On the Hogwarts Express headed home after a second year that had seemed both very long and to have gone by very, very fast, Harry tunes out the soft conversation Blaise and Theo are having—they either don't notice or don't mind, as neither tries to get his attention—and daydreams about being back at the Doghouse and safe, back in a place where he can have a hug from Sirius or Remus when he's frightened or sad, and he can help with mundane chores to take his mind off of things, and they can go and run in the park until Harry is exhausted and knows he'll sleep well. The warmth of home is waiting for him.
He's welcomed with love and joy by Sirius and Remus and fed a good dinner, and the next day they have a lazy morning. Sirius and Harry play card games and make silly suggestions when Remus asks for help with a crossword clue, and it's brilliant. Harry can't wait for a whole summer of this.
And then, just after Harry turns out his lights and crawls in bed on only his second night back home, an owl raps at his window. Frowning, he gets up and lets it in, and by moonlight reads the note it carries scrawled in familiar handwriting:
Potter,
The Dark Lord calls us both to his side on the evening of the solstice. Find a way to escape the monitoring of your godfather and his pet and meet me at the Muggle entrance to the Leaky Cauldron at six on Monday night, the 21 st of June. Do not be late, or I will make you sorry—before the Dark Lord does.
It's not signed. It doesn't need to be. After two years of seeing it on a chalkboard and in the margins of his essays, Harry knows Professor Snape's tall, sharp handwriting.
He flips the note over and writes on the back, Yes sir.
He hands the paper back to the owl, and waits until the bird is gone. Then he closes his window, lies down on his bed, presses his face to his pillow, and cries in a short, jagged burst that feels ripped out of him. Barely a full day back at the Doghouse; only a single weekend of freedom. On Monday, he'll sell his soul or die. He can't even tell Sirius. He certainly can't trust Snape, who's probably a Death Eater—has probably been a Death Eater this entire time. And he let him into his head.
His door clicks open, and he freezes.
"Oh, Harry," says Remus's soft voice. He closes the door behind himself and walks assuredly across the shadowed floor of Harry's room to sit on the edge of his bed, and he places a hand, fingers splayed, in the middle of Harry's back. Harry's face is still pressed into the pillow and he can hardly breathe, but he doesn't care. Doesn't know if he'd be able to breathe, even if he were lying on his back.
"It'll all be alright, my dear," Remus says softly. "I know it doesn't seem that way right now, but you are the strongest boy I have ever known, and you will get through this."
Remus doesn't promise that they'll be there for him or protect him. Harry doesn't know why—it's all Sirius had talked about during that first week after Easter, what he'd said tonight after kissing Harry's forehead, just before sending him to bed. But it helps.
Harry sniffs wetly and raises his face to peer through the darkness at Remus. Everything is blurry without his glasses, but Remus's familiar shape is there.
"Let's turn your pillow over," Remus says, and helps Harry do just that. "Here, and a handkerchief." And he conjures one, lets Harry blow his nose and then banishes the fabric again. "Better?"
Harry shrugs. He doesn't have the words. If he speaks, he thinks he'll spill everything, and he can't.
"I know how that feels," Remus sighs. "I only wish you didn't. Would you like a cup of water before you sleep?" When Harry shakes his head, he strokes Harry's hair back away from his forehead—it's still short and wild, but Sirius had suggested last summer that Harry might want to grow it out, and this summer he thinks he'll do it. Remus strokes the soft strands through his fingers, and then he bends down and kisses Harry's forehead much like Sirius had earlier. "I love you, my cub. If you have bad dreams, or need anything in the night, please don't hesitate to come wake us."
"Okay," Harry whispers. He won't, but… again, the offer helps, just enough. He closes his eyes. "Sorry, Remus."
"It's alright, love." Remus strokes his hair one more time, and then gets up. "Good night, Harry."
"Night."
Soft footsteps, and then the door opens and shuts again, and Harry is left alone to spiral down into dreaming.
He has nightmares, because of course he does. They're mostly amorphous; he doesn't remember anything specific when he wakes in a cold sweat early on Sunday morning. He lies in bed for a while, staring at the ceiling, and tries to force his brain to work—he's feeling shocky and shaken by the fear lurking in his dreams, but he's also only just woken up. It's a bad combination. Eventually, however, he manages to straighten out his thoughts, and he sits up and meditates for about a half hour to calm himself down and continue the slow process of repairing his Occlumency shields. He thinks he has everything back to how it was before Easter, but he still checks and reinforces the walls of his internal Hogwarts at least twice a day, and sometimes thrice. He can only hope that his shields will stand up to Voldemort again, because he doesn't have any more time to get stronger.
When he's done meditating, he stays in his room a while longer and listens for any noise out in the rest of the flat, but things are still quiet; a look at the clock on his bedside table tells him exactly why. It's still early, only just seven, and though Remus will likely be up and around in another half hour or so, Sirius will sleep at least another hour. That gives Harry some time to figure out what the hell he's going to tell them in order to get away tomorrow.
A meeting with one of his friends would be easiest, but they might insist on accompanying him. In fact, they probably would insist—Voldemort, after all, is at large. So he needs to have a genuine meet-up planned—one that Sirius and Remus would let him go to alone. That they would have to let him go to alone. But… Harry thinks he could do that. Remus is meant to be working at his muggle job tomorrow, and the Wizengamot always has a session on the summer and winter solstices, even if they don't coincide with the new moon—the summer solstice session happens at noon, so Sirius will be busy all day tomorrow as well. They'd told him yesterday that they trusted him to stay at home alone; he hopes they'll trust him to visit Diagon Alley in the company of a friend and perhaps their parents, instead.
Harry scrambles up out of bed and grabs for parchment and a dip pen, and writes out a quick note. Hermione, he decides, will be easiest; she'll reply the most promptly and will be the most likely to agree to a spur-of-the-moment Diagon Alley trip. With that in mind, he writes her a note asking her if she'd like to meet him at Flourish and Blotts at two tomorrow afternoon to help him decide what he wants to buy for summer reading, and says that while Remus and Sirius will both be busy, her parents are welcome to tag along—and maybe should, given everything. He sends Hedwig off, and only a few minutes later, hears the sounds of movement outside his door that suggest that Remus has woken up. Harry doesn't want to attract any suspicion, so he waits a little longer, and then wanders out of his room, stretching and rubbing his eyes, to find Remus busy brewing tea in the kitchen.
