Chapter Three

Venturing Out

Severus had reappeared in Birch Hall the next day as though nothing unusual had occurred in his absence. Harry gave no notion that anything had changed except a slightly harder set to his chin as he looked at the professor and a marginally more purposeful step in his limping gait. Severus decided that his wisest move was to permit Harry these changes without comment and instead settled himself in the study with a long scroll rolling out to the floor before him, crossing items off with a flourish and adding more in scrawling writing at the bottom of the page occasionally.

"What are you doing, sir?" It had taken Harry far longer than Severus could have imagined possible to give into his curiosity from where he sat in the chair opposite, clenching and unclenching his hands as though wishing he was able to put them to a constructive use.

"I am organising what I must pick up from Diagon Alley today for the new term," he replied steadily, trying not to let his frustration at Harry's formal way of speaking show through.

"Why?" Harry suddenly sat forward in the chair. "The school term doesn't start yet."

"I do try to exercise some preparation before my classes," Severus replied, his voice steady rather than sneering, Hermione's words were burned into his brain. "I have the choice of going today or waiting until Diagon Alley will undoubtedly be inundated with hundreds of former and future students all having consumed far too many chocolate frogs."

"Owl post," Harry suggested quickly. "Just get it sent to you. They do that, take orders I mean."

"At a very unreasonable price per feather on the owl they send," Severus countered, still in an oddly gentle tone which bothered Harry much more than his argument did.

"I'll pay." He forgot sometimes that not everyone had his money and his many lessons from Ron would never teach him that people did not like it flaunted before them. Severus' nostrils flared and he pointedly stared down his nose at Harry.

"If I were so inclined to have my belongings delivered by owl pos, I assure you I am capable of paying for it, however I am loathe to offer anyone money which they do not deserve. Furthermore, I cannot trust any bumbling half-wits to select out the most appropriate ingredients from the apothecary. A Jobberknoll feather which was plucked too early from its owner will have as much effect in a memory potion as one pulled from a raven. Bundimun solution which has been improperly diluted will either not perform as it should or will eat away at all of Poppy's furniture."

"Why would you be brewing cleaning potions?" interrupted Harry in surprise. Severus's returned gaze was almost comical in its utter disbelief. Catching himself, the older wizard wiped the expression from his face and set his jaw again. For a moment he had been lecturing Potter the boy and not Harry the man. Infuriatingly he realised Hermione had been right in calling him out on his behaviour.

"It is a significantly cheaper not to mention superior way to get strong, anti-bacterial potions," he concluded quietly. The young wizard nodded and his shaggy hair, too long untrimmed, fell into his face. Instead of shaking it back impatiently he stared at the table in front of him for a long minute.

"I suppose if they sent you an improper cutting of hellebore a Draught of Peace could turn out rather badly," he mused under his breath. Slightly confused by Harry's lack of attention to the subject at hand, Severus tried to steer him back onto safe footing.

"Indeed. Lucky for the students, and perhaps unluckily for me, I am an expert at telling the difference between all of these potion ingredients and that is a large part of the reason which draws me to Diagon Alley today." The eyes came back into focus and the head snapped up. Severus was relieved to see it. That dreamy half-state sent shivers down his spine.

"It's not safe. Hermione…." Harry trailed off as though he had let slip the trail to an Aztec treasure.

"Miss Granger suggested that I might be in some sort of mortal peril if I tried to pick up my shopping?" Severus kept his voice light and dry but the frown never departed from Harry's face.

"I think it's a bad idea, sir."

"I acknowledge that you think that however it does not change my decision to go."

"As a guest in my house I would think that manners would dictate that you at least consider my opinion," Harry said, his voice turning icy. Cocking his head ever so slightly to the side Severus raised one eyebrow until the young man ducked his head away and stared at the opposite wall, crimson blooming in his cheeks.

"Why are you so concerned about me leaving? Are you afraid that you are still being controlled?" Harry did not reply but instead made a very big show of counting the number of stones in the wall opposite him. "Very well, you do not wish to talk and the afternoon is fast approaching. I will be back before nightfall." He had made it all the way to grabbing the floo powder in his hand before Harry leapt from the chair. For a moment Severus had actually thought he would be able to leave in peace.

"If you are going I'm coming with you."

"It would hardly be prudent for your first reappearance in the public eye to be strolling along Diagon Alley. I am certain if Miss Granger advised you of any hostility towards me she also advised you that some of the public remains…unsettled about recent events surrounding you." Harry wanted to shake the other man to force him to stop speaking in that oddly soothing, even tone.

"If you mean she told me people want my head on a stake then yeah, it might have been mentioned in passing," he said rather bitterly.

"Always the talent for the dramatic overstatement," the words were out of Severus' mouth before he could stop them but they had an oddly calming effect on Harry.

