Rating:
R
House:
Schnoogle
Characters:
Draco Malfoy Harry Potter Remus Lupin Severus Snape
Genres:
Drama Angst
Era:
Multiple Eras
Spoilers:
Philosopher's Stone Chamber of Secrets Prizoner of Azkaban Goblet of Fire Order of the Phoenix
Stats:
Published: 09/13/2003
Updated: 09/20/2004
Words: 335,561
Chapters: 81
Hits: 1,465,159

Blood Magic

GatewayGirl

Story Summary:
Blood magic was supposed to keep Harry safe, but his relatives are expendable. Blood magic was supposed to keep Harry looking like his adoptive father, but it's wearing off. Blood is a bond, but so is the memory of hate -- or love.
Read Story On:

Chapter 56

Chapter Summary:
Something to put personal problems in perspective...
Posted:
02/22/2004
Hits:
13,840



Distrust


In the Gryffindor common room, Ginny and Ron were screaming at each other. Ron, apparently, had been vocally more upset about Durand then the nine Hogsmeade victims.

"So he can't play half the time!" Ginny shouted. "He'll live!"

Harry took a breath like he was about to dive, and stepped into the room. He kept his attention on the boys' staircase and started towards it at a normal walk, as if he did not notice the yelling.

"What use is a Quidditch player who can't play half the time?" Ron retorted.

"Ron, people are dead. Dementors kissed seven children for the crime of being half-bloods! How can you worry about Quidditch?"

"Look, it's a risk. But Durand had no reason to expect --"

Harry thought he could argue more effectively with Ron, but he couldn't chance it getting personal. Ron might yell out something revealing. He exhaled slightly as he made it to the stairs.

"So they should have expected it?!" Ginny was shouting back. "Should Harry expect it? He's a half-blood! And Dean and Hermione can expect the Killing Curse, I suppose? If they're reckless enough to marry purebloods?"

"Ginny, I know it's horrible --!"

Harry ascended the stone spiral of stairs until the angry words faded beneath him.

He didn't have the letter available, he realized, once he had shut the door behind him. He had left it, like Lily's, in the relative safety of his dungeon room. Harry lay back on his bed, stared up at the red canopy, and wondered if it was safe to approach his father, yet. He needed to tell him that Ron and Hermione had found out, and that he had told Ginny to keep things under control. Harry wasn't sure they would get to that on his first try. Severus would scream about Remus until Harry stormed out or gave in, and afterwards, Harry wouldn't dare bring up more bad news.

Harry decided he would not admit his suspicions about Remus to his father. Severus did not need fuel for his vilification of the werewolf. Harry rolled to his side and curled up. He wanted to use the portkey now, but he couldn't claim this was an emergency.

I wanted to curl up in my own bed and reread what James wrote,

he imagined himself saying, because I miss him. And I want some of that hot milk drink, with the cardamom and saffron and pistachios. Make that, please?

Severus did not tend to that sort of indulgence.


When the ache had faded to a dull depression, Harry's thoughts returned to the letter. He wondered how much of it he could remember. He tried to picture it, as it had unfolded in his hands in the light of the torch, two months ago.

"My dear son,

"This letter is spelled to go to your sixteenth birthday ..."

something. The explanation.

"First, I love you very much. I hope this is unnecessary sentimentality"

...something about hoping he would know that - oh! living long enough! The joke about Gringotts and the tendency of Potters "to die in messy glory at a young age."

Harry stared miserably at the edge of the windowsill. The words had seemed so important to him at the time. He would have thought he would remember more. What had James written at the end? "I want you to know how I walked with you and sang to you when you could not sleep. I want you to be mine, but ..." some expression of regret "... My stolen child."

And how had he signed it? That had "father" in it somewhere. "Home-father," Harry remembered suddenly. "Your loving home-father, James Potter."

Sometimes Harry wished he could cry as easily as Hermione, and just get it out. Crying, he thought, was a bit like being sick. It was horrible, but all at once, and then you felt better. He scarcely ever cried, and he'd never been able to make himself sick up, either.

After a while, he left the bed and crossed to the window seat, where he knelt on the cushion, his fingertips set against the glass. The view was similar to the one in his dungeon room, but showed less of the lake. Harry tried to figure out where the grove was, but he thought it was beyond his line of sight.