"Morning, Harry," Remus says, when he notices him. "Sleep well?"
Harry hums, and waggles his hand in the air.
Remus nods in commiseration and quietly offers him a cup of tea. They have a quiet cuppa together, and then the post owl arrives with the Daily Prophet. Remus shakes it out and reads the front page, then digs through it to extract the sports section, which he offers to Harry. They read quietly until Sirius wakes up, and then have breakfast.
It's a perfect morning. Harry can only pray to a god he doesn't believe in that he'll have many more.
After breakfast, Harry takes a shower, and then sits down to get a start on his summer schoolwork, with occasional help from Remus. He wants to get it out of the way as early as possible, and both Remus and Sirius look approving about that. After about an hour of work, Harry sits back and stretches his back, and then looks over at a tap on the balcony window to find Hedwig there, clutching a letter in her talons.
"One of your friends?" Sirius asks.
"I guess," Harry says, though he doesn't have to guess at all. He goes over and lets Hedwig in, following her over to the table where she lands and waits patiently for him to procure her an owl treat from the cupboard before she hands over his letter. It is, indeed, from Hermione, and Harry says as much as he opens it and scans it quickly.
She's agreed to meet him, he reads with relief, though he hides that emotion and instead sighs and shakes his head with a fond smile. "She wants to go look at books for summer reading," Harry says. "Tomorrow afternoon. I told her I thought we should go sometime early in the summer, but I didn't think she'd want to go right away."
"Zealous, that girl," Sirius says, with a laugh. "Well, I see no reason to put her off—though I wouldn't be able to go with you. Solstice Session."
"I'm working," Remus says. "You'd have to go on your own, Harry."
Harry skims further down the letter, and shrugs. "She says her parents would come, take us to dinner afterward."
Remus and Sirius exchange a brief look, and Sirius shrugs minutely. Remus tilts his head, but then the both of them look back to Harry. "That would be alright," Sirius says. "But don't leave Diagon. I doubt Voldemort and his posse have the resources necessary to make a direct assault on the Alley just yet, but you'll be a target—they may be watching for you, and specifically for you to wander off on your own."
Harry nods. He'll be careful, of course he will, but going off on his own with an agent of the Dark Lord is half the point—he just can't have Sirius and Remus find that out.
"In that case, you go ahead and let her know you'll be going. I can take you to the Leaky before I head to the Ministry."
"Alright," Harry says, and writes back just that—that Sirius will escort him to the Leaky Cauldron around 11:30, and that if Hermione wants to join him, he plans to make a run to the bank and get himself some lunch before book shopping. He lets Hedwig rest a while, and then sends her off again with a few final strokes of the smooth feathers on the top of her head, and she nips his fingers affectionately before she wings away into the afternoon. Against a bright sky, her white feathers vanish quickly, and Harry sighs. Easily done, to lie to Sirius and Remus, to Hermione, to everyone.
The rest of the day passes pleasantly; they go for a walk in the evening with Sirius as Padfoot to run about in the park, and Harry plays fetch until he's tired. Before bed, he asks Sirius quietly if they can have a quick Occlumency session, and Sirius obliges without any protest or apparent suspicion; he just seems glad that Harry is determined to keep up his skills, and doubly pleased when he sees how strong Harry's shields have become. He delivers a plethora of compliments and advice for refinement, but says that Harry has come along extremely far, and should be prepared for pretty much anything.
Harry only hopes that's true. Once he turns his light off, he sits up a while longer and meditates, and then tries the trick of mental organization that had gotten him through his last encounter with Voldemort. It's not as easy without pressing desperation to fuel him, but after an effort he manages to close away most of himself behind doors, leaving behind only his darker emotions. He's sure that his mind must seem hollow without all of the light and life that usually fills it, but that hadn't seemed to bother Voldemort last time. This time, Harry tries to populate the halls and rooms of his inner Hogwarts as best he can. It's like hanging paintings, he decides, and uses that visualization to strengthen the technique. He's drawn curtains over all of the windows, so Voldemort can't see what lurks beyond the walls, the sunlight and greenery of the grounds, where his love and his joy live. He places outside the walls of Hogwarts itself every monument to his dedication to see Voldemort destroyed, the Death Eaters killed or imprisoned for what they've done to Harry's family, to his friends, to everyone in the magical world; he hides away between the trunks of the Forbidden Forest his disgust for Voldemort's ideals, for pureblood bigotry, for violence. He hides there, too, his fear and his shame at what he's about to do, and hopes that Voldemort will step into the walls of Hogwarts and believe that because he is within the walls, he'll believe that he's seeing the deepest heart of Harry, when really everything that Harry is lives outside, in the clear fresh air.
And inside, Harry tucks away memory and emotion. Grief and rage and disgust, for things that Voldemort either would approve of or that he would be able to use. Everything he hates or fears about himself, Harry lets linger in the halls of his Hogwarts. Some things he lets stand out, proud: paintings on the walls of the dream he has of seeing Pettigrew suffer at the end of his own wand. His joy in humiliating Draco Malfoy in public. Himself standing defiant in front of Dumbledore. Himself as proud Black Heir, pure and strong and powerful. The motivations for these he tucks away in nearby rooms. One room for his frustration with the state of the magical world, his anger at inefficiency and bigotry, the foolish flailing of the people in so-called 'power' who have no real power at all. One room for his frustrations with Dumbledore, who had been responsible for his placement with the Dursleys, who hates Slytherin and doesn't trust anyone. His bitterness toward the magical world at large, which should have welcomed him as a scion of real power and instead rejected him when he was young, treated him like an outsider, nearly managed to force him down altogether; it was only Slytherin House that had granted him a path to prominence.
