A Year Like None Other

Disclaimer: I don't own these characters, or this fictional universe. JK Rowling, some publishers, and some film companies own everything. I'm not making anything from this except a hobby.

Summary: A letter from home sends Harry down a path he'd never have walked on his own. A sixth year fic, this story follows Order of the Phoenix and disregards any canon events that occur after Book 5. Spoilers for the first five books. Have fun!

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A Year Like None Other

by Aspen in the Sunlight

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Chapter Fifty-Four: Out of Sight

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Get out of my sight.

The words haunted Harry as the hours wore on that evening.

Get out of my sight.

He kept thinking that Snape would relent at any moment, would come in and... well, do something. Assign a punishment. Yell at him. Talk, so they could get past all this. But he didn't. He left Harry completely alone.

After a while--it must have been past midnight by then--Draco did come in, but all he did was storm past Harry's bed and into the bathroom. Harry heard the rush of water, but no singing, not that night. And then Draco was stalking his way back through the room, his wand angrily flashing through the air as he charmed all the lights off. He almost slammed the door--almost, but not quite--and then Harry was alone once more. Draco, evidently, was back to sleeping on the couch.

Morning seemed a long, long way off.

At some point Harry must have slept, but he woke up remembering nothing but the hours of staying awake. He knew it was morning only because Draco's enchanted picture frame was showing a view of daylight over the lake.

A bit unnerved that even after a night's sleep Snape still hadn't come to see him, Harry hurriedly washed and dressed, then poked his head just a little bit into the living room to see what Snape or Draco might be doing. It was Saturday; his father should be home.

Nobody was in sight, though. Not even Draco.

Then Harry heard voices coming from behind the closed door of the Potions Lab. A bit relieved, he realised that Snape and Draco were merely working on something together. That often happened. Harry had tried to join them a few times, but he'd been bored beyond belief. He might have earned an Outstanding on his Potions O.W.L, but that was just from sheer hard slogging--and a burning desire to prove the Potions Master wrong after five year of ridicule in class, he acknowledged. O.W.L. or no, he just didn't have the innate fascination for the subject that the other two shared.

As Harry glanced around the room, he couldn't help but start to feel a bit apprehensive. There were breakfast dishes on the table; two dirty plates proving that Snape and Draco had breakfasted together, and not invited Harry to join them. When had that ever happened? At least there was a plate for him, and plenty of food left over. He didn't want any of it, though; he wasn't hungry in the slightest. Actually, just looking at the table made him feel a bit ill. Was his presence so distasteful that Snape didn't even care to share a meal with Harry any longer?

Even stranger than not calling him for breakfast was the fact that neither Draco nor Snape had summoned a house-elf to clean away the debris. It seemed they'd left it to him to take care of the dishes. He could have yelled through the Floo for an elf to come get them, he supposed, but Harry decided he'd rather leave the dishes unattended. If he was too upset to eat, he was certainly too upset to clean up after the people who had.

Moving away from the table, he found himself once more hovering outside the door to the Potions Lab. He wanted to go inside, to work things out... but he was afraid to. Afraid of that terrible frost in Snape's black eyes, afraid of hearing again that Snape found Harry a complete disappointment.

But he wasn't a Gryffindor for nothing, so fear or no fear, he laid his fingers on the doorknob and began to turn it... only to discover that the door was locked.

Another first. He'd never been locked out of where Snape and Draco were working. He'd always been welcome, but clearly he wasn't welcome now.

Voices drifted to him as he stood there.

"The powdered lichen now, Draco," Snape said, sounding entirely focussed on the task at hand. As if he'd forgotten Harry completely, in fact. As if in all the world, nothing mattered except the Potion underway...

"It didn't turn quite that shade of orange last time, did it?" Draco said after a moment.

"Spell the cauldron warmer until the hue approaches rust..."