"Miss you, James," he said, even though it seemed a bit silly, especially considering he didn't remember James, for real. It was the thought of James that he missed, he decided, or the thought of James being comforting. Thinking of James usually made him angry now -- it had ever since the incident with the pensieve. The letters had helped, for a while, but apparently that had worn off. Afterwards, he thought, they may have made things worse, because now he knew the memory was true.

He remembered the one time Remus had spoken of the letters. The werewolf's thin fingers had traced lovingly along the edges of his copies of them. "Portrait of the author as a bullying git," he had said wryly. "He really wasn't that bad, you know. It was something he fell into, now and then -- the comfort of power -- like you fall into fits of hatred and long sulks."

Eventually, Harry got up and left the room. He wandered downstairs, all the way underground, but didn't find anyone he wanted to talk to. Severus was not in his lab, and his rooms were dark. Malfoy was not in evidence. Harry went back up to the ground floor, then outside. He found himself at Hagrid's hut.

"Harry!" Hagrid exclaimed. His welcoming expression turned uncertain. "Yeh doin' all righ', Harry?"

"I suppose."

Hagrid stepped aside, and Harry entered the warm, slightly smoky, hut. Keeping his face clear of Fang's enthusiastic licks was a welcome distraction.

"Hermione all righ', then?" Hagrid asked.

Harry shrugged. "I don't know. I've been too upset to deal with her. I asked Ginny to take care of her."

"Not Ron?"

"Ron's not talking to either of us," Harry said bitterly. "And he's too much in a state about Durand to worry about a couple of nothing families in Hogsmeade. Draco's more upset about that."

"What? Malfoy, yeh mean?"

"He liked the baker's daughter. Hadn't known she was half-blood, but he's upset." Harry shrugged. "Won't say a word against it, but he is."

Hagrid's brow furrowed. 'How long yeh bin on a firs' name basis with the Malfoy boy?" he asked.

Harry buried his face in his hands. "Does it matter?"

Hagrid watched him for a while, then went to put on the kettle. "Yeh'll be friends with who yeh will," he said. "I trust yeh, and yer judgement."

"Thank you," Harry said sincerely. "I can't tell you how good it is to have someone say that."

"Yeh doin' all righ' with Hermione?"

Harry shook his head and laughed mirthlessly. "Better," he said. "We seem to be friends, again."

"Yeh want to tell me what's been wrong?" Hagrid asked.

Harry shook his head. He watched Hagrid prepare a pot of tea. "Hagrid," he said. "How well did you know my Dad?"

Hagrid considered. "Not so well as I do yeh and yer lot," he allowed. "After all, I've known yeh since yeh was a baby. An' James -- he was from a good family, he was. No reason fer him t'bother with me. Weren' till that lot started wanderin' the grounds that I met him, to matter."

"He was a bit of a bully, though, wasn't he?" Harry asked. "I mean, even Sirius admitted that."

"Sirius was a bully, now," Hagrid said. "No offense against him -- he became a fine man, an' no one expected it, what with his family, an' all. James...." He hesitated. "James was a good boy," he said finally. "Exuberant, maybe. Got carried away, a bit, when up again the Slytherins. Not a bad bone in his body, though, and don't yeh let anyone tell you otherwise."

Harry stared at him. "I see," he said. "So if a Gryffindor hangs a Slytherin upside-down and threatens to strip him, that's exuberance, and if a Slytherin does it, it's -- what? Malice?"

"What yeh be talkin' about, Harry?"

"Something James did."

Hagrid looked at him uncertainly. "Never saw James do anything he oughtn'," he said. "'Sides pranks on Snape and Avery."

"Who didn't count?" Harry asked coldly.

"They did as bad to him!" Hagrid exclaimed. "What's fretting yeh Harry?"

Harry looked down. He took the tea Hagrid offered and drank some of it before answering.

"I think it's unfair," he said finally. "I think Professor Dumbledore is nearly as unfair to the Slytherins as Professor Snape is to the Gryffindors. I think we're just making everything worse, and if my father had been in another house, people wouldn't remember him nearly so fondly...."

"Ah, but there's charm, y'see," Hagrid said eagerly. "An' James had that, beyond house and family an' all. He was a charmin' one." He frowned at Harry. "An' whatever he did as a boy, he was a good man. Brave an' true, he was. Don' let anyone tell yeh elsewise."


