EIGHT. Shades

The first thing that Severus Snape did on arriving at the Black house was to banish the spectre of Dumbledore with something approaching contempt. Of all the childish nonsense! Expecting Severus to quail at a mere shade when he'd gone and murdered the real thing.

Then, Draco Malfoy (or some approximation thereof) showed him to a quiet room, whereupon he attempted to protest that he did not sleep. However, said approximation shoved him through the door and dimmed the lights and played some sort of white-noise sound like waves crashing against rock. Severus didn't even have time to unlace his boots before he was dead to the world.

He woke several times with a painful start, heart hammering. The first time it took him a good ten minutes before he was able to calm himself enough to sleep. Each jolt thereafter took less time to overcome than the one before it until he was in honest-to-goodness, deep slumber.

God, he thought sluggishly, the images of the past several weeks flickering behind his closed lids, Merlin on a fucking bender. And the cursing seemed to help, so he went on with it: fucking Dumbledore, he thought, properly angry for the first time since he'd – since Dumbledore – since he'd… Merlin, FUCK, he went on, because it felt good to be angry, it felt good to be anything. And with that he was truly awake.

Severus sat up and looked down at his bare toes. He wriggled them experimentally.

At some point during the night, someone had helpfully removed his shoes. They were lined up neatly at the side of the bed, muddy and dark and serviceable: his.

Severus tried to picture any of the children downstairs doing so, flipped through the images like mental Polaroids – Draco, Granger, Weasley, Potter – and could not make sense of any of them. Then, he'd no idea why he was here, why he'd allowed himself to be convinced.

Maybe you weren't, a sly little voice said, a voice that sounded very familiar. Maybe you were sick to get out of there.

"Of course I was," Severus said aloud, and it was true. Only people who were well shot of their marbles, like Bellatrix Lestrange, really wanted to be in the Dark Lord's presence. The others viewed him as a gauntlet they had to run on the way to the wealth and power they deserved. And if you didn't want power, then, why stay?

Unless you were guilty, of course. And Merlin knew Severus was that in spades. He could see Lily standing before him, looking politely incredulous in that way she had, one brow raised, lips pressed together in an unwittingly charming little moue. Is't hard, Severus? she'd inquire, leaning forward engagingly. Is it difficult for you? Didn't think about how difficult it was for me, though, did you, being the mother of the Boy Who Lived… Luckily I wasn't at it for long…

Severus shook his head, dismissing the image, but it was a persistent one. A lock of Lily Evans-Potter's vibrant red hair slid into his vision even as he turned the other way; she was still leaning forward, only now she had ducked around the recalcitrant tilt of his head to slip into his vision. Still so tormented, she intoned lowly. Still so focussed on his own problems. That's Severus Snape in a nutshell.

He stood and whirled to the old dresser-drawers in the scarce hope of discovering clean clothing, blinking rapidly, but it was as though she were burned on his retinas: she slipped before him in all her twenty-year-old glory, hair unbound, eyes bright as foxfire, bright as scorn. Her lips parted to speak, and then her eyes traveled down to his bare feet, and she seemed to forget what she was going to say.

This was so startling that Severus himself stood as though he'd been struck.

She smiled, suddenly, and then began to laugh, clutching at her stomach, wrapping both arms around her guts, as though she still had guts to hold in. Oh! she exclaimed in between gales of laughter, oh, you've brought yourself to ruin, Severus Snape! It was over the moment you walked through the door! Then, she disappeared to his eye.

Severus sighed when his investigations yielded cloaks and trousers to fit the young men in the house, and one motheaten suit that wouldn't suit his grandfather. He cast a freshening charm instead, then leaned his head against the closed bedroom door, eyes tightly shut. He took several measured breaths, pulled the mantle of Professor over his shoulders and exited the room.

Twelve Grimmauld was so ancient and so thick with magic – black, white, wardish – that all noise was muffled, but it took Severus little time to discern that there were young voices piping from the dining room. Severus descended until he stood in the foyer and paused a moment, listening: if the children were too foolish to cast wards, then it was on their own heads.