"I know it's not safe. I…I don't particularly want to be out there anyway," he said slowly. "But…I have…I think I have an idea." The uncertainty in Harry's voice was so heartbreakingly like the Harry who emerged in spite of Voldemort's hold on him that Severus was loathe to deny the man anything. Shaking away those feelings and reminding himself sharply that this was a life or death situation Severus advised gently,

"Your invisibility cloak would not be wise. There is too much chance of someone bumping into you."

"I try not to wear it anymore. It tends to upset Augury," Harry said the name like something sour had settled in his mouth. "Seeing as it was probably made out of one of his ancestors."

"Ah. So your plan is?" Harry looked suddenly severely uncomfortable and got to his feet, seeming to second guess himself several times before turning towards the door.

"Wait here." Two steps forward and he changed his mind, turning back to the fireplace and collecting the bowl of floo powder from the mantelpiece as well as indicating that Severus should drop the handful he held back into it. Resisting the urge to roll his eyes and reminding himself that much of this paranoia was well-deserved and likely to serve the man in staying alive, Severus did so. Harry left the room with the bowl tucked under one arm.

Several minutes passed and Severus began to wonder if the man was attempting a disillusionment charm or some other such disguising magic and was discovering it beyond his diminished magical capabilities. Or worse still, that he had performed some unexpected adverse magic in the attempt. Just as he decided to go and check on Harry the half-closed door was nudged open and a rather wiry, pale lion paced into the room. Severus did not need to check for the darkened patch of hair to the top of the animal's forehead or circling its eyes to know that this was Harry's animagus form.

"A lion, Potter? A bit of a cliché, don't you think?" he drawled. McGonnagall must have delighted in seeing the form as she gave her star pupil lessons. She had acted mysteriously for weeks afterwards and had flatly refused to tell anyone Harry's form with the promise that the surprise would be far more interesting than word of mouth. The lion reared onto its hind-legs and Harry reappeared on the spot looking shaken.

"I couldn't transform for a bit while…" apparently unable to admit again that Voldemort had been inside of him, Harry trailed off. It became clear to Severus why Harry had left the room, for fear of failure which might indicate the presence of something sinister. "I thought…I thought maybe my form would've changed."

"Patronus' may change. Animagus forms do not," Severus told him in his 'Professor Snape' voice, though quietly if that question had been posed to him prior to seeing the transformation he had to admit that he would have thought that Harry's unique situation might have caused an alteration. Harry gave a half-hearted shrug. "In any case, I hardly think that going to Diagon Alley as a lion will be any more of a disguise than placing a tea-cosy on your head. You cannot believe that no one will be smart enough to surmise who a conspicuously marked lion is? Particularly given the need for you to disguise yourself in public? And in my company?"

"I don't think so. I think… I think people will think I'm too evil to be a lion," Harry said uncertainly.

"Lion's are not the pure creatures you seem to want to believe simply because they happen to be your house mascot, Potter," Severus retorted in a long-suffering tone. "They are proud, certainly, as all Gryffindors are insufferably. They have the ability to hunt down their prey patiently and viscously and usually on their own, hardly considered pure. They are extremely territorial and are ferociously certain that their beliefs should be the ones which others follow." Severus stopped abruptly when he noticed Harry looking pale and trembling. "Those are not always bad things," he added, his tone returning to mild. After a beat he added, "Harry."

"Sounds a lot like Voldemort really," Harry muttered, turning his face away and unconsciously scrubbing at his arm in an effort to rid himself of the uncomfortable tingling Severus' words had elicited.

"Therefore people will certainly suspect you," Severus said rather tartly, frustrated at his inability to understand the strange mood changes Harry kept placing before him. The man did not flinch but instead set his face determinedly.

"It is rather moot. Whether or not they suspect it is me it is the best plan and I don't intend to let you go off and get murdered without at least attempting to help. Don't try and suggest anything else because you and I both know that charms and invisibility potions will all have the same problem as my cloak. I am coming or you are not going and you will have to take the risk that students will start falling through beds because of improperly prepared Bundimun solution."

"It would not be my preparations which would cause the damage," Severus said in a defeated voice. "Dumbledore mentioned he might be in Diagon Alley today." As expected, this made Harry do a double-take. As though it was playing out before him on a screen, Severus could see the conflict Harry felt over the possible confrontation with his old mentor who he had turned on as viscously as the lion Severus had described. He had tried to kill him.

Had he been capable he would have paled further at the sudden realisation that if he had killed Dumbledore then, very simply, the headmaster would no longer be around. Such a reality seemed so foreign and incredible that Harry could not hold onto more than a few glimpses of how different the world would be. Even now, even after all that had occurred between himself and the headmaster, even considering the distrust he would possibly always feel for the man, Harry at least had faith that Dumbledore would always appear to be on his side. If that was the case then others in the wizarding world would fall into line.