Some things he hides better, knowing that Voldemort will probably find them anyway. Things that he knows that this version of himself shouldn't feel, but must anyway, because it would be too suspicious if they were absent. In the Mirror of Erised room, his grief for his parents—and the shameful spark of resentment he feels toward them for breaking when they should have stayed strong for him. In another room, his boiling hatred for the Death Eaters who were involved in that attack on his family: Pettigrew and Crouch and Lestrange, and also there, his mistrust for Voldemort himself, his uncertainty about what place he might be able to find in an organization that would have seen him dead as a baby. Every memory he has, too, of being friends with Neville Longbottom and Ronald Weasley and Hermione Granger, people he shouldn't trust or like or be close with, but is. The reasons for that are… so complicated that Harry can barely sort them out, but he tries to lay threads that make his loyalty to them look surface-level and harmless, rather than like a part of the foundation of who he is. The same for his loyalty to the House of Black, to Sirius, who is his godfather and his Lord and a staunch enemy of Voldemort.
He wraps up thoughts and feelings in layer upon layer of winding halls and moving staircases, places things behind doors, compartmentalizes and organizes until he's exhausted. And then he double checks the way his shields are layered: yes, the first layer that protects his surface thoughts is there. And below them, the layer of shields that allows access to Hogwarts itself, a solid oak barrier in his mind like the front doors of the castle. And then the castle itself. And finally the walls of the castle, dark stone like bedrock that blocks anyone who has broken in this far from breaking anything further and gaining access to the grounds, where Harry's true heart dwells: in the fresh air and open sky and sunlight of Hogwarts in spring, trees growing and the smell of cut grass and the freedom of flying, laughing with his friends by the lake, reading in the shade beneath a tree. He lets himself linger there for a while, and then he withdraws back to the castle layer. He throws open the curtains on the windows, lets the light shine in, illuminate the paintings and fill the rooms until the darker parts of his mind are reminded of why they exist, until he is reminded of why he has to become the person Voldemort will see if he violates Harry's mind again, and then Harry emerges and lies down to sleep, drained… and prepared for whatever may come tomorrow.
Monday, June 21st, 1993 dawns early and dawns bright; Harry wakes at his usual hour to find his room already flooded with sunlight through the curtains he'd left open the previous evening. He gets up and dresses, putting on slacks and a tidy black shirt, sleeveless but collared and made from linen to account for the weather; over that he slips on a similarly light robe in ash grey. Formal enough to pass muster in public—and in front of Voldemort, Harry hopes—but casual enough not to alert Sirius and Remus that anything more unusual than a visit with a friend is happening. He also puts on his dad's lily pendant, hiding it below his collar, for luck; Neville's snake bracelet, for cleverness; and a hint of his mother's perfume at his throat and wrists, for courage. The faint scent, a little spicy and richly floral, fills him up until he almost feels like everything will work out.
Remus gives him a look when he comes out, mournful and curious and startled all together, and Harry ducks his head, embarrassed. "I just—"
"It's alright," Remus interrupts. "I miss her too."
"Yeah," Harry says, his voice thick.
Remus makes tea, and then while he carries on to making breakfast, leaving the careful minding of the steeping leaves to Harry, Sirius emerges, already showered and dressed. He comes into the kitchen and steps up behind Remus to kiss the back of his neck, and then turns to Harry to kiss his forehead; when he does so, he pauses and breathes in deeply, and then gives Harry a sad smile. Harry returns it with a shrug, and Sirius doesn't say anything—he's made the same assumption Remus has, Harry thinks.
Remus finishes breakfast and they all eat quickly, not so leisurely as previous mornings. Remus has work soon, and he gets up and kisses Sirius and squeezes Harry's shoulder before he heads out with a quiet goodbye for them both. Sirius and Harry still have a while before they need to head for Diagon, and Sirius has the paper to read, so they have a bit of quiet time. Then Sirius's watch pings from its place in his pocket, informing them both that they'll need to leave now if they want to make it to the Leaky Cauldron by half-eleven. They have to walk to the closest Apparition Point, and from there, Sirius takes Harry side-along to the pub. There's a corner designated for those Apparating in, and after being squeezed as usual they appear there.
They step out together into the pub, and a faint hush falls for a moment as people notice and recognize Sirius. Then people return to their conversations, and Sirius bends slightly to put himself on Harry's level and meets his eyes. "I need to go," he says. "But be safe, alright? If anything happens, Floo back here to the Leaky, or to the hospital. Or ring Remus, if you can make it out into muggle London."
Harry nods. He doesn't have an easy way to get in touch with Sirius if there is an emergency, but he has the phone number for Remus's work. "I know, Sirius," he says. "I can take care of myself, you know."
"I know." Sirius leans forward and kisses Harry's forehead. "I'll bring you all the gossip when I get home, hm?"
"Sounds good," Harry says, smiling up at his godfather.
"And you're having dinner with the Grangers, yeah?"
"Yeah," Harry says. It's a lie, but of course he doesn't want Sirius to know anything about where he's going this evening—and he'll be telling the Grangers that he's going to Floo home from the Leaky. Of course, the Doghouse's Floo is sealed right now, the better to keep the wards tightly shut. He's told Sirius and Remus that Hermione's parents will drop him off at the flat.
"Alright, well, I'll see you this evening."
Harry nods, and then, because he doesn't know when—if—he'll get another chance to do so, he says, "I love you, Sirius."
Sirius smiles, an edge of delight to the expression that appears every time Harry says that. "Love you too, pup," he says. He hugs Harry one last time, squeezing tight, and then lets him go. Harry waves as he walks away, weaving between the people in the Leaky Cauldron until Sirius is out of sight and Harry is on his own.
The Grangers are due to arrive at noon to meet him for lunch before the bookstore, so Harry goes to the bar and orders a butterbeer to kill time. He sits at the bar and watches Tom, the barkeep, do his business and sips from his bottle, letting himself think about nothing but the sweetness of the drink and the bustle of the Leaky Cauldron; it's definitely distracting enough. Wixen of all descriptions come and go: young and old, clean and smelly, fashionable and unkempt. Some come to the bar and order; others choose tables, sitting down with friends for a meal and a drink; others still are only passing through, either out of Diagon Alley and into muggle London or the other way, toward the Alley to conduct business in the magical world. Some are in muggle dress, others in outlandish robes. Harry still doesn't entirely understand magical fashion, for all Blaise's attempts to teach him a thing or two; he just knows what he looks best in, what he prefers, which is more minimal than what many wixen seem to choose if left their choice.
