A Year Like None Other

aspeninthesunlight

Story Summary:
A letter from home? A letter from family? Well, Harry Potter knows he has neither, but all the same, it starts with a letter from Surrey. A letter that sends Harry down a path he'd never have walked on his own. It will be a year of big changes, a year of great pain, and a year of confronting worst fears. It will be a year of surprising discoveries, of finding true strength, of finding out that first impressions of a person's true colours do not always ring true. It will be a year of paradigm shifts. And from the most unexpected sources, Harry will have a chance to have that which he has never known: a home ... and a family. (A Snape adopts Harry fic.)
Read Story On:

Chapter 62 - Between a Rock and a Hard Place

Posted:
06/05/2006
Hits:
6,157
Author's Note:
Betaed by the Fabulous Mercredi.

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 Sixty-Two:
Between a Rock and a Hard Place

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Snape's voice was little more than a rasp as he harshly questioned, "Seer dream, Harry?" The boy nodded, the motion jerky, his mouth dry as he tried to explain further. Before he could, though, Snape was biting out, "Don't say another word!"

One arm yanked Harry close against him; with the other he began warding the closed door with silencing charms. Lots of them, Harry noticed as he quaked, Snape's strong embrace all that was holding him up. He couldn't tell if his father was recasting spells that had failed, or layering ward upon ward deliberately. Probably the latter, Harry decided, since even a distraught Severus didn't seem likely to miscast a silencing charm. Besides, hadn't his father once told him that the door warded itself whenever it was closed? Snape must be reinforcing the automatic protections... Or had those been just on the office door? At that moment, Harry couldn't remember. His dream kept spinning through his mind, the horror of it only growing the longer he thought on it.

It was all he could do to keep hold of his tongue until Snape was through casting spells and they could talk without fear of Draco bursting in.

Finally deeming the room secure, Snape set aside his wand, which Harry took as a sign to get to it. When he tried to speak past his dry throat, though, the words got all jumbled up inside his ears, the thundering sound still rushing through him like a great current. "We... oh dear God, the Owlery, it was. We have to stop it--"

Both Snape's hands descended to his shoulders, the pressure so firm that the boy almost winced, his voice a low, insistent thrum. "Calm down, Harry."

Right, because he had to explain the whole dream, everything he'd seen and heard. Steeling himself against the panic he could feel racing along every vein, Harry tried to speak in complete sentences, though what he heard emerge wasn't too much better than before. "Somebody's going to throw Draco off the Owlery! Other Slytherins, sounded like, that's what the Gryffindors were saying, there was a threat made first, though, and I was supposed to stop it--" It felt like something inside him was dying as he blurted, "Oh my God! They were all going on about his funeral--"

"Quiet!" Snape snapped, abruptly steering him over to the bed to sit him down. "If you don't do as I ask, and stop talking," the Potions Master threatened, upper lip curled, "I'll bind your mouth with Mudos! Are you listening to me, now? Every word you say solidifies the dream in your conscious memory, which is quite a bad thing considering that what we need to do is pensieve it from your subconscious! So for the love of Merlin, stop telling me all these details! Is that clear, Harry? Absolutely clear?" By the end there, Snape was shouting so loudly that Harry actually leaned back from him.

The message got through, though, there was no doubt about that. Harry nodded his agreement, cautiously sat up straight again, his eyes on Snape, and questioned, "Dreams can be pensieved?"

Snape gave him an impatient glare. "Not unless the dreamer cooperates. We'll get nowhere until you calm down."

Harry nodded again, though his thoughts were still a riot. After what Snape had explained, he tried to not think about the dream, but little parts of it kept replaying inside his head.

Perhaps Snape saw as much in his eyes, for the man pressed a glass filled with something thin and transparent into his hand. "Drink this. Slowly. Try to identify it."

Harry was in no mind for guessing games, but the rational part of his mind knew that Snape couldn't be indulging in one, strange as the order seemed. The liquid tasted clean and clear. He strained harder with his tongue, with all his senses, concentrating, trying to taste any elusive hint of anything... and all the while, the Potions Master stared at him as though studying the rise and fall of his chest... as though he were counting his breaths. Snape had that same intensity of focus that he had when he needed to stir something a specific number of times...

Not liking the feeling that he was a potion, Harry finished off the drink. "Water," he announced, his voice wobbling. "Where's the pensieve, then?"

"You aren't calm enough yet." Snape explained, beginning to pace before the bed.

"Give me a proper Calming Draught, then!" Harry exclaimed, frustrated. "What possible use was it to give me water?"

"That wasn't mere water, it was an attempt to make you think of other matters," Snape dryly informed him. "As for an actual potion, I hardly think it wise at the moment."

Harry felt stupid then, realizing that of course taking a potion might interfere with being able to pensieve the dream. He really should have figured out the water ploy sooner, too, which proved that his father was right, and he did need to calm down. He could hardly think straight! But if getting his mind onto other matters would help with that, Harry decided, he'd ask the next logical question. "Dad... if dreams can be pensieved, why didn't we do that with the unadoption one?"

"Perhaps," Snape sighed, "because you waited a week and half to mention it to me." He pushed his hair back from his forehead in a gesture that betrayed his own anxiety, though his voice remained a level, soothing drone. "A pensieve needs to be used the first night, if at all. And too, you had already reconstructed your dream in writing, which process no doubt shifted portions of it from your subconscious to your conscious mind."

Realizing that talking of something else was making his panic recede a bit, Harry went ahead and pressed, "But what about back in Grimmauld Place? That time you woke me up when I was screaming in Parseltongue? Why didn't we use a pensieve then?"

"Then, if you recall, not a single seer dream of yours had come true yet. Lupin didn't understand what we were dealing with, and unfortunately neither did I."

Just the words seer dream had Harry's panic thundering back in. He felt his breath catch, only to have Snape notice at once. Sitting down on the bed, too, the Potions Master turned slightly to regard the boy. "Harry. You simply must get yourself under control. The dream, whatever it means, won't emerge coherently if you are still upset when we attempt to draw it from your mind."

Harry looked down at his bare feet. "I understand. But... well, I can't not be upset after dreaming something like that."

Snape patted the spot beside him as he spoke. "I would suggest Occluding but I believe you're still doing that as a matter of course?"

Harry nodded as he shifted over and felt the comforting warmth of his father wrapping an arm about his shoulders. "Tell me about the Gryffindors in your year," the man invited. "What sort of career do you think each will pursue upon leaving Hogwarts?"

It was a ploy to get his mind off the dream and onto a more pleasant topic; this time Harry was aware of that. He was even aware that Snape was certainly not that interested in the Gryffindors, and that once upon a time, Harry would never have considered giving the Potions Master such information. Who knew what he might do with it? The art of the insult... Snape could turn even the most innocuous details into scathing commentary, were he so inclined.

Ginny and Hermione had made it clear enough that adopting Harry hadn't made Snape any fonder of Gryffindors in general...

But all that aside, Harry did trust the man. Snape would be as snide as he liked and might never get over his tendency to take unfair points from Gryffindor... but what he wouldn't do was misuse whatever Harry told him now.

"Um, I don't know," he said, thinking his way through it as he relaxed in his father's embrace. It was hard to let the dream go, it really was, but like Snape had said, for Draco's sake he had to. "Let's see. Hermione. I can't think that Hogwarts is going to be enough education to suit her. I could see her at Oxford or Cambridge, except I'm not sure she'd want to go to a strictly Muggle university..."

"And Mr Weasley?"

Harry smiled slightly. "Seven years of formal education will be enough for him. But afterwards... hmm. He talks sometimes about joining Fred and George in their business, but he'll want something with steadier prospects, I expect. A regular job with a regular salary so he won't have to wait too long before he can--" Harry abruptly shut up and began chewing his lip.

"Propose to Miss Granger?" Snape drawled.

"I don't know if things'll get all that serious or not," Harry backpedaled.

"Well, I've thought for a good while now that Mr Weasley has Auror written all over him," Snape said, his tone making it sound far from a compliment. "Not too observant, doesn't do 'subtle.' Can't bear, in his capacity as prefect, to enforce a rule against a friend though woe betide his enemies. Perfect Auror material."