Harry was not sure he could ever trust the headmaster again. The thought pained and saddened him. Dumbledore had been someone he had looked up to so very much before the start of the previous year. Where had it all gone wrong?

"I don't care," he said finally, his voice rasping a touch. "I'm coming." Severus felt a tightening in his chest and the strongest urge to help Harry in some way, to take away some of his pain. It had been so easy when Voldemort had been a part of him. All it would take was a touch, a kiss and he knew he had made a difference. Even now he was still uncertain about whether Harry resented him for what he had done whilst Voldemort inhabited the man.

"You have to start understanding that the acts which have been carried out in the past months have been Voldemort, not you."

"It was me," Harry replied with surprising aggression. "Every stinking murderous act it was me behind the wand, me wanting to kill, me saying the words." Suddenly fearful at the strange turn in Harry's attitude, Severus acted with instinct and strode across the room to Harry's side, reaching out to place a hand across the nape of the other man's neck. Harry flinched violently and threw him off, heightening Severus' concern until he said, "I don't like you touching there. It…it's where you had to to get him away." He looked so utterly wretched that Severus wanted to wrap an arm around his shoulders and squeeze. Both his distaste at this sudden thought and the concern that it might startle Harry prevented him from doing so.

"Very well, you may come," he relented instead. "On the condition that you listen to every thing that I say."

"Of course," Harry said, silently adding to himself that listening did not necessarily equate to obeying. He would not, for instance, listen to any self-sacrificing commands of running to save himself if they were attacked. Severus knew he should consider this easy assent as suspicious but found himself too glad at the prospect of Harry leaving the house to risk spoiling it.

"You realise you will have to use the floo in human form and then change once we arrive in the Leaky Cauldron?" Severus confirmed. "Are you able to transform that rapidly?" Harry nodded but, unlike the cocky Gryffindor of old, did not use the chance to show off his skills. This calmed Severus somewhat. "I will go first then and offer you at least some shade from wandering eyes." He indicated with his fingers for the floo powder which Harry realised he had left outside. He raised a hand to summon it in before flinching and dropping it.

"Back in a moment."

"No need," Severus interrupted and with a wave of his wand the floo powder flew back into the room. He wondered if a part of Harry's reluctance to change in front of him had also been to do with his diminished magical abilities. Biting his tongue to keep from asking if Harry's healing skills had disappeared with the rest of his abilities, he grabbed a handful of floo powder and offered the bowl to Harry who repeated the motion.

He really did look unwell, so pale and with a thin line of sweat on his forehead.

"Are you sure you are well enough to such a trip."

"Do you want me to go first?" Harry countered, touchily.

"No." Severus threw his handful onto the fire and stepped in. "Diagon Alley." He was thrown through the floo with his arms snapped to attention at his sides and stepped out in the Leaky Cauldron. A few pairs of disinterested eyes glanced casually at the fireplace but only one pair bothered to be surprised at seeing Severus Snape, Dark Wizard Accomplice there. On the pretence of shaking off soot, Severus raised his robes out to the side and shook them until he heard the sound of four paws hitting wood. Having successfully disguised Harry's entrance to the dingy pub he straightened up with dignity and snapped his fingers as though calling to a familiar.

Harry, rather affronted by this, refrained from nipping at the offending fingers. Instead he stuck close to Severus as he wound his way past two warlocks involved in a heated discussion about illegal dragon smuggling and between someone Harry swore must have been half-troll and a tiny goblin having a debate over where was best to sit. One of the comical pair nudged him and Harry leapt forward dramatically, the unfamiliar feeling shaking him. He could feel Severus' eyes on him in concern and quickly tried to act more animal-like by raising a paw and licking it as though it pained him.

Apparently satisfied, Severus continued out to the bricks which would lead into Diagon Alley. Harry padded behind him, trying not to be overwhelmed by the smells his new nose could detect. The cigar an old warlock was smoking in the corner was enough to almost choke him. In a sudden fit of panic he realised his limp translated to his animagus' rear paw but shook off his fear with a sharp reminder that he was there only to protect Severus and it did not matter if anyone recognised him.

He at least enjoyed the semi-animalistic feeling he got in his animagus form. It was just enough to stop him thinking too much about the many murders which kept flickering throughout his mind. Trying his best to appear like a familiar, a difficult task as he had never actually met someone with one, Harry followed Severus out into the street. For a moment he felt incredibly at ease. Diagon Alley was one of his favourite places in the world. It had been his introduction into the wizarding world.

He had stared into each of these windows astonished by the tiniest piece of magic. The site of wizards impatiently reducing all of their bags to one small enough to fit in their pocket had left his jaw to the ground. For a moment he was not The Dark Phoenix or any other variation of that man, for a moment he was 11 year old Harry Potter with no clue of his destiny.