Remus wasn't present at lunch, nor at dinner. Neither was Severus. The werewolf's absence was understandable, but Harry grew increasingly anxious about his father. He followed Dumbledore out into the Entrance Hall at the end of the evening meal.

"May I talk to you, sir?"

"Of course, Harry. My office?"

"Please."

In the privacy of Dumbledore's office, Harry slumped in a comfortable chair. Fawkes came and preened his hair. Harry giggled like a child and tried not to squirm.

"Sherbet lemon?" the headmaster offered.

"Thanks." Harry took one.

"What is it, Harry?" Dumbledore asked.

"Um ... Has Fa- Professor Snape been summoned?"

Dumbledore looked grave. "I'm afraid so. He feels the risk is slight. Voldemort is pleased."

"Despite your intervention."

"Of some worth, but he had his kills, nonetheless." Professor Dumbledore sighed. "Your father hoped you would come speak to me."

"Oh? Has he something to say?"

Dumbledore frowned at Harry's sharp tone.

"He did not relay any messages -- beyond that he would like you to come talk to him directly. He expects to be ... available tomorrow. Go to his apartments after the end of breakfast -- by foot, cloaked. If he has company, he will make the door flare when you knock."


The Sunday morning edition of the Daily Prophet had a long article on the werewolf threat. Harry and Hermione read it together, both letting the food on their plates grow cold. None of appealed to Harry, anyway, as his stomach twisted in slow knots at the words on the page. He read about how werewolves were inherently savage. He read about the failure of the Wolfsbane potion to protect society. He read a quote from Durand's sister, saying how she feared Trent would attack her children.

"What utter shit," he said, shifting back from the table.

Hermione didn't even twitch at his language. "Let's just affirm everyone's fears!" she exclaimed in irritation. "This isn't reporting! This is pandering to the basest instincts of the masses. The papers should counter ignorance, not foster it!"

Harry looked up at the staff table. Remus was not there, just as he had not been at lunch or dinner, yesterday. Harry had seen the owl after owl wheeling into the tower, bearing red burdens for him. His throat constricted.

"Do not be alone with me, in secret, this week."


Harry knocked, then waited. No one answered. He wondered if Severus had not made it back, after all, or if he was still asleep. Harry knocked again. After counting to ten, he gave the password. He was just peering into the kitchen when his father emerged from the bathroom.

"A bit impatient?"

Harry shrugged, trying to hide his relief. "You picked the time. I was afraid something had happened to you."

"Just the normal calls of nature. Nothing that requires a Gryffindor hero to fix."

Harry looked sharply at him. "You have an attitude problem, you know that?"

"And you don't?"

"I," said Harry archly, "can blame it on you." He was pleased that Severus laughed. "Let's sit in the kitchen," Harry urged. "Make me some of that sweet, spiced milk. Everything else will be horrible."

Severus's expression soured. He nodded once, then turned away. Harry followed him into the kitchen.


Severus cooked much like he brewed, with concentration, precision, and grace. He did not speak until he had placed a mug of foamy, pistachio-topped milk in front of Harry, then sat down across from him.

He scowled then. "You know what I'm going to say, I expect."

"Yes." Harry took a sip of the milk. "Stay away from Remus."

"Yes."

"Remus hasn't done anything." Harry felt as if he were reciting a lesson. Remus never does anything, his mind whispered traitorously. He just pretends not to see.

Severus put far more conviction into his words. "He's been in communication with those ... creatures. They plan to use him, somehow."

Harry shivered. "He won't hurt me." The words came out disturbingly quiet and small.

"He won't have the chance," Severus snarled. In a quick grab, he seized Harry's wrist and pulled it up in a painfully tight grip. "Those werewolves continue to contact him; do you understand me? If they believed they could not persuade him, they would GIVE UP!"

Harry forced himself not to show pain. He avoided his father's eyes by looking down at the table. He could not argue the point; he had no idea how long the WFU werewolves would persist. He did not even know how much Remus might try to play a doubt to his advantage.

"So you won't let me meet him, even if you know when and where?"

"Very good." With a little push, Severus let go.

Relieved, Harry looked up. He dropped his hands under the table to rub at his wrist. "I will anyway."

His father's face darkened. The threat implied in the way he leaned forward was hampered by the protective width of the table. "You will not."

"Do you think you can stop me?" Harry challenged recklessly.

"I'll take every point I can from Gryffindor."

"You do anyway!"