Harry knew, of course, that Snape had good reason to hate Aurors, but it still bothered him to hear the man speak that way. He knew Harry wanted to become one, didn't he? And now Draco did as well. What was he going to think when both his sons were part of the ranks he so despised?

If Draco lived that long, that was.

Feeling his panic rushing back in, Harry abruptly redoubled his Occlumency and pushed the emotion outside the fire protecting his mind. The effort made him a bit lightheaded, but he ignored that.

"I don't think Ron's got much wish to be an Auror," he said before Snape could warm to the theme any further and mention how the lot of them were all sadists, or something. "Anyway, where were we? Oh, yeah... Dean. You know, sometimes I think he'd like to get an apprenticeship to become a Medi-Wizard..."

Snape let him rattle on for a few moments after that, and then standing, opened a large cabinet and fetched forth Dumbledore's stone pensieve. It surprised Harry a bit that Snape would have it so handy, but he shrugged off that issue and tried to remain calm as his father set it on a writing table and beckoned him forward. He couldn't help but feel his tension returning, though Snape helped it quite a bit when he sighed and pointedly asked if Harry ever thought to put on slippers before wandering from his bed at night.

"I had more on my mind than cold feet, you know," Harry mumbled, only realizing then that cold was washing up from the floor in waves to drench him. Had been, for some time. Maybe that was why he'd been trembling so much.

"Well, as we don't want to risk waking Draco..." Shrugging, Snape Accio'd a pair of his own socks. "Put these on. Then we'll begin."

Harry slipped on the socks, hopping first on one foot then the other, ignoring Snape's slightly derisive stare at the behaviour. A toasty warmth at once enveloped his toes, and he realised the socks must be charmed. Before he could comment on that, though, he felt the tip of a wand touching his temple. He began thinking of his dream, of course, but instead of the familiar Pensare non pensatum, his father began instructing, "Close your eyes, Harry. Now, I realise you're habitually Occluding already, but this time when I say to clear your mind, I need you to do what you used to think it meant. Think of nothing at all--"

Harry jerked, his eyes opening in reflex. "You don't want me to remember the dream so you can pull it all out?"

"Imposing conscious thought on it will corrupt the purity of your memory," Snape reminded him. "Precisely why I didn't want you going into details out loud. So now, do exactly as I say. Clear your mind of all thought, all emotion..."

Harry thought he wouldn't be able to; he'd never had much luck before in achieving a state of complete mental blankness, and goodness knew he did used to try... Now that he finally did know how to Occlude, however, this other skill came without too much effort.

He wasn't exactly thinking of nothing, though.

He was falling into a great pool, a calming lake that soothed his every worry and fear, a smooth clean pond that surrounded him with waters that were strangely warm.

Or maybe it wasn't water at all; it was just a sense of being loved. Of knowing he could let go and be safe. Of knowing he could trust.

It was like something inside him unlocked, then, and he felt himself draining away. And then, his mind did clear. Completely. His defences fell, the fire he'd been hiding behind finally quenched as all thought ceased and he simply drifted, disembodied. Calm.

Finally, completely calm.

"Pensare non reves," the syllables drifted through his consciousness, flowing all around him though the sound didn't seem to impinge upon his thoughts. He had no thoughts; he was simply existence. "Pensare circundatae..."

There was nothing to him but the sensation of a gentle pulling, of a long stream of knowledge being drawn from inside him, leaving him weak and gasping and shocked by the loss. He felt himself falling over sideways, felt a strong arm supporting him and keeping him from collapsing.

Harry's eyes flew open, the air itself seeming to strangle him as his stunned eyes sought out his father. He tried to draw a breath and couldn't, his mind caught up in some sort of tangle as it hunted for what was gone, no thought to spare for something as irrelevant as the fact that he might need oxygen.

For once, Snape didn't drawl breathe, you idiot child at him. As if knowing that this was something beyond a mere panic attack, Snape quietly urged, "Drink, Harry," wrapping the boy's fingers around a teacup brimming with something blue and frothy.

Harry opened his mouth and tried to breathe again, but he still couldn't, so in desperation, he gulped down a huge swallow of the potion, only to spew half of it out, the taste was so foul. It did the trick, though. All at once it was like his brain snapped to attention, or something, and a violent rush of air expanded inside his lungs though he didn't think he actually had breathed, yet. But now he could, he realised.

Snape wordlessly handed him a small towel and watched him mop off his face and hands, then gestured that Harry should drink the rest of the potion. Harry made a face, but complied. It made him sweat a little, so he was glad of the towel again afterwards.

"Better?"

Harry blinked, and wiped a bit more at his face. He felt hot... and above all, confused. Like he'd just woken up... that disoriented feeling when you realise you've been asleep. Only worse. He couldn't remember going to sleep at all, and certainly not in Snape's bedroom--

"What... um, what happened? What am I doing in here?" Harry's gaze took in his own pyjamas. Then he noticed Snape's socks on his feet and almost did a double-take. It seemed such a terribly personal thing to be wearing them. Uncle Vernon would have flayed him alive...

Snape though, wasn't anything like his Uncle Vernon. He'd been foisted on the Dursleys, and they'd never let him forget it for one instant, but what had Snape said? You're my son by choice, not obligation.

"Thanks," he said, his voice a bit rough, and when Snape looked at him a bit incredulously, Harry explained, "For the socks."

Snape suddenly scowled, his mood shifting like quicksilver. "If they weren't dead already," he muttered, but then his expression cleared. "Harry, you're entitled to have your father love you enough to lend you a pair of socks."

Harry nodded, a little bit embarrassed that his insecurities were so transparent, but that thought got lost when he noticed Snape's long robe, so blue as to be almost black. His gaze skidded across the simple silver clock hanging above his father's bed. "It's the middle of the night!"

"Yes. Prepare yourself for a shock," Snape dryly announced, gesturing toward a chair. He pulled another chair around the table to place it alongside Harry, speaking again only when he was seated as well. "You've had a bad dream and this time, you had the sense to come to me with it at once. We've just pensieved the dream from your mind--"

The boy noticed the stone bowl, then, so close he could touch it. Funny how he hadn't realised it was there. "You can do that?"

For some reason, Snape's answering nod looked a bit weary. Actually, Harry had a vague sense that they'd had this conversation already, but for the life of him, he couldn't really remember... His whole head felt like it was stuffed with candy floss... but also like he was missing some vital part of it, too.

"Pensieving dreams is a notoriously difficult endeavour," Snape was explaining by then. "And highly unpleasant, as you've no doubt discovered. The mind is well able to cope with the temporary loss of a conscious memory; pensieving a dream, however, involves removing a part of your subconscious. The mind doesn't appreciate it." He suddenly stopped speaking and peered closely at the boy. "Do you need another dose of Breath of Life?"

"Ugh, that blue stuff?" Harry moaned, rubbing his temples. "No, I don't want more." He tried to think past the haze of confusion churning in his mind, though what he wanted more than anything was just to go to sleep. For days, something like. "All right, so I had a dream," Harry said, reasoning his way past the huge empty place in his mind. "And I can't remember it because you already took it out of my head, right. But... um, why can't I even remember coming to you, though? Actually, the last thing I remember is joking around with Draco--"

Fortunately, the exact content of that conversation came clear to him before he finished the sentence and mentioned something about the two of them making so much fun of Snape.

"Your conscious memories at the fringes of the dream were drawn out too," Snape explained. "The better to be sure I swept the whole dream out of your mind."

Harry swallowed, trying harder to remember going to sleep. Had he and Draco kept making silly plans to steal shampoo? He'd die if Snape saw that; he'd simply die. Of course it was hopeless trying to figure out what other nonsense he and Draco might have spouted; his bedtime memories were in the pensieve, not inside his head. "So, um... you're going to see what Draco and I were laughing about, I guess," he murmured, feeling his face heat at the prospect. Better to get it over with, right? Because if Snape was going to see anyway... yeah, better to pay the piper. Or face the music. Actually, Harry wasn't sure why metaphors like that were coming to mind. Probably because he just felt stupid, now. Snape had taken him in, warded him, cared for him, made him his own son, for pity's sake, and what had he done in return? Cackled and howled at the man's expense.

