenness, the whirlwind of images and sound died, leaving Severus standing in a fog of gray haze. "Snape." He spun around and saw Potter standing not ten feet from him. "What did you hope this would accomplish?"

Severus shook his head, "I just wanted the truth from you, for once in your life."

Severus didn't like the smile that appeared on Harry's face. It made the teen look rather deranged. "Truth? You've been walking in shadow so long, Snape, I doubt you'd know the truth if it crawled up your ass and died there. However, I feel like humoring you. What did you want to know? Did you want to know that those memories you saw over this last year weren't isolated incidents? Did you want to know that my aunt and uncle would prefer it if Voldemort got his heart's desire in seeing me dead, just so they didn't have to deal with me any more? Did you want to know how often I read and reread Hamlet simply because of his soliloquy and how true it is for me? What did you want to know, Snape? What?"

Severus attempted to end the spell, to go back to his own mind. Though he felt the characteristic tingle that indicated the legilimens spell had been cancelled, he didn't immediately return to his own mind. Harry laughed, "It's not that simple, Snape. I'm tired of your attitude. You won't be going anywhere until I say so. This is my mind and I'm sick of you mucking about in it."

Severus found himself at a loss, a feeling he wasn't used to having in Potter's presence. He said the only thing he could, the only thing that had been on his mind since he discovered that Potter wasn't quite who he thought he was. "I wanted to know why."

Harry smirked a little, "'Why'? You want to know 'why'? For a Slytherin, Snape, you certainly leave a lot of loopholes, don't you?" The smirk broadened and bordered on a real smile. "I don't think I'll answer you. Not yet, anyway. Maybe someday, but not today. Now, get out of my head so you can run off and tell Dumbledore all about this." Harry made a shooing motion with his hands, "Go on. Get out and run off and talk with Dumbledore. I have better things to be doing with my time."

Severus staggered a little upon returning to his own mind. He took a moment to reorient himself and when he looked around the kitchen, Potter was no longer there. Something's not right with that boy, he thought. But damned if I know what it is… This requires some thought. Contrary to Potter's opinion, Severus had made it a habit to only go to the headmaster when he had something concrete to offer the man. At that moment, all he had were suppositions and theories so unformed as to be embryonic. Forgetting that he'd originally headed to the kitchens for a bit of a late-evening snack – he'd missed dinner while busy in his lab – he removed himself to his quarters.

While Severus was busy thinking, Harry headed back to the dorm. He didn't run across anyone until he opened the portrait. The common room was crowded. Ignoring the questions that began the moment he was noticed, Harry made his way to the stairs and up to the fifth-year boys' room. Neville was there, sorting through his trunk. "Hey," Neville greeted him.

"Hello," Harry replied absently.

"You really don't look well," Neville said, setting down a pair of socks and getting up from where he'd crouched on the floor.

"Thanks," was Harry's sarcastic reply.

"No, really, Harry. You look like hell. What happened? Did the headmaster tell you were you were going to stay until your family got back from their trip?"

Harry shook his head, "No, I wasn't talking with Dumbledore."

"Where were you, then?"

"I went down to the kitchens for something to eat. I ran into Snape."

Neville winced, "How many points did we lose?"

Harry shook his head, "None that I'm aware of."

"What happened?"

Harry's forehead wrinkled in thought for a moment before he nodded to himself. "What were you doing when I came in, Neville?"

"Just going through my trunk, figuring out what I could get rid of before we packed to go home."

"Nothing that can't wait until later, then?"

Neville nodded, "Right."

"Where are Dean and Seamus?"

"I don't know. I think Dean said something about wanting to finish up an extra-credit essay for Sinistra, and I haven't seen Seamus since dinner. Why?"

"Because I think I need to talk to someone, and I don't know who else I can trust with this… I don't think it's a good idea to do so here, especially since we don't know when Seamus will come back."

"Why don't we go to the Room of Requirement?"

Harry shook his head, "Not this time, Neville."

"Where, then?"

Harry opened his trunk and dug out the backpack Lily had sent him. "You trust me, right?" he asked, putting it on over his shoulders.

Neville nodded warily, "Yes… Why?"

Harry retrieved his broom from under his bed. He handed his invisibility cloak to Neville, "Put this on and wait in the window."

"What?" Neville asked, holding the cloak while Harry mounted his broom and flew out of the window, not unlike how he had done so the night before. Neville hurried over to the window and looked down. He could see Harry pull up on the broom long before the fall became dangerous and almost before he could blink, Harry was hovering just outside.

"Put the cloak on, Neville. I don't care if I get in trouble, but you shouldn't have to worry about detentions this late in the year."

Curious, Neville swung the cloak on, and pulled it closed around himself. "You'll make sure I won't fall, right?"

"Of course." It took some doing, but before long, an invisible Neville was seated behind Harry, clinging to the backpack. Flying rather slowly, Harry took the two of them to the Gryffindor stands on the quidditch pitch.

