Nobody reads this forward anyways. :P

Harry had honestly thought that, after his first year with the Philosopher Stone and after his second year with the Basalisk and the Chamber of Secrets and after discovering that a maniac had escaped Azkaban for the sole purpose of hunting him down to kill him, his luck couldn't get any worse.

He had decidedly been wrong.

First of all, he had endured a rather deplorable D.A.D.A. class with his Potions Master subbing in for Professor Lupin...a class Harry had arrived late to, which was unacceptable of a Slytherin (who wasn't Malfoy). Then he had listened to the back and forth exchange between Hermione and the professor and Ronald and the Professor, which resulted in detention for the Weasley and points from the "insufferable know-it-all." It was a terrible class as they were studying werewolves of all things when they weren't due for it. Then he had assigned two rolls of parchments on the subject, which Harry thought a bit extreme for any essay.

Then things got almost unbarable.

Not only did stupid Malfoy insist that his arm was not better and they had to sub someone else in as Professor Snape insisted that Dumbledore would suspect foul play if they missed this match and then the weather got so bad that Harry was sure the match would be cancelled. Except it wasn't. Instead, Gryffindor backed out, claiming their Weasley twin beaters were sick with some mysterious disease and Hufflepuff would play instead, which annoyed the Slytherin team because they had planned to use Malfoy's arm as an excuse to get out of playing in this horrible weather. Then the Quidditch match had been murder (after murderous practices the days before) with rain so blinding one couldn't see the colors of the teams and wind so loud one couldn't hear the shouts of the surrounding crowds. Then Harry had seen the Grim in the stands as if Harry needed more sightings of the beast. Now, most would consider the Dementor attack on his person (which resulted in the loss of the game to the Hufflepuffs of all people) would be the icing on the cake, but no it hadn't...because the Fates had insisted on throwing Harry's broom all the way across the grounds and magically into the limbs of the Whomping Willow, which obliterated it.

Broomless, beaten by Hufflepuff, feeling insane from constant Dementor attacks, and hopeless of his fate due to the reappearances of the Grim, Harry was in an especially bad mood these days. It was to the point where if Weasley or any member of the gang gave Harry even the slightest of a bad look, Harry was set off on a hexing rampage that landed him in detention with his Potions Professor finally.

This irritated him as well as the man didn't have him do anything detention-like. Instead, he asked him to sit in a seat and explain what was wrong with his behavior as of late.

Before Harry could even think to be mad and start on some angry monologue, he began to pour out exactly how he had been feeling the past few days, down to how humiliated and abashed he was at how the dementors made him feel and even went on to say how extraordinarily difficult that werewolf essay had been as there simply hadn't been enough worth writing to make up two parchments (though he was fairly sure Hermione Granger could fill it fine). He then complained about how he was whining over himself and it made him feel pathetic and he was sure his professor was thoroughly disgusted.

"I am...a little."

Harry was probably more surprised by his Professor actually admitting something, than by the fact that his professor was currently disgusted with him.

"Look, Potter." The man sighed as he leaned against his desk and folded his arms. "What you're experiencing with the Dementors is normal."

"But nobody else faints!" Harry argued.

"Nobody else has faced the horrors you have faced." Professor Snape cut in. "When a dementor comes near you it sucks away all the happy memories you have and leaves only the worst memories behind and what you have...what you endured as a mere child of one is certainly enough a bad memory to do more than knock you off a broom."

Harry hesitated, wanting to elaborate on what he heard when he was attacked. For some reasons, the words stuck in his throat and he had to swallow several times before he could finally whisper, "When they get near me...I can hear V...You-Know-Who murdering my mum."

The silence that followed was more severe than that of a long-abandoned crypt. It felt eerie and cold and full of hidden sorrow and secrets. Professor Snape was as stiff as a statue, eyes staring up at the ceiling and his hand gripping his desk as if for support. There was a long pause, during which Harry felt himself sinking in his seat, wishing he would disappear into the floor. If only his Head of House wasn't so impossible to read. He really wanted to know what the man was currently thinking right now!

