The Proud Man's Contumely

Chapter Ten: I Was the More Deceived

Despite Ron's disturbing, one-sided conversation the night before, Harry woke the next day surprisingly refreshed, and perhaps all the more determined because of it. His foreboding he now accepted as a condition of life, but otherwise he felt cleansed and capable of tackling any task they set before him. He was allowed to sleep in again, but when he finally rose sometime around noon he was fed and immediately sent to work. And he was more than ready.

McGonagall turned up that afternoon to begin her series of lessons with Harry. She was adequately impressed by his newfound fervour, and informed him that she expected it to carry over into her classroom when term started. She began by teaching him how to transfigure knives, arrows, swords, and other 'common' weapons into things like feather dusters and silk pillows. Harry didn't do too terribly bad. But his silk came out more like burlap, and his feather dusters...well, they had a lot of work to do. All the transformations were done on stationary objects. The trick, she said, was performing them while the weapons were being hurled at Harry with deadly force. Harry did not look forward to those practices.

That day he also finally began his sessions with Remus. Though Harry thought it may have been awkward after all that had passed between them recently, he found himself very pleasantly surprised. Harry was really very comfortable with Remus, and the feeling appeared to be mutual. Remus' attitude was light and friendly and his lesson on part humans was every bit as enjoyable as his Defence Against the Dark Arts lessons had been those years before at Hogwarts. Harry was fascinated by the subject and they studied everything from the diet of hags and the mating habits of banshees, to the evolution of Warlocks from antiquity to present day.

"There was an excellent text here in the library on the traits and lifestyles of vampires," Remus frowned looking through the stack of books from which he wanted Harry to study. "Do ask Hermione to share it with you," he said with a knowing wink.

Their session lasted a full two hours longer than anticipated, and might have stretched on longer had not Dumbledore arrived to give Harry his Occlumency lesson (acting as temporary substitute until Snape returned) at which time, much to Harry's disappointment, it had to be called to an end. Snape's only offer of guidance to Dumbledore was to inform Harry that: despite what he had said before meditation would not be necessary and Harry should cease immediately (assuming he ever began). Though his lesson with the Headmaster was considerably less nerve-wracking than it might have been with Snape, and though Harry certainly didn't miss the man's company, Harry began to understand Snape and Dumbledore's point about the effectiveness of their respective teachings. Dumbledore was patient and took a moment to outline the theory behind the magic being used in hopes it would help Harry better understand and so better combat it. But to be quite honest it was mostly over Harry's head, and he would have much rather had his wand out, as he seemed to learn more easily from a more practical, hands-on approach. All in all, Harry felt there was little accomplished during the lesson, and grudgingly conceded to himself that perhaps Snape was his only hope of mastering this all-important skill.

Harry continued this routine for the next week, alternating between McGonagall, Flitwick, Remus, the headmaster, and even occasionally Hagrid. Because of his hectic schedule, Harry saw little of Ron and Hermione. In a way, this relieved him. When he did see them he was, of course, polite and friendly, but his topics of conversation were frivolous and content light. A chasm was slowly growing between him and his friends. And though it pained him somewhat, he really thought it was for the best and did little to mend the rift. As far was Harry was concerned, the less they had to do with him, the better for them. Hermione, as intuitive as always, seemed to understand Harry's distance and respected it. But Harry could tell it was taking it's toll on Ron. Sure he and Hermione had a blossoming relationship to see to (the depth and nature of which Harry was still not entirely certain) but Harry knew it couldn't substitute a best friend. Hermione wasn't exactly keen on Quidditch, or Fred and George's latest products, or any of the myriad of other things boy their age took interest in. Harry could just imagine Ron sitting alone in their room while Hermione busied herself in the library or chatted with Ginny, bouncing a quaffle off the far wall and telling Pigwidgeon (when he could steel him from his little sister) all about the Cannons' new Chaser. Phineas, should he not be sleeping through it all, probably knew more about that team and the game of Quidditch itself than he could ever care to know. Harry kept telling himself it was all for the best and avoided Ron's lonely, hopeful glances when they met in the halls or at meals. Ron wouldn't be able to understand it, but Harry cared about him far too much to be his friend just now.