The half hour passes quickly, and Harry is just draining the last drops of butterbeer from the bottle when he spots Hermione and her parents through the transitory crowds. He waves, and she waves back, then makes her way toward him, her parents trailing her.
"Hello, Harry," Hermione says, once she's near enough, and he hops down off his bar stool to accept her hug. "How are you?"
Harry smiles a little. "I'm alright," he says. "Well as can be expected, anyway. And you?"
"Oh, I'm good," she says. She glances over at her parents and seems to remember her manners fully, saying, "Harry, you've already met my mum, Helena; this is my dad, Rupert." Hermione's mum looks like her, even moreso now than last year, now that Hermione is a bit older, but Hermione clearly got her darker skin tone from her dad. Her mum is black as well, but lighter-skinned; Hermione has her dad's rich dark brown skin and his clear, sharp hazel eyes.
Harry smiles at them, bows marginally, and says, "Nice to meet you for the first time, Dr. Granger, and you again, er… Dr. Granger, also, I suppose."
Hermione's mum gives Harry a pleased smile and says, "You go ahead and call me Helena and him Rupert, Harry—it'll be quite confusing otherwise."
"Yeah," Harry says with a laugh. "Thanks."
"Shall we go grab a bite?" Rupert says. He has a resonant voice, low and soothing; an image appears in Harry's mind of Hermione as a small girl, being read stories in that deep voice, and it makes him smile a little.
"Yes, sir," Harry says.
"Well, why don't we see what we can find in that wonderful Alley of yours, hm?"
Harry and Hermione both agree eagerly, and make their way through the passage—Hermione opens it, having a better memory for patterns like the one necessary to open the archway—and into Diagon Alley. Noon on a weekday, the Alley is bustling and busy, people hustling to and fro, bright signs flashing the names of wares for sale in the shops and merchants with carts calling out to passers-by. Harry is struck all over again by the brightness and colour of Diagon Alley every time he visits; he hopes he never entirely gets over the wonder of it.
The Grangers seem just as struck, just as wondering; Harry recovers faster, thinking that perhaps he's spent more time in Diagon than them, and guides their group over to the side of the alley so that they're not wandering in the way of anyone in a hurry. They make their way up the Alley at a leisurely pace, and come to Gringotts before they find anywhere they decide is particularly interesting for a spot of lunch, so they pop into the bank first. The Grangers change muggle pounds for shining knuts, sickles, and galleons, and Harry rides down to his trust vault, key in hand, to retrieve a bag of coins. Hermione peppers him with questions on their walk away from the bank about the vaults and the goblins, most of which Harry can't answer; he eventually tells her that they should look for a book on Gringotts in Flourish and Blotts later, which satisfies her curiosity for the moment.
They find a place serving bizarre sandwiches, which is magical enough for the Grangers to find amusing and light enough to suit the weather, and have a nice lunch. Helena and Rupert ask Harry about his studies and his plans for the summer, and Harry and Hermione discuss their shared electives and their planned summer readings. Harry mentions that he's planning to focus on Animagus studies this summer, which gets Hermione interested; he describes the process to her a bit, and she nods seriously and says that perhaps she'll look for a book on that, as well.
After lunch, they head for the bookstore. Helena and Rupert seem perfectly happy to do their own browsing and leave Harry and Hermione to it; Hermione of course immediately gets absorbed, so Harry is left mostly on his own for the first little while, wandering around to look at books on mind magic. It's a small section, but then, he supposes, it would be hard to learn Occlumency from a book. Still, he picks up one of the more interesting-looking volumes, and then wanders back toward the transfiguration section, where he'd left Hermione muttering over a book about Animagi. On the way, he passes herbology and gets distracted there for a moment, ultimately picking out a book about the moon's effect on harvesting practices, in hopes of earning a smile from Professor Sprout when he proffers some extra knowledge next term—it's not like it's not fascinating stuff, after all. He's no natural like Neville, but plants are soothing, and he's always found the connections between herbology and astronomy neat.
Then he continues on his way to transfiguration, and to his utter lack of surprise, Hermione is still there. He helps her find a book on the Animagus transformation that looks actually useful, and then the two of them go together over toward the section on runes. Hermione immediately selects a hefty tome on the history of runic magic in Britain; Harry finds a book on the use of the Greek alphabet in runic spellcasting, and then another from the same shelf on Sanskrit.
It's nice to just… be with someone. His friendship with Hermione started with books, and they'll always have books, and talking about books together will always be simple. Even having that grounding means their relationship has always been simpler than his friendships with most everyone else, and he likes it. He can get lost in it for a few hours, reading bits of books, picking up things just because he's curious, discarding them when they're boring or too complicated. He and Hermione find her book on the history of Gringotts, and then about a dozen more books between the two of them on all sorts of topics, because why limit themselves? Why put a cap on what they can know?
Harry doesn't love books the way Hermione does, but he has come to love knowledge, especially in this past year. He'd never before appreciated the phrase knowledge is power so very much, but now he definitely does—the things he's learned have kept him alive, and will continue to do so, but only if he can continue to be prepared for what the world is throwing at him. With this, with spending this carefree afternoon buying books, he can maybe buy himself a few more carefree afternoons as well. Or at least he hopes so.
He doesn't keep very close track of how long they spend in the bookstore, and Hermione's parents seem no more inclined to hurry along than Hermione herself, but eventually Harry catches a glimpse of the window and realizes the afternoon is getting on. He still has some time before he has to meet Snape, but he doesn't want to push it.