Draco really did connect with Snape on a level that was beyond Harry. No matter how hard he tried at Potions, he'd never have the enthusiasm and drive for it that Draco had. It hadn't bothered Harry before, or not much, since Snape had seemed to like him well enough as he was.

But now, things were back to where they'd been before this year had even started. Harry had done something unforgivable, and Snape didn't like him at all.

Resolutely telling himself that he didn't care, Harry snatched up Sal's box and took it back to his room.

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His room wasn't a cupboard of course, but Harry couldn't help but feel a bit the same as he had all those times he'd been punished at the Dursleys. It was the isolation, he supposed. He'd been shoved under the stairs as a child to teach him a lesson, true, but more often, the sole motive had been to keep him out of sight.

Get out of my sight. I don't want to see you.

Depressed, Harry slept a while, Sals wrapped around his wrist.

When he awoke it was just noon, as the enchanted window showed, but peeking out into the other room revealed that the breakfast dishes had yet to be cleared away. Draco and Snape were still working on some Potion or other, obviously. Harry told himself he didn't care. What was it to him if he was left out?

It occurred to him that it was probably bad strategy to just let those dishes sit there. Snape being so Slytherin, maybe the dirty plates were some sort of test. Harry couldn't figure out just what the purpose of that could be. Of course, given the way Harry had been raised, he figured it was actually more likely that extra chores were being given as punishment. He knew that was a stupid conclusion, since flooing the dishes down to the kitchen wasn't really much of a chore at all, but what else could he think?

Well, whether the dirty plates were supposed to be a test or a punishment, Harry decided he'd better just play along and take care of them. Snape and Draco were still in the Potions lab; he could hear them. Maybe Snape wouldn't realise that Harry had waited until noon to do the job he'd apparently been assigned.

He went and fetched his wand from his room, deciding that if he was going to magic the dishes away, he might as well try to avoid lifting them by hand while he was at it. Wingardium Leviosa didn't work, though. Maybe it would have, Harry thought, if he'd have said the words with more force, but he didn't want to speak above a whisper. He didn't want Snape to hear him trying magic and failing. Harry hadn't been ashamed of his lack of strong magic, not before. He'd just been frustrated--at times even wondering if Draco might be right and his inability to use his magic really did hint at some deep psychological problem.

Now, though, he realised he was ashamed. Actually, he felt worthless. He was no good as a son, and not much better as a wizard.

Well, at least he knew he could use the Floo, though after the burn he'd gotten he wasn't too eager to put his face in there again. Still, Madam Pince had flooed books through for him, more than once. Amazed by that the first time, Harry had asked Draco how on earth the books managed not to burn up on the way. Draco, predictably enough, had scoffed at Harry's "Mugglishness" and had explained in a voice dripping with scorn, Well, it is called magic, Harry....

The memory sort of stung him, making him remember all kinds of other things Draco had said over the last few weeks. The Slytherin boy might not be as vain about his looks as Harry once supposed--all that fussing over his hair was apparently some form of overcompensation--but he was definitely vain about his magic. Most of the time he was pretty patient with Harry's lack of any, but once in a while his real feelings came out in force. He was impatient with how long it was taking for Harry to get over his "whatever." He held Harry pretty much in contempt for letting himself become so very vulnerable.

Harry told himself that none of that should bother him. He didn't care what Draco thought, did he? Trouble was, some tiny little part of him actually did.

Even more discouraged than before, Harry piled the dishes--including all the congealed food--into the fireplace, then tossed in some Floo powder and shouted for the kitchens. He wasn't actually sure that was the right way to go about things; Snape and Draco seemed to know how to contact house-elves; more often than not, the dishes simply vanished straight off the table when the meal was through. It did work, though. Or at least, the dishes went somewhere. As long as they weren't in sight any longer, that was good enough for Harry.

He went back to sitting on his bed, letting Sals slither through his fingers as he poured out all his troubles to his pet... making a snake his confidant just as Draco had said. But who else was there? Snape didn't want to talk to him; that much was obvious. So Harry talked and talked to Sals. He explained how Ron had said a bad thing but had been punished more than enough already; how Snape just wouldn't listen to reason. How Draco had blown it all out of proportion, and then Snape had too, taking five hundred points for something that wasn't a school matter at all.