"…need a more streamlined approach," one of the children said in an intense voice with a trace of the West Country. "Hunting these things down one by one just isn't very smart, H – er, Potter."

Severus blinked when he realized the informal speaker was Draco Malfoy, losing his cultured accent in his frustration.

Which is hysterical, Lily whispered in his ear. Who knew he so much as spoke to the Muggle filth in Wiltshire?

Severus waved her away like a troublesome bee.

"…see that we have a choice," said a fussy voice, and of course that was Granger, with her clipped syllables and careful wording. "We've got to get all of the Horcruxes in one place, Malfoy, and I don't hear you offering any other suggestions!"

"I don't have any on hand, Granger, I'm suggesting we begin to research, something that should light you aflame with joy! There's got to be a way to find these things more easily than mucking about in hopes of –"

"It isn't mucking about," came Potter's voice: quiet, cold, it sliced through the voices of the other children like the words of a much older, more venerated wizard. "Don't you think that if there was a faster way that Dumbledore would've found it?"

The name Dumbledore seemed to hang in the air for a good half-minute; Severus wondered if Potter were aware he was using it like a talisman to ward off Draco's argument… if the others were aware.

"…and if Professor Snape wakes up, he might have an idea about a spell that could help us locate them as well…"

Lily's voice in his ear scoffed, choked. Countering Dumbledore's influence with yours?

"Fighting a losing battle, boy," Severus whispered to himself, and sure enough, Granger's voice interjected.

"We can't wait on Professor Snape any longer," she said in a surprisingly sympathetic voice. "He's been asleep for three days. There's no telling when he'll wake up."

Lily stared. Three days?

"It's a healing sleep. And as I've already explained, he'll awaken soon. Several of the more pureblooded families –"

" – So it's not something I'd understand," Granger cut in.

"That's not what I said."

"It's what you meant," she returned.

"Fine," Draco huffed, and Severus could almost see him crossing his arms over his chest. "I'm a pureblooded bigot who can't see past the end of my Malfoy nose. That's not the question at hand, here. The question is whether we should go to Godric's Bloody Hollow in the faint hope that something interesting leads us to someplace else interesting, or we can work on engineering a spell that can lead us to the Horcruxes directly… or at least try for Iridian Manor… Ron?"

And Severus had to blink in surprise, because the last could not be mistaken for anything but supplication.

A Malfoy begging a Weasley, Lily whispered. There are undercurrents here you don't understand.

There was a long pause in which no one spoke.

"…I don't know what you want me to say," said the youngest Weasley brother.

"Well that's clear enough," Draco spat.

"Don't take your frustration out on him," Granger sighed. "Look, I'm sorry, I shouldn't've – with the Muggleborn crack. I know you don't – but it's hard, all right? Maybe we should just continue this discussion another day."

"I'm not waiting another day," Potter predictably declared, probably with a dramatic flourish of some sort. "I'm not waiting for Snape to wake up or for you to invent some kind of Dark-Arts detecting spell. I'm leaving for Godric's Hollow, and you can come or not."

"Oh, no!" Draco shouted. "You don't get to say that, Potter!"

"I get to say whatever I bloody well –"

"No!" Draco returned, and the Wiltshire was in full force, lo and behold! Severus gaped. He didn't think he'd ever heard the blond boy sound so impassioned. "You do not get to guilt us – them – bloody hell, us! – into following you and damn the consequences. I am not a Gryffindor, I'll bloody well look before I leap, and you'll bloody well let me and SIT DOWN POTTER BEFORE I NAIL YOU DOWN."

Severus figured now was about the proper time to interject, so he strode forward into the dining room. "Good morning, class," he said, with the appropriate irony.

He had the satisfaction of watching all the colour drain from the faces of the three Gryffindors – except, perhaps, Weasley, who looked white as milk to begin with – and of watching Draco's cheeks flush with the color of fury. "You tell him, Professor, that he always rushes off without a thought for the rest of us! Who jumps down into a dark hole he needed a flying hat to get out of the last time! I ask you!" And he sat down with a huff.

