FOURTEEN: White

Severus supposed he shouldn't have been surprised when he and Lupin descended the hill to an argument in progress.

"You fools!" Malfoy was shouting. To Severus's surprise and horror, he dipped down to scoop up a rock and threw it at his counterpart.

Draco squinted at the rock, which halted in mid-air and dropped at his feet. "You didn't think of it, either!" he growled. "Just how were we supposed to know –?"

"You're the one who figured it out!" Malfoy shouted. "You're the one who knew magic would treat us as the same person! I don't want this, I don't want Potter in my fucking head…!"

Lupin gasped behind him, and Severus groaned. "Mister Malfoy, tell me you did not realize this might…?"

"Of course not!" the two boys shouted in unison.

Severus could not help but think that Narcissa, standing behind her boy, looked oddly smug. "Children," she said, in a calming voice. "We have all had a terribly trying time of it," she went on, gesturing towards the encampment as though to encompass everyone's terrible time. "Mister Potter will have an even more trying time tomorrow morning. And as… unforeseen… as this is, I can only think it betters his chances of survival, having two wills holding him here rather than just one."

Malfoy was shaking his head, not in negation, but as though he hoped to toss something loose. Severus could have told him that wasn't going to work.

"Yeah," Harry put in. "In case we're all forgetting, I'm leaving, tomorrow. And I'd really like to get some sleep. Y'know, for the trip."

Draco sobered immediately, and even Malfoy looked oddly abashed, even if his intermittent frowns meant he was angry at feeling that way. Malfoy stared first at Harry, then at Draco, then whirled away. Not that there was far to go; Severus heard a thunk as he leaned against the opposite side of his mother's carriage.

"You knew this would happen," Snape growled to Narcissa once Lupin was off comforting Harry and Draco was had followed his counterpart. Severus could hear low voices coming from the other side of the carriage.

She blinked wide eyes at him. "I suspected. And so? Draco will grow close to the Potter boy; he won't be able to help it, now." Her eyes suddenly narrowed. "In case there is any doubt," she added, "I mean to protect my family. Draco loves me, but I fear my husband spent too many years with too free a hand in his raising. This was my mistake; I see it now, but there is no way to undo it. The best I can manage is to make sure Draco has a vested interest in protecting the Boy Who Lived, even in coming to care for him. Perhaps his ideals will follow his heart. Eventually."

Severus sighed. "It's not as though I don't see your reasoning…"

Narcissa nodded, resolute. "Well; good, then."

"…but if your son ever discovers you are manipulating him in this way, I fear he may take leave of his senses and of us," Severus finished. "Surely you don't wish that."

"I did not suggest this course of action; I simply did not prevent it," Narcissa replied. "I still do believe it is the best way to keep the Potter boy alive, and I don't deny that it also yielded a valuable opportunity for us."

Severus examined her earnest features in the light of the carriage-lantern. "I never know whether you are lying without Legilimency," he admitted.

Narcissa seemed genuinely surprised. "Severus, I don't believe I've ever lied to you. I try not to make a habit of it." She smiled, sweet. "If you ever wonder, simply ask yourself: how do her actions benefit her son, and her son's chances of survival? Then you shall have your answer. Always."

Severus swallowed. "You are… remarkable."

"Thank you," said Narcissa, and her practiced smile grew wobbly. "I – I must get to sleep myself, I think. I have told Him that I planned to sleep at Tioram, tonight, but He has no reason to come looking."

Severus nodded. Tioram was a reasonable place for a well-to-do witch to stop between Wiltshire and Hogwarts, protected by a charm that made it appear an old ruin. "Be careful, Narcissa," said Severus.

She looked up with one foot on the bottom step to the carriage. "I am," she said. "Always."

She disappeared within, and Severus looked for a slightly-less-damp patch on which to spread out his long limbs. He looked up at the stars overhead, clear and sharp as a blade. We are killing Harry Potter tomorrow, he thought, but the thought refused to take hold, his mind sliding over it as though it were covered in treacle.

Like Albus, was his last, clear thought before he slipped entirely under the blanket of exhaustion.

It seemed Severus Snape was who one called when the time came for killing.

Agony woke him.

Pain lanced down Severus's arm, and the Mark glowed fire-coal red. The Dark Lord was angry, and summoning all of his followers back to the Manor.