His stomach a churning vat of acid, Harry weakly ventured, "Listen, Professor... Draco and I... we were goofing around a bit. Um, talking about you, actually, but we didn't mean anything by it, honest. I mean, you're a really good father and I do love you, I swear. We were just having a spot of fun--"

Snape was shaking his head. "Harry, do you remember me telling you that you worry too much? I assure you, whatever you and Draco were laughing about, I'm not likely to take offence. I was actually quite pleased to see you two at such ease with one another."

"Could have fooled me," Harry muttered, glancing up through his lashes. Snape was going to be furious with them both, he just knew it. And Harry was the one who'd brought up the whole hair thing, wasn't he, had actually said that his father's appearance embarrassed him? He wished the floor would split open and swallow him, he really did.

"Perhaps I am more pleased looking back on it than I was at the time," Snape allowed. "You woke me up and my sleep of late has been particularly disturbed. But that is no matter. At the moment, we have far weightier concerns to occupy us."

"My dream." Harry nodded. Funny how that was the whole point of his being here, and he could barely even keep that in mind. But then again, he couldn't remember it, so maybe the distracted feeling in his mind was normal. He looked around his father's bedroom, a dark feeling stealing across his soul to freeze it. He wouldn't wake Snape up in the middle of the night, especially not after the man had been so angry with them earlier, unless the dream had been very bad indeed.

Snape seemed to know what he was thinking. One warm hand covered both of Harry's as he pulled the stone bowl closer. "I'd best prepare you before we have a look. Actually, I'd suggest you not watch your dream, but seeing the pensieved version will likely help you understand it far better. If you're up to it?"

Harry bristled and stood up straighter. "I'm no coward, Professor."

Snape raised his eyebrows. "I would never suggest you were." He paused, clearly debating something, then went on, "You came to me because you'd had a seer dream. I don't know a great deal about what it entailed, as to preserve the integrity of the dream I stopped you from talking much about it, but the salient point is this..." He paused, his hand gripping Harry's a bit more firmly, as though trying to give him strength. "You dreamed that Draco would die."

Harry felt like he might sick up. "Oh God, that's awful," he cried out. And all his dreams came true, didn't they? Or would... "I always lose people," he complained, the words bitter. "I'm afraid of losing you, too. I dreamed you were with Sirius, you know, but that one wasn't a seer dream." He gulped, suddenly hopeful. "Maybe this one isn't, either? I mean, you thought the unadoption one wasn't, right? You still think that."

"Why don't we just watch it and see?" Snape gently suggested.

Harry gulped. "Do you want to go first?"

"We go together," his father clarified. "If you are prepared?"

Harry nodded, flexing his fingers. Snape however, didn't let his hands go. After a moment, the boy decided it was nice to be taken care of, after all. Relaxing, he took a look at the pensieve, at the ghostly tendrils he could see foaming a bit at the rim. Funny, the last time he and Snape had been in pensieve together, they'd been bitter enemies. It wasn't even that long ago... but it seemed like something from another life. He couldn't imagine hating Snape, not now.

His father looked at him and nodded slightly as though to indicate that he, too, was ready.

Together, they leaned forward and plunged inside Harry's dream.

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The first few images weren't of a dream at all, though.

"... and then the next year she came out with Broom of Doom," Draco was yawning as he lay on his side in bed, his head on one pillow, his arms curled around another one much the way a younger child might hug a toy bear. "But that one I never liked as much. The dark magic in it didn't make sense. I mean, cursed potions were a big part of the plot, when any fool knows that you can charm a potion but not curse it..."

"You knew things like that when you were only eight years old?" Harry sleepily asked.

"I don't know how I knew that, actually," Draco murmured. "When I read it, it just didn't seem right."

"Great intuitive grasp of magic. Like Severus said."

"Mmm. Well maybe my great intuitive grasp will extend to his hair care products," Draco softly laughed. "So get me some shampoo if you can. Go tell him you had another nightmare; he'll let you in."

"You go tell him you had a nightmare," Harry retorted, rolling over. "I'm not going to lie to my father."

"Gryffindor," Draco accused. "I lied to mine at least twice a week--"

"Really?"

"Have I mentioned how gullible you can be? Honestly, Potter. Lucius is almost as good a Legilimens as Severus. I wasn't too likely to lie to him when it meant a wizard's beating for sure."

"What's a wizard's beating, anyway?"

Draco hugged his pillow even tighter, "Lucius had me whipped, see? Not that he'd dirty his own hands with something so Mugglish. I was actually surprised when he did the... ah, needles, himself to you, Harry, but I suppose he was showing off for that idiot who actually demanded Muggle tortures for you. So anyway, the house-elves did it--"

"House-elves?" Harry gasped. "You're having me on again, right?"

"I wish," Draco spat. "There's a reason I don't like them much, Potter. They'll do whatever they're told, whatever."

Harry went completely still. "You don't mean Dobby--"

"Oh, your little elf-friend?" Draco sneered. "No, not him. Bunch of his little mates, though. Lucius had them beat me half to death. Ha, more like three-quarters."

Harry cleared his throat. "Um, but why's it called a wizard's beating if the house-elves did it?"

"Oh, but I haven't gotten to the good part yet," Draco drawled, all bravado though his voice shook a bit. "My marvellous father healed me, don't you know, his wand tracing over every lash mark, every welt. Except, instead of just healing them, he was recording them, you see. Wrapped them all up together inside some fancy spell his father had taught him. Family tradition. Really lovely coming from an old-fashioned pureblood family sometimes, I can tell you that. Anyway, afterwards, whenever Lucius was angry at me, all he had to do was cast one curse and I'd relive the whole whipping from start to finish, as many times as he cared to toss it my way. Just the pain though, not the marks. Lucius thought it was splendid. He could curse me all afternoon and then drag me out to a Ministry dinner where I had to sit up straight no matter that I felt flayed all over, and nobody could prove a thing."

"Wouldn't using that over and over be pretty dangerous? Like Crucio, you know, Neville's parents?"

"No, the spell's too specific for that." Draco sighed. "Anyway, if you believe I'd lie to a man who used to wizard's beat me for so much as sneezing too often... well, you just don't know what it's like to grow up Slytherin." When Harry made some sort of choking sound in reply, the Slytherin boy dryly added, "I told you because you asked, not because I fancied having you weep like a Hufflepuff, you do realise."

"But that's just so awful," Harry exclaimed. "I mean, Uncle Vernon used to slap me sometimes, but nothing like that, and not even that often, and most of the time it was just chores they punished me with, and the cupboard, but after the first few years I sort of liked it in there so that was no big deal--"

"They starved you, or have you forgotten?"

"It still wasn't like what you had to deal with. Beating you, and like that, just because you'd sneezed?"

"Oh, all right, I might have exaggerated a tad. Not about what it was like, mind. But... well, he didn't ever do it because I'd sneezed, he just said he might," Draco admitted, shrugging as he lay there. "And the Ministry thing only happened once, and if you absolutely must know, most of the time I was pretty much spoiled rotten. But I still knew better than to lie to Lucius."

"But couldn't you just Occlude?"

"Great intuitive grasp doesn't mean great innate power, you know," Draco sharply admitted. "I might have gotten over your awful snub on the train a lot sooner if you hadn't turned out to be so hideously magical. A Malfoy being out-flown by a Muggle-raised half-blood who'd never so much as touched a broom before." He sighed. "And it just got worse and worse. Every time I turned around you were talking to snakes or mastering charms grown wizards can't do or throwing off Unforgivables. You made it very easy to hate you."

"You're a fine one to claim that," Harry protested. "And I didn't snub you on the train. You snubbed Ron and I was sticking up for him. And as for that very first flying lesson... well, all right, I had touched a broom before, all right? Hagrid lent me one and I flew the whole summer before first year--"

"Really?"

"Now who's the gullible one?" Harry lightly gibed.