Then a foot caught him painfully and he yowled loudly. Severus turned immediately, wand out to find the offending witch blubbering apology while staring in a panic at the giant cat at her legs. Severus' eyes burned into Harry's mind and he realised he was staring disconcertingly at the woman who had run into him. Hastily correcting his behaviour he twisted around and started to lick at the painful spot.

"For Merlin's sake stop blubbering and go woman," Severus growled at the witch who took to her heels with pleasure. Clearly wanting to ensure Harry was okay but knowing it was unacceptable Severus turned in a flurry of cloak and stalked down the alley. Harry followed, his limp worsened. With sudden relief he realised the witch's blunder had given him the perfect excuse for his injury.

More nudges came from all sides and panic wormed its way into his throat as he realised how crowded the road was. He had lived in seclusion for so long even half a dozen people in his study had been too much to handle. A swarm of chattering wizards surrounded him and for one horrific heart-clenching moment he could not see Severus at all.

"Severus!" he cried, but all that emitted from his mouth was a panicked half-roar. Two of the wizards jumped aside warily. Though he could not speak Severus had heard him and a moment later had wrestled his way back through the crowds, snarling at the group.

"Isn't that..." Harry froze, they could not have recognised him. Not now, not like this.

"Snape," muttered another man. As though he had spoke a particularly threatening word the rest of the group hastily faded away. Severus knelt down on the pretext of adjusting his shoe.

"If you could please avoid drawing so much attention to us?" he growled. "I thought the idea was to protect me not to ensure everyone in the alley was aware I am here." Harry's lion-eyes were beseeching and Severus sighed. "Just stay by my leg and avoid getting dragged off." Harry fell into step beside Severus again, brushing up against his leg as he stuck so close. He could tell he was irritating the man but as more irritable witches and wizards swept around he could tell he was better off with an irritated Severus than an infuriated anyone else. It would only take one of them, it would only take one spell...

"Inside," Severus barked suddenly, in a way which suggested he had been attempting to get Harry's attention for sometime. Harry quickly obeyed, dashing inside the apothecary and then curling up unobtrusively in a corner in what he hoped was an animal-like fashion. Severus glanced at him, shook his head and went about collecting the ingredients he needed. He murmured something Harry could not hear to the shopkeeper and slipped him a list. From the bowing and,

"Of course, Professor." He received Harry could tell he was a good customer. Probably one who picked up illegal ingredients too. Severus turned to look at Harry, straight-faced but scrutinising as he tried to work out what exactly had spooked the other man so badly. He supposed it was natural for him to feel frightened when he first ventured out into the world again. Sometimes Severus felt like that after he had been brewing for several days or worse still, after the school holidays.

He hoped it did not mean anything more sinister. He doubted it did, not when Harry could transform into his animagus form.

"Here you are, Professor Snape. All of the specialty items you request," breathed the shopkeeper. "That's seventeen galleons." Severus grimaced but dropped the gold onto the counter. They always charged an arm and a leg when they knew you could not risk being handed over to the authorities. Bastards.

"Come," he barked at Harry, collecting his packages and slipping them into various parts of his robes. Opening the front door he waited for Harry to slink out beside him, stopping as soon as he could to avoid being too far from Severus as he shut the door and followed him out. "One stop before we go home." Harry looked up at him beseechingly but Severus wanted to see how far he could push the boundaries. He could tell the young man was becoming more confused as they headed passed the book store, the cauldron store and the robe store only to stop outside Florence Fortescue's.

"Two cookies and cream ice-creams, one in a dish," he ordered. Fortescue looked surprised, glancing between Severus and Harry.

He knows my favourite, Harry thought, simultaneously excited that Severus knew and horrified that Forescue did. Severus' glower must have done the trick however as he said nothing and instead hurried off to supply them with their order. A few minutes later Severus was licking his ice cream in as dignified a manner as someone could lick an icecream. The dish presented to Harry was immediately turned into a black and white mush, half of which slopped onto the ground much to Severus' disgust.

Nonetheless he was pleased to see Harry enjoying the food so much. He doubted there was any situation which would make Lord Voldemort each in such a manner and it was the final confirmation he needed to make him relax. It was Harry next to him. Now all he needed to concern himself with was the man's rehabilitation.

Rehabilitating him from being possessed by the most evil wizard ever to exist, turning evil and murdering people brutally and openly.

He supposed this was the easy part.

A/N: I'm sure you're all sick to death of hearing about whatever personal issue has been holding up this story so I will leave it at 2011 was a rough year but the story continues. I renew my pledge to continue the story come hell or high water. Thank you to all the reviewers who spurred me to scribble a little more of this every time I had a moment.