A week before term was to begin, Remus and Mrs. Weasley stormed Diagon Alley, fetching all four of them their school things and Harry all the necessities, including, most importantly, many new clothes. It wasn't that Mrs. Weasley had bad taste per se, just conservative taste...not a boy's taste. She did, however, have an eye for colour and coordination. With Remus input into the selection, Harry found himself in possession of a very decent wardrobe. He now had several pair of nice trousers and fetching jumpers that complimented his complexion and build better than he could have imagined. Having always worn either Dudley's hand-me-downs or else a few hastily and thoughtlessly purchased outfits, Harry never knew how much difference the right colour and cut could make in one's appearance. He also had a number of comfortable t-shirts bearing Quidditch references or the names of popular wizarding bands he wasn't familiar with. (Though Tonks assured him they were all very savvy.) The least welcome of his new acquisitions was Archimedes, the large, handsome tawny owl Remus had chosen for him. He was a fine bird, but Harry felt there could simply be no replacement for his beloved Hedwig.

As the term inched closer, Harry's schedule relaxed a bit as the professors were distracted by preparations at Hogwarts. Harry continued his studies independently, seeing his instructors whenever they were available. It was a lazy Tuesday evening when Harry found himself in the upstairs bedroom which had unofficially been designated as his private classroom, waiting for Dumbledore who was, uncharacteristically, quite late. Harry had spent over an hour there, idly tracing the fading patterns on the wallpaper and nosing under sheets and in cabinets. Finally he stationed himself at the window, peeking out of the dusty drapes, and watched as the day crawled sluggishly to hide behind the horizon. As the last speck of the sun's neon disk blinked out of view, Harry's mind turned to dinner and bed. But even as he resolved to give the lesson amiss and head downstairs, Harry felt a subtle draft stir the still, stale air, and he made to pull the curtains closed before turning toward the door to greet the Headmaster. Harry barely heard the whispered spell that sent him crashing to his knees and plunged him into a spiral of sharp images.

Privet Drive on Dudley's sixth birthday when Harry had been given rice crackers instead of cake; his rotund cousin cackling through his icing at Harry's longing expression

Resting against a stall in Myrtle's bathroom, watching the dust drifting in swirls through the rays of sunlight through the window like the doubts that swam through his mind, while Hermione brewed Polyjuice within.

Hagrid showing them how to feed flobberworms.

His first glimpse of Snape , glowering at him from the staff table during the sorting his first year at Hogwarts, not understanding the stranger's dislike yet feeling a mutual distaste rising in him as well.

Harry woke on the floor, curtains pulled down in a heap atop him, pain shooting through his knees and up his legs where he had struck the floorboards. The first thing he was able to focus on as he rolled his aching head to the side was a pair of immaculate, pointed-toe, black boots clicking to a halt only a few feet from him. Harry followed the slender, black-clad legs upward until his eyes came to rest on Professor Snape's familiar, snide expression. Harry groaned . The man had been gone so long he had almost forgotten how much he loathed him.

"I see you have learned precious little in my absence," Snape said, looking down his hawkish nose at him. "Not that I had hoped for much else."

Harry scowled at him and pushed himself shakily to his throbbing knees. "That wasn't fair," he complained to the buttons on Snape's waistcoat. "You didn't even give me a chance to-"

"Am I mistaken, or did the word fair just pass your lips?" Snape snorted, making no move to help Harry to his feet. "You, of all people, should know that fairness is a farcical concept best reserved for fairytales and children's stories. We live in the real world, Mr. Potter. Legilimens." Harry was still teetering on one knee, midway through his struggle to a standing position, when he was sent crashing back to the floor.

Aunt Marge floating near the ceiling.

Winky in the Top Box at the Quidditch World Cup.

Draco as a ferret.

"Damn it!" Harry grimaced, rolling to his back, pain shooting through his elbow and side as well now.

"Do you think the Dark Lord is going to be so gracious as to allow you to draw your wand or even gain your bearings if he can prevent it?" Snape said nastily. "Get up!" he barked, pulling his wand back and drawing breath to cast the spell again. Harry plunged his hand into his robes and withdrew his own wand, casting a disarming spell before the word could pass Snape's lips. He'd been tempted to use something nastier. About half a dozen good jinxes came to mind. Merlin's beard but Snape had come back in a foul mood.