"There's your Slytherin side," Draco approved. "Remember that when you visit the common room or eat with them, all right? We like to verbally cut each other to ribbons...but you're catching on all right, I think. Anyway, they'll never think you're one of us if you can't join right in..."

Draco yawned then, and fell silent, and shortly after that Harry drifted off as well.

The images in the pensieve shifted, becoming tinged with grey, then dissolving into a vast pool of fog that slowly rolled across the scene to drown every image. Harry glanced at Snape, who even inside the pensieve was still holding his hands. Thank goodness the man didn't look angry, but Harry supposed the comments about hair care didn't mean much compared to all that had followed. He felt a bit chilled just hearing those things about Draco's childhood, even if the Slytherin had exaggerated a bit.

"You're asleep now," his father explained, gesturing at the mist all around. "But you aren't dreaming yet. Wait."

How long, that was what Harry wanted to ask. But he didn't bother, as he knew the answer already. They would wait as long as it took, it was as simple as that. And then they'd see the seer dream... the one Harry knew about already in one sense, though in another it was about to unfold anew before him...

The fog parted onto a forest thick with pine trees, the ground underfoot layered with their needles, the bright noon sun beating down on them though the air itself was sharp with winter chill.

Harry looked about, a little bit confused as to what this scene could have to do with Draco dying. Then he remembered. Seer dream, right, so this must be the past, something that had already happened. His first thought after that was of the forest where he'd been tortured, but no, this was another place. There was no clearing here...

But there was a sense of menace, all the same. Of someone coming...

Lucius Malfoy strode forward, his long-legged gait self-assured to the point of arrogance as he stalked through the forest as though he owned it. His footsteps took him toward a little house with a thatched roof, and an imperious knock had the rough-hewn door swinging open as an owl hooted once on its perch, then flew away.

A woman peered out, a scarf covering her hair, her dark gaze studying Malfoy closely before flicking to either side of him as though to ascertain that he was alone. A man joined her at the door as she spoke a hesitant, "Oui?"

Malfoy glared down at her as though to intimidate by the sheer strength of his presence. "You are in danger, both of you," he quickly rapped out, one hand flashing through the air in a commanding gesture. "The Dark Lord intends to attack this house. You must leave and never return."

"Ze Dark Lord?" the woman gasped, a hand at her throat at the dreadful title.

"But we have done nothing," the man protested, shaking his head.

Malfoy was resolute, his own eyes narrowed in grim determination. "You are a half-blood, Monsieur," he sneered, clearly filled with disdain to so much as speak with such a one. "And your wife worse, filthy Mudblood scum. The Dark Lord needs no more reason than that to seek your deaths. You must leave here and never return."

Inside the pensieve, Harry gaped at Snape, but the Potions Master ignored him, intent on watching the scene unfold.

"But always we live here," the man lamented in broken English. "Where to go?"

Malfoy raised his upper lip in a distinct sneer, one Harry had seen before, and swept an arm free from his robes, shoving his sleeve up to display his left forearm. "Do you want one such as I to know your whereabouts, truly?"

The woman cowered back, actually crossing herself as she shrank from the Dark Mark clearly on display. The man paled, but stood his ground. "Why come here to warn us, Monsieur, if already you are his?"

Malfoy shrugged, the gesture careless and contemptuous all at once. "I grow weary of these pointless attacks. By the fifteenth of February at the very latest, the Dark Lord will burn your house to the ground and torture to death anyone he finds within."

"Zat is ze day after tomorrow!" the woman gasped, stepping back yet again.

"The attack may come yet sooner," Malfoy impatiently grated. "Have you and this Mudblood no sense at all? You must leave at once! Take only what you need, do not use a Floo until you are well away from France."

As though disgusted with the pair of them, then, Malfoy stepped back, fastidiously wiping his hands on a monogrammed handkerchief which he then dropped and burned to ashes with a quick Incendio spell. Then he was Apparating away, leaving the couple at the door staring out in shock at the nothingness which the moment before had contained the Dark Lord's greatest supporter, come to warn and protect them...

Harry turned to Snape to say something, but before a sound could leave his mouth, the whole world all around them began spinning. Brown lurched into green as the trees stretched, elongating as they whirled, and then the two of them were flung straight out of the forest and into another place, one with rich red rugs underfoot and grey stone walls worm smooth by countless generations of students leaning up against them.

"Thrown from the Owlery," Parvati was saying, her tones hushed with horror.

"Thrown from the Owlery," Ginny answered back, nodding as she spoke. "I always thought if something like that happened, they'd go for one of us. A Gryffindor. Not one of their own..."

"Yeah, but remember that day in Potions?" Parvati shook her head, her dark ponytail swaying, the motion was so emphatic. "It was pretty clear something like this would happen eventually. The threat was made right there in the open, right in front of the professor, for Merlin's sake!"

A hushed voice from behind them chimed in, "I heard the funeral has to be closed-casket since the body's just.... a mess."

"Slytherins are a mess dead or alive," came a hard reply from Seamus Finnegan.

Harry felt his hand let go as Snape began to walk around the common room, examining the scene from all angles, his dark eyes analyzing every gesture, every nuance of expression as the Gryffindors gossiped amongst themselves. Harry stood up too, then, and motioned that his father should listen to Ron and Hermione, who were sitting close together on the sofa that faced the fireplace.

"This is just awful," Hermione was saying, her lips turned down as she frowned.

Ron grunted even as his hand reached out to lightly pat her skirt-clad knee. "You can't convince me you're upset about a dead Slytherin!"

"I'm upset about Harry!" Hermione exclaimed, brushing his hand away. "What do you think this will do to him?"

"Yeah, well at least now we don't have to worry about him being around sodding Malfoy all the time--"

"Ron, you know what Harry's like! He's going to blame himself for this. He'll tell himself he should have stopped Malfoy from leaving Snape's rooms! Never mind that without magic he'd have no hope..."

"It's not Harry's fault Malfoy took himself up to the Owlery!" Ron spat back, vehement. "And what was Draco Malfoy doing up there, anyway? That's what I'd like to know! My guess is he went up there to betray Harry! And something went wrong!"

"That's beside the point." Hermione said, standing. She impatiently tapped a foot when Ron remained on the sofa. "Come on, we have to go see Harry, see if we can help."

Ron rose to his feet and caught Hermione's hand in his own. "Yeah, let's go. But don't get your hopes up, all right?"

Hermione swallowed so loudly that it was almost a gulp. "You're right. It didn't make much sense to me, but Harry was really getting along with Malfoy. I don't think anything we can say or do is going to cheer him..."

Ron lifted a derisive lip to admit, "Yeah. But that's not what I meant. It's just... I'm not even sure we can get in any longer. After this, I bet..." he hesitated ever so slightly before continuing, "Snape's put up a ton of extra wards."

"True, he won't be in a mood to trust anybody. And who could blame him? Well, all we can do is go down there and try to make him let us in."

Ron and Hermione turned as one toward the portrait hole and quietly stepped outside without a word to the others.

The dream ended, but this time as conscious thought returned, the pensieve didn't fill with fog. Instead, in the glimmering of an instant, Harry found himself back in his own bedroom, looking at himself sitting bolt upright in bed, horror and terror written across his face as he sought for breath and eyes wild, scanned Draco's bed...

With that, his father yanked him backwards out of the pensieve.

He ended up falling out of his chair and onto the hard floor.

"Oh God," Harry moaned, the horror of it fresh and crisp since of course he had no prior memory of having dreamt all that. Snape had warned him, or had tried to, anyway, but the impact of it was still so great that his hands were shaking like he had some horrible sort of palsy or something. Ashamed of how that looked, Harry staggered to his feet, weakly collapsed onto his father's bed, and slid his hands underneath his thighs as he sat.

Pulling over a chair, Snape sat down to face him. "And you assume that to be a seer dream because...?"

Harry stared rather blankly at his father, the question barely registering for a moment. "Oh. It follows the pattern. Past, whirling, future."

"And the past being true is the marker that proves it an authentic seer dream," Snape calmly confirmed, leaning forward.