"You're… well," said Granger blankly.

Ronald Weasley stood, and moved towards a door that Severus recalled headed down to the kitchens. "Cannot stand my company for the space of an entire minute, Mister Weasley?" he hissed.

Weasley paused with the tips of his fingers against the door, and didn't say anything for a moment. "Thought we might have some tea," he replied without turning, and disappeared.

Something strange there and no mistake, said Lily.

Severus began to worry about the extra voice in his head at precisely that moment.

Though if anyone has leave to go mad it's you, she went on with a tinkling little laugh. Isn't that what you were thinking?

"There's no two ways about it, you were listening and no mistake," Draco said. "So? Well, is there such a spell?"

Snape smiled. "I've never heard you speak that way, Mister Malfoy. Did the guttersnipes in Wiltshire teach you? I suppose you weren't so well-insulated from Muggles as your parents imagined."

This had the doubly-satisfying effects of making Granger and Potter look obscurely guilty and causing Draco to pale and stammer.

"I – I – It's none of your b – b – bloody business how I…" Draco turned a brighter red and clammed up, suddenly.

Severus swallowed, and Lily leaned forward, suddenly visible to his eye. She turned to stare mutely at Severus. "…the Cruciatus. My formula wasn't strong enough to repair the damage..."

Draco opened his mouth and closed it again, obviously thinking better of continuing to try to speak, and Granger – and Potter, even – looked sympathetic but at a loss.

Weasley emerged at that moment from the kitchens with a tray and tea things. He poured Draco a cuppa and set a small potion phial in front of him. "You forgot your potion last night," he explained. "And, sir, it's not that M…" Weasley closed his eyes and his jaw firmed. "The potion wasn't to blame. It's only that Draco gave it to my brother, Bill, who'd been slashed by Greyback. Full moon or no, he was never going to look the same. So Draco has to take this potion to fix his stammer, now. Probably for good."

Severus turned to stare at the Slytherin, who was knocking back the potion while avoiding Severus's eyes. Severus barked a laugh, then stared, until Draco finally looked up. He discerned through Legilimency that Weasley had spoken plainly; that, moreover, Draco hadn't given Bill the potion in order to flip Ron, though he'd seen that as an additional benefit at the time.

"Why - ?"

Draco shrugged.

"And we could use the Trace," Weasley blurted suddenly.

Everyone turned to stare.

"The Trace," Weasley said, busying his hands with the tea things. "Used to detect underage wizards doing magic? Draco and I researched it when he was still in the Wing. The Trace works by detecting the sort of untrained magic performed by underage witches and wizards: it has a trace. There must be other spells that detect traces of magic. We've got a Horcrux, so it shouldn't be but so tough to tailor a spell to detect its trace. Right, sir? Professor?"

"Ron," Granger breathed, as though she'd never seen him before.

Severus sort of knew how she felt.

"You trust that I will aid you in order to discover this spell?" he queried, staring at the Weasley boy.

Ronald Weasley looked him up and down, and Severus felt, strangely, as though he were being Legilimized, although he felt no tell-tale press of another's mind against his own. "Sure," the redhead finally said, with an anticlimactic shrug. "Draco trusts you, and, well, he doesn't trust many people, so… and I trust him."

Potter stared, Granger stared, and Draco pinked.

"Thank you, Ron," he said quietly. The blond looked up to find Potter with his eyes. "Please don't go without us. Promise you won't."

Potter's gaze slid across the room, from Ron, who looked mulish, to Hermione, avoiding his eyes, to Snape – no help there – and back to Draco. He deflated. "Merlin, Malfoy – fine. Nowhere without you. We'll just sit in this old pile of termite-holes 'til we rust."

Severus examined Potter's features while the boy was occupied. His expression was so complex it was impossible for Severus to read.

Lily smiled. Really? she inquired, one eyebrow arched. Your skills fail here, of all places? She knelt down at her son's feet and looked up. He's bewildered; no one's ever gone against his wishes like this, at least not in this realm. But, she added with a smile, he's glad someone finally did. He was afraid he was going to have to do this all on his own.