So he catches Hermione's attention and suggests that they get ice cream, to which she reluctantly agrees. It's at least another fifteen minutes before all three Grangers are successfully pried away from browsing, and they all make their purchases, Harry packing his books into his satchel, which was fortunately charmed yesterday night by Remus with a long-lasting Featherlight Charm. Fortescue's is just down the way, so they go there and the Grangers insist on paying for Harry's ice cream, even though he shows them that he has plenty of money left. He has a single scoop of strawberry; Hermione gets chocolate. Her parents both spring for bizarre magical flavours that Harry can't quite identify. They eat and laugh, discussing the titles they picked up at the bookstore, and then walk back to the Leaky Cauldron. Inside the pub, Hermione wraps her arms around Harry in a huge hug, and says, "We'll have to do this again!"
Harry nods, conjuring a smile. "We'll do our school shopping together, if nothing else. And my birthday, of course."
Hermione smiles at him, her large teeth shining against her dark skin. "And don't forget to write!"
"I would never," Harry promises solemnly, then winks.
Helena laughs. "You're fine to get home on your own, Harry? Hermione said you were… Fleeing?"
"Flooing, mum," Hermione says, sounding exasperated.
"That's right," Harry says. "Through the fireplace."
"Oh, Floo, like… well, that does make sense," says Rupert. "Well, best of luck with that, lad."
"Thank you, sir," Harry says, and he makes a small half-bow to Hermione's parents before waving to them as they leave. Then he checks his watch—it's about half-past four, so he has some time to kill. Fortunately, he's just bought a small library, so he settles into a booth and pulls out the book he bought on Greek runes. He reads for a half hour—it's fascinating stuff, even the first chapters, which are all about 'magic words' on ancient Greek papyri and the way the ancients used language to invoke the 'power of the gods'—and then decides that he'd better buy something if he's going to loiter in the Leaky's taproom. He gets himself another butterbeer and a basket of chips, and then returns to his booth to read more, and also pulls out a muggle mechanical pencil to make some notes in the book's margin where he doesn't understand the rune theory, though he's careful not to get so absorbed that he loses track of time.
Eventually, he checks the clock again and realizes it's only ten to six. Reluctantly, he packs up his book and his pencil, carefully tucking everything away into his satchel, and heads for the door that leads out into muggle London. He looks around, and then, since Snape doesn't seem to be there yet, he leans carefully against the wall and double checks his belongings. His father's necklace, check. His snake bracelet, the silver warm against his skin, check. His wand, stored in its wrist holster, check. His second wand, the rowan wand from the Potter vault, is also in its place in the holster strapped around his leg. It had only been luck that he'd had it on him at Easter, and he'd gotten no real use out of it then, but since then he'd carried it everywhere. Better safe than sorry.
With that done, he closes his eyes briefly and begins the work of setting his Occlumency into place, setting his protections and checking their edges for cracks.
"Potter."
Harry opens his eyes, not quite finished with setting his Hogwarts labyrinth up, to find that Snape has appeared from nowhere and approached on silent feet; he's nearly looming, dressed in black as usual, though wearing a heavier cloak than he does at Hogwarts, or than is really suited to the weather. Harry barely manages to keep from flinching, but meets Snape's eyes stubbornly, deflects the Legilimency probe when it comes, and smiles. "Hello, sir," he says. "Nice evening, isn't it?"
Snape just stares at him, stone-faced. "Come along."
"Oh, yes," Harry says blithely, following along as Snape begins to walk deeper into muggle London. "Of course, I'm quite well. I hope your summer has been alright so far too, sir? Though we haven't had much of it."
"Enough," Snape says. "Now is not the time."
Harry's smile twists, turns bitter, and he ducks his head to hide it, though he's behind Snape and wouldn't be seen anyway. "Of course, sir." They walk in silence for a while; Harry doesn't know where he's being led, but decides it doesn't matter. They'll surely be Apparating elsewhere. Then he decides, no, he does have something more to say, and he jogs a little so that he's walking by Snape's side. It's a little difficult to keep up with his long stride, but Harry manages, and under his breath he murmurs, "So. You're a Death Eater."
Snape shoots him an unreadable glance, but says nothing.
That's not good enough for Harry, so he stops walking. Snape takes another few steps before he realizes and turns, meeting Harry's stubborn green gaze once more. Something almost like a flinch passes over the professor's face, a shadow of a reaction, and Harry smiles grimly. "We'll have to talk about it eventually, sir. We're in this together, now, no matter how much you hate me."
"Rest assured," Snape says smoothly. "I do not hate you."
"So you're just projecting on me your problems with Sirius, then?" Harry asks, then shrugs before Snape can answer. "I don't care. It doesn't matter. But I'd like to know what Vol—the Dark Lord said to you about me." And what Dumbledore might have said, but… well, there's a chance that Harry has been very wrong about Snape all along. He has a suspicion, but he doesn't know, and he's not going to betray his status as a spy until he's sure.
There's a pause. Then Snape exhales, so steadily that it wouldn't seem like a sigh on anyone else, but he's so very measured in every other way that it's noticeable. "Only to bring you," he says, on the end of the breath. "We will talk after."
"If I survive." Harry smiles again at the faint widening of Snape's eyes. "I'm not an idiot. But you knew that already, sir."
"Hm," Snape says, and then turns and waves to Harry over his shoulder. "Come along. We're nearly there."
'There' turns out to be a narrow back alleyway. The faint shiver that passes over Harry's skin as they step in reminds him of the feeling of the wards at the Apparition Point near the Doghouse, so he figures that's what this must be as well. Indeed, a few steps into the alley, Snape stops and turns to offer Harry his arm. His whole posture is stiff, and somehow gets even stiffer when Harry actually touches him, but no discomfort shows on his face; instead he simply turns on his heel once he's satisfied with the strength of Harry's grip and whisks them both away through the twist-squeeze of Apparition.