He sat slowly upright to find that Remus Lupin was glaring at him from across the glowing remnants of their campfire, his golden eyes reflecting the fire's embers. For a stark moment, a jolt of fear lanced through Severus: an age-old fear, quickly suppressed, it left him shaken and even more snappish than pain alone could manage.

"Keeping watch?" he hissed, knowing the watchdog was implied too subtly for the werewolf to take offense.

"I heard you wake," Lupin replied, eyes still eerie in the dark. "He's calling?"

Severus sketched a sharp nod. He rapped quietly on the carriage door and Narcissa stuck her head out, wide-eyed with adrenaline. Severus blinked at her white nightclothes and couldn't help twitch a small smile.

"Out with it, Severus!" she ordered, doing up her gold hair with both hands.

He showed her his forearm. "He calls," he whispered.

Narcissa nodded. "The disappearance of both of my boys – He's finally noticed." She leaned close, both arms still perched atop her head as she wound her hair up into a bun. "Do not forget," she whispered. "He never knew of Potter or Weasley."

Severus frowned. "They were in the dungeons, they were imprisoned…"

"And yet their capture had not been announced," she broke in, eying him soberly. "No one was certain who those boys were, and no one wished to report it to Him until they were sure; I suspect their presence was kept quiet, much less their escape. No: his primary concern is whether I or you or the both of us aided in the escape of my sons." She disappeared back into the carriage; Severus could hear the thumps of presumed bits of luggage as Narcissa tossed through them. "I should have hoped to be here… for Mister Potter's sake…" emerged from the darkness of the carriage door. "…but I fear I have told Him where I shall be tonight. And there I must go, in case He comes looking."

Severus thought carefully back to his visit to Tioram in his younger days. He believed it was surrounded by water, meaning that Narcissa would have, by necessity, left her carriage behind. Apparition with a small bag for essentials would not be questioned.

"You suspected something of this nature," he called into the bustling carriage.

" 'She who plans for misfortune'," came the reply. A moment later, Narcissa emerged. If Severus peered at her closely, he could tell that her hair just might be askew underneath that overlarge hat of hers, but he supposed it would do, in the dark. She looked sufficiently travel-worn, too, with everything just that much askew. "So: I take my leave of you," she said, hand atop her hat. Her voice was breathless, and her blue eyes were still wide with just-woken adrenaline. She frowned, regretful. "I do wish we had more time."

Severus bowed over her hand, and Lupin nodded in her direction. "What shall I tell your son?" Severus inquired, pressing his right hand into his left forearm. The pain was growing rather dizzying.

She nodded once, tight, sharp. "Tell him that he is just where his mother wishes him to be," she replied. Then, her smile turned secretive. "See you at work, Severus," she said, and Apparated in a whoosh of damp air.

Snape sighed and closed her carriage door. He woke Narcissa's Elf and told him that his mistress expected him to be in the vicinity of Eilean Tioram by morning; the Elf roused himself and headed off into the night.

"Must you return?" Lupin suddenly said.

Severus turned and offered up his best glare.

"It's not a rhetorical question," Lupin said. "I fear if you leave now, Severus, you may not return."

"If I do not come when Summoned, Narcissa will be implicated," Severus said with a sigh. "We left together."

"What shall you say?"

"I will say that our Draco became over-curious, and the other enchanted him, and together they escaped."

"And you believe He Who Must Not Be Named will accept such a story?"

"Only one way to find out."

Lupin stared. "You're mad," he said, slowly.

"Perhaps. Perhaps I have long been mad," Severus replied, casting a charm to make his cloak blacker than night and withdrawing the shrunken Mask from his pocket. "Tell Evans – no, I shall," he interrupted himself. He pocketed the Mask again and shook the boy's shoulder.

Evans blinked up at him sleepily. "Professor Snape? What are you doing in Gryffindor?"

Severus quirked a smile. "Be easy," he said. "I only wished to inform you I was leaving. Do not – attempt the spell to rid yourself of the Horcrux until I return."

With that, the boy was fully awake. "What? No – Professor, you don't have to go, it's over, that's why you came with us –"

"I will return soon," Severus said and, moved by some strange impulse, placed his hand atop Evans's head. The boy, for his part, blinked up at him in surprise, words cut short.