When they'd landed, Neville handed Harry the cloak. "You know that curfew isn't for another hour – we could have walked."

Harry nodded, "I know, but I don't know if this will take longer than an hour or not, and this way we didn't run into anyone I didn't want to talk to."

"Oh," Neville sat on one of the wooden benches. "What did you want to talk about, though?"

Harry removed the backpack and sat it carefully at his feet before taking a seat next to Neville. "What I'm going to say needs to stay between the two of us for now." Neville nodded, his eyes wide. "In all honesty, I don't know if the last twenty hours or so haven't been some sort of weird hallucination…"

"What's going on, Harry? You know you can trust me."

"I thought I could trust Ron and Hermione, too."

"But they're your best friends. What are you talking about?"

Harry sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "I don't know how to explain this, so I'll tell you what I know so far. First point, when we got back from the Ministry last night, I talked with Dumbledore." Neville nodded, he had assumed as much. "I found out some things that Dumbledore had been keeping from me. I got angry and ended up in the Room of Requirement. I hadn't really been thinking of anything in particular when the door showed up, so, curious, I went in. I'd wanted to see what the room thought I needed." Harry bent down and unzipped one of the pockets on the backpack. "Point two, the room gave me this." He handed the palmtop to Neville.

Neville took it and looked it over. "What is it?"

"It's a muggle thing, a palmtop computer. Here, let me show you what I found when I turned it on." Harry took it back and opened it. It took a moment for it to boot up, when it finished, Harry pulled up the video of Lily.

Neville watched it in silence, a thousand questions flickering across his face at any given moment. When it finished, he blinked several times. "How do you know it's not another trick from You-Know… Vol… Oh, hell. Him."

"For one, I don't think that Voldemort would be able to create something like this. Secondly, I was able to confirm some of what she told me, and I went to Gringotts last night and they were able to confirm more. I found this backpack in my personal vault, and I know I didn't put it there. The earring is part of a radio that makes it so I can talk with her. Sorry about the lie earlier, but –"

"Don't worry about it," Neville interrupted, "I think I would have done the same in your shoes. So, you're pretty sure what she's said is the truth."

Harry nodded, "Yeah, I do. Have you ever heard of 'exibeo magus'?"

"I think so… Isn't that the spell that healers use to find out what went wrong in botched transfigurations?"

Harry nodded again, "That it is, but it can also tell you if there are any spells on you and what those spells are and how long they've been there. I did that spell on myself, and found that I had a tracking charm on me, a spell called a 'core block', and an obliviate."

"What did you do?"

"Well, I transferred the tracking charm to this shoelace," Harry pulled his pant leg up a little to show Neville the gray shoelace tied to his ankle.

"Why didn't you just break it?"

"Because I didn't want Dumbledore to know that I now know he's up to something until I was far enough from him to be able to think. We've still got most of two weeks before term ends."

"What of the other two spells?"

"Well, the computer has that library in it that Lily mentioned," Harry was a little proud of the fact that he didn't stumble on Lily's name, "and using it, I was able to remove the core block."

"What is – rather, what was it?"

"According to the information in the computer, it's a spell to limit the amount of magic a person has access to. I've felt somewhat off since I removed it, but not in a bad way. It's more like I've been half-asleep my entire life and only just woke up."

"And the obliviate?"

Harry frowned, "That's the one I don't fully understand. Here, let me show you what I mean. Exibeo magus," the blue glow appeared on his wand. He let it sink into his arm. In short order, the display splashed up.

Spells Found: 1
Active Spells: 1

Spell Descriptions

Obliviate – Active – blocking approximately 54 years' time –
set in place 14 years, 7 months, 27 days, 10 hours, 43 minutes

Neville had to get up and move behind Harry to read it. "How can an obliviate be blocking more time than you've been alive?"

"I don't know, and that's what I don't understand."

Neville moved back to his seat. "It doesn't make any sense. You did the spell right, otherwise it wouldn't have worked at all."

Harry's intended reply was cut short by a chime from his earring. He hit 'mode' three times on his watch, "Just a moment, Neville. Hello?"

"Harry. Not interrupting anything, I hope?"

"Not really. I was talking with Neville Longbottom."

Lily chuckled, "That's good. I had hoped you had more friends that weren't under Dumbledore's influence."

"Is there any way to make it so that he can listen to this, too?"

"Yes, in the backpack, there should be another watch/earring pair. Just transfigure the post on the earring into a clip if Neville doesn't want an actual piercing."

"Okay, hang on for a minute."

"Harry? What's going on? Who are you talking to?" Neville thought it simultaneously amusing and disturbing that Harry was seemingly talking to nothing.

"It's Lily," Harry replied, pulling up the backpack. In the compartment he'd originally found his earring and watch, he found another set. The earring on this one wasn't a dragon though, merely a simple silver ball. He removed it from the card and handed the watch to Neville, walking him through how to activate the watch. "Lily said I can make this a clip-on if you don't want a piercing."