They reappear somewhere quiet, cooler than London had been, and Harry shakes away the dizziness of being brought side-along and looks around. They seem to have landed in a small copse of trees, and between the trunks Harry can see a distant low stone fence. Snape begins to walk in that direction, and Harry falls in behind him once more, wondering where exactly they are. As they pass through the trees to the edge of the copse, it becomes clear they're on the outskirts of some wealthy family's property—beyond the stone fence is a low, sprawling manor house with walls made of a dark grey stone that glitters in the setting sun. They skirt the fence for a ways until coming to a tall wrought-iron gate with stark, straight bars, over which is laid a panel with a crest depicting a sword surrounded by stylized flames. Snape reaches out and lays his hand on the panel, and after a moment there's a brief flare of red light. The gates swing open before them, granting access to a winding path that leads up to the front doors of the house. Harry stays close to Snape's heels, and the gates clang closed behind them shortly after they pass. Fortunately, it's not far to get up to the doors, and Snape pushes one of them open, not bothering to knock.
The inside of the house is sparsely decorated, or at least the foyer is. The walls are painted a dark grey similar to the stone outside, and the floor is stark white marble with black lines tracing like lightning across it; nothing hangs on the walls, and there's only a single small table holding a statuette of a gargoyle so twisted that it sends a shiver down Harry's spine. There's a pause when they enter, and then a sudden pop which makes Harry tense, startled. But it's only a house elf Apparating in in front of them, a skinny thing with green-tinted skin and ears long even for its kind. It makes a deep bow to them, and says in a squeaky voice, "Master and honoured guests is in the courtyard, sirs."
Snape says nothing to the elf, just strides past it. Harry wants to thank it, but thinks that that's not the sort of thing that Heir Black, soon-to-be Death Eater, would do. So he tucks away that impulse, and also takes the opportunity of the walk to finish prodding his Occlumency into its proper place. As he'd practiced the previous night, he makes sure that the doors to his inner Hogwarts are open, a tempting and literal doorway into the first few layers of his thinking, and that its curtains are closed, blocking out the light and any view of his heart and soul. Having organized his mind this way once makes it easier to do it again, and he finds when he's done that he feels different, his emotions sitting differently in his chest than they had just a moment ago. He feels less bothered by his surroundings, by the implacable black of Snape's cloak ahead of him and the click, click, click of their footsteps on the hard floor echoing against the bare walls. He's still not sure who would want to live in a place like this, but he's more willing to tolerate their spartan tastes, he finds; he's less unnerved. It's probably a side-effect of hiding away all of his fear and uncertainty about the situation he's walking into.
It's a fairly long walk, at least. They wind deeper into this strange house, eventually coming to a doorway at the end of a hall before which Snape pauses. He reaches into an inner pocket of his cloak and withdraws a mask, bone-white and painted with black and silver lines, and places it carefully over his face. He pulls up his hood, as well, and then reaches out and opens the door.
The door opens to the outside once more, though Harry can tell at a glance as they step through that they're not really outside. As the elf had said, it's a courtyard that he finds himself in, a square enclosure open to the sky and surrounded on all four sides by covered walkways with marble colonnades, like something he'd seen once in a primary school history book about the Romans. The centre of the courtyard is a grassy patch, well-groomed, and currently occupied by a number of other figures, cloaked, masked, and hooded like Snape is, all standing in a circle… and, at the far side of the circle, facing Snape and Harry, a single man who is bare-faced.
Voldemort, the Dark Lord, looks just like Harry remembers him. His dreams, his nightmares, have been accurate as to the details of that handsome face, the aristocratic high cheekbones and straight nose, his dark red eyes the colour of fresh blood that pierce Harry even from across the courtyard. His hair has been tamed into a modern style, slicked back with a few strands left to lie across his forehead, black as the robes he wears. Harry knows he's staring, but can't force himself to blink, to look down or away. Voldemort stares back, and a faint smile crosses his face, his whole affect shifting from a commander's severity to something entirely different. Not welcoming—more like sadistic, Harry decides.
"So," the Dark Lord says, once Snape has joined the circle, filling the final gap. "You came."
Harry bows deeply. "Of course, my Lord," he says. It's dead silent in the courtyard; he feels like his own breathing is deafeningly loud. "I said I would, did I not?"
"People lie." Harry rises from his bow to see Voldemort looking around. "Particularly about their loyalties."
A few members of the circle, still anonymous, shift or twitch slightly. Voldemort's smile deepens. "Unmask," he murmurs. "Let us see whose loyalties held true."
No one hesitates. Almost in unison, as soon as the command is issued, the figures in the circle reach up and pull off their masks. Harry recognizes some of them—of course he does. He and Snape are standing directly across the circle from Voldemort, on whose immediate right is Lucius Malfoy. On Voldemort's left are Nicodemus Flint, Marcus Flint—Marcus Flint, whose dark eyes are fixed on Harry, his expression stony—and then a woman that Harry thinks he recognizes from the Wizengamot session last summer as the Lady Flint, whose name he doesn't know; and past her are the twins who had been present at Voldemort's resurrection, Amycus and Alecto (Carrow, Sirius had said, the Carrow twins). Further to Malfoy's right are Barty Crouch Junior, Asphodel Parkinson, Theodore Nott Senior, and Peter Pettigrew. On and on, until all of the faces in the circle are bared; some twenty-five wixen, many of whom Harry recognizes, more he does not.
Voldemort, too, is looking around, measuring and assessing, examining each of their faces, meeting eyes all around the circle. A few of the gathered Death Eaters flinch when he does so; those who know enough Occlumency to feel the invasion of their minds, Harry thinks. Those who have never learned the skill are probably better off, even if they are unprotected.
Voldemort skips past Harry on his first look around the circle, and Harry takes a deep breath when finally that gaze comes to rest on him again. He meets the Dark Lord's eyes squarely and tries to prepare himself for the tearing pain of violation… but it doesn't come. Instead, Voldemort takes one step into the circle, then another, and he raises his hands toward the darkening sky.
"I am risen," he says. "And you all have returned to my side. That is a sign of your wisdom—though do not think that I have forgotten which of you stayed truly loyal, and which disowned their allegiance. Each will get the repayment that they have earned." Malfoy cringes slightly; Pettigrew does too. "And some of you are new to this circle. That is wisest, for you have already seen the direction the future will turn, and you have chosen well where to pledge yourself. If a pledge is truly what your presence means."
