Chapter 72

Remus didn't see it coming, but his brain must have registered the sudden movement because his arm moved to shield his face by reflex.

Severus' first spell hit his hand so hard that he hit himself on the forehead with it before he could engage his muscles to oppose the impact force.

The next spell came so close behind that Remus didn't have time to dodge and had to block it with his arm too, glad that it wasn't a Killing Curse either. By then he was fully alert and high on adrenaline, so he dived behind the counter before the third spell could make contact with any part of him —which was fortunate, since the loud crash behind him suggested Severus had intended to break his arm with that one.

He had his wand out now, but the fingers in his right hand were all numb —that first spell he had blocked seemed to have affected his peripheral nerves—, so he couldn't hold it properly, and the Stunning Spell he had blocked next must have hit some nerve too because he was having trouble lifting his arm. Remus switched his wand to the other hand and tried to revert some of the damage, but he had never been any good at magic with his left so to his frustration he couldn't manage anything more complex than a completely ineffective Finite spell.

While he desperately rubbed his upper arm and opened and closed his fingers trying to bring some sensation back to them, Remus tried to process and assess his dire situation more rationally, knowing that he would have a better chance of getting out of it alive using his wits rather than his force.

Not that his life seemed to be in immediate danger. Remus was well aware that Severus could have killed him a moment ago, if he had wanted to, but the Death Eater had aimed to incapacitate rather than kill, which was somewhat reassuring. The fact that his first spell had been a memory charm made Remus extremely uneasy, however, and it worried him for reasons that had nothing to do with himself.

"I won't let you obliviate Harry, Severus," he warned out loud.

"I'm not asking for permission, wolf," came an angry voice from the other side of the counter. "And you won't even remember that you talked to him, or me, so why would you try to stop me?"

"He's is fourteen, Severus, for Merlin's sake!" exclaimed Remus, cursing himself for having miscalculated things so badly twice in one night.

"You and Dumbledore should have thought of that before sharing inappropriate information with the boy," hissed his former colleague. "Now get up and stand still. You're less likely to suffer brain damage if you cooperate."

"I will call Dumbledore if you don't stop this!" threatened Remus, feeling very much like a schoolboy threatening to accuse a classmate to the teachers.

"Call him how?" mocked him Severus. "You can't use the Hogwarts' house-elves anymore, Lupin, they would have to punish themselves if they were foolish enough to take orders from an outsider. And I know for a fact that you're incapable of producing a corporeal Patronus. You're too dark for that."

"That goes to show your ignorance," said Remus. And your blindness. Severus despised Remus so irrationally that he kept underestimating him, forgetting or not wanting to acknowledge that werewolves were both dark and light, and as such could access the entire spectre of magic. "My Patronus is a jack rabbit. And I'm certain that I can dispatch it to Dumbledore before you manage to hit me with anything else."

Judging by the answering silence, his words had made Severus hesitate.

"Call him, then, if you can," drawled the Death Eater with indifference after a moment. "You will be dead before Dumbledore gets here, though. And the old fool will just give me a slap in the wrist, make no mistake. It would not be the first time he let me get away with murder, and delivering your head to the Dark Lord would secure my position as a spy so I might even earn myself a lemon drop." Severus began to move slowly away from the counter, which made Remus uneasy since it could only mean he was preparing to cast something explosive. "If you surrender now, however, I will let you walk away with your head on your shoulders and a functional brain inside your skull."

Remus flexed his fingers again, verifying with relief that the numbness had receded almost completely, and considered his options. He had a decent grip on his wand now, and he could move his arm normally if with a lot of pain, but he wasn't confident at all that he could survive a mortal duel against Severus, not with his unwillingness to kill his adversary holding him back. And despite what he had said, he wasn't sure either he would be able to summon and dispatch his Patronus before Severus struck him down. Even if he were fast enough, wasting seconds calling for help might cost him the chance of defending himself, and he feared Severus might be right in that the Headmaster would not care much about his death if it served a higher purpose. Dumbledore had sent him to live with his fellow werewolves knowing that Remus might be torn apart at the first full moon, after all, and the old wizard didn't yet know about his change of status in the pack so he would probably not consider the loss so great. Even if Dumbledore were aware of his new rank, he might agree in that the best use for his head would be as a gift for Voldemort, to secure Severus' position as a spy even at the risk of a war with werewolf massacres every month.