The points really worried him because of the way Snape had taken them. Off Gryffindor only, even though any son of Snape's would be in Slytherin, too. So where did that leave him?

Sals listened. She didn't understand about the points, and no amount of Parseltongue could make it clear. What she did understand was that Harry needed a warm place to curl up in. Warm places always made her feel better, Sals said, adding that her new box was very nice.

Harry sighed, wishing things could be that simple for him.

Draco came in again late that afternoon, looking oddly unlike himself. His skin unnaturally pale, his blond hair plastered to his head. Well, he had been working over a cauldron for something like ten hours, which might account for his foul mood, Harry supposed.

He took one look at Harry and sneered, "What have you been doing all day, playing with your damned snake?"

Harry looked away, hiding Sals inside his hand. "I cleaned up the dishes you and Snape left on the table."

"Well, that must have taken ages," Draco drawled, so obviously contemptuous that Harry felt something inside himself wither. He didn't want Draco's good opinion, he told himself. Maybe the Slytherin boy's scorn bothered him so much because it was an echo of Snape's. They were both angry at him.

"Shut up, Malfoy," Harry returned, but without much spirit. "I don't want to fight."

"Well, isn't that a huge surprise," scathed the other boy. "And here you've spent the months since your operation trying just so hard to get your magic back so that you can go vanquish the Dark Lord. But that's right, you haven't! Most days you don't even try a single spell, and then when Severus arranges things so you'll want to use the Floo or such, you actually resent him for it!"

Harry's patience began to evaporate. "Well I did get burned, you know, so you tell me who was right about that firechat!"

"And Harry Potter is right about everything, isn't he!" cried Draco. "You're every bit as arrogant as Severus always said! Ha, you know what he told me? He warned you not to get that operation in the first place! Told you that wizards had no business letting Muggle doctors anywhere near them! But you insisted! You know what I think? You were hoping all along that the operation would destroy your magic! You wanted an excuse to wimp out of the war!"

Harry saw red. What had Snape been going on about trust for, when he had taken private conversations with Harry and shared them with Draco? Just as he'd done before with Remus, only now, he didn't have the excuse he'd had then, did he?

"Yeah, well you told me you understood that, remember?" Harry shouted. "You said if you were me, you'd have wanted let out of the fighting, too!"

"That just proves I'd make a lousy you!" Draco shouted back. "But we expect better of the Boy-Who-Lived! We need better!"

"Don't call me that!"

"I'll call you whatever I damned well please. Coward, how's that for starters? If you ask me, you practically worship that burned out core that's keeping you from doing magic!"

"Oh yeah? Well it's money you worship, isn't it?"

"Severus explained about the adoption," Draco retorted. "He didn't think I'd choose money over him, but he didn't see why I should have to lose what little I have left, either. Because either way, I'd still have him."

Harry turned his face to the wall and hugged Sals, just a bit.

Draco went and had his shower. That time, he sang. Just as though he hadn't a care in the world.

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The dinner hour came and went, but Harry stayed in his room. Snape wasn't out there anyway; he could tell that from the fact that the silence was only broken by the clink of fork against plate. Draco was evidently eating alone.

Harry still wasn't hungry, but he ate a couple of the chocolate covered raspberries Neville had sent him for Christmas, and drank water from the tap in the bathroom. Not exactly a balanced meal, but he just didn't have the stomach for more.

He read for a while, and found out that Arabic gum was a wish to purify evil, but even the mystery of the well-wish had lost its allure. He was just so tired. Nothing really mattered, not even Snape being so angry. All day long he'd waited for his father to come talk to him. All day... and not one word.