As Severus watched, the corner of Potter's mouth twitched. The boy followed this with a puzzled frown, as though even he wasn't certain why he felt so relieved.

Severus took a sip of his tea, and nodded warily at Weasley, who nodded in return.

It was really quite good.

"There are whole classes of detection spells," Granger said, eager to share her knowledge as ever, now that the tension in the room seemed to have eased. "It may not be possible to equate Horcruxes and the magic performed by underage witches and wizards –"

Weasley's head jerked up in response, and his eyes flared. "Oh. No, no, I looked it up. It's, it's –" He broke off to snap his fingers.

"…Magnetic," Draco filled in, without looking up from his tea.

Ron pointed at Draco. "Yeah, right, that's it. So it's, y'know, attractive. Perfect, see?"

Hermione nodded. "Well, that's lucky. Polars are dead tricky, but Magnetics are all right." She smiled, patiently.

If she thought Weasley would stop there, however, she was immediately disabused. "Thing is, we need more than just a Magnetic trace," he said, rubbing his chin. "I mean, that was fine for the potion Harry took, we just needed to… mess with the – thingie." He waved his hand.

"Destabilize the attractive force," Draco translated.

"Right, right, disrupt the – yeah," Weasley went on, hand still rotating at the wrist.

"Destabilize the – what?" Potter interjected, rotating his wrist in turn and wearing a puzzled frown.

Weasley conjured a bit of parchment. "See here," he began, then flushed and ground to a halt. "Er… professor, you'll tell me if I've gone wrong…"

"Rest assured," Severus said with a predatory smile. "Do continue."

Weasley gulped, but then turned his attention back to the parchment again, undeterred, while Draco looked on like a cat who'd got the cream. "See, there are traces – signatures – when underage magic is performed. And the Trace spell sort of attracts those traces. And so the Ministry can follow that Trace back to…"

"…its origins," Malfoy finished.

Looks rather smug, that one, Lily observed, standing behind Draco Malfoy's chair.

"So if we engineer a Horcrux Trace," Hermione Granger filled in, "then it should take us back to the object on which the Horcrux curse was cast."

"See, no," Ron corrected, instantly and emphatically enough that Granger's features fell. "It'd take you to the person who cast the spell…"

The entire table fell silent.

"The Trace tracks the the witch or wizard's spell back to their magical core," Weasley went on, bringing his hands to his chest and throwing his arms wide. "Following a Trace means finding the person who cast the sort of magic you're looking for."

"Then how will that help us find the Horcruxes?" Potter inquired – without, Severus noted, his usual impatience. He wore the same expression as Draco, though Potter's also held the hint of incredulous surprise.

"Yes, then how will that help us with the Horcruxes?" Granger echoed, rapt.

Weasley shrugged, and eyed Draco; but the blond only gestured forward: the floor is yours.

"Er… we'd have to invent a new spell. Like the old one, but only sort of."

Potter threw up his hands and a whoof of exasperated air escaped Granger. "Ronald," she said, "that's not as easy as you're making it sound!"

"You did Point Me," the boy pointed out, "when you were loads younger than we are now. That's a location spell. You could use it to find people, things… dead useful."

"Point Me is a child's spell," Granger protested, even as her lips twitched at the implicit compliment. "It can't find just anything. It is repelled by most of the wards wizards place around things they want to stay hidden."

"Regardless, Granger," Draco interjected lazily, "Ronald's point is a good one. If you did Point Me at… what… age twelve?... then perhaps the whole of us working together could manage something a touch more complex. Plus, we have a professor working with us. Don't we, Professor Snape?"

Severus blinked.

Oh, cleverer and cleverer, Lily said, one hand pressed to Draco Malfoy's shoulder; he did not seem to notice. Perhaps there's a reason he's so smug, eh, Severus?