Would Severus take that risk, though? Nobody took the werewolf threat as seriously as he did, and if he was truly on Harry's side he would not want the boy to ever have to face werewolves in battle. He would not want any other children nor people in general to be exposed either, since Lycanthropy got harder and harder to eradicate the more it spread, each contaminated person becoming a new source of infection that wasn't yet legal to freely exterminate.

No. The fact that Severus' first spell had not been a Killing Curse and that even now he was trying to resolve the situation in a non-lethal way spoke volumes. It said that keeping the werewolves out of the war was more important to him than getting revenge on a Marauder or currying favour with Voldemort. His hesitation when Remus had threatened with calling Dumbledore also suggested he might not be so confident as he sounded about his chances of getting away with murder, so perhaps Severus was just making idle threats as usual.

"I think you're bluffing," he said. "You won't risk killing me."

"You have no idea what I would risk, Lupin," said Severus' cold voice from his new position by the door. "The only reason I haven't killed you yet is because I'm high on three different drugs and I can't trust my brain to make that decision right now."

"And I'm supposed to trust you with my brain?" asked Remus incredulously, his uneasiness increasing exponentially at the confirmation that Severus had more than just alcohol impairing his judgement. "With Harry's brain?"

"Even at my worst I am far more competent and responsible than you, wolf. It is you who cannot be trusted not to make a gory mess of Potter's body organs."

The nasty Slytherin made a pause, no doubt to allow his cutting words time to slice their monstrous target into guilty pieces. Remus certainly felt guilty as hell at the reminder that he had nearly savaged Harry and his friends last June.

"The boy will be fine," added Severus with distaste. "I would never endanger the prodigious mental faculties of our glorious saviour. As to you... you can either leave this room without memories or be carried out transfigured as a bone. I will leave the decision to you."

"I won't let you wipe my mind," said Remus firmly. "And you won't get to Harry either. I will send my Patronus to Dumbledore with my last breath, warning him-"

The counter behind him exploded. Chunks of stone flew in all directions, the bulk of it breaking against his back as hard as a giant's fist before going to shatter against walls and ceiling. Remus waited until the worst had passed and rolled over to a side just in time to dodge a green beam of light that made its way through the still falling debris and went to crash against a wooden cabinet filled with laboratory glassware. He swirled around to protect his eyes from the glass shards that flew back when the cabinet was reduced to splinters, and sent a stunner in Severus' direction while he climbed to his feet, hoping to distract him long enough to take cover behind something. There was not much shelter to be found inside the small lab, though, and he didn't have much time to look around —never mind to cast a Patronus— before another deadly curse came his way.

And then they were on.

Remus had never duelled in such close quarters, trapped in a tiny room that was falling to pieces all around him and that soon had no remaining furniture to hide behind of. He also had never duelled anyone so freaking fast and hard to predict as Severus was, nor anyone with so much murderous energy who could stay so calmly focused through his rage. No wonder Voldemort had been willing to shrug off Severus' muggle blood, and no wonder Dumbledore was watching the former Death Eater so closely. Anyone who had witnessed what Severus was capable of —even under the influence of alcohol and other drugs— would want to make sure this wizard was either on their side or neutralized somehow.

Struggling to stay alive was all Remus could do, since Severus was blocking the exit and making sure he didn't get a single break long enough to complete a Patronus incantation. His natural resilience, which had protected him initially, was no longer an advantage, since Severus had quickly caught on the fact that Remus could take hits that other wizards couldn't and was now only aiming Killing Curses or crippling spells powerful enough to affect a transformed werewolf. His enhanced senses didn't give him much of an edge either, not against an opponent so direct and fast who didn't give himself away in any way before striking, and while Remus still had fear on his side he really didn't want to use the monster card against Severus if he could help it.

Another Killing Curse flew straight at him, followed by another one, and yet another. Remus dodged the first one, blocked the second with some levitated rabble, and dived out of the way of the third one, just to have to block a blasting curse closely followed by a bone-breaking curse.

"Damn you, Severus!" he growled when he got slashed by some sort of cutting curse that came out of his opponent's wand without any warning or informative beam light. "Stop this, you arsehole!"

"I'll stop if you stop, mongrel," snarled Severus, slashing again the air in what looked like a very close attempt to slice Remus' throat. "Surrender now, and I will let you keep your life. I will even heal that cut and mend your brand new robes before letting you go."