"Yeah." Harry blinked again, hating the tight feeling in his throat, afraid it meant he was going to cry. He didn't want to, not in front of his father, even if he had bawled and blubbered all over him back in Devon.

"Then this is no seer dream," Snape pronounced, shaking his head. "That so-called 'past' is ludicrous. Lucius Malfoy popping 'round for a quick visit with a Mudblood and her husband? And what does he say, that they'd better pack quickly to avoid Voldemort? Be serious, Harry."

Harry flinched a bit from the open scorn in his father's voice.

Snape frowned. "What were you thinking of as you went to sleep tonight, Harry? Apart from my shampoo?"

"Oh, God," Harry moaned. "I was afraid of this. We shouldn't have been talking that way, Professor. I'm really, really sorry--"

"I do believe we've covered this ground," Snape impatiently put in. "Forget your discomfiture, Harry. Now, tell me. What were you thinking about as you fell asleep?"

"Well I can't remember, can I?" Harry asked. "You sucked it all out of my mind."

"Ah. True," Snape admitted. For the Potions Master to have overlooked that was so unlike him that Harry knew then and there he wasn't as blasé about the dream as he wished to appear. "Are you ready to have your memories restored, then? It shouldn't be quite the physical shock that removing them was, but..." He paused. "You can remember your dream now, but restoring it will make you aware of having lived through it. The experience can be... intense."

"It can't be any more intense than seeing that was," Harry sighed. He forgot about getting his memory back in place as the images of that forest churned through his mind. "That part about Lucius Malfoy... it just doesn't ring true, but... you... you don't suppose he could possibly have changed, do you? I mean, yeah, I know, it's ludicrous like you said but... well, look at Draco. He's not so bad, now. You know, Ron said I was going to say that. Funny..."

"Harry, wouldn't your dream indicate that Lucius Mafoy's conversation with the French family took place around noon on the thirteenth of February?" He waited until the boy nodded. "There is a Board of Governors meeting every month on the thirteenth, and for the past few, I have been present, the better to fend off Lucius' attempts to expel Draco from the school. Lucius was here at Hogwarts from early in the morning until well past noon on February thirteenth. He was not in France."

"Maybe I was seeing last February or the one before that. Lucius looked about the same age as at Samhain, so I don't guess it was decades ago, but maybe the scene was from before he was ever on the Board?"

"He's been on it since Draco was quite small," Snape asserted, shaking his head. "Except for one brief spell after that incident with the Chamber of Secrets. And he's always gone to every meeting. Even while he was sacked he went to observe!"

Harry almost snorted. "We're talking Lucius Malfoy! He can't be that civic-minded."

"He's mad for power," Snape sneered. "I don't think you realise quite how much power the Board exercises over Hogwarts, not to mention that influencing the curricula here can potentially yield a dark wizard an entire army of young, malleable, minds! Use your head, Potter! Nothing but Azkaban would keep him away from those meetings! He certainly wouldn't miss one to run around the Pyrenees warning Muggleborns of their coming doom!"

"Okay, so he was with the Board of Governors like you said," Harry decided. "But still, he can Apparate all the way to France, I just bet he can. So maybe he slipped away for just a few minutes and went and talked to these people--"

"He was not out of my sight for one instant. Do you hear me? Not one instant, Harry. I wouldn't let him out of my sight for fear he might slip down here and attempt something foul."

"Uh..." Harry thought hard. "Maybe the person in the meeting with you was some other Death Eater on Polyjuice, right? So the real Lucius could be over in France--"

"I cannot believe that you are seriously arguing that the man who tortured you with needles has suddenly become determined to save Muggleborns from Voldemort's tender mercies!" Snape exclaimed. "Are you listening to yourself? This is like your other dream, Harry. It's about you, not the future. You know how Draco longs for his father to be redeemed, to achieve what I have and turn away from darkness. The casewitch even told you that he yearns for that, and then what did you do when you were upset about how horrid Lucius has been to him, but dream that very thing!"

"But my seer dreams always come true, you know that, so there must be something to this--"

"In case it's slipped your feeble mind, I am not going to unadopt you! Though you may well wish I had if you insist on going on about Lucius like this!"

"All right, so it's not too likely Malfoy's changed his stripes," Harry admitted, rubbing his temples. "What if it was the other way around, and it wasn't him in France. Say, he was here trying to expel Draco as you witnessed, and somebody was in France impersonating him. You know, on Polyjuice."

"Yes, I do know about Polyjuice," Snape snidely put in. "How much do you know? Or, to put it another way, when you were wandering the Slytherin common room a few years back pretending to be Crabbe--or were you Goyle?--just how easy did you find it to walk in another person's body? Did you feel you could copy the needed mannerisms in any remotely convincing way, or speak with the right intonations and lexicon even though you possessed the right voice?"

Harry stared. "You knew? You never said, you didn't take points, you just let us get away with it?"

"I hardly think coughing up fur balls constitutes getting away with much. My one regret is not getting to see the catwoman in person. But your utter idiocy years ago hardly matters to me now, Potter, though I'd hope you'd realise from this that I was never as stupid as you believed--"

"I've never once thought of you as stupid!"

"The point," Snape interrupted, "is the Polyjuice does nothing to help one act the part of another. It's a costume, nothing more. How successful was my impersonation of Lupin? Be honest. Suppose Dumbledore hadn't let you in on the deception. How long would you have needed to realise I wasn't in fact the werewolf?"

"Don't call him that," Harry muttered. "Um, I don't know. Maybe five minutes." When Snape scowled, Harry blurted, "Well, you said to be honest! I know Remus, is all. I could tell the difference."

"And Lucius Malfoy, in your dream. Didn't he seem exactly the way you picture him? Down to the last mannerism, the last detail?"

Harry blinked. "Well, yeah. But if that means it couldn't have been somebody else on Polyjuice, then it means it was really him, and we're back to wondering why he's suddenly gone good!"

"No, what it means, you young fool, is that he matches your impressions perfectly because it is your subconscious that conjured him! Of course he appears exactly as he should, Harry! He's the product of your memories. Had you in fact seen someone else on Polyjuice, 'Lucius' would be behaving distinctly strangely, I do assure you."

"All right, all right, the Polyjuice is out," Harry raggedly admitted. "And I can't believe he's reformed, not really. Though I sort of want to, I guess, for Draco's sake. And that's just sick, it is. 'Cause what I really ought to want is him dead and buried. Well, part of me wants that too, I guess, but then I think of Draco and the whole feeling sort of gets twisted up. Actually," he slowly admitted, "it was easier to hate Lucius when I hated Draco too. Maybe that's why I fought so hard not to trust him, you know? I probably knew it would make everything a lot more complicated." Harry frowned, then. "But how did Lucius strike you? I mean, as himself?"

"No," Snape announced. "One thing was wrong. One thing more that proves we are discussing a figment of your mind, and not the actual man. Lucius Malfoy, Harry, speaks absolutely flawless French. Yet you dream of him in France, speaking to French wizards, but conducting the entire conversation in English, even though their command of it was obviously lacking in several regards? If you really dreamed the past, why wasn't Lucius speaking French as is his custom whenever he crosses the Channel?"

"Uh, because I don't know any French?" Harry hazarded a guess.

"A seer dream would not take that into account. You would have heard exactly what was said, though you would have understood nothing. But as your own mind, not any psychic force, was creating the images and sounds in the dream, you had recourse only to languages you know. Though, I would expect your French extends to oui and monsieur, correct? Exactly the words scattered amid all the English. Amazing, isn't it? Not to mention that your idea of French people appears to include some very hackneyed bad accents--"

"All right, you're right!" Harry conceded. "Obviously the dream wasn't real at all. Well, not that part, anyway. And if not that part, then not the other, either, I suppose. But... listen, if what was really going on was that I went to sleep sorry for Draco and wishing something good for him, then why did I end up dreaming he was going to die?"

"I expect you'll know the answer to that once your memories are back in place."