"I believe..." The voice was startling as Harry had begun to expect that this conversation was over and eventually he'd be dismissed with the wave of a hand. Despite, his surprise, he didn't miss the quall in his professor's voice, nor the drop in tone. "I believe it is time you were taught a certain skill, Mr. Potter. As I am quite busy with classes, I am afraid I'll have to pass this task on to another colleague, but I assure you...I promise you...you will learn to fight off a dementor...Harry."

Too many things happened in his professor's statement for Harry to really be able to register it all at that time. It didn't hit him until he was in his bed in his dorm that Professor Snape had promised to him, that Harry would learn to fight off a dementor, and that the man had finally called him "Harry"...just..."Harry." And this last part made him happier than he imagined winning the Quidditch Cup would make him feel.

Hopefully, Harry had thought things would take a turn for the right after his conversation with Professor Snape, but he wasn't spot on with this pleading thought. Sure, it turned out that he didn't have to do the werewolf essay (which was annoying because Harry had completed it), but then there were the bad things. First of all, Professor Snape had to choose Lupin to be teacher of this "certain skill" he would be learning, which wasn't a comforting thought at all to Harry. Secondly, he was beginning to doubt a certain sickness the D.A.D.A. teacher claimed to suffer from, especially since all indicators currently pointed to Lupin being none other than a werewolf of all things (which terrified Harry honestly). Thirdly, there was to be another Hogsmeade visit before end of term and the thought of missing out on another one was, in Harry's opinion, enough to dampen anyone's spirits no matter how bolstered they were.

Then the Potions Master did the unthinkable and most outrageous thing Harry ever expected the man to do: he offered to accompany Harry to Hogsmeade, if only so Harry could look over broom possibilities.

Okay...things were going much much MUCH better than they had been.

Of course, convincing the man to let him into Honeyduke's and into Zonko's had been an interesting affair as his Head of House seemed absolutely certain Harry didn't need to see these things, which Harry was absolutely certain he actually did need to see these things. To his surprise, Professor Snape did consent and even asked Harry to grab him some toffees while he was in there as Professor Snape (of course) would never set foot in such a place. Harry adventured through Zonko's alone as well, while his professor waited at the door.

It was odd, Harry noticed. It didn't seem anyone was paying either him or Professor Snape a bit of attention. Even Ronald, when Harry walked right up to beside him in the owl post office, didn't seem to even notice him. This confusing little thing led to a question, naturally, of his professor.

"I cast a spell around us." Professor Snape snorted, seeming rather amused and pleased Harry had noticed something...for once. "It will for a time allow us to pass through crowds and even someone who would want our blood wouldn't seem to recognize us. It's almost as if we're under an...invisibility cloak."

The way he said these last two words made Harry's stomach squirm. He had yet to tell his professor about the artifact, though he suspected the man knew of it anyways.

Professor Snape continued. "We can interact with people, but if they know us they will recognize us. As long as we make no interaction with others, however, this little visit into the village can remain a secret and neither of us will be in trouble with the headmaster."

He gave Harry a meaningful look. "Do you understand, Potter?"

The corner of Harry's lip twitched a mischievious smile. "Why, of course, Professor, sir."

The cold eventually drove them into the Three Broomsticks where Professor Snape set them at a table and went to order them drinks. While the professor was away, Harry busied himself with some of the candy he had bought himself until the door opened and he watched McGonagall, Flitwick, Hagrid, and...Cornelius Fudge enter. Harry ducked under the table at sight of them, forgetting the charm, but it was just as well as McGonagall seemed to take notice of Professor Snape trying to slip by them and invited him to the table with them. He tried to gracefully bow out of it, but Cornelius Fudge would haven none of it and insisted he take a seat beside him. The Potions Master cast one glance Harry's direction before he took his seat beside the Minister of Magic.

Harry realized he was trapped there under the table as the conversation began with Rosmerta delivering the drinks and getting caught into the discussion as well.