"I will tell him I have forbidden it. Lupin knows to fear me."

"Why should Remus be afraid of you?"

A truly evil look crossed Severus's face. He sat back. His voice was quietly cold as he said, "I might misbrew his potion."

"What?!" Harry shrieked.

"It could happen. " Severus examined his stained fingernails. "It's a very complex one."

"You wouldn't dare."

Severus lunged to his feet and leaned across the table to hiss in Harry's face. "Of course I'd dare, you idiot boy! My control over you may be limited, but my control over him is not! If you won't listen, I'll see to it that he does."

Harry, his heart pounding, thought frantically and tried to evaluate what might be negotiable.

"I'll agree not to be alone with him," he said, "even scheduled, if you will allow me to be with him and someone else."

"Lupin is an accomplished duellist!"

"So am I," Harry said baldly. "Hermione and I could take him, or Draco and I could."

His father flinched back. "And if Draco betrays you with him?"

"I find that hard to imagine."

"I find it quite easy!"

"Draco working with Remus?" Harry sneered. "They're barely civil."

"The servants of the Dark Lord do not choose their companions."

"Neither Draco nor Remus is Voldemort's servant!"

Severus sat. He stared incredulously at Harry. "Are you mad? Draco will be. He merely waits to be asked." He snorted contemptuously. "And he only waits because he is a Malfoy, and his pride requires it."

"Oh, was that why he was out by the lake with me, getting all upset about the baker's girl?" Harry protested. "She was one of the ones kissed. He fancied her."

Severus looked honestly surprised. "Had he known she was half-blood?" he asked.

Harry shook his head. The sense of confusion that had overwhelmed him when speaking to Draco returned. He whispered, "No."

Severus nodded coldly. "He'll get over it. By next week, he'll rant about how she deceived him."

"Deceived? She wouldn't give him the time of day, he told me. And he knows I'm half-blood!"

"You don't count, and we are getting distracted! Draco is not suitable for your defense."

"Hermione?"

"Hermione," Severus's lips tightened around the name like it was a wedge of lime -- "and Weasley. Not Granger alone."

"All right," Harry conceded. It was convenient, he thought, that his father hadn't specified which Weasley. There were so many.

Severus slumped forward, leaning his forehead into one spread hand. "I hate this," he said.

Harry was surprised, and in some way honored, by the honesty of that. "Me too," he offered.

Severus looked wryly over at him. "Any ideas? I'd prefer not to be at your throat the whole time we're together."

Harry turned his cup nervously in his hands. "Want some help in the lab?" he suggested. "You'll feel better if you're doing something. I probably will too."

Severus nodded. His mouth twisted in a wry smile. "I'm going to say something I would have sworn would never pass my lips."

"Oh?"

"You're a fine boy, Harry." He stood up. "Let's go, then."


*********

Harry wanted to say something. It was quite easy to tell, Severus thought. The boy would look up, his eyes would widen slightly as he started to open his mouth ... and then he would look away again. Severus set up two cauldrons, laid out the ingredients for three potions, and did his best to appear calm. He had the shamed suspicion that he had hurt the boy earlier. He wasn't sure how anyone, least of all Dumbledore, who was reputedly insightful, could possibly have thought he had the maturity to handle this. Lily had known better.

He dared another glance at Harry. Even the boy, he thought, was handling it better than he was. Now, though, his usual quiet trust was gone, and Severus found he missed it. Harry moved and spoke carefully around him, as he had around his gormless godfather. Severus hated it.

"What should I make?" Harry asked finally. That clearly wasn't the question that had been trying to come out.

"Set up a third cauldron and brew a batch of Flame-Stop Potion, will you? Use the oil-based formula -- someone will be painting it into wood."

"I hope I can use a textbook?"

"If you think I'd trust you without one...." Severus growled.

Harry grinned. "Oh good. My memory of third-year potions isn't that good."

Severus continued to crumble fairy wings between callused fingers as he jerked his head towards the front of the room. "The blue book on the second shelf."

Harry came back with proper book and a cauldron. He was using the latter as a basket to carry all the necessary components. Severus wondered if he would need to tell Harry to clean the cauldron after that, but Harry, unbidden, scoured it with a magically summoned wind.

It wasn't until after Harry had started to prepare the potion components, and the scent of cut iceweed was sharp in the air, that he finally asked the question.

"What did you make, last week?" He ducked his head as the words came out, all in a rush.