Snape gave a kind of growl low in his throat. "That's more like it," he snarled, his harsh tone belying the praising words. As he stalked over to retrieve his wand, Harry scrambled to his feet, wand prone on the stooped Potions Master. But Snape only straightened and stared daggers at Harry as he brushed the grey dirt from his new trousers and righted his clothes, running his free hand through his hair to remove it from his eyes. Both of them were breathing heavily, as if meaning to blast their animosity toward the other with each exhalation. Though Snape's wand lay slack in the hand at his side, Harry refused to relax his guard.

"Was that really necessary?" Harry asked sharply.

"You think it wasn't?" Snape replied, lips tensing to near invisibility. "The Dark Lord is plotting your demise, traipsing through your thoughts and memories like a housewife doing the daily shop, and you think my teaching is unnecessary?" he hissed.

"I didn't mean the Occlumency! I meant you sneaking up on me when you know I'm not advanced enough to defend myself," Harry snapped angrily. "And stop making it sound like I've sent Voldemort an invitation or something."

"Your refusal to cooperate with me is just as good as an invitation to the Dark Lord."

"Who says I'm not cooperating!" Harry objected, growing increasingly aggravated. "Listen, just because you're in a shitty mood after visiting with Lord Thingy doesn't mean-"

"What did-you-just-say?" Snape hissed, hand tightening on his wand until his knuckles whitened, eyes glinting dangerously. Harry closed his mouth with a snap. What had he said? He was so irritated at Snape the words just tumbled out. Shite. This was bad and Harry knew it. He started to stammer some weak apology when he felt the spell, whatever it was, strike him in the chest like a fist, knocking his backwards and stealing the breath from him. He blinked up at Snape, unable to speak and so waving his hands in a silent plea for ceasefire.

"I have warned you before not to treat mention of the Dark Lord with such disrespect!" Snape spat, leaning down over Harry. "Do you think this is a game?" he demanded, taking Harry's shirtfront in his fist. "Do you think we're simply playing tag with the most powerful and ruthless dark wizard to ever walk the earth? You naive, impervious little...." Snape literally bit his tongue, desperately trying to reign in his self-control. "Do you have any idea what he wants to do to you?"

"Yeah," Harry sputtered, finally finding his breath. As if he hadn't faced down Voldemort several times already, hadn't narrowly escaped death at his hands before. "I thought the idea was to kill me. Though it looks like you're trying to beat him to it," he shot, looking down at his own collar bunched in Snape's iron grip. Snape gave him a particularly cold, ugly sneer and released him abruptly, flinging Harry away from him so that the back of Harry's head struck the floor. He straightened slowly and brushed the front of his robes.

"You should be so lucky," he spat.

Harry rubbed at his neck where his collar had chaffed him and propped himself on one elbow. "Look," he said. "I'm sorry for calling him that, all right?...Professor Snape?"

This seemed to placate Snape somewhat. He swept his eyes coolly over Harry's sprawled form before commanding him calmly and sneeringly to, "Get up...Mr. Potter." With a fair amount of relief, and a tad of inner grumbling, Harry did as he was told. Snape waited until he was standing to continue.

"Prepare yourself," he told him, raising his wand.

"But...I've lost my wand," Harry said with a note of panic, eyeing Snape's and taking a small tentative step away from it.

"And just what good do you think it would do you?" Snape asked as though wearied by Harry's simplicity. Harry's eyebrows knit and his bottom lip pouted in distress.

"If you don't think I can do this," he complained, "Then why are we even bothering with-"

"You misunderstand my point," Snape drawled, casting Harry a withered look. "You are not preparing yourself against me. Ideally, you are preparing yourself against the Dark Lord. The attack will be internal, your wand will be of no use to you . You must learn to rely on the strength of your mind alone to repel the attack."

"B-but you told me not to meditate," Harry argued. "I haven't been. So, I can't fight it without-"

"I know perfectly well what I told you. And I know perfectly well what I am doing. I'm the Master here remember? Now prepare yourself," he said, wand already rising.

"No wait!" Harry cried, but it was too late.

The reptile house at the London Zoo.

Cho sitting across from him beyond a veil of raining, pink, heart-shaped confetti.

His parents smiling at him from within the Mirror of Erised.

"Fight it!" Snape shouted. "Now. Again!"

Remus sleeping on the Hogwarts express.

Cedric's shade asking him to return his body to Hogwarts.

"Damn it, Potter. What did I tell you!" Snape growled angrily. Harry gazed up at him from the floor, eyed glazed, desperate and dreading. "Again! Fight it."