"So, what brings you to this neck of the woods, Minister?" Rosmerta finally asked.

"What else, m'dear, but Sirius Black? I daresay you heard what happened up at the school at Halloween?"

The Potions Master cut in. "I daresay this isn't conversation for a pub. Who knows who could be listening?"

"Oh, Severus." McGonagall scolded. "You and your worries about spies."

Madam Rosmerta interrupted, "Do you think Black's still in the area, Minister?"

"I'm sure of it."

"You know the dementors have searched the whole village twice. Scared all my customers away...it's very bad for business, Minister."

"And Dumbledore doesn't like them at all." It now appeared as if Harry's Head of House wanted to stay on the topic of dementors as it kept it from the topic of Black...a little... "Says they're a threat to the school. They even attacked students at a Quidditch Match."

"You're just concerned because you feel they sabatoged your chances at the Quidditch Cup." McGonagall scoffed at him.

He made a disgusted sound in his throat at this, but before he could speak Fudge complained that Dumbledore wouldn't let the dementors in the castle, to which everyone at the table aside from the Minister seemed to believe this was a good thing.

"All the same..." Fudge seemed a little deflated at such a massive disapproval. "They are here to protect you all from something much worse...we all know what Black's capable of..."

"Do you know, I still have trouble believing it." Rosmerta sighed. "Of all the people to go over to the Dark Side, Sirius Black was the last I'd have thought (Snape snorted)...I mean, I remember him when he was a boy at Hogwarts. If you'd told me then what he was going to become, I'd have said you'd had too much mead."

"You don't know the half of it, Rosmerta." Fudge said. "The worst he did isn't widely known."

"Really..." Snape started, but Rosmerta ignored him.

"The worst? Worse than murdering all those poor people, you mean?"

"I certainly do." Fudge nodded.

"I can't believe that. What could possibly be worse?"

"You say you remember him at Hogwarts, Rosmerta," McGonagall was suddenly saying. "Do you remember who his best friend was?"

Snape tried again, "I do think..."

"Naturally," Rosmerta smiled fondly at this. "Never saw one without the other, did you? THe number of times I had them in here...ooh, they used to make me laugh. Quite the double act, Sirius Black and James Potter!"

Harry covered his mouth from the gasp he had omitted though he doubted anyone would have heard him over all the voices in the pub. Snape made a slight grumble and seemed to be focusing rather pointedly at the contents of his tankard.

"Precisely," McGonagall continued. "Black and Potter. Ringleaders of their little gang. Both very bright, of course...exceptionally bright, in fact...but I don't think we've ever had such a pair of troublemakers..."

"I dunno," Hagrid chuckled. "Fred and George Weasley could give 'em a run fer their money."

"You'd have thought Black and Potter were brothers!" Flitwick put in. "Inseperable!"

"Of course they were," Fudge muttered. "Potter trusted Black beyond all his other friends. Nothing changed when they left schoo. Black was best man when James married Lily (did Harry see Snape stiffen?). Then they named him godfather to Harry. Harry has no idea, of course. You can imagine how the idea would torment him."

"Because Black turned out to be in league with You-Know-Who?" Rosmerta asked in a whisper.

"Worse even than that, m'dear..." Fudge began, but Snape finally interrupted again.

"I really think this conversation doesn't need to happen."

"No one really cares what you think, Severus." Rosmerta waved for Fudge to continue, which he did.

"Well, not many people are ware that the Potters knew You-Know-Who was after them. Dumbledore, who was of course working tirelessly against You-Know-Who, had a number of useful spies (did Snape stiffen again?). One of them tipped him off, and he alerted James and Lily at once. He adviced them to go into hiding. Well, of course, You-Know-Who wasn't an easy person to hide from. Dumbledore told them that their best chance was the Fidelius Charm."

"How does that work?"