Severus's face darkened. From the boy's manner, he suspected Harry had some idea how unwelcome that line of inquiry was. Severus looked away. He did not want to describe what he had done, and let the words make it yet more real.

"Was it used in the attacks?" Harry persisted.

"Yes." And that's all you need to know.

"Can you make a counter-potion?"

Severus growled. He wished it were that easy. Reopening vulnerability to Dementors was simple -- it was blocking it that had been hard. Delivery to an unknown raiding party was more of a problem. "We are hardly likely to be able to get attacking Death-Eaters to drink a potion," he observed caustically. "I am, however, planning to contaminate some of the stock I make for the Dark Lord with time-charmed morning glory, so that it wears off unexpectedly quickly."

"Brilliant! Show me how?"

Severus smirked. "Certainly."

"But about the counter-potion," Harry pressed. "Could you make something that works by fumes or skin contact, and make a sort of grenade?"

"A what?"

"A ... a thing that explodes when you throw it. With the potion inside."

Severus frowned at him for a moment, puzzling this out. He had certainly seen potions that exploded, but generally the explosion was itself the desired effect. Harry seemed to mean.... He remembered, the autumn of his first year, choking under a barrage of spore-filled dried mushrooms. Sirius had discovered how they released a smelly cloud when stomped on, and had collected them carefully and laid an ambush. Lupin had helped with that attack. He had probably considered it harmless. "Like a dried puffball?" he asked distantly.

"Sort of -- more forceful, though."

Severus closed his eyes and rubbed the sides of his nose. The explosion would deliver droplets of the potion. He could make something that worked that way. Of course, he needed something that would cause the explosion without damaging the counter-potion. He thought aloud. "Sulfur salts -- no, that would neutralize -- puffballs? Phoenix droppings, perhaps -- I can get those...." His eyes snapped open. Harry was looking hopefully at him. "It might be possible. But someone would need to reach the attack sites, in time."

"Could Dumbledore provide the counter-potion to likely targets of the attacks?" Harry asked.

"Perhaps." Severus evaluated the idea. "If I can concoct it with no irreplaceable components, I suppose I could make enough for wide distribution. That would even the field, a bit, if the targets used them as soon as an attack started."


Severus taught Harry how to imbue morning glory seeds with a time charm to delay or halt magical effects, then set him to brewing Flame Stop Potion. He worked himself on creating several explosive potion bases that might be compatible with the counter-potion. Hours later, as Harry was covering his finished potion, the boy suddenly spoke.

"I'm starving," he said.

Severus shot him a sharp look. "Too long since breakfast?"

"I didn't really have any."

Severus snorted, remembering how he had to tell Harry to eat, after he had first arrived. "Honestly, Potter -- feed you regular meals for a month or two, and you're suddenly dependent on them!"

Harry laughed.

"Speaking of which, let's see how tall you are." Severus motioned Harry over to the wall, and checked him against the marks. Harry had grown only an inch in the past week and a half. "The growing has slowed, at least," he observed. "Try easing off the muscle relaxant."

"Okay." Harry stepped away from the wall. "So ...." He looked nervous, again, but he did not delay, this time. "I have to leave in about half an hour, but there's something I need to tell you, first."

Severus was immediately wary. He tried to guess what Harry might have done. "You visited Lupin, yesterday."

"No."

Severus relaxed slightly. He's courting the Mudblood girl, perhaps? The thought didn't upset him as much as he might have expected. "Things have vastly improved with Granger?" he hazarded. "I've seen you with her."

"Sort of." Harry stepped back, so he was against the wall again. He looked like he was waiting to be executed. "She figured it out."

The long-feared news seemed to seize Severus's breath. He could not speak. It was only now, discovering that he felt no anger and presumed no fault on Harry's part, that he realized he had long regarded this as inevitable.

Harry was looking pleadingly back at him. "She confronted me in front of Ron, so I had to tell him. She had a picture of you in school, and told me to take off my glasses...."

"And you did?"

"No, but she's fast with a Summoning Charm. Anyway, I took them someplace safe, warded it madly, and then told them. And Ginny. I've told them no one else can know, and impressed on them that I could be killed if anyone finds out --"

"I am a much more definite kill," Severus said harshly.

"I glossed over that bit."

It took Severus a second to understand. Harry's friends might be willing to sacrifice their most hated teacher and the head of their rival house. They would guard Harry. "Wise." Severus sank down onto his stool. He was vaguely aware of Harry stepping closer.