Severus swallowed back fear and regret and braced himself for what was to come. Closing his eyes so he wouldn't see the boy's face, he Apparated, letting the Mark guide him forward.

Harry waited until Lupin fell asleep again, and then waited ten minutes more. Then he crept over to Draco – or Malfoy, Merlin knew which – and shook him, then gestured towards the other one. Malfoy – or Draco – jostled his counterpart, who rose, shaking his head from side to side in an effort to fully awaken. Together, the three moved just a little ways off from the others.

The one he'd woken first was Draco – Harry was pretty certain, now. The blond's eyes were sleepy but concerned, and the careless hand he drew through his bedhead was too casual to be the Malfoy he knew. "What is it, Potter?" he inquired, in a not-unkind voice.

The other one – Malfoy? – said nothing at all at first, then realized what was missing from the clearing. "My mother left?" he said in a voice so despondent that Harry was momentarily distracted from his plans. The shocked hurt vibrating down their shared connection was near-impossible to ignore.

"She had to go," Harry said. "She – she knew he would look for her, right? She had to be where he expected."

"She could've taken me with her," Malfoy went on, still staring off in the place his mother's carriage had been.

"Don't be foolish," Draco snapped. "Of course she couldn't've – you were imprisoned, if you were found with her she'd be implicated. And before you try to say you could've pretended to be me, you tried that and that's how you got imprisoned in the first place. Not to mention the fact that he's looking for both of us, now. Anyhow, he didn't wake us up to tell us that," Draco said.

Malfoy sat gazing east, in the direction of the gathering light; or maybe off in the direction of Wiltshire, and the Manor. Then, he snorted. "Potter's decided to do it now. Isn't that right, Potter?"

The two boys turned identical, wide grey eyes on Harry, who shrugged.

"Yeah; now," he agreed.

Malfoy frowned. "I'm not certain which of us it is you believe can cast the Killing Curse on you, Potter, but I assure you –"

"No!" Harry exclaimed, then sighed. "No," he repeated in a much calmer voice. "I figured I'd do it myself."

The lamp-like glare of two pairs of shining eyes pinned him again, this time in identical mixtures of disdain and surprise.

"You can't mean to –" Malfoy began.

Harry shrugged again. "I won't make Snape," he said, resolute.

"You won't? Nothing'd give him more pleasure, I'd think."

Draco hissed, and a sharp, metallic tang seemed to vibrate down their shared connection, like the taste of blood or the gathering of electricity in the air before the flash of lightning. "Shut up," he said. "You don't know anything."

"It doesn't matter," Harry said. "It doesn't matter, I can do it. You have to mean it, don't you, but I do. I mean it, I want it to happen. I have to destroy the Horcrux, I – I'm the only one who can."

Draco and Malfoy rolled their eyes in tandem. "God, Potter," said one, and Harry had to swing his eyes from one face to the other, unsure of who had spoken. "Are you always like this, in every incarnation?"

Had to be Draco, then. In their exhaustion, or maybe in the wake of the connection, they were… Harry didn't know. Less like the evil twin and the good twin, and more two sides of one coin.

"Thanks, Potter," Malfoy growled, then paused, and pinked. Fuck, this needs to go away, he thought, desperation hanging around the words like icicles ready to shatter at the slightest touch.

"Not yet," Harry said. "I need you both. Malfoy… will you help?"

Malfoy grumbled something that sounded a lot like so now he thinks to ask. But when he looked up at Harry, his eyes were steady, and Harry believed for the first time that the other boy was really going to help him, not just in this but in general: that Malfoy was here to help. The thought was so unbelievable that Harry had a hard time hanging on to it.

Draco twitched a smile at him as if to say you believed in me easily enough, but Harry's mind reeled away from that, too.

Because he had, even after the whole Master nonsense he'd been stupidly trusting; only he hadn't, even if Ron had brought Draco straight to Grimmauld Place. He shook his head to free it of the double- and triple-images that thinking about Draco seemed to engender, now.

"I think you're going to have to mean it, is all," Harry told them, floundering about for the conversation that had been taking place aloud and not the snippets that had been passing through their heads. "I mean, really hold on. Which might mean you have to wedge the connection a little deeper…"

Malfoy's face drained of colour.

"Whoa," Draco said, and caught him at the shoulder.

Malfoy sneered and shook him off. "I can do it," he said, glaring at them both. "You don't have to be so careful of me, I'm handling things perfectly well on my own."