Remus was beginning to feel that memories were overrated, but at this point he didn't trust Severus not to kill him anyway if he surrendered so he didn't even consider it. He couldn't keep going like this forever, though, fighting to death against someone he wasn't willing to kill, so Remus finally made the split second decision of making a run for it, and charged across the lab in full alpha mode disregarding all sense of self-preservation.

Just as he had anticipated and hoped, his physical approach triggered some ugly flashback in Severus, who suddenly looked more like a terrified gazelle than like a merciless Death Eater and seemed to temporarily forget his murderous intent. Remus took advantage of the lapse to go on the offensive, aiming several spells in a row to further overwhelm his adversary before pointing his wand upwards.

"BOMBARDA!"

He didn't stay to see how Severus handled the collapse of the ceiling over his head. Knowing that the distraction would win him a few seconds at most, he rushed towards the only other door in the room —the one that presumably led to Severus' quarters, since the Slytherin had gone that way to get dressed— and rammed head-on against it. Neither the wood nor the dark magic warding it presented much opposition to him —Severus really was a fool, if he had thought such a feeble ward would hold against a werewolf just because it was dark—, and once on the other side Remus demolished the doorway before setting off at a run, bombarding the ceiling behind him a few more times as he went to further delay his pursuer.

His first irrelevant —and slightly envious— thought when he emerged from the narrow passage and found himself in a luxurious sitting room, was that his former colleague had much bigger and nicer living quarters than Remus had had last year. He had already been aware that Severus' status as a Head of House granted him special privileges, same as McGonagall, Flitwick and Sprout, but he hadn't imagined anything like this, and despite the urgency of his situation he couldn't help wasting precious seconds wondering whether the ascetic Potions Master felt comfortable living in such a place. Remus would have expected something more on the lines of his office or his private lab —cramped, austere, unwelcoming—, but maybe there was a decadent side of Severus he didn't know about because he doubted even Lucius Malfoy could compete with this much splendour.

He was snapped out of his dumbfounded contemplation by the sound of rock being blasted away across multiple barricades, which reminded him of the extremely dangerous Death Eater currently attempting to murder him. Not wanting to even imagine how much more painful Severus would strive to make his death as punishment for invading his personal space, Remus ran towards what looked like the grand exit of this underground palace, only to find the door locked and much more heavily warded than the internal passage connecting Severus' laboratory to his chambers. Remus knew he would never stand a chance of breaking through such complex wards before Severus got past his flimsy obstacles, so he gave up on that and ran to the fireplace instead, but to his growing despair he couldn't even approach the fancy grate. He cursed under his breath, remembering in frustration that only the Heads of House and the Headmaster could access the internal Floo Network connecting all their living quarters. Remus probably couldn't even access the regular Hogwarts network at the moment, being an outsider and a dark creature to boot.

Which meant that he was trapped here.

Remus floundered in claustrophobic panic for a moment, until he suddenly remembered the Patronus Charm. Cursing himself again for having forgotten all about it, he now focused on summoning his jack rabbit, intending to send it to Dumbledore and perhaps also to Harry if he had time enough.

Nothing came out of his wand. Not even silver mist. Nothing. He tried again, but he knew it would not work, not because he was intrinsically too dark, like Severus thought, but because the light had gone out inside his heart. Harry and Sirius had become again sources of anguish and conflict for him, when before tonight they had represented hope, the possibility of family and friendship. Harry in particular had been his light, the reason why last year in the Hogwarts Express he had been able to cast silver mist for the first time in over a decade, but now he felt so much hopelessness thinking of the boy that it was as if he had a dementor inside him.

Swallowing the knot in his throat, Remus looked frantically around, searching for another way out or means of communication with the Headmaster's office, but all the other doors seemed internal, and the only portrait in the room was currently empty. He called a few house-elves whose names he remembered from last year, but just like Severus had predicted none came for him now that he wasn't a member of staff anymore. Fawkes didn't come either, which wasn't surprizing seeing that he wasn't feeling so very loyal to Dumbledore at the moment.

A loud bang behind him made his heart jump. It sounded like Severus had reached the closed door and in his fury was trying to blast it open instead of simply unlocking it. Damn. Not having the slightest idea of what to do, Remus began opening doors at random, hoping one would lead to another passage or to some room with more portraits. The first door he tried opened to what was obviously Severus' sumptuous bedchamber, whose only promising feature was an entire wall made of glass that Remus doubted he could break even if he were willing to brave the mighty weight of the lake plunging in. The second door revealed a comparatively modest —if still regal— bathroom. The third one was locked. The fourth...