Harry closed his eyes and braced himself. "Do it, then. I'm ready." And he thought he was, but it was still a shock, as Snape had said, to feel the experience of that dream rushing back into his mind to take up residence. He staggered slightly, then righted himself. And then he gave a long sigh and said, "Oh. So that's it. Yeah, I would be thinking that. I've been thinking it a lot, actually. And it makes perfect sense."

"It being, specifically?" Snape sounded a bit impatient.

Flushing a little bit, Harry admitted, "Um, well I have to move up to the Tower pretty soon, and this'll sound stupid after all the complaining I used to do about him, but I'm going to miss Draco. I mean, I'll visit like I promised but it won't be the same, and it's a bit like losing a brother just when I've finally got one, that's all."

"And you always lose people," Snape echoed his own words back to him. "Or so you believe."

"Yeah," Harry sighed. "So what are we going to do, then? I mean, the dream probably wasn't true in the least, I grant you that. But just in case, shouldn't we warn Draco? He can't get shoved off the Owlery if he doesn't leave here, after all, and if he knows he might get killed going out, he'll stay where he belongs..."

"Oh, warn him by all means," Snape announced in a hard tone, waving a sarcastic hand toward the door as though urging him to it. "And when he asks how you know your dream to be prophetic, do be sure to explain that you always dream a factual past, and go right on to taunt him with the prospect of his father doing something decent for once in his miserable existence!"

"I don't have to tell Draco about that part," Harry weakly protested.

"No? How are you going to prove to him that he is indeed in danger, then?"

"I'll, er, misdirect him a bit, I guess," Harry decided. When Snape scoffed out loud, the boy protested, "I can keep a secret--"

"Not ten hours ago you proved the opposite! Do not get me started on what I think of your having decided, despite my clear disapprobation, to tell him about your birth prophecy!" Curling a lip, Snape mercilessly went on, "I know you, Potter. You aren't nearly Slytherin enough to keep up a lie when someone you care about begins pressing you for details. If I liked, I could make you tell me here and now just exactly what you thought you were doing with that Polyjuice all those years ago!"

Probably true, Harry reflected, but still, he objected, "I kept my promise not to tell Ron or Hermione about my operation until it was safe to talk, you know!"

"But you didn't misdirect them, which is what this situation will require. You refused to speak of it, and to their credit, they didn't press you. Draco will press you for details about your dream. Who wouldn't, after being told their own death has been forecast? And will you be able to sustain a lie?"

He wouldn't, Harry reluctantly realised. After all, if it wasn't for Draco stopping him, he'd have told Hermione about his magic when she started pressing for details about his aches and pains. And that, despite knowing that his father would be furious...

"I might end up mentioning what I saw Lucius doing," Harry finally admitted. "And that would just about kill Draco, wouldn't it? I mean, he'd want it to be true! He might want it to be true even if it meant he'd get into a fight in the Owlery." Harry suddenly felt sick. "Oh, God. Draco's really proud of his duelling skills. If he hears about the Owlery he might start thinking of it as a challenge or something. I mean, he does have that problem with his impulse-control... But no, I don't think he'd really go looking for a fight... But what if he thought the Owlery thing had to happen so that the other part could, so that his father would turn good? What if he thinks they're both the future? Telling him about the dream might make him want to go up to the Owlery!"

"I seriously doubt Draco is quite that irrational," Snape put in. "But Harry, to tell him anything at all would be simply cruel. Not very Gryffindor of you, in fact."

It was just like Severus to use his Gryffindor tendencies against him at will. "Manipulative bastard, aren't you?" Harry remarked, though pleasantly. He wasn't trying to score a point; he just wanted to show his father that he understood the motive behind that last remark.

"Actually," Snape deigned to inform him, "I thought you classed me a rat bastard. No, of late it's been vicious bastard, I do believe."

Shocked to the core, Harry exclaimed, "You said you wouldn't sneak up on me with any more Legilimency!"

"I don't recall promising that."

"But wait, I've been Occluding like mad... Oh, no. Am I letting my defences down without realizing from time to time?"

"They're down right now," Snape pointed out. "You dropped them as you cleared your mind so I might pensieve out the dream. To no ill effect, I am gratified to see. But no, Harry, you haven't failed at Occlumency to my knowledge, and no, I haven't surreptitiously read your thoughts. I don't have to, not when you mutter vicious bastard under your breath almost every time we visit Devon."

"Well, you are," Harry defended himself. "Vicious, I mean. My whole forearm still hurts from the way that Troneo curse slammed me all the way across the field and into that stone wall."

Snape's expression was tightly shuttered, as though he regretted his viciousness but wasn't disposed to change it, or apologise. "Shall I heal it?"

A little ashamed to be complaining when Snape was doing his best to make sure Harry would survive whatever life threw at him, the boy shook his head. "Nah. It'll be okay."

Snape gave a brisk nod. "Now, the dream. Since it was merely some species of nightmare, you will say not one word to Draco. Is that clear?"

Harry raised troubled eyes. "I don't think it's a seer dream, all right? It's stupid, the whole thing, and I just don't. But what if we've missed something? What if we're wrong? We have to do something to protect Draco, we just have to."

"Very well," Snape sighed, clearly irritated. "This will be a colossal waste of my time, but I will go to the Owlery personally and ward it to be sure that only birds can pass in and out. If someone attempts to throw Draco off, they'll do no more than knock him against an invisible wall. Will that set your fears to rest?"

Harry thought about it and decided it would. "Why isn't there a spell like that already?" he asked, more from curiosity than any other motive.

Snape gave him a look Harry hadn't seen in a while, the one that said Harry wasn't being any too bright. "There is. Believe me, it is not terribly likely a student could fall from the Owlery, let alone be thrown. I will, however, augment the protections as I have said." His voice went silky, then. "And in return, you will do something for me."

"Right, keep quiet about the false seer dream."

"Something else as well. You will resume taking Truthful Dreams each night."

Harry stiffened. "You don't experiment on students, remember? I can't take that stuff when I've been having seer dreams!"

"What you've been having are paranoid delusions," Snape retorted. "And because something in your twisted psyche is making them masquerade as seer dreams, they are distressing you beyond all reason. And me as well, arguing about such tripe as you're going to unadopt me and Draco's going to die," he sneered. "You said once you wished to become dreamed out. A sensible notion, I have decided. You will take Truthful Dreams and deal with all the nightmare experiences that are causing these nocturnal disruptions, and that is an end to the matter."

"Oh, no it's not--"

"You will do as I say," Snape stressed, glaring down at him. He looked away then, his gaze strangely evasive as he added, "The potion takes a week to make. Once I have it prepared, you will take it each night without fail until I say otherwise. Is that understood?"

Strange, whenever Harry had asked for some Truthful Dreams before, Snape had had some on hand. He'd even had some with him in Devon. But now...

"What happened to Don't you think I keep essential potions on hand at all times, Potter?" Harry inquired, intrigued when something like a dull red flush began to stain the hollows of Snape's neck. The man clenched his jaw, clamping down some sort of iron control, and the colour stopped spreading. More curious than before, Harry pressed, "Dad? Is something wrong?"

"Apart from your defiance?" Snape icily inquired. "Nothing whatsoever."

That, Harry clearly sensed, was misdirection. Or more like a big fat lie. And wasn't it strange that he could tell? Unlike Draco, Snape was an exceptional liar. He'd had to be. But now he wasn't meeting Harry's eyes. And the reference to defiance... that was very odd. Snape didn't talk to him that way, not any longer. They talked things out.

Whatever was going on, it had to do with this potion, Harry sensed. "Why don't you have any Truthful Dreams already made up?" he softly asked.

"It is not a subject for discussion. Leave it."

Harry shook his head.

"Would you defy James like this?" Snape tossed out, the question delivered as though the Potions Master thought it would put an end to the conversation, once and for all.

"I don't know; I never got to know him enough to find out," Harry flatly returned. "But it hardly matters. You're my father now. And there's more to being one than just caring about me. You need to let me care back. But you won't even tell me why you're low on a stupid potion! How's that supposed to make me feel? It sure doesn't make me feel like your son, Dad."