"I can't!" Harry cried as Snape's wand cut through the air to cast again. Snape halted.

"You won't. You must try," he said, preparing to continue through with the spell.

"No! I can't!" Harry wailed. "Stop it! This...this is pointless!" he shouted in frustration. "I can't do this," he repeated despairingly to himself, rolling to his stomach to hide his face in his arms.

"...Get up," Snape said firmly.

"No."

"Excuse me?" Snape said, eyebrows rising incredulously.

"I told you. I can't do this!" Harry whined, not looking at Snape, not wanting to see the abusive smirk there. But it was true. Harry couldn't do this. He wouldn't. He wouldn't tolerate this anymore.

"So," Snape scoffed, "This is the rose and expectancy of the fair state. The boy who aspired to train a juvenile army to do battle with the Dark Lord himself cannot even manage elementary Occlumency," he said with cold, jeering condescension. "That your godfather was the only one lost during that little crusade of yours is indeed most fortunate."

Gods! Must he insist on turning the knife? Harry already felt wretched allowing Snape to see him like this. Did Harry look like he need to be further wounded? What a git.

"You would consider Sirius dying fortunate," Harry spat venomously, peeking from the fold of his arm to glower at Snape. His despair was once again bubbling into a low fury. Snape only arched an eyebrow and sucked his tongue, perhaps thinking it unwise to out and out confirm the indictment.

"...You're enjoying this aren't you?" Harry said in a low voice, fixing him with a searing, suspicious look.

"Enjoying what exactly?" Snape said.

"Torturing me," Harry said, convinced of it now. Snape crossed his arms and rolled his eyes as if Harry's melodrama was causing him a headache.

"Circumstance requires that you learn this skill, and apparently I am the only one qualified to see that you do so. I didn't exactly volunteer for this nightmarish undertaking with bubbling enthusiasm. I assure you that in no part of this arrangement do I find enjoyment, Mr. Potter." But Harry pushed himself to a sitting position and gave Snape a look that said he knew better and was indignant that Snape would so insult his intelligence.

"Why won't you just admit it?" he challenged. "You're still bitter about what Sirius and my father did to you, but since they aren't around anymore you're taking it out on me. Admit it...You hated them."

"You can hardly blame me," Snape said strainedly through pursed lips. "You were in the pensieve." Snape's features darkened as anger at the memory of Harry's trespass washed over him afresh. "You witnessed their cruelty."

"But I didn't do those things to you!" Harry shouted belligerently, leaning forward and placing a hand on his breast to punctuate the statement. "I've never done anything to you. Why? Why do you hate me?" he cried, desperation and a genuine desire to understand infecting the frustration in his voice. "Why have you always hated me?" Harry's voice broke on those last words, but his gaze remained true. Snape's gaze was steady as well, and as cold and hard as stone in winter. After a silence so long Harry despaired of a response, Snape answered him, his voice as stiff as his posture.

"It's true, Mr. Potter. I hated Black, and I loathed your father." Harry was slightly taken aback. Though he knew it to be true already, that knowledge did little to blunt the shock of hearing it spoken. But Snape wasn't finished. Harry straightened and regarded him uncertainly "It's also true that I hate what I see of your father in you...which is far too much I might add. And I hate the dangerous influence that inheritance has had...I hate many things, Mr. Potter," Snape went on. "I hate continuously risking my life for an ungrateful whelp of a boy without the sense not to be shepherded, almost wistfully, into one blatant trap after another. I hate knowing that this behaviour is the result of the way you have been alternately sheltered or else left completely to your own devices your entire life with grossly impractical proportion and timing...I hate fate. And necessity. I hate circumstance...But no. I do not hate you, Mr. Potter," Snape finished plainly. Harry looked up at Snape's severe expression, at a lose for words. Snape heaved a sigh and shifted as though irritated.

"Well," he said shortly, "I feel that is enough for one night. It's already quite late and I believe you have a train to catch in the morning. We shall continue this when you arrive at Hogwarts." Harry opened his mouth to object that he wasn't finished talking about this, but Snape was already passing through the door, leaving so swiftly and silently he may as well not even have been corporeal. Harry remained in the floor, tucking his knees under his chin and hugging his legs. He sat there for some time, toying with the hem of the fallen drapes, pondering what Snape had just said and what exactly it might mean.

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