"I'm sorry. I really did try." Harry picked up a vial of dragon's blood and turned it pensively in his hands. "And actually, it's probably safer this way. It turns out they've been blabbing more incriminating stuff around trying to investigate than they ever would have if I'd told them -- looking for photographs of me, saying I'd been seen in the dungeons, and that sort of thing."

Severus flinched. He looked at Harry. "What do you think the damage is?" he asked through gritted teeth.

"Probably containable. It was all in Gryffindor, except for Malfoy. Colin's not likely to figure anything out unless he's bludgeoned with it. I brought in Ginny because she was the only one who seemed dangerous."

"Malfoy?" Malfoy is loyal to Voldemort. I need to explain away whatever he knows.

"Just the thing I told you about before -- he saw me go into your lab. Did I tell you?"

"No."

"Oh. It was a few weeks ago."

"A few weeks!"

"He told Ron and Hermione, to try to get information out of them. I was much more worried about that, because they bargained with him. I'm sure I told you that part. It was over Maitland."

"And you're not worried about what he knows?" Severus decided he would need to press Draco for information, as Harry seemed unable to tell him anything useful. First, though, he had to figure out what he was to pretend to know, and why.

"Not really. He was just getting at them, I think. He hasn't shown any interest." Harry bit his lip. "I think Ron's more dangerous. He hates you, and he's not talking to me now, and he wouldn't betray me intentionally, but you know how he loses his temper."

Severus found himself more interested in what Harry had not said than what he had. "But Granger is friendly?" She, a Muggle-born girl that I have been particularly unfair to, hates me less than a Wizarding boy whom I have treated not much worse than he usually deserves?

"She doesn't like that I'm spending time with you, but she doesn't hold it against me." Harry shrugged. His shoulders stayed hunched up as if he were caught in a cold wind. He looked miserable. "Ron was what I expected, really. He's not angry with me for being related to you; he's angry with me for liking you. He can tell himself that it's my behavior that upsets him and he's not being unfair, so he might maintain it for quite a while."

"The constant armor of righteousness," Severus sneered. "How very Gryffindor."

Harry straightened. A disturbingly cold look crossed his face. "And of course," he said sarcastically, "Slytherins don't do that. You would never protect yourself from your actions with righteous fantasies."

Severus felt his face go blank with the effort not to flinch back from the cut. He turned and stirred his cauldron, pretending to evaluate whether or not the mixture was cool enough to bottle. It clearly wasn't. It occurred to him that Harry could be referring to Lupin, as well as his time following Voldemort, and any argument would be almost an admission of guilt.

"Have you any other orders?" Harry demanded. "Besides avoiding the only other adult who sometimes seems to care about me?"

Severus, in a relieved flash of genuine, uncomplicated anger, dropped his ladle and turned on the boy. "Don't whine! The headmaster, for all his other concerns, most certainly cares about you, and Molly Weasley, though you may not like her protective expressions of it, visibly loves you, with fewer other concerns placed above you. I could continue."

"Sorry." Harry momentary look of apology faded into defiance. "But Remus is the closest to family. You know that. Ron's mum has too many of her own to worry about, and my relationships with each of them to consider."

"Lupin is far more important to you than he ought to be."

Harry shook his head. "Remus is exactly as important to me as he should be." He bit his lip. "May I go back to your rooms? There's something I want from mine."

"Go, then."

Harry paused in the door. Severus glared at him. "What?"

"Tuesday?" Harry hazarded.

Severus sighed. He hoped Harry couldn't tell how much of that was relief. Some days, he had no idea why Harry wanted to continue to meet with him. "Wednesday," he countered. "We've become too predictable. Someone will notice."

"Okay," Harry agreed.

He put up his cloak, and the door opened and closed. Severus was alone. He wondered what Harry might want from his rooms. For a moment, he was tempted to follow, just to make sure it was nothing dangerous. A minute later, it occurred to him that Harry might be angrier than he seemed -- perhaps he wanted to clear everything out. He imagined walking in to find the room empty, abandoned, with drawers and cabinets half open.... Something clenched painfully in his chest. Fiercely, Severus glared at the cauldron in front of him. Harry wanted something from his room. That was all. When they talked next, it would be better.




Author notes: Chapter 57 -- Personal Matters