He slipped inside and locked the door behind him just as a thundering blast nearby announced Severus had finally gained access to his personal quarters. Remus looked around the room he had trapped himself in, a tiny spark of hope igniting inside him as his eyes roved the overflowing bookshelves lining all the walls from ceiling to floor. If one place in the world held the potential to make Severus Snape hesitate before starting to hurl destructive curses all around, it had to be his personal library, especially since it was evident that most of the books collected within these four walls had Dark Magic imbibed in their very pages.

Perhaps here Severus would agree to discuss things civilly.

Remus' first measure was to shrink Severus' desk and chair to a harmless toy size, to clear the way from potentially hostile furniture, followed by urgent vanishing of all the silver chains hanging from the ceiling. Then he began to hurriedly pull out books from the shelves, hand-picking the nastier ones and improvising a full-body physical shield with them.

"LAST CHANCE TO SURRENDER, WOLF!" thundered Severus through the door. "YOU HAVE NOWHERE TO GO. COME OUT!"

Interpreting as a good sign the fact that Severus was trying to draw him out instead of blasting the door of this particular room open, Remus ignored the ultimatum and continued pulling down books, growling at those that tried to bite or curse him to cow them into good behaviour.

"IF YOU DARE TOUCHING ANYTHING IN THERE...!"

Severus didn't seem to have a strong enough threat to complete the sentence with. Remus could hear him trying unlocking charms of increasing complexity, so he quickly aimed another tricky spell at the door —a prank charm that glued the entire locking mechanism together— to keep him out a bit longer. His nose caught the scent of alcohol as he wildly searched for more valuable objects to fortify his little fort with, but it seemed to be just more vodka stashed behind some books, nothing expensive enough to make Severus pause. There was something else hidden behind the vodka, though, Remus could smell it through the wall, and when he rapped the heavy stone with his knuckles the sound that answered confirmed the existence of a secret cavity...

It was evident at once, when his would-be-murderer finally managed to open the door and saw what Remus was hovering in midair, that this was the shield that really counted, the one thing that could make the deranged Death Eater stop and listen. Severus stood frozen in the doorway of his study/library for what felt like an eternity, tension radiating out of him in almost palpable waves while his alternatively fearful and furious eyes darted between Remus and his prize.

"Put that down, Lupin," he said finally, his voice the softest and deadliest murmur Remus had ever heard. "Carefully."

"Not until we have had a proper conversation about this," said Remus as sternly as he could make himself sound, noticing that Severus was keeping his wand trained on the floating box rather than on him. "A sober conversation. I know you have potions to counteract the alcohol and whatever else you have taken."

"I assure you you don't want me more sober than I am," drawled the Death Eater darkly. "As it is, I will remove all your fingernails one by one and chop you into potions ingredients while you're still conscious if you drop that box."

"I won't drop it," assured him Remus, wondering again what was inside the box. His first guess had been illegal drugs, but he could identify most narcotics by smell and this wasn't any he knew. He had felt the Dark Magic seeping through the wood, though, so his next best guess was some sort of dark weapon —something precious and fragile, judging by Severus' reaction. "Not unless you break my concentration somehow."

"Last year you forgot that you were a bloody werewolf about to transform in the company of children," spat Severus with venom. "I don't trust your ability to concentrate on more than one thing at the same time."

"Yeah, well, I don't trust you not to kill me if I put this down," shot back Remus.

"I have been willing to spare your life all along, wolf, it's you who refuse to meet me half way!"

"Frying my brain is hardly an acceptable middle ground!"

"I will only fry your brain if you keep pissing me off, and you can be sure I'll do it with boiling oil, not with harmless memory charms. Now stop dawdling and put that down, slowly!"

"I won't put it down until I feel confident that you won't try to wipe my mind," said Remus resolutely. "And since I can't trust you not to, I think we should take this matter up to the Headmaster's office."

Keeping a firm control over his bargaining chip in case Severus tried to summon it away from him, Remus stepped from behind his fortified bookshield —which seemed unnecessary now that he had something more valuable to negotiate with— and gestured with his left arm to indicate that his unwilling host should lead the way out. Severus redirected his wand towards him by reflex, to halt his advance, and of course he refused to move. Remus made the box swirl dangerously in midair to remind him what was at stake.