"No one said…" Harry began, then shook his head when Malfoy turned an ice-cold glare on him. "All right," he said, drawing his wand. "Just… try focussing on me, will you? See how close you can get."

Harry closed his eyes and tried to let them in, but it was almost as difficult as it had been on the hillock the night before. Every time they drew close, he batted them away, until Malfoy came at him rough out of what felt like desperation, and Harry's barriers stayed down out of sheer surprise.

Hi, Malfoy said, sounding a little strange to Harry's mental ear, but Harry knew which one of them it was, it was impossible to be uncertain, now. This Draco Malfoy was frightened and furious and still somehow glad to be with Harry, maybe because he'd been running for a long while and Harry couldn't deny that being this close to someone had its own way of being a comfort. Malfoy latched onto him somehow, which felt wrongly like holding hands.

I could do without that image, thanks. It was Malfoy's most ascerbic tone, but Harry wasn't perturbed. He could feel, sort of, how Malfoy kind of thought it was funny, and kind of didn't want to let on.

Then Draco was with them: cool, collected Draco, at least on the surface. Beneath that, he was terrified for Harry, with more concern for Harry than Harry had a right to.

I'm not him, Harry told him.

Still, came Draco's voice. His consciousness seemed to mesh together with his counterpart's until they were both… supporting Harry.

Harry took a deep breath, then another and another again as he drew his wand from his pocket. Self-directed Dark Arts, he thought suddenly and for no reason at all. He could feel Draco attempting to calm and soothe him, reminding him that he and Malfoy were there, as though he could possibly forget.

Harry summoned up every thought he could about his hatred for Voldemort, how badly he wanted him to die. He thought of what might happen if he were to fail, forced himself to see: Hermione, features dirt-streaked, gripping iron bars; Ron, staring up at the sky, glassy-eyed, the Burrow burning to the ground, Mrs. Weasley wailing in the distance; Remus, hunted like a dumb animal… he could do this, had to. For them.

Harry closed his eyes and pointed his trembling wand at his own heart. "Avada Kedavra," he whispered.

And then, Harry Potter died.

White, was all Harry thought, at least at first. Then, he looked around more closely.

There was white-glowing brick and concrete all around him; there were benches that looked as though they should have been made of wood, but were shining like the sun. And then there was a drop, a precipitous drop, really, that led down to two, close-set…rails.

"King's Cross," Harry said aloud; but then he was distracted by the sound. There was something – someone – making a terrible wailing noise. A horror of a noise, one that raised every hair up on Harry's arms.

But something, perhaps his infernal and eternal curiosity, made him approach anyhow. He crept forward, his fingers itching for his wand, and peered under one of the glowing benches.

There lay the most hideous baby Harry had ever seen. It looked burned, blistered, as though it should have died long ago if it were in any way natural, and its peals were desperate and gurgled, maybe on blood. Harry reached a hand forward in horrified fascination.

"Stop," said a commanding voice behind him, and Harry's reaching hand froze. He turned.

Severus Snape was approaching at high speed, robes snapping out behind him; in a breath he was beside Harry, crouching and peering below the bench. "Dear God," he said in horror, and snatched the baby up.

Harry's brain seemed to freeze. "…sir?" he inquired in a small voice; because this was the Severus Snape he remembered, the one with the commanding air and the… the presence that made every eye in the room snap towards him. "Oh my god, he killed you," he realized. All of King's Cross seemed to flicker with that realization, as though the world itself were a lightbulb, burning out.

Snape looked up over the baby, whom he was bouncing in a most desperate fashion. "First thing's first: make yourself useful, Harry, and get this baby something to quiet it."

Harry, Harry thought in a daze. Snape had never called him that. He'd called him Potter, and then Evans, which was sort of strange and sort of… desperate, as if Snape wanted, more than anything else, to forget they'd ever known one another at Hogwarts. As though Snape needed to see Harry as someone else entirely.

Meanwhile, Harry's body seemed to be ahead of his conscious mind. Milk, he thought, and there it was. He picked it up and it was just the right side of cool. He handed the milk over to Snape, who popped it in the baby's mouth.

The scaly, wretched baby blinked in surprise, gave a few more half-hearted squalls, then subsided, drinking the milk as though it were starving as well as half-dead. Snape bounced it around a few more times, then handed the baby off to Harry.