"The creation of a new spell is a weighty endeavor," Severus drawled, neatly side-stepping the question, "but not an impossible one. That is, provided the… inventors… are motivated." He raised an incredulous eyebrow, then wasn't sure at whom he should be directing it. Granger was swottish to the point of foolishness, Draco was bright and capable and certainly appeared motivated enough, and Weasley was being uncharacteristically constructive. He settled, eventually, on Potter, who could be blamed for most things.

He found that Potter was already staring right back, eyes dark.

Severus's gaze jerked away and landed back on Weasley.

"Look," Granger was telling him, "what you're discussing is a hybrid spell between Point Me and a Magnetic Trace –"

"No, not a hybrid –" Malfoy interrupted.

"What's a hybrid?"

Granger, in full lecture mode: "…like a spell, one laid atop another…"

"But that's not right," Weasley said. "We don't want a hybrid, a hybrid combines spells 'til what you get is somewhere in between –"

Potter jolted upright. "First one and then the other!" he exclaimed. He scrabbled for Weasley's piece of parchment and began writing. It was the most vehement Severus had ever seen Potter, discussions of his godfather aside. While Weasley had slowly warmed to his subject, Potter was a combustion reaction and, once lit, flared brightly.

The children were all alight with it, now, leaning forward to examine Potter's parchment, each one's energy feeding off the others'. "No, no," Granger said, "because of the –" and Draco snatched the kohl from Potter's hand and scribbled. "But, see, if we –" And Weasley laughed aloud.

Lily hovered behind them, frowning and making such contortions of her features that Severus had to rise and stand behind them and watch what was taking shape.

The spell had the Arithmancial symbology of a Trace, but the rune for travel – R – was inverted, in Granger's precise script.

"No," Severus snapped, ready to rip the useless Arithmancy in half; but then he noticed a particularly innovative use of Walrim's Theorum in Draco's unmistakable lacy handwriting, and he had to slowly seat himself instead, the children clustered 'round him.

"No," Draco quoted, "what's no?"

"You cannot inverse the quantity like that, the solution for energy becomes undefined," Severus murmured, but he was still staring at the strange location of Walrim's Constant in the equations, and his finger lingered there.

"Look," Draco said, conjuring more parchment. He used a Sticking Charm and pressed three sheets to the dining room wall. He scribbled down three formulas: the more complex and lesser-used Arithmancical formula for Apparition on the first sheet, the formula for the Trace on underage magic on the second, and the formula for Portkey creation on the third: energy expended is change in distance times mass over time and time again.

Granger stared at the three formulas. "If this part of the Apparition formula is converted to 'distance travelled', and this whole bit to 'Second Energy' in the Portkey, they're identical."

"They're based off of the same principles," Draco replied. "But look: combine them and cancel out here and here, and…"

"It's Walrim's Constant, only written using different symbols," Hermione said. She was staring at Draco Malfoy as though he had just gifted her with a grand library, or ensured that House Elves should never be enslaved again.

Then Hermione blinked, shifted her bushy hair out of the way, and leaned over Severus's shoulder. "And that's… the Arithmancical Model for Apparition along a Trace," Granger breathed.

"A spell could be crafted to Trace any magical object," Draco agreed, "and, potentially, Trace where magical portals lead, in the case of Portkeys, Mirrors, and… other such things."

"Potentially," Potter interjected, missing the reference entirely. "I mean, you'd have to tailor the spell to each magical object in turn, right? It's not as though this spell would detect the path of a Portkey."

"No," Malfoy sighed. "It's not a catch-all. Our spell would solely be a Horcrux detector." A smile grew on his face until he was shining with it. "I'd started to think you lot were dimmer than mine, honestly."

"Shut it, Malfoy," Potter ordered, but there was no bite to the boy's words. He was staring at the formulae and trembling, just barely on the edge of Severus's perception – terrified or like a hound dog on point, though, that was the question.

Once again, the Potter boy's eyes found his, and Severus found himself dropping his gaze with an instinctiveness that threatened to needle him past reason. First, that near-Legilimisation from Ronald Weasley of all people, and now this from Potter. Next he'd be wondering if Granger were going to take points!