"I cannot believe my brewing habits can precipitate such potent angst," Snape sneered, standing so abruptly that he knocked his chair to the stone floor. "So I've no Truthful Dreams on hand! Would you take it if I did?"

"Why don't you have any?"

"Obviously, because I stopped making it, you half-witted moronic excuse for a student!"

"Why?" Harry said, and that time his voice emerged as a full-fledged shout. "Why, damn it?"

"Don't you rail at me," Snape scathed, pointing a shaking finger at the door. "Get out of my sight! Now, Potter, this instant, out!"

The words brought Harry up short, brought his own sarcasm to the surface. "Is your next line going to be that I don't deserve to be your son? And what are you going to say to drive me away if that one doesn't work either?"

At that, Snape seemed to realise how far things had gone. Or perhaps, how far they had come. "I don't wish to argue," he quietly announced, passing a weary hand over his eyes. "I merely wish to be alone, Harry. Please, just go to bed."

"No."

"What did you just say to me?"

"No," Harry calmly repeated. "I want you to tell me what's wrong. Tell me about the potion." And when Snape said nothing at all, Harry added, "Please. Please, Severus."

The last word seemed to unlock something. Snape picked up the chair that had toppled over, sank into it, and looked at Harry with eyes that seemed decades older than they were. "I..." He cleared his throat, and said in a rambling tone, "Harry. I used to think that all I wanted from you was that you be respectful, but now I want your respect, which I find is a much more difficult thing."

Harry thought that over, but found that all he could reply was, "I don't understand what you mean..."

Snape waved a hand through the air as though to start over. "The potion. I'd rather you not know. It reflects badly on me. Were I not a Potions Master, it might be excusable, what I have done..."

Harry still didn't understand, though he was finally getting a sense that they were getting somewhere. "You... um, messed up brewing it? Well, you're human, aren't you? You've seen me do worse in class, I'm sure. And besides, I already know about the time you made a mistake brewing the Wolfsbane."

"I can brew Truthful Dreams in my sleep," Snape lightly sneered, though it seemed his heart wasn't in it.

"Then what?"

Snape suddenly appeared to find the wall of great interest. "You have no idea how long I've taken it, obviously, nor any grasp of what the formulation means." He looked back at Harry. Another long pause. "You have noticed that I am not in the best frame of mind, as of late?"

Talk about an understatement... "It's not just Death Eater activity eating at you," Harry guessed, though he'd guessed by then that being left out of the war might be bothering his father just as much. Hadn't he taunted Sirius for having to sit it out? "It's something to do with this potion."

"It's the lack of the potion, Harry," Snape admitted. "I stopped making it deliberately, to deprive myself of any supply. Taking it had become a... habit, I had recently realised. Actually, it was telling you to be careful not to become... ah, addicted to healing potions that brought me to my senses. It came to me then that I'd been taking Truthful Dreams for well over a year. It was necessary for a long while, believe me. I had to be able to report to the Order in great detail about each and every meeting I attended. I tried to stop taking it once that part of my work was over." He sighed. "But then I began to have such nightmares over Samhain that I resumed, and after that..." A low shrug coursed through the man's shoulders as he sat slightly slumped. "I was simply so used to taking it that I made no effort to stop again. Until quite recently."

"Oh," Harry murmured. "You're..." He didn't want to say addicted, even if Snape had. The word seemed sort of judgmental, though he knew he was wrong to think so. But Snape had said that thing about wanting his respect, so Harry didn't care to say anything that might make the man think he'd lost it, or even come close. "So you're... uh, suffering from withdrawal, I guess," he compromised.

Snape nodded, the motion stiff as he sat up more, his posture acquiring the precise one he usually favoured. "Purple loosestrife. The abrupt loss of it has rendered my temper... a bit more volatile than I'd like."

"I'm glad you told me," Harry said, making his voice as warm as he could. And then, realizing that it wasn't right to expect Snape to admit to things if he wouldn't, he went on, "I'd rather know what's really going on with you, see? Because I'd actually started to wonder if you were angrier about the books I ruined than you were willing to say. I... um, I even asked Draco to lend me some money so I could try to replace them, but he told me that wouldn't help."

His father's glance on him was wary. "You can't really have thought it would."

"You... yelled at Neville and threw his book across the room when he ruined it, I heard. And I thought, maybe you overreacted to that because you really resented what that Lumos did to your own books..." Harry flinched a bit, but went on, determined to make Snape understand. "I... um, growing up, I wasn't allowed to touch much on the Dursley shelves, including the books. Something about my grubby little fingers staining the pages, though nobody seemed to mind chocolate sauce spilled all over the place if it was Dudley doing it. I don't think you're like them, honestly. But I wasn't very comfortable, either, knowing I'd ruined so much of your stuff. Habit, I guess. Like with you and the potion."

"Speaking of which," Snape briskly resumed, "I will have a supply ready in a week and you will take it."

Not this again... "Maybe you shouldn't make it," the boy suggested. "You know... um, temptation?"

"I think I can restrain myself," Snape dryly announced. "My withdrawal, as you put it, is well underway. It just seemed simpler in the interim to not have any on hand. But as you now need it--"

"Just because this last dream fooled me doesn't mean I'm done with seer dreams entirely," Harry put forth. "The unadoption one still could be one. In fact, I'm sure it is. Lotion Potion, remember?"

"I know what is best--" Snape began, but Harry cut him off.

"Like you knew what was best with Ron?"

Snape narrowed his eyes. "When it came to Mr Weasley's punishment, I perhaps had more than one agenda," was all he would admit. "Be that as it may, I did in fact think that protracted time in the dungeons, even time spent doing lines, would be salutary for the young man's ability to see what was laid before his stubborn eyes."

"I know you thought that." Harry leaned forward, hands on his knees, and looked his father in the eye. "You were wrong, though. No offence, and no hard feelings, and I do respect you, honest, but all you accomplished with those lines was to make Ron mad, and as long as he was mad, he couldn't see that there might be more to you than you like to show in Potions class."

"I fail to see any purpose in this post-mortem," Snape remarked. "Unless you want me to agree that you know more than your father, perhaps? That sixteen is the height of wisdom?"

"I don't know more than you," Harry admitted. "I just don't want you forcing a potion down my throat."

"Of course I would not force you, you idiot child," Snape stiffly conceded, though the last three words helped soften the harsh tone he'd used. "I happen to believe you will continue to have highly disturbing dreams and that the potion would have helped you. I was hardly going to let it become a habit for you, if that was your concern?"

"I know that. It's just what you said about not mixing it with seer dreams. The Draco one isn't, I agree. But.... more are coming."

"You can't possibly know that."

"No," Harry admitted. "But my instincts are often good, remember?"

"I have a feeling you won't ever let me forget having said as much."

Harry smiled, the expression fleeting. "Dad... I think you should tell Draco about the potion. He's noticed your... um, mood swings, too. Don't worry. He'll still respect you in the morning."

Snape was looking at him rather quizzically. "You wish me to wake him up and tell him now?"

"Oh, no. That's just a Muggle phrase. Means... never mind, it's stupid."

"I think the onset of babbling definitely indicates a need for more sleep."

"Yeah." Harry yawned, suddenly so tired that he could feel himself drooping. "Um, want your socks back before I go?"

"No. Just go. Good night, Harry."

"Good night," Harry echoed, thinking that was much better than the previous Get out Snape had so scathingly delivered. Hmm, they'd managed to have a fight and come out the other side of it all right, and without it taking days to work things through. That was a nice thought, Harry decided as he padded out the door Snape waved open for him.

Once in his own room, he looked down at Draco for a moment, keeping his distance in case those Slytherin reflexes sensed him again. He couldn't help but think about his dream. It would be all right, wouldn't it? The stupid thing wasn't a seer dream, and Snape was going to secure the Owlery anyway, and Draco did know better than to leave the dungeons---

"Playing ghoul again, are we?" Draco's voice broke into his thoughts.

Slytherin reflexes were better than he'd figured. Harry reminded himself to keep that in mind when it was time for him to face his new house mates in their own territory.

"No, just thinking," he answered.

"Did Severus sort out your dream?"