Harry had never seen a baby this close nor ever held one, so he was horror-struck at the idea that he might drop the thing. But when Snape arranged his hands just so, somehow the baby fit there, like – God, like it was his, somehow, even though that was impossible. Snape nodded, but Harry barely saw. He backed up to the bench and settled there as the baby suckled the last of the milk from the bottle.

Snape handed him another, and the hungry baby ate half of that, too, before its eyelashes began fluttering in heavy sleepiness and it eventually let the nipple slip from its mouth; finally, it fell into an unsteady slumber.

Harry looked up at Snape with wonder-filled eyes. "What – I don't –" he tried, before gazing down again into the baby's face.

Was it his imagination, or did the baby's skin look just that tiny bit smoother, healthier?

"You're going to make a good father someday," Snape blurted, then blinked, as if the very observation had startled him.

Harry grinned, surprised into pleasure. "Hey. Thanks," he said, bouncing the baby a bit in his arms. It wasn't his imagination – the child's skin was growing rosier. It squirmed; Harry jostled it just a bit, and it burped and settled. "Wow."

Snape settled next to him on the bench. "Are you all right?" he inquired after a moment.

Harry looked up in surprise. "Huh? Oh, right. Dying. Baby distracted me right away. Didn't hurt, if that's what you mean. But how are you here?" He gulped. "Are you – did you die, too?"

"Ah," Snape said with a small smile. "Not precisely. I'm looking for someone, actually. I wonder if you've seen him. About yea tall, wild hair, answers to 'Snuffles'."

Harry stared. "You're him. The – the other one."

"Well-spotted," said Snape, and ruffled his hair. "About as bright as my Harry, are you? Or did you suppose yours had miraculously passed away from pining for you? And so quickly, too!"

Harry tried to look at his own hair in amazement – a futile gesture – before gazing back down at the baby.

"Severus?"

Snape and Harry looked up to see Dumbledore approaching them from across the station.

"Oh – no. Oh, no, no," the old wizard was saying as he approached them. Snape shot to his feet and moved to support the ancient wizard, who slumped against him in shock. "Severus – you're… dead?"

"It's a temporary thing," Snape assured him. "I'm searching for some people I've lost, that's all."

"Severus!" Dumbledore exclaimed, pushing the other man away to stand on his own shaky legs. "One does not simply enter the Realm of the Dead and go gallivanting about – serious damage could be done to your soul!"

"Sirius damage, that's hilarious," Snape deadpanned. "Good to know you've got the same rot for humour, no matter what world…"

But Dumbledore ignored him. "And Harry! Too soon, you're here too soon…"

"You knew about me being a Horcrux," Harry said, feeling as though he were realizing it all over again. "You knew and you never told me…" The baby squalked, irritated at the rough treatment; Harry realized he was squeezing the poor tyke a bit too tightly, and him all covered with boils…

Harry looked down to find that the baby looked… well, all right. Not super, and some dead skin was still flaking off, but – well, a right healthy baby, at least in comparison to before. It yawned a baby yawn and dropped right back off to sleep.

Dumbledore stood aghast. "Harry… Harry, what have you got there?" he inquired in a low voice.

Something in his voice made Harry's stomach drop. "Nothing," he said, quickly, pulling the bundle towards himself.

"Show me," Dumbledore said in a commanding voice, and Harry slowly lowered his arms, just enough that Dumbledore could see.

"Harry," Dumbledore said, in a kind voice. "Oh, I should have known. Harry… your soul is so good, your spirit so pure… of course you'd see and you'd want to help…"

He advanced, Harry backing up until he was once more against the bench; he sat down roughly, clutching the baby to him; the baby began to cry.

"That's Voldemort, Harry," Dumbledore said, sadly. "That is the piece of his soul you excised when your spirit left the mortal plane. You must leave it here."

"Leave it?" Harry whispered, peering down into the sleeping bundle. "But it's a baby."

"I feared this," Dumbledore admitted. "Oh, if only you hadn't come so early, Harry."

"If I hadn't come so early?" Harry squeaked, still trying to evade Dumbledore, who looked nothing so much like that spectre of Mad-Eye Moody's, screeching in the hallway at Twelve Grimmauld. Only much scarier.

"You know, Harry," Snape interjected coldly.