That's simple, Severus, Lily interjected, perching on the table before him and swinging long, white legs back and forth. You're at their mercy. Without my son's tolerance, where should you go? She eyed him coyly. You could disappear, true. But alone, cut off from the war you've sacrificed so much to win – it would end you. It's no wonder you keep looking to the three of them to test the waters. Hoping they're better masters of you than you were to them…

Severus stared up at her, knowing she was right. He'd placed his entire future at Harry-Bloody-Potter's feet the moment he'd left the Manor – he'd have to've been half-mad to do such a thing.

No wonder the other half of his mind seemed to be galloping after, he thought, staring sourly at Lily's shade.

"…cast the coordinates according to this formula to discover the wand-movement," Hermione Granger was saying, sounding breathlessly excited at the prospect, "and see if the result makes sense."

Keen, isn't she? Lily enquired, leaning back on her hands to peer half over her shoulder at Granger. Good, too – better than you, Severus.

Keen was the word, and also brilliant and blindly compassionate, sometimes to her detriment, Severus thought, staring at the bushy-haired girl as she went on with her work, the boys clustered 'round her as she played with the variables. When she had a captive audience for her ideas she was vibrant, pointing out this or that aspect of her work with excitement and anticipation. There was nothing of the girl who needed his attention so desperately that her hand shot up for every question, waving through the air on that first day of school.

He had to stop thinking of her as a girl, he had to stop thinking of them all as children and in fact, he realized he'd already started.

They're your allies, now, Lily whispered. And it's really no different from before. Remus Lupin, she said, standing behind Hermione Granger. Severus snorted and turned his head, but Lily had already moved to stand behind Ronald Weasley, placing one slim hand on his shoulder. James Potter, she said, causing Severus to blink in surprise. Needs approval from the others, perhaps too much, but he's got a good heart, would save your life even if he despised you. She smiled, taking his silence for agreement, and moved to stand behind her son.

Severus couldn't help a huffed laugh, putting his head in his hands.

And this, Lily went on, is Sirius Black.

Severus's head shot up to find that Harry Potter was still staring at him, or perhaps again, with the darkest of gazes.

Watch out for this one, came Lily's lowest, most serious voice. He doesn't know what it's like to have an adult love him, and to him, you represent all that dark patriarchy that has beat at him until he hates the very thought of it. Of you. He'd let an unwitting friend murder you and think it a lark.

Severus swallowed, and nodded once to Potter.

Potter jerked and looked away.

She leaned forward, the sweep of her blood-red hair tickling Severus's ear. The difference is that he's ashamed of it, she whispered as Potter stood suddenly, making eye contact again. You can work with that, Sev, but then, you can work with anything, can't you.

Severus rose and followed Potter down to the kitchens, feeling as though he had been called up to the Headmaster's Office.

The thoughts that swirled in the eddies of that one burned.

A/N: Welllll, hello, there! Are you surprised I'm still alive?

Yes, yes, I know. The life of a teacher is filled with peril. Which is not to say that I haven't been writing; just that I haven't had time for polish-and-post. And, really, precious little time for writing either. Truth be told.

Once more, I owe it to my first pre-reader that this was posted at all; I was in the middle of saying, that whole bit where they figure out the thing - that's way too much exposition, I'm going to cut it when she said SEND IT NOW. I have this thing going where all exposition bores me when I read it (not when I'm writing it - then, it's brilliant. Only dull in hindsight, of course.) Mama (the pre-reader extraordinaire) reminded me that some exposition is necessary and besides, in her words: "don't you think the reader's going to wonder why the Order never tried this before, if it's so easy?" True. And then there was this awesome spell that they found someplace just doesn't have as much of a ring to it. ;)

So please, readers, let me know if you skipped past the technobabble? Or if you thought hrm, interesting! (Or at least, hrm, necessary to the plot!) I wait on tenterhooks! Not literally. That would be... disturbing.

Just for being so patient and waiting so long, I'm going to post you another chapter shortly. It was going to be part of this chapter, but then the chapter was over 9000 words, so... no.

Missed you all! Hope you're having a marvelous summer. :D

-K