A/N What will Luna say?

Oh, and Gnocco is the singular word for dumpling. Gnocchi is dumplings.

Disclaimer: Would I even have to write one if I owned HP? I think not.

Save Me, No One

Chapter 16

Luna sighed heavily. "When he gets too close to people, feels safe, or wants his secrets to be known, his... his glamours... they weaken..."

Severus looked at her, his eyes calculating, but it lost the effect, since they were sunken in, and bright with fever.

"You knew, didn't you." It was not a question.

"Yes. After the final battle, right after it... In the hospital wing. I wanted to, say something, I think. But I had nothing I could say, nothing I could do. He is an adult, an adult that had a deep loathing for me... A loathing I had cultivated throughout the years, and only nurtured it more when he came to my office, looking for..."

'What had the boy been looking for? Hope, happiness, redemption, love, answers? All of the above?'

"It isn't your fault. His emotions were raw, with Ginny, Hermione, Ron, everyone abandoning him. They were all still kids, going off and having dates while he was busy pushing for Draco and Narcissa's release, and you to have a portrait and be buried beside Dumbledore and- I know, I'm rambling, but its unfair! All of it!"

Severus nodded in agreement, staring at the brick patch that was Harry's window.

"First, he looses his parents, and then... He goes THERE."

Severus looked towards the closed bathroom door, wondering if the boy's glamours were still holding...

"They tortured him in every way imaginable. They starved him, that's why he's so small, though he's worse under the glamours. They beat him, mostly his uncle and cousin. They made him do all the chores, even cook, and he couldn't eat. In second year, my first year, I had heard from Ginny that he had a bladder infection. They didn't even let him go to the bathroom!"

She closed her eyes, hating the cold whiteness of the room. Almost instantly, a light golden color coated the walls and ceiling. Luna smiled softly, though it was a sad, haunted smile. "He would only ever say anything right after he got back to school. I stayed with him, just us in a compartment on a train. The first time, we knew each other, pretty well. He listened to me, and I liked that. Officially, we 'met' in his fifth year, but really, we met in his second. But when I really noticed something was wrong... It was my third year..."

***Flashback***

Luna sat down on the seat across from Harry. It was chilly on the train, yet the boy wore a grey shirt, so worn, it was, that it looked like the lint that comes out of a muggle dryer, sowed together into the shape of a very holey, dirty shirt. He also wore a huge pair of navy blue drawstring sweatpants, and what used to be white trainers. He shook, his face contorted in discomfort, making his bruises and marks of tiredness look strained against his unnaturally pale face.

"Harry?" Luna asked, gently, as she reached a hand out to the boy.

"Yeh Luna?" he slurred, as he carefully avoided her hand. The girl smelt a strong mixture of medicine, and alcohol in the air.

"Are you drunk? Or on drugs?" She knew his home life wasn't the greatest. He was well known for saying he hated his relatives... but doing drugs just to irritate them?

"Hey dunt blame me! I di'nt take drugs on purposs!" he exclaimed, angrily, his face seeming healthier.

Luna looked confused. "What do you mean you didn't take them on purpose?" She leaned in closer, despite the smell. "Was it the Nargles?"

Harry looked at her disgusted. "It wasn't because of the bloody Nargles!" he shouted hoarsely. Swallowing, he whispered, "I was forc'd."

Luna's eyebrows raised, as Harry sunk back into his seat. "Who?!"

Harry sighed, rolling over onto his side, wincing. "Not 'posed ta tell..."

"Harold James Potter, you tell me this instance!" the teen girl yelped, jumping to her feet. The boy flinched, before sighing again.

"You mus' swear on yur magic that yull neva tell a'yone. Swear i'."

Luna felt cornered. If he was in danger, she would really need to tell an adult... but... the curiosity of a Ravenclaw won out.

"All right. I swear."

***End Flashback***

"It was his relatives. Wasn't it," Severus muttered bitterly.

Luna nodded, tears swimming.

"You would never believe the things they did to him. Yes, they starved him, but for days on end, and he had to do sooo many chores on top of that! Yes, they would beat him, but not only with their fists. He's terrified of belts, you know. Refuses to wear them. And then there were all the other less common things they did: Forcing him into a bathtub filled with boiling water, taking away his blankets, refusing medicine when he's sick or injured... Except the year before fourth. He learned not to complain real fast."

Severus didn't even have to ask why. When the boy asked for relief from whatever plagued him, they had obviously drugged him, probably by feeding him almost everything in their medicine cabinet. Severus wished what he thought was an educated guess. But no. He knew from experience.

The rest of the information slowly leaked into his foggy brain. Starved, but forced to do chores? Including making the very food he was denied? Beaten? With a belt? So afraid of the inanimate object he was afraid to wear one? Drugging him? Baths of boiling water?

All of those dreadful things crashed into his heavy heart, leaving cracks in the already lopsided, damaged organ. But for some reason, the fact that those... creatures... took away the child's blankets... That just felt so heinous and hideous to him, and he didn't know why!

An image of a small shivering child in a dark room, wishing for some warmth, some love, something to force the cold away, leaked past his Occlumency barriers. He tried to shut the image out, but it didn't work.

The child was thin, pale, and had long, black, straight hair, except for the ends, which curled slightly. When the child lifted his face, pink lines ran down the child's pale face, coming from the heartbroken black eyes.

Only now, the eyes flooded with green, and were forced behind crooked round glasses. The hair shortened a little, becoming like a tangled mob of dirty black hair...

He and Potter-They were one and the same.

A/N Getting to know each other, and something bad to come... Review!