Harry startled. He'd almost forgotten the other man's presence. He wasn't sure how he could have; Snape seemed like the opposite of this pale room, sucking all the light away and letting Harry blink the bright tears out of his eyes. Turning from Dumbledore to Snape was like finally being able to relax his attention after a long exam, or being allowed to go back to Gryffindor after an interrogation in the Headmaster's Office…

And wrenching his gaze from the old wizard had been surprisingly difficult.

"If you'd come later," Snape said, "then you'd have been through far worse than leaving a baby at a train station. Perhaps you'd have been through so much that doing such a thing might seem right… necessary. Perhaps it might not have mattered to you, at least not in the way it does now, whether you lived or died…"

"Professor!" Harry protested; at the same time,

"Severus!" Dumbledore gasped.

Snape turned to him, one eyebrow raised. "Is this part of the boy's sacred hero training programme?" he inquired. "Were you hoping, too, for Unforgivables? They say that Imperio hardens one to all sorts of things." He shook his head. "Despite what I know you've done, I can hardly believe this of you. You knew, all along, that the boy was to be destroyed, yet you allowed him to think he was special to you." Snape's eyes were cold, now, and his lips were compressed to a thin, unforgiving line. Though his tone remained even, there was something in those eyes that made Harry acutely aware that he did not want to be the one with whom his professor was so displeased.

Harry wanted to say that surely Dumbledore hadn't meant it that way, that there had to be something else behind the way that Dumbledore had timed things besides hope that Harry would emerge harder, and resigned.

But he couldn't quite forget the horror in the Headmaster's eyes when he first clapped eyes on the baby, or that his own first instinct had been to clutch the child to himself – to protect him from the Headmaster. And he couldn't escape the feeling that Snape was more here, somehow. Truer, bigger, more real, as though he'd lost all inessential parts of himself in coming here, in being here; but Dumbledore seemed more or less the same, or perhaps even diminished to Harry's eye.

"It was not the way you paint it, Severus," Dumbledore said. "I loved Harry. I still love him."

"If that is your love, then I should hate to be hated," Severus said. Then, he took in a deep breath and seemed to calm. "I see that you did what you believed was right, Albus," he said, in a very weary voice. "You always do. But I marvel you did not allow my counsel to sway you, or Minerva's. You are not the sole purveyor of that which is right and good, are you? You have not come so far to believe such a thing…?"

Harry looked up and saw an expression on the Headmaster's face that was so unfamiliar that it took him longer than it ought have to place it.

It was doubt.

"What would happen, if Harry takes the child?" Severus pressed, for all his voice was low.

"I… don't know," Dumbledore said, with a shake of his head and a swaying of that venerable beard.

With the admission, King's Cross dulled. Colour began creeping up the bricks and into the sodium lamps. When Harry blinked again, passengers were exiting and boarding the trains.

"Would he still have the Horcrux inside of him?" Snape said. "Is the baby itself a Horcrux, now?"

Dumbledore shook his head again, frowning in confusion. "No; Harry's death should have destroyed the Horcrux itself… But Severus, there's no telling the evil he could bring back with him in that child…"

"It's a baby," Harry said. "All right, even I know that babies don't typically symbolize evil, do they? And this is my dream. Babies are new beginnings and hope."

"Ah," Severus Snape said, eyes dark as coal lighting on him a moment. "There's your Slytherin side," he commented with a frankly incongruous grin of approval. Harry didn't think he'd ever seen that expression on the Potions Master's face.

At least, not the man he knew.

Dumbledore appeared to have noticed as well. "…Severus?"

"Albus," Snape greeted him in a very even voice.

"You are not Severus Snape," Dumbledore accused. "Not… quite."

Severus smiled, and suddenly Harry put it all together – oh Merlin! – it was Remus Lupin's smile of unruffled calm on the Potions Master's face. For one, mad moment, Harry had the wild thought that Snape had stolen it from him. It seemed Remus no longer had the use of it, after all. "Sharp as ever, Albus," he said, with an elaborate bow. "It's all right," he added, when the Headmaster's eyes widened in dismay. "Harry knows who I am, I think."

Harry looked from the Headmaster to his dreaded Potions Master, whose black eyes glinted with humour, and down into the bundle in his arms. "Yes," he said quietly. "You're – you're Draco Malfoy's teacher and mine. And Remus Lupin's best friend, I think. You smile just like him." He paused, took a breath. "You're trying to bring Sirius back from beyond the Veil. That's who you were searching for, here."