Harry might have thought that Snape was waiting for him to make the first move... except if he was, why lock Harry out of the lab? No, it seemed clear enough to Harry that Snape didn't want him around. And Harry had learned the hard way that when adults didn't want you around, your best course of action was to make yourself scarce. So of course he'd stayed in his room all day. But how much longer was it going to take for Snape to forgive him?

Slytherins weren't by nature the most forgiving of souls, were they? And Snape was supremely Slytherin. Sure, he'd finally forgiven Harry over the pensieve incident, but this was different. Snape had never trusted Harry before, so Harry's snooping hadn't really been a betrayal, it had simply been rude. But this time... Harry hung his head just thinking about it. Snape had said it himself: he had trusted Harry to keep quiet about the things that had been discussed with the casewitch.

This time, Harry had betrayed Snape's trust.

He had no idea how long it took a Slytherin to get over something like that. Knowing Snape, he might resent it for a long, long time.

Enough of such morose thoughts. Harry took a shower to try and clear his mind, but it didn't work. He ended up sitting on the floor of the granite stall, letting the water pour over him as he wondered what he could have done differently. The trouble was, the root of the problem was Snape's treatment of Ron, and Harry couldn't have approved of that, he just couldn't have. Not even to appease Snape could he approve of it now.

Harry toweled himself off, shivering in the cold air, wishing he could perform a warming charm or two. He often had such thoughts, but tonight, the thought itself actually chilled him. Because... if Snape really was never going to forgive him, he'd want rid of Harry, wouldn't he? But he couldn't make him go live elsewhere, not as long as Harry was without magic...

Which meant that he might gain his magic back only to lose his father.

Then again, hadn't he all but lost him already?

You don't deserve to be my son, Harry. Points only from Gryffindor, not Slytherin. Get out of my sight.

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When he finally emerged from the bathroom, he saw Draco was propped up in bed, reading one of Snape's Potions Journals. Of course. No wonder Severus liked him better.

"I do hope you've finished sulking," Draco smoothly said as he set the bound parchment book aside and spelled out the lights.

"I haven't been sulking," Harry tightly informed the Slytherin boy. He found his way across the room in the dark, and slid into his own rumpled bed.

"What do you call hiding in the room all day?"

"Snape said to get out of his sight, so I did."

"Oh, I get it," Draco drawled. "You're playing the martyr card. And there I thought you had some Gryffindor guts."

"Actually, you think I'm cowardly and stupid," Harry gibed. "Isn't that what you said?"

"What about what you said, Potter?"

"You started it!"

"No, you started it, siding with that damned Weasel!"

"Well, you won't have to worry about that any longer, will you?" Harry shot back. "Ron's probably expelled already!"

"See, there you go again! All this concern for Weasley!"

"You'd be concerned too," Harry scathed, "if a friend of yours was getting expelled. Oh, but that's right... you don't have any friends. Maybe that's why you don't seem to have a clue how I feel!"

"I don't care how you feel! I just want you to stop being such a little shite to Severus!"

"I'm being a shite?" Harry gasped. "What about him? He hasn't so much as said one word to me today!"

"Just as well for you that he hasn't," Draco snarled. "He wasn't exactly in the best mood. But you wouldn't know about that, would you? And why not? Because you sulked all day, instead of bothering your head to see how he was!"

"It's hard to see how he is when I'm locked out of the room where he is!"

Draco went unnaturally still. "The door was locked?"

"You know it was! Come to think of it, you probably locked it!"

"No--" All at once, Draco's voice changed completely, to those smooth tones that meant he was lying through those perfect white teeth of his. "That's right, I locked it. Let's just get to sleep now, all right?"

Something wasn't quite right; Harry could tell. Obviously, it was Snape who had locked him out, but why would Draco lie to him about it? Not to spare his feelings, not after he'd just called him a shite and a coward and all the rest. No, there was something else Draco knew, something else he was trying to keep from Harry. Secrets, as usual.

"What aren't you telling me?" Harry exploded.

"Nothing."

"What!"