"Stop that, damn you!" snapped Severus, stretching his free hand towards the threatened object as if hoping to catch it wandlessly if it fell. Remus would not be surprized if Severus proved himself capable of performing wandless magic, but even with a wand in each hand it would be near impossible to channel different sorts of magic in two opposite directions at once, which was no doubt why the Death Eater looked so furiously torn: if Remus decided to drop the box and attack, Severus would have to choose between defending himself or catching the box, and the box would likely end up broken no matter what he chose.

Despite all the recent murder and obliviation attempts, Remus felt suddenly sorry for his former schoolmate. And he hated himself, because he realized that he was pushing the already stressed-out man towards another nervous breakdown, just like Sirius had done not so long ago, and causing even more distress to his once-almost-victim was monstrously unforgivable.

"I just want to talk, Severus," he said in a conciliatory tone, trying not to weaken his position by letting on how guilty and remorseful he felt. "I don't want to force your hand, nor to break anything of yours, but you're clearly too upset or intoxicated to discuss things calmly. Dumbledore will help us work this out-"

"Dumbledore will get Potter killed!" roared Severus. "You will get Potter killed! I'm trying to save the boy's life, you bloody moron, and you're screwing everything up! If you drop that... If Dumbledore confiscates it... I don't have time to brew more of that stuff! I won't be able to help either if I'm locked up or banned from Hogwarts during the Third Task, which is what will happen if Dumbledore suspects what I'm doing. And Potter might not survive without my help, just as he wouldn't have survived the First nor the Second Task without me. Is that what you want? Are a few insipid memories worth that much? Who will bring the Dark Lord down if the brat dies, you? Or are you actually on his side, come to make sure I don't interfere with his masterplan?"

Severus had definitely lost it. Remus regretted to have sent him over the edge, but at the same time he did not regret it, because in his madness the unhinged Slytherin seemed to be spitting out everything that went through his head without any filter nor subterfuge, and his demented rant was finally shedding clarifying light over this insane situation.

This was all about helping Harry. And about Dumbledore not finding out.

Remus hadn't stopped to think about it before, because the whole concept of unhelpability was still hard to grasp for him, but it was clear that despite the supposed restriction Severus had been somehow helping Harry this year, and that he had done so in such a covert way that not even the boy was certain of the man's good will. Remus had assumed that Dumbledore was aware of everything —Harry had said that all the teachers were looking the other way, after all, implying that they all knew what the champions were up to even if they pretended not to—, but apparently Severus was working behind the Headmaster's back. Which made sense, considering that as Head of one of the participating schools in the Triwizard Tournament Dumbledore must be one of the judges in charge of enforcing the rule against cheating.

A world in which Albus Dumbledore was the one endangering children while a former Death Eater was trying to save them seemed crazy, but looking back Remus could see how that underlying conflict had dictated Severus' main decisions in the last half hour or so. The sour Potions Master had seemed initially reluctant to discuss anything with him, but he had agreed to meet in private when Remus had revealed that he knew about Severus looking after Harry, and all his questions had been aimed to find out how much Remus knew and who would miss him if he died, so clearly the man had planned to obliviate or murder him all along. He had only turned truly murderous when Remus had threatened with sending his Patronus to Dumbledore, though, just as he now seemed truly afraid at the prospect of Dumbledore denying him access to Harry during the Third Task or confiscating something intended to help the boy.

Remus glanced sideways at the hovering box, feeling suddenly terrified himself that he might drop it in a moment of distraction. He also felt concerned, because the wooden container had given off a very nasty vibe when he had held it in his hands, and he didn't like the idea of Harry ingesting anything remotely dark.

"What is this stuff?" he asked.

"That's none of your business," spat the nasty Death Eater. "Just put it down, if you care at all about the boy."

Remus sighed. He supposed he trusted Severus to know his way about Dark Magic, and to only expose Harry to it if it was the only way to keep him alive.

"I won't put it down yet," he said tiredly. "This is the only thing keeping you at bay, Severus, even if it's for Harry-"

"You will risk the boy's life for a few memories?"

"Will you?" challenged him Remus. Severus scowled at him, but still didn't strike, which was plain confirmation that he, indeed, would not risk Harry's life for anything in the world. Remus sighed again. "I haven't sent my Patronus to Dumbledore, Severus, and I won't tell him anything about you or Harry if you ask me not to. You don't need to obliviate me."

"I can't take that risk," said Severus in a strained voice, although he relaxed visibly at the reassurance that Remus hadn't dispatched his Patronus to anyone. "I am willing to let you live, but I cannot let you leave this room with your brain intact."