Snape nodded. "Well deduced, Harry," he said, "though I was hoping to be able to find Draco and Ronald. You can breathe easy," he added, turning towards Dumbledore. "Your Severus Snape is alive and well… as well as a man who's done the things we have can be," he added with a frown. "My students invented a Horcrux-detector, and of course your Harry would be the first Horcrux detected. That's why he didn't arrive at the end of the journey, as you'd planned, but at the beginning. Were you figuring on a welcome party?"

Dumbledore's expression twisted.

"A… welcome party?" Harry echoed anxiously.

Snape stared Dumbledore down. It was like watching a black hole face a blazing sun.

"Of course, I wanted your loved ones to walk with you," Dumbledore replied. "That's why I sent the Resurrection Stone."

"The what?"

"You see," Dumbledore said, sadly, "this is all out of order."

Harry looked up to see Snape's funny expression, and suddenly it all came together. "Dying… would've looked downright good if Mum and Dad and Sirius were waiting for me." He paused, swallowing past the sudden lump in his throat. "All right. I get it."

"I just… you've been so brave," Dumbledore told him, earnest, now. "So brave. I cannot imagine how hard it is to face one's death at such a young age. I only wanted to make things easier for you."

"Easier," Harry said, clutching the baby. "Yeah, I see." He bowed his head over the baby and did not look at the Headmaster. He felt sick. He knew it had all been for the war, he knew, he even understood, but he couldn't, just couldn't face the Headmaster, knowing that from almost the moment Dumbledore had clapped eyes on him at age eleven – and maybe earlier – the old man had suspected he should have to die. Every time Dumbledore had offered him a sweet, every time he'd smiled at him, every time he'd told Harry how brave and good he was and it's our choices that matter, he'd known what was to become of Harry, in the end. And how could he have possibly known that Draco would be there to save him, when the time came? He'd probably figured that Harry would die, and stay that way; rather like most people who died, he supposed.

"Harry…" Dumbledore began.

"Sorry," Harry said, chancing a quick look up from under his lashes at the older wizard. The expression on the old man's face broke his heart. "I want to forgive you," he said, lowly, "but I can't, yet."

"I believe I understand, Harry," Dumbledore replied with a sigh. "My portrait will be at Hogwarts; I hope you will go and speak with me, when you are ready." He bowed. "My boy – you are the bravest and best of us. Godspeed," he said, and disappeared into the crowd.

"…that was… ill-done of me," Severus Snape said, at length.

Harry looked up to find Snape sitting down beside him again. "No," he said, slowly. "No, it wasn't."

"He really did want what was best –" Snape began.

"…for the war," Harry cut in, bitterly.

"I won't argue."

"There's a first."

The pair watched the people bustle by for awhile. Sometimes, Harry thought he recognized them; sometimes he thought he knew their names. The trains came and went, disgorging and admitting them.

"I can't leave the baby here," Harry said eventually, helplessly.

"Perhaps the Headmaster was right," Snape said. "If I were evil, and could choose whatever form I could think of, a form that would lull the viewer into a false sense of security…"

"You still wouldn't pick a baby," Harry countered. "Look, he can barely move. And I think he just pooped himself," he added, when a foul odor arose from the baby's hindquarters.

Snape's nose crinkled at the smell, and then he laughed.

Harry smiled. "Good to see you laugh," he said, circumstances prodding him to honesty. "Weird, but good."

"I believe could send a signal to my home, send up a flare as it were. Give the others something to follow," Snape said, ignoring his comment utterly.

"You could really do that?" Harry said, tacitly agreeing to the change of subject. "You could follow me?" Something about this Severus Snape made Harry want, with a fierce and aching desire, to believe in him. He had the peculiar notion that if Severus Snape showed up on their home plane, everything would set itself aright or he'd know the reason why.

"…Harry?"

Harry flushed, realizing he must've been staring. "It's just… Draco gave me all these memories, and… and so I know you," he blurted. "I know you, you're the one I remember." He shook his head and looked up, desperate to change the subject; his own Professor Snape would never want to look after him the way this one had, and so there was no use in dwelling on it. "Where are all of those people going? What if I get on the train?" he asked.