He hasn't looked away from Harry. Harry bows his head slightly, but doesn't break eye contact, and so doesn't see the twist of the wrist that summons the Dark Lord's wand into his hand. He has only the moment it takes for the Dark Lord to raise his wand to prepare himself, and then the crackling, jagged light of a nonverbal Cruciatus strikes him, and his whole body is torn apart. He feels like his skin is burning, his muscles tearing, bones breaking; it's impossible to keep his feet and he collapses into the grass, twisting under the spell as he screams. Blind agony is all he knows and it goes on and on, until he feels like he can hardly remember what existence without pain feels like—and then the curse lifts and he's left lying there, gasping past sobs, the taste of blood in his mouth and his whole body trembling. Echoes of suffering flash through him, the aftershocks of an unnatural disaster.
Distantly, Harry hears Voldemort say, "Get him up, Severus." A moment later, hard hands land on him, one digging claw-like into his shoulder to drag him to his knees and the other twisting into his hair to force his face up. He finds himself looking again into the bloody hue of Voldemort's eyes, and then comes the blade-thrust of Legilimency into his mind. Just like the first time, his outermost shields are nothing against the brutality of the Dark Lord's strike, and in a moment Voldemort is an acid shadow slipping through the castle halls in Harry's mind, breaking down doors and leaving jagged wounds wherever he touches. He tears through the rooms, digging out every secret that Harry had tucked away there, prodding at the buried emotions and staining the memories with rage and pain that is both the signature of his own mind and what his violation evokes in Harry.
No amount of self-discipline could have stopped Harry from struggling, and struggle he does, closing and locking doors as he can, bending hallways and moving staircases, trying to protect some corner of his mind from the lightning probe of Voldemort's Legilimency. It works, at least a little—it slows down Voldemort's progress, at least… and keeps him from touching the curtains that ripple in the wake of his passing. Those remain firmly shut, and Harry keeps his thoughts far from them, focusing instead on keeping the Dark Lord out of the most deeply buried rooms, away from the highest shelves of memory in the library. Somehow, despite the distraction of the Cruciatus and the suffering the probe causes… it works. His true self, the sunshine of the outside, stays hidden; Voldemort sees the embittered Heir Black who might hate the Death Eaters, but only as much as he is disgusted by all of the rest of the magical world.
A small eternity passes—probably only a few minutes in the real world, but Harry's sense of time is as shattered as the rest of him—and finally Voldemort withdraws. Harry blinks and reaches up with shaking fingers to wipe the tears and snot from his face, and to Voldemort he says, "I am sincere, my Lord."
"Good," Voldemort says, his voice nearly a hiss. He walks forward and lays one long-fingered hand on Harry's face, cupping his cheek in a parody of a comforting gesture. "A wise choice indeed, Harry Potter."
Harry says nothing, just waits until those cool fingers have left his skin and then bows his head again as best he can with Snape's hand still wrapped tight into his hair. He closes his eyes, then, as Voldemort steps away to return to the centre of the circle. It worked. It worked, and he's going to live, but… this is only the beginning.
"It might seem strange," Voldemort says, "to call this meeting today, on the longest day, when the Light is the strongest."
As the Dark Lord speaks, Snape releases Harry, stepping back to his proper place in the circle. Harry shifts back as best he can and rises shakily to his feet, glancing at his professor. Snape's face is bloodless, even more so than usual, but he looks unerringly at Voldemort; there's no expression there at all for Harry to read. Fine. After it is.
"But," Voldemort continues, and he makes a grand gesture toward the sky—the sun has set almost entirely, and Harry can see the first stars appearing, "it is not the daylight I am concerned with. It is the oncoming night—the creeping Dark, which will now only grow stronger. Each day after this, the night will last longer, be darker, stronger, and so too will we. The Light dominates—for now. It will not last. It will never last, not while there is loyalty to the true heart of magic, the Dark and fundamental core of what makes us wixen. We, magical, possessed of inborn power beyond anything a muggle could imagine or the Light could ever create with their surface tricks and pale illusions, are the masters of the world, and the time has come for us to prove it, once and for all.
"I am reborn before you now and that is proof, my loyal ones, of all that I say. The Dark will never, can never, die, for magic is my ally and an ally even more powerful than death. You see before you proof of my power, my right to walk foremost in this world, and I will lead you all to glory. No more will Dark mean hidden. No more will Dark mean shunned. No more will Dark mean shamed for living wholly in the truth of what we are: masters of magic, and by that mastery, the rightful rulers of the world. We will smother the destructive fire of muggle influence that is slowly reducing our great society to cinders. No longer will the blinded Light be allowed to rise from the ashes of their mistakes—instead we will show them the truth of what they do in allowing the world to burn. And we will be victorious. We cannot fail. I cannot fail, cannot die, cannot ever be defeated, for I have already defeated Death itself to return here to you and complete the task which fate has placed now within my grasp."
The sun has finished setting as Voldemort speaks, and it is in shadow that he pauses and looks around at all of the Death Eaters surrounding him, measuring them again, assessing, meeting eyes and accepting as his due the looks of fervent devotion on so many of their faces. Harry's eyes have adjusted slowly to the fading light, and though the lingering pain of the Cruciatus still itches beneath his skin, he is bothered less by that than by the clear commitment of every one of these people to the cause that Voldemort describes.
"You, my Death Eaters, have come back to me. And now I bid you: go out. Seek those sympathetic to our cause, and bring them to me as well. Grow our numbers, help us thrive, and begin the work of undoing all the damage that the Light has done. Further direction will come, but you know your task: to make our cause immortal, as I have become, and unstoppable, as I always have been. Go."
A wave of a pale hand causes the Death Eaters all around the circle to bow, nearly as one. Once everyone has straightened, Lord Flint draws his wand and points it upwards, and murmurs a long incantation. When he finishes speaking, there's a brilliant red flash, nearly blinding after long minutes in darkness. A moment later, a crack announces Voldemort's Disapparition. Once he's gone, the others swiftly follow, one by one disappearing in a cascade of noise that leaves Harry reeling.