As it was a charm, it came as no surprise that the Charms Professor, Flitwick, explained: "An immensely complex spell involving the magical concealment of a secret inside a single living soul. The information is hidden inside the chosen person, or Secret-Keeper, and is henceforth impossible to find...unless, of course, the Secret-Keeper chooses to divulge it. As long as the Secret-Keeper refused to speak, You-Know-Who could search the entire village where Lily and James were staying for years and never find them, not even if he had his nose pressed against their sitting room window!"

"So Black was the Potter's Secret-Keeper?"

Harry felt sick. He literally wanted to vomit everywhere, but he kept gulping down the bile rising in his throat and reminding himself: "This isn't happening. This isn't happening."

"Please..." Snape seemed close to begging, but McGonagall answered Rosmerta's question.

"Naturally. James Potter told Dumbledore that Black would die rather than tell where they were, that Black was planning to go into hiding himself...and yet, Dumbledore remained worried. I remembering him offering to be the Potter's Secret-Keeper himself."

"He suspected Black?"

"He was sure somebody close to the Potters had been keeping You-Know-Who informed of their movements. Indeed, he had suspected for some time that someone on our side had turned traitor and was passing a lot of information to You-Know-Who."

"But James Potter insisted on using Black?"

"Like a fool..." Snape muttered, apparently giving up on trying to turn the conversation away. "Like the absolute idiot he was instead of trusting Dumbledore, he had to go and think his own ideas were better than that of..."

"Severus." McGonagall snapped at him. "Really, that's uncalled for."

"And, yes, Rosmerta..." Fudge continued the tale. "He did. And then, barely a week after the Fidelius Charm had been performed..."

"Black betrayed them." Rosmerta breathed.

"He did indeed. Black was tired of his double-agent role, he was ready to declare his support openly for You-Know-Who, and he seems to have planned this for the moment of the Potters' death. But, as we all know, You-Know-Who met his downfall in little Harry Potter. Powers gone, horribly weakened, he fled. And this left Black in a very nasty position indeed. His master had fallen at the very moment when he, Black, had shown his true colors as a traitor. He had no choice but to run for it..."

"Filthy, stinkin' turncoat!" Hagrid spoke loud enough for people to quiet in the pub and McGonagall shushed him. "I met him! I musta bin the last ter see him before he killed all them people! It was me what rescued Harry from Lily an' James's house after they was killed! Jus' got him outta the ruins, poor little thing, with a great slash across his forehead, an' his parents dead...an' Sirius Black turns up, on that flyin' motorbike he used ter ride. Never occurred ter me what he was doin' there. I didn' know he'd bin Lily an' James's Secret-Keeper. Thought he'd jus' heard the news o' You-Know-Who's attack an' come ter see what he could do. White an' shakin', he was. An' yeh know what I did? I COMFORTED THE MURDERIN' TRAITOR!"

"Hagrid, please!" McGonagall begged. "Keep your voice down!"

"How was I ter know he wasn' upset abou' Lily an' James? It was You-Know-Who he cared abou'! An' then he says, 'Give Harry ter me, Hagrid, I'm his godfather, I'll look after him...' Ha! But I'd had me orders from Dumbledore, an' I told Black no, Dumbledore said Harry was ter go ter his aunt an' uncle's. Black argued, but in the end he gave in. Told me ter take his motorbike ter get Harry there. 'I won't need it anymore,' he says. I shoulda known there was somethin' fishy goin' on then. He loved that motorbike, what was he givin' it ter me for? Why wouldn' he need it anymore? Fact was, it was too easy ter trace. Dumbledore knew he'd bin the Potters' Secret-Keeper. Black knew he was goin' ter have ter run fer it that night, knew it was a matter o' hours before the Ministery was after him. But what if I'd given Harry to him, eh? I bet he'd've pitched him off the bike halfway out ter sea. His bes' friends' son! But when a wizard goes over to the Dark Side, there's nothin' and no one that matters to 'em anymore..."

Harry was sure Snape had trembled slightly at this final statement of Hagrid's while the remainder of those at the table fell utterly quiet for some time.