Snape looked at Harry, and his features were alarmed. Then he paused, and thought about his answer. Harry liked that, that he stopped and thought about his answer to Harry.

"Well." Snape cleared his throat. "That's the thing about trains. Getting on is your last decision for awhile. Then you have to trust that the conductor is taking you to be where you belong. I suppose one could simply stay on awhile, not having to see anything but the waystations, traveling back and forth and never getting anywhere. Or one could… go on."

"Suppose I gave the baby to one of them?" Harry whispered, although the thought tore at him vicious as shards of glass. "Suppose I found someone who looked trustworthy and I gave him away?"

"It could be done, I believe," Snape agreed, watching him closely.

"But – oh Merlin – I can't," Harry said, peering down helplessly at the sleeping child in his arms. "I mean, I really can't, it – it feels like mine," he tacked on, with eyes pressed tightly closed. "Like it belongs to me, like I can't…"

"Then you must take him with you," Snape said, gently. "Come what may."

"You're giving me the Hufflepuff answer," Harry said, desperately. "You said Slytherin before; give me the Slytherin answer."

"Very well," Snape said, curving his large hand over the baby's dark, feathery hair. "You have something that was once part of Tom Riddle. That may confer certain… advantages."

Harry blinked. "Oh…" He'd thought for sure that the Slytherin answer would be to slip the baby right back where he'd found it, but perhaps after seeing Draco's memories he should have known better.

"Harry, listen to me," Snape said, and his voice was as urgent as 'no Unforgivables'. "The Harry Potter of my world won because of whom he loved, and I believe that is your key to victory as well. Your greatest gift – it has always been – is to make others feel important and loved, to show them that they are part of something bigger just through knowing you. You must hang on to that; you must hold to it at all costs."

Harry swallowed, and nodded.

"I'll follow when I can," said Snape. "I'm here for a reason. Then, I shall follow the path you've left me."

"We could use your help," Harry said.

Snape laughed again. "Very well, I'll bring help, then."

They talked for awhile longer, although Harry knew he couldn't have said what about. It was spinning through his mind, over and over, that this was what it felt like to have someone who was truly interested in his well-being, whom he felt he could tell anything. He loved Ron and Hermione, but somehow this wasn't quite the same.

Eventually, though, Harry felt as though King's Cross were fading around him. "Guess that's my cue," he said.

"Tell Draco and Ronald that I will find them and bring them home. And tell them…" His features twisted. "Tell them Harry has Obscured their departure. The boy could do nothing else, but… they may not receive the welcome home they expect or deserve," he finished.

Harry nodded, clasping the baby tightly to his chest.

"Tell them that Mrs. Weasley does not yet know, nor will if I can help it," Snape added. "Tell them they are missed, and tell Draco… this is not his punishment, for Merlin's sake."

Snape now sounded as close to emotional as Harry could imagine him being, so Harry scooted until he was shoulder-to-shoulder with the other man. "I will," he said. "I – if you see Mum, tell her I love her. Dad, too, if he'll listen."

"I'll pass on the message, Harry," said Snape, wearing Remus's small smile. "But I imagine they are well aware."

A/N: Whew! Oh my goodness, do I ever need your feedback for this one!

...and in general. Remember - reviews feed the creative beast! Without them, no story would exist! In all seriousness! Do you see my exclamation points of seriousness?

I apologize in advance for any remaining errors - I kept editing this one rather extensively until the moment I hit 'post'.

As far as recs go, I tried to look for excellent romantic fics - fics that CENTER on romance and are awesome - but sadly, most of my romantic reading in the HP fandom preceded my use of delicious to keep track of my bookmarks, so that's a no-go. So I did an about face and decided to rec a dark fic.

I don't tend to like dark!fic as much as fiction with hopeful endings, so I have a few requirements. First: typically, they must be medium or short-length works. If it's too dark for too long it gets predictable. (How will this next scene go? Answer = wrong! In every possible way! *yawn/eye roll*) Furiosity's 20 Random Things About Draco Malfoy fits the bill for short and snappy, with a big punch. It is quite short, so saying anything else is probably giving away too much. Just go read it; you won't be disappointed.

(I will also add that if you want to read a story much like SoS, but with slash? Furiosity is your author. Find 'Before Peace' and ye shall be overjoyed.)

-K