"There's nothing!" Draco exclaimed. "Listen, I need to sleep, all right?"

"You tell me what went on in that Potions Lab today!" Harry shouted.

"It's up to Severus to tell you," Draco retorted. "It's his business. Not mine, thank Merlin."

After that, no matter how Harry harangued him, Draco wouldn't say another word.

Finally, Harry let the other boy sleep, but he didn't sleep much himself. Locked out of Snape's lab... ignored all day... he couldn't help but wonder if there was more to this than just his father still needing to get over their fight. Maybe that locked door was symbolic of something bigger, like being locked out of Snape's life, now. That would be the Slytherin way of going about things, wouldn't it? If a Slytherin was mad enough, he'd just cut you off or kick you out, and Snape couldn't do the latter since Harry still did need the warding. It wouldn't do to endanger the Boy-Who-Was-Supposed-to-Save-Them-All.

But clearly, Snape personally couldn't stand him. It was as if this year had never happened at all.

Feeling suddenly jittery, Harry finally decided he'd put up with just about enough of this. Snape might have told him to get lost, might have underscored the command by locking Harry out, but Harry'd had enough of hiding. He was going to make Snape talk to him again, if for no other reason than to know just where he stood. Unable to bear the not knowing even one second longer, Harry fished around for those warm furry socks Dumbledore had given him, and padded out in pyjamas to the Potion Master's door.

He raised his hand to knock, then almost thought better of it. If Snape was mad already, maybe the best course of action wasn't to rouse him from a warm bed. Uncle Vernon would have pummeled him into the ground for waking him up like this. Snape though, wasn't Uncle Vernon. He'd even said, just recently, that Harry should come get him if he needed him at night.

He did need him, Harry decided. Even if it wasn't over a nightmare or wild magic, he really did need to see Snape. Steeling himself for the worst, Harry rapped his knuckles on the door, then loudly whispered, "It's Harry, sir. Can I come in?"

No answer greeted him except the gloomy silence of the dungeons themselves.

Again, Harry knocked and called, that time a bit louder.

But it was no use. Snape either wasn't in there, or he was ignoring Harry.

More depressed than ever, Harry slowly made his way back to bed.

Where, for the first time in weeks and weeks, a dream of past and future stole into his mind to lodge itself deep inside his soul.

It was Christmas again, Christmas Day in Devon, and Snape and Draco were sitting on the tattered sofa, engaged in conversation. "You never asked what I did to improve the Lotion Potion," Draco was saying, a sly smile on his lips.

"That's a remarkably vapid name," Snape commented, his tones a shade acerbic.

Draco smirked. "I invented it, so I get to name it."

"On the contrary, Mr Malfoy, I invented it. You merely enhanced its properties, or so you claim."

"Too bad you can't test it now. I guess we have to wait for---"

"Don't speak of such things. I don't want Harry to know."

"Well, he can't hear us anyway. He's way out over by that old oak, talking to his snake."

Snape raised an eyebrow. "It's far too cold outside for Sals to be alert."

"He's got her in the box you gave him," Draco explained.

Harry wanted to hear more, wanted to know what else Snape was keeping secret from him, but all at once the dream began whirling, a sickening spinning sensation sending the whole world into a twisting tornado that dizzied him until he could scarcely breathe. And then the dream began again, but he wasn't in the past any longer. He was in the future. He knew that, because he was in his room in Snape's quarters, and Draco's enchanted picture frame was showing the Whomping Willow trying to bud out into new leaves. It was spring, early spring, and Harry was alone in the room.

When he looked around, he noticed an envelope laying on the shelves where he normally kept his books and some of his Christmas gifts. They were all missing now, though; there was only that envelope. Curious, Harry wandered over to the shelves and broke the plain wax seal keeping it closed. A tiny key dropped forth into his hand. A Gringott's key.