Rosmerta finally put in what sounded like a hopeful happy note: "But he didn't manage to disappear, did he? The Ministry of Magic caught up with him next day!"

"Alas, if only we had." Fudge grumbled. "It was not we who found him. It was little Peter Pettigrew...another of the Potters' friends. Maddened by grief, no doubt, and knowing that Black had been the Potters' Secret-Keeper, he went after Black himself."

"Pettigrew...that fat little boy who was always tagging arounda fter them at Hogwarts?" Rosmerta questioned.

"Hero-worshipped Black and Potter." McGonagall clarified. "Never quite in their league, talent-wise. I was often rather sharp with him. You can imagine how I...how I regret that now..." She snuffled a little.

"There, now, Minerva." Fudge patted her gently on the shoulder. "Pettigrew died a hero's death. Eyewitnesses...Muggles..."

Harry wasn't listening anymore. His head was swimming and pounding and all he could think was: Black had betrayed his parents. Black...best friend of his father...his parents' Secret-Keeper...Harry's godfather...had betrayed his parents to Voldemort. Harry's life had finally reached the pinnacle of his life where he realized: things don't get much worse than this.

McGonagall saying, "You know, Cornelius, if you're dining with the headmaster, we'd better head back up to the castle." was what brought Harry back to his senses.

As he watched everyone leaving, aside from Snape who insisted he was going to have another drink and Rosmerta who returned to work, Harry realized most of his lower torso was numb and buzzing and his head felt like it was weighed down with rocks. He didn't move until Snape took a seat at his table with a fresh drink and cast a spell about them.

"You may take a seat..." The words were barely a whisper, but Harry heard them well enough and did as he was told. A foaming tankard of hot butterbeer was pushed in front of him and he took it and drank from it quietly. There was a long pause before the Potions Master murmured, "You weren't supposed to find out this way..."

"And how and when was I supposed to find out, sir?" There was a bite in Harry's tone that he knew he couldn't shove out of it.

Snape hesitated, an action incredibly rare for him, and finally stated wearily, "The headmaster believed you were best not knowing for a multitude of reasons, though most importantly because he believed the information would push you to seek out Black and deal out revenge personally."

"And before?" Harry's lip was trembling. "Why wasn't I told from the start?"

"It was the belief of many of the staff that you were not ready to hear the details."

"That I was weak?"

"That you were young."

Harry was shaking violently and forced a gulp of the butterbeer down. The hot liquid seemed to dampen some of his anger, but he wasn't done fuming in the least. "And so I suspect you expect me to just lie down and let Black hunt for me? That I'm not supposed to do anything if I come across him?"

"If you come across him, Harry, you will do everything in your power to stay alive and come for aid." Snape spoke in a severe tone. "That is what is expected of you. You are also expected not to purposely seek him out to enact revenge. You heard what happened to Pettigrew. All that they found of him was a finger. Nothing more."

"D'you not remember what I told you about what I see when the Dementors come near me?" Harry said harsher than he had meant to. "D'you not remember that I hear my mum screaming and pleading with Voldemort as she's about to be killed?"

At these words, Snape trembled visibly and focused his gaze outside the window, grip on his tankard tightening. "I...can't forget it."

"So how can you expect me, who just heard that a person who was supposed to be a friend of hers betrayed her to the very person killing her..."

"Because you will not risk her sacrifice being in vain." Snape cut him off in a tone that left no room for arguing, not that his words weren't enough. "Because hearing her screaming should be a reminder to you, Harry, that she died for you and that risking your life for revenge on this person...Harry...there is nothing to be done about your mother's death, or about Black's betrayal, but you can do one thing: you can make her sacrifice count by not chasing down Black."

Harry shuddered, feeling all the bit like the "selfish arrogant big-headed James Potter" that Professor Snape loathed so much, and he finally, unable to stand it any longer, burst into tears.

Yay! I finished another! So close to crashing at work...and I'm in tears over how tired I am :D Oh, well. Could be worse. At least I have the internet.