"You know I can resist Veritaserum," said Remus, feeling lightheaded after so much arguing in circles. "And Dumbledore is just as loath as you are to break into a werewolf's mind. I'm a good liar, too, when I have to. You know I can keep a secret."

Severus scoffed.

"The problem is not that you can't, wolf, it's that you won't. You are incapable of discretion!"

"I am perfectly capable, if I know discretion is necessary," argued Remus. "And whatever you might think, I am not blindly loyal to Dumbledore. My first priority is Harry. Everything I do is for him, and if I have to go against Dumbledore or keep secrets from him to protect the boy, I will do it. I would let you wipe my mind if that helped, Severus, truly, but I need my memories of tonight-"

"You don't."

"Yes I do! I need to know that Voldemort is back, that Crouch is dead, that you and I are both on the same side. I need as much information as possible to do my job, and unfortunately I don't trust Dumbledore to tell me anything! If you obliviate me, I might go back into the wild completely clueless, and I won't know to relocate the pack first thing in the morning to make sure Fenrir can't find us again. I need to know these things, Severus!"

Severus hesitated for a moment, but then he shook his head again, his expression set in a stubborn scowl.

"You need to know," he agreed, "but you don't need to remember. I will send you an anonymous warning in case the old fool decides to keep you in the dark a while longer. You just have to give me your address in monster land, and you will know everything you need to know before morning."

Now Remus hesitated. He would actually give almost anything not to remember this dreadful night, to forget the contemptuous look in Harry's eyes and return to his werewolf life with some hope to keep him going. He knew that if he agreed to the obliviation he would not be able to protect the boy from the same fate, but Remus would also give anything for Harry to forget too, to erase his shame from that young mind and get another chance with the kid in the future. It had worried him that Severus might fry both their brains if he tried to obliviate them while under the influence of drugs, but the man seemed completely lucid, his reflexes more than good, and it was true that Severus had proven himself more responsible than Remus —at least when it came to the safety of children— so perhaps...

He shook his head to himself. Choosing obliviousness would be selfish, cowardly. Remus deserved Harry's scorn just as much as he deserved Severus', and Harry deserved to know the truth even if his knowing was a painful inconvenience for all the people involved.

"Harry is confused, Severus," he tried. "He was confused before I talked to him, and he will go back to being confused if you obliviate him. He will continue trying to understand why you help him, why you hate him, where your allegiance truly lies... You can't erase every-"

"I will handle Potter however I see fit," cut him off Severus. "None of this is any of your business, wolf, you're meddling in affairs that don't concern you. When are you going to understand that you have no business here? You don't belong amongst humans, can't you see it? You are accursed. You are not safe," he spat viciously. "And you can't just blame your monstrous nature. It is your 'human' decisions that have endangered children over and over again. Your decisions. Not Dumbledore's, not Greyback's, not anyone else's. Yours." Severus look him up and down with absolute loathing. "If you want to help the boy and make up for all the lives you have nearly ruined, put that down, carefully, and run back to where you can be of some use without harming anyone worth saving."

Remus had never seen quite so much abhorrence disfiguring someone's features. He hadn't imagined Severus could despise him even more than he already did, nor that his words could cut any deeper, but here he stood, thoroughly eviscerated, shred to worthless pieces, held together only by the need to keep afloat what might be Harry's only hope of survival.

"Do lower the box before breaking apart, if you please," drawled the Death Eater cruelly. "I definitely don't trust your ability to cry and do magic at the same time."

Remus forcefully swallowed his anguish, knowing that exhibiting weakness would only encourage Severus to finish him off with some extra cruel remark. Tears were for this bastard what blood was for sharks, and Remus was already bleeding as it was.

"You know, Severus," he said through his obstructed throat, "You told me last year that apologies don't mean anything if one doesn't back them up with actions, and you were right about that. What I told Harry tonight... that was me trying to make things right for you. To set the record straight. I thought the boy deserved to know the truth about you. That you deserved to be judged fairly by Lily's son. I thought at the very least you would be pleased to know that now the boy hates his own father. That he agrees with you wholeheartedly about Sirius. About me."

Feeling heavy with sorrow and guilt and hopelessness, Remus slowly lowered the wooden box to the ground.

"I think you will regret obliviating him," he said hoarsely. "But you're right in that it's not really any of my business. I was just trying to help, but... I understand if you can't handle Harry knowing that sort of stuff about you."

Remus lifted the spell he had been sustaining around the box and, taking as deep a breath as he could in case it was his last one, threw his wand at Severus feet.