Neville shrugged, "Just do it, I don't care what Gran has to say about it. I'll deal with that later."

"You're sure?"

"Yeah… Just do it."

Harry pinched the lobe of Neville's right ear tightly, until the flesh under the skin parted somewhat and the front and back layers of skin were rubbing against each other. "Sorry," he said as he poked the post of the earring through. Neville jumped a little, but to his surprise, it wasn't as painful as he'd feared. "Hold still," Harry said, aiming his wand at the earring. "Episky," he said, and a tiny tingle of healing magic washed over the miniscule wound.

"Now what?" Neville asked, fingering the little metal ball. Harry walked Neville through the button-pressing pattern on the watch to activate the device. Neville jerked a little when the earring made a chiming noise.

"It's ringing, isn't it?"

Neville nodded. Harry smiled, "Hit 'mode' three times, quickly, on the watch to answer it."

Neville did as he was told and heard a voice. "That's right. Oh, you're on. Good evening, Neville."

"Hello?" Neville obviously had never used a telephone before.

"This is Lily – I assume Harry's been telling you about me."

"He has."

"And what is your opinion of the situation?"

Neville took a breath and let it out slowly. "Honestly? I don't really know. At least, now I know Harry hasn't gone completely barmy."

"'Completely barmy'?" Harry repeated, an indignant look on his face. "'Completely'?"

Neville smiled, "Harry, mate, you've always been a bit touched, but that's part of why you're you."

Lily's laughter echoed through the earrings. "I think I like this friend of yours, Harry."

Harry rolled his eyes and whispered, "Why me?" to the sky.

Lily answered. "Because you're just lucky, I guess."

Shaking his head in bemusement, Harry attempted to bring the conversation back around to what he thought they should be talking about. "Mu… Erm… I mean, Lily? Weren't you going to answer some of my questions?"

Politely ignoring the fact that this was the second time Harry had nearly called her 'Mum', Lily chuckled one last time and replied. "Not as such, Harry. There were a few things I needed to go over with you, and Harvey tells me that this is the last time I'll be able to get a clear signal through on the radios until the day before term ends."

"What of my questions?"

"Harry, you're going to have to get used to the fact that I am not going to be able to give you all the answers you want. Firstly, I don't know all the answers. Secondly, some of the answers you want are things you need to figure out on your own – if I were to just tell you, then your reality's causality string may become corrupted. Third and lastly, we don't have much time to talk tonight, so listen and try not to interrupt.

"I set up something of a present for you – you may have received a letter about your uncle winning a trip to Fiji?"

"Yeah, he did," Neville supplied.

"Good. I wanted to give you the opportunity to meet some people outside of school. I'm using MOTAP to try to nudge your timeline along the proper channels."

"MOTAP?" Neville asked. Harry was more than happy to let Neville do his interrupting for him.

"Magic Oriented Timeline Analysis and Projection. Basically, it's a combination of a computer program and a spell that can give estimations on the probability of particular events happening in any reality's causality string – their timeline. May I continue?"

"Please," Harry said, his tone amused.

"Where was I? Oh, yeah. The Dursleys will likely run into some… issues while on their trip. By that time, however, you should be ready to no longer need their 'help'. I suppose this next bit would be considered 'bad news' – at least for the time-being. The person who will be responsible for your protection for the first part of the summer will be Severus Snape."

Harry groaned. "Can my life get any more complicated?"

"Yes," was Lily's matter-of-fact reply. "This may not seem to be your ideal circumstances for the summer, but it's bound to be better than the Dursleys. You know that he won't stoop to acting like they have in the past. And, don't despair, the summer won't be without… redeeming features."

"Oh?"

"Yes. A distant relative of your professor and a friend of said relative will be staying with you for the duration."

"Where will he be staying? I thought students weren't allowed at Hogwarts during the summer term so that repairs and whatnot could be done."

"That is true, Neville, and all I can say to that is that Harry will only be staying at the house Dumbledore selects for a couple of days. After that point, there are equal chances he will end up staying in any one of a dozen different locations. MOTAP just can't clarify it any further at that point – at least, not yet." The clarity of the connection was beginning to suffer. Some background static was making itself heard.

"The radios can be used to talk to each other over any distance," Lily hurriedly told them; she had heard the static, too. "It's all in the reference manual in the computer. Neville?"

"Yes, ma'am?"

"Have Harry copy the instructions for you. We haven't yet managed to send a reliable printer for the computer." The static was growing noisier. "And Harry?"

"Yeah?"

The sound started fading while the static grew louder, "You need to… marks. …hear… Need… Snape's… back… marks… runes… talk… day before… ends…" The line grew silent.

"What was that last bit about, Harry?"

"I don't know… Something about runes and Snape's Dark Mark, I assume."

"What do you think she meant?"

Harry shook his head, "I have no idea."

A/N2: Next chapter in a couple days.