He flinches hard when Snape's hand comes down on his shoulder once more, and then his professor hisses, "Grab me, you fool."
Automatically, Harry obeys, and in the next moment they're gone too. The crushing twist of Apparition is wretched in the aftermath of Voldemort's torment, and Harry is near-blind with pain when they land; he can't seem to get his limbs to cooperate, and he topples to his knees, then his roiling stomach objects to this final bit of abuse and he vomits abruptly onto the ground in front of him, only by luck avoiding throwing up on himself.
Once he stops retching, he kneels there for a few long seconds, gasping for breath, and then swipes the tears off his face. He readjusts his glasses just in time for a potion vial clutched in a slender hand to appear in front of him, and he shoots a suspicious glance up at Snape.
"Drink it," Snape orders, "unless you want permanent nerve damage."
Harry scowls, but nods and takes the potion. It doesn't taste as awful as he's expecting, but maybe that's just in comparison to the taste of bile already in his mouth. Once he chokes that down, another potion is produced from somewhere within Snape's robes, and without waiting for the order Harry drinks that one too; the second one tastes like mint, to his surprise, and completely clears the horrifying residue from his mouth. His head, too, feels somewhat clearer, and he looks around. They've appeared in the back garden of a rickety old house, its back wall once whitewashed wood panelling but now stained with age and disrepair. The house is narrow and dotted with dirty windows, and the yard around them is filled with scraggly plants—though, as Harry looks around more, he realizes that many of the things growing are magical plants and herbs, or mundane ones used for common magical purposes, and well taken-care-of; the garden only seems disorganized and neglected.
"Where are we?" Harry asks.
"My home," Snape says. "You will not be coming inside."
"That's fine." Harry places his hands on the dirt and pushes himself up, and then brushes himself off as best he can. His robes are grass-stained, though, and he's sure there are still tear tracks on his cheeks. "Can you clean me up before I go home? I can't have Sirius and Remus asking questions."
Snape narrows his eyes, but raises his wand. Harry can't restrain a slight flinch at the gesture, but doesn't cringe away entirely, standing as still as he can as Snape cleans his robes and then his face with nonverbal spells cast with precise gestures.
"I assume you have questions," Snape says, once he's done.
"Of course," Harry says. "And I assume you have answers. But are you actually going to give me them?"
Snape narrows his eyes. "That depends on the question."
Harry sighs. Then he lets his Occlumency relax a little, because he's exhausted, and it's not like Snape doesn't know what's in his head after all their lessons together in the spring. "Respectfully, sir, I think I'm too tired to play that game right now."
Snape looks away, staring at his garden, and his mouth twists into a scowl. "Fine," he says. "Know this, then, Potter: I am your ally. There will come a time when you cannot come to your dogfather, or to Dumbledore, but there is no issue you cannot bring to me."
"Are you a spy?" Harry asks bluntly, and Snape turns sharply to glare at him.
"Yes," he says, his voice acidic.
"For who?"
"Who do you think?"
Harry studies Snape's face, his dark, narrow eyes, his large nose and thin lips, pursed into a scowl. Cold and sour and mean, is Severus Snape, filled with vitriol and hate… and a sharp intelligence and determined focus, both keen enough to cut, when wielded correctly. "I would guess," Harry says, "that that depends on who I asked."
Snape's expression turns to a wry, bitter smile; Harry has seen that expression before. It's maybe the closest thing to real pleasure he's ever seen on his Head of House's face. "Very astute, Mr. Potter," Snape says.
So Snape isn't going to tell him the whole truth of who he's working for. Harry supposes it doesn't matter—if he's a double agent, which seems to be the case, anything Harry tells him or asks him for is likely to be reported to both of the professor's two masters. Better not to tell him anything at all, not unless he needs to. "You taught me, last year, how to really protect myself," Harry says, and taps his temple. "In here. Did you know, then, what was going to happen?"
Snape shakes his head. "You are a child, Potter. If either the Dark Lord or the Headmaster ever listened to me, you would never have been placed in this position."
"Both of them must trust you," Harry says. "For you to have been able to retake your position so easily."
"Of course," Snape says. "I have never led my master wrong. But both sides trust me most to be a liar."
"Your position is as precarious as mine," Harry says quietly. The summer evening is cooling around them, and the chill of oncoming night soothes the fire burning beneath his skin until he feels almost himself again. But not quite—he might never really feel himself again, after even one single night spent kneeling at Voldemort's feet. "I'll try not to ask you for anything beyond your reach."
"Nothing is beyond the reach of a Slytherin dedicated enough," Snape replies. "If you are in trouble, Potter, ask."
A smile as bitter as Snape's earlier one slides across Harry's face. "We're all in trouble, sir," he says. "Haven't you heard? The Dark is on the rise—nothing will be the same."
Snape closes his eyes, then bows his head briefly. "Indeed," he says. Then he looks at Harry again and makes a dismissive gesture. "Get off my property and go home before your dogfather begins to fret. The front yard is warded against muggle attention; you may summon the Knight Bus there."
"Thank you," Harry says, and he makes a deep bow, a proper one, Heir-to-Heir, and then he goes. The front yard, like the back, is home to a garden of potion ingredients, and from there he holds out his wand to call the bus, which arrives swiftly. He fetches out his money to pay the conductor and finds a seat. The tumult of the bus ride revives the lurking nausea, but he manages not to vomit again before the bus stops and the conductor calls out the intersection Harry had specified as his stop. He steps off a few blocks from the Doghouse and walks, keeping an eye out for trouble, but all of the trouble is far away, dispersed into the night to begin the work of the Dark's cause, and Voldemort himself is who knows where, waiting. Planning.
Harry lets himself into the Doghouse's building and trudges up the stairs, feeling endlessly weary, and then has to dig around for a minute to find his key to the flat itself. Fortunately, it hasn't gotten too deeply buried in his satchel, and then he's letting himself back into the warmth of his home.
"Harry?" calls Sirius from the den.
"I'm home!" Harry calls back, and goes willingly to face the questions about his afternoon, shoring himself up against this one last effort toward deception before he can finally sleep.