"Yeah..." Harry rolled wearily into bed and fussed with the blankets until he had them just right.

"Good..." Draco lapsed right back into sleep.

And after just a moment more, so did Harry.

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Harry didn't know if Snape actually had told Draco about the potion; he just knew that for a couple of days, the Slytherin boy didn't mention anything about Snape's mood or his temper. Just as well. Harry thought he'd have a hard time not explaining the situation, and it really wasn't his place.

That morning, Snape had returned from breakfast in the Great Hall with a series of packages bobbing through the air behind him. Books, he'd explained, with a wry glance at Harry. A quick indexing spell performed on each neatly wrapped box revealed the contents. Snape banished one package into his office, and said that as it was Saturday, Harry and Draco could work on shelving the remainder of the books that morning. He promised to take them to Devon that afternoon, which made Draco grin and Harry sort of groan, and then Snape was leaving again, muttering something about sometimes feeling he was more a Detentions Master than a Potions Master.

Draco wasted no time in performing a box-splitting spell, but when he tried to levitate the books out, a flashing red light surrounded the cartons for a few seconds. "Looks like some of them, at least, must be warded."

It was news to Harry that books could be, but these were wizarding books, so he simply pitched in and started lifting stacks out of the boxes. It didn't take him long to realise that after those first few seconds, he was the only one pitching in.

"It won't make you a house-elf to help me, you know," he commented as he heaved a set of dark black books onto the table.

Draco looked up from a slim volume that had caught his attention. "Hmm? Oh, well. If you insist." Instead of helping, though, he set himself to studying the spines of several stacks already on the table. "You know, I wonder if this is some sort of test," he mused.

Harry gave him a curious glance.

"To see just how we'll shelve them without direction," Draco mused. "Severus probably wants to see what we come up with."

Harry stopped unpacking then, and studied the book titles himself. "Alphabetical or by subject, then?"

Draco gave a rather sly grin. "I know. Just for fun, let's put them on the shelves by height. Tall ones on the bottom shelves, shortest ones at the top." And when Harry shook his head, he urged, "Oh, it hardly matters, you know. When Severus wants a book he can just Accio it by title."

"But you said the books were warded--"

"Not against Accio," Draco announced in that smug voice he did so well.

Harry had to agree, it would be a little bit funny to see the look on Snape's face if they organized the books that way. It was a harmless prank... nothing like making fun of the man's shampoo--or lack thereof...

"The worst thing that can happen is he makes us reshelve them," Draco wheedled. "But he might laugh, you know. And... well, Severus could do with a laugh, I think."

Harry gave the other boy a sharp look, but couldn't tell if Draco was referring to Snape's withdrawal from Truthful Dreams, or not. It was true, however, that he thought it would be good to see his father have something to laugh over.

Nodding, Harry began scooping up some of the tallest books and putting them away. Draco didn't help, but by then Harry wasn't expecting him to. The Slytherin boy probably considered he had done his part just in figuring out how the books should be organized, even if his solution was more a joke than anything else. At any rate, before Harry could complain, the magic doorbell rang and Draco was sauntering over to look at the parchment which read simply, Hermione Granger.

"You think she'd give us the weekend off," Draco lightly complained, but at least when he opened the door he was civil. That was all that counted to Harry.

Hermione's eyes widened as she took in the scene in Snape's living room. As Harry might have guessed, the first words out her mouth were, "Oh, what wonderful books--" and then she was down on her knees, fishing through boxes and oohing and aahing over the contents. "Mostly Potions, a smattering of defence, and a few that look a bit like Restricted Section material..." Sighing with pleasure, she looked up at Harry. "This must be the best part of living here. I always suspected Snape would have a really marvellous research collection. Does he add to it regularly? Do you get new books all the time down here?"

Harry shook his head, relieved for once to be having a normal conversation with Hermione. He should have thought sooner to get her mind onto books... "These are replacements for some books that got destroyed," he explained. "Draco told you about it, remember?"

Hermione glanced once at the Slytherin boy, who was by then seated at the table reading that same slim volume that had caught his eye earlier. Harry strained to see the title and was pleased that even at a distance, the small type was visible. Blood is Thicker than Potion... Harry wasn't sure what a book like that would cover or why Draco would be so interested in it.

Scooping up a few tiny little treatises on various seeds--they might have come in handy when he'd been researching the Gryffindor well-wish-- he reached up to place them on the topmost shelf.

And that was when it happened.

Hermione looked up to ask something else about Snape's books, and as she did, Harry's loose sleeve pulled back to display his entire forearm, and the ugly black-and-yellow bruise that marred it.

Hermione drew in a harsh breath, and Harry thought, Uh-oh, I really should have let Snape heal this one. But he'd wanted his father to respect him, too, not think of him as a crybaby, and anyway, it was inches above his wrist where nobody would see... except that Hermione had.

Harry hurriedly pulled his sleeve back down, but not before Draco, sensing the change of mood, had glanced up from his reading and taken the entire scene in.

"Harry--" Hermione began.

He would know that tone anywhere. It meant that she'd had just about enough of his lies and evasions. It meant she was done holding her peace about it. She was going to do something. She was going to tell someone that Snape was abusing him, for pity's sake! Or maybe she thought that Draco was to blame and Snape wasn't doing anything to stop it. Either way, she was going to report the matter to Dumbledore, or maybe Wizard Family Services, and that horrid casewitch was going to come back to take him away, and make Severus sign some awful paper saying he wasn't a fit father or something. Harry could see it unfolding in his mind.

I might as well just tell her, Harry abruptly came to a decision. Severus will just have to deal with it. It's not like her knowing is any real problem. Hermione'll keep my personal business to herself, just like Ron's been doing.

"It's like this," he cut across her words. "I've been working really hard to get my magic back--"

"And he decided to try flying, of all things," Draco smoothly interrupted, his silver eyes glittering in potent warning that if Harry didn't shut up, Draco would find a way to make him. "On my broom no less. I could have told him if he'd asked, that I'd hexed it years ago to throw anyone but me. Trials of living in Slytherin," he explained almost as an aside.

Hermione had narrowed her eyes, and no wonder. Draco wasn't a great liar at the best of times, and he'd delivered most of that with such an undertone of hostility that the whole thing sounded fishy. Maybe Hermione would just think Draco was angry that Harry had supposedly touched his broom without permission? Of course Harry knew the truth. The Slytherin boy was fuming because Harry had come so close to confessing the truth about his magic being back.

"You were thrown from a broom," Hermione echoed in a blank sort of voice, as though that were so daft she was having trouble even repeating the words. "And that would be where, here in the living room?"

Draco gave off a laugh that almost made Harry cringe, it sounded so fake. "Oh, Severus lets us out sometimes. Haven't you come down recently and noticed nobody was home?"

Hermione slowly nodded, her eyes still suspicious as she pressed, "But where do you go?"

"Well, that has to stay secret," Draco informed her. "Sorry. We're a bit paranoid for Harry's safety, but you can't possibly object to that, I'm thinking."

When Hermione still looked extremely dubious, Harry ventured, "Listen, I know that bruise looked bad but you don't understand--"

"Stop talking, Potter," Draco snapped.

"I just want to say that--"

"There's only one thing you should say," Draco darkly warned, "and it's that you won't try sneaking off on my broom again!"

It came to Harry then that this was a conversation he really shouldn't have with an audience. Things were bound to get too ugly. So, rolling his eyes, he sneered, "I wouldn't touch your lousy broom again. Some of us have a Firebolt, you know."

"And the reason you didn't just try out your Firebolt if you wanted to test your flying, Harry?" Hermione smartly inquired. "Hmmm?"

"Draco's broom was handier," Harry invented, relieved that he could at least tell the truth as he added, "He brings it along sometimes when the three of us leave the dungeons."

"I see," Hermione said, in a tone that announced she didn't, not at all.

And that Harry hadn't heard the end of this.

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Coming Soon in A Year Like None Other:

Chapter Sixty-Three: Wizard Family Services

~

Comments very welcome,

Aspen in the Sunlight


Betaed by the Fabulous Mercredi.
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