Voices drifted in from the living room, distracting him from the key. Amaelia Thistlethorne was talking, her high voice unmistakable. Harry put the key back in the envelope and set it down, then went to the door to listen, peering out through the crack to spy on Snape as he talked with the casewitch from Wizard Family Services.

"Well," she was saying. "I certainly never thought to be back here so very soon, and under such terrible circumstances."

"Have you brought the paperwork?" Snape asked, his voice businesslike and determined. "I want this over and done with, as soon as possible."

The casewitch pursed her lips. "I am under a great deal of pressure not to permit you to take such a step as this, you understand."

A sneering expression settled on Snape's face as Harry looked out at the scene in the living room. "I need not ask from which quarter. He does so love to pull those strings. No doubt he doesn't care for this development, but..." Snape shrugged. "I'm afraid it is necessary." His eyes narrowed. "You won't let his influence dissuade you, I trust."

"Of course not. Wizard Family Services' sole concern is the best interest of the child. Are you certain this is the only way to resolve the situation?"

"I am absolutely certain," Snape replied, his arms crossed in resolution.

"I understand that your feelings may have changed, but this is so sudden--"

"On the contrary. It is long overdue."

The casewitch shifted on her feet as though considering how best to get through Snape's stubbornness. "I'm sure the young man must be very upset, which is only natural, considering--"

"Miss Thistlethorne," Snape softly said, his tones ringing with decision, "it is time to end this... standoff, so that both he and I can move past the regrettable position we find ourselves in. I trust I make myself clear?"

"Very clear, Professor."

With that, the casewitch extended a parchment. Snape took it, and summoning a quill, signed it.

"I'll speak with Harry now," Amaelia Thistlethorne said. "He really should have been informed of this in advance, you realise."

Snape nodded, a sweep of long, black hair brushing his face. "No doubt."

Harry woke up thrashing, his hair sticking up wildly, his eyes haunted from what he had seen.

Wizard Family Services, here again. The situation "unfortunate" and "regrettable," so it couldn't possibly mean that Draco was being adopted as the casewitch had once wanted. In fact, she had seemed to be arguing against whatever was up for discussion. But what could that have been?

Snape had talked of pressure, of someone pulling strings to stop them... well, who else could that be but Dumbledore? He had so much influence with Wizard Family Services that he'd gotten them to rush Harry's adoption through in the first place. Snape didn't call the headmaster the chessmaster for nothing. And now both Snape and Thistlethorne were prepared to do something that Dumbledore didn't want... something that would have Harry and Snape moving past the "regrettable position" they found themselves in...

And then there was the vault key... and the fact that the room had been so strangely bare. In fact, everything he'd been leaving out had been gone. Nothing of his remained in the room, except his trunk and that key...

Somebody had packed his things, without even telling him he was going to leave!

But that made sense, didn't it? If Snape was going to sign those papers, if they meant what they seemed, then of course Harry would have to be packed to go. Of course he would need his key.

His first panicked thought was that maybe it wasn't true. He had plenty of dreams that weren't seer dreams, after all. But the pattern was all there: something from the past, a whirling, then something from the future. And the future part always came true.

Always.

He'd tried his very best not to hit Ron, but that had come true.

It had been completely absurd to think that Draco Malfoy would ever call him a brother, but that had come true, too.

And now, another seer dream. Something else that was going to come true.

Something Harry should have known even without the dream. Why else would Snape leave him to sit in his room all day and brood? When he'd been upset before, the man had insisted he come out and play Wizard Scrabble! Not this time, though. This time, Snape just didn't care.

But that made sense. It was all there, in the dream.

Snape wasn't going to forgive Harry, ever. He was going to give him back his key, instead. He was going to call Wizard Family Services, and say it hadn't worked out, and defy Dumbledore who would no doubt say to give Harry more time.

But Snape wasn't going to give Harry more time; the dream made that much clear enough.

He was going to unadopt him, instead.

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Coming Soon in A Year Like None Other:

Chapter Fifty-Five: Wisdom

~

Comments very welcome,

Aspen in the Sunlight