After the Storm.

Harry awoke in an unfamiliar room with pale curtains moving in the breeze from the window. Watching them, it took him a moment to recollect where he was. Utter mortification accompanied the memory that he was in Snape's home; swiftly followed by fury that Dumbledore had abandoned him here like some valuable but awkward piece of luggage. Worse, he had tricked Snape into accepting him.

Opening the curtains, he gazed out at the garden. Early morning, he decided, from the shadows. He picked up the towel that Jane had given him and wrapped it around himself. Time to get dressed. Again he crept down the stairs, ready to retreat at the first sign of Snape. While he could not stay in his room forever, he had no intention of facing the greasy git any time soon, especially in no more than a towel. He reached the washer-dryer without incident, and began to unload his clothes, but that was as far as he got.

'Mr. Potter, a word if you please.' Harry felt his blood congeal. Clutching his clean laundry, he stood up slowly.

'Right sir, I'll just get dressed.' Snape said nothing. Carefully not looking his way, Harry fled back up the stairs.

Heart pounding, he took his time to get dressed in the clothes that he had so recently acquired. He decided against the industrial boots. Petunia Dursley would have had a fit had he worn such things in her house. Slowly, unwillingly he descended the stairs.

'Sit down Potter.' Harry sat on the edge of one of the opposed sofas. Professor Snape on the other, his usual expression of frigid distaste firmly in place.

'Mr. Potter,' Snape mused, 'what do you think would happen if the Dark Lord ever found out about Jane?'

'He'd kill you?' ventured Harry, to his own horror, sounding quite pleased with the idea, 'sir.'

'Oh?'

Wrong answer, thought Harry, desperately avoiding looking at Snape. He was very much aware that, while Snape had a wand, he didn't.

'This is not a matter of some house-elf spilling the tea, or even simple defiance.' Fury spat from every word and Harry thought about the Longbottoms, alive, but insane in Saint Mungos. 'A traitor who has actively and successfully worked against him for years, someone who has made a fool of him, Potter.' Harry risked a glance into Snape's black eyes and their intensity scared him. 'Have you any idea of what muggles are capable of doing to one another?'

There had been that video that Dudley had, without Petunia's knowledge. While Harry loathed Snape, Snape who had been one of them, his stomach twisted.

'Do you imagine that wizards are any nicer, Potter?

'N'no sir.'

'What they do possess is a far greater range of available unpleasantness along with the ability to keep their victim alive and conscious throughout.' Harry stared at the floor. He could hear Snape breathing 'And, Mr. Potter, while you may well believe that I've got it coming,' at this Harry froze, 'they would not do it to me.'

Jane.

Not Jane.

Realisation hit him hard. He couldn't breath, and he couldn't straighten up. He remembered Molly Weasley's boggart taking on the shapes of members of her family, dead. The worst way to hurt Snape was to hurt Jane: Jane who, like Sirius, had been prepared to risk her own life for his. Determination and sheer fury surged through him. That isn't going to happen he decided. No one else was going to get hurt because they tried to help him. He twisted his head around to look at Snape, who was now watching him with the detached air of someone who had fed something of doubtful toxicity to a laboratory rat and was observing the results.

'You begin to understand.'

Again Harry stared at the ground and concentrated on breathing. Finally he got control, 'Occlumancy, sir.'

'Yes, Potter?'

'The lessons were making it worse, not better.'

'Did you practice?' The Potions Master stood up sharply. 'If not then that would, indeed, have been the result.'

'You told me to clear my mind. I don't know how.'

Snape was now standing at his elbow. 'If Miss Granger needed information, what would she do?' He sounded as though every word cost an effort.

'Find a book, sir?'

'Quite. Try Miranda's library. If you can find nothing suitable, tell me.' Snape strode to throw open a door. Through it Harry could see shelves laden with books and files. Obediently, Harry entered and began to hunt through the shelves.

* * *

Harry actually found two books dealing with Yoga and Meditation along with a rather thick book labelled 'Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance' which, after inspection, he returned to its shelf. With the books in his arms he went into the living room where he found Jane.

'Hello Harry.' The greeting was friendly. 'You look an awful lot better.' So did Jane, now dressed in a light summer dress and looking much healthier, warm brown eyes and a twisted little smile replacing the exhaustion of earlier in the day. 'I'm sorry I wasn't completely honest with you, and I do mean it about your being welcome here.'

Harry found himself smiling back and Jane grinned. 'What are the books for?' she asked.

'I need to learn to meditate.' He saw no need to elaborate.

'Are you hungry?'

Harry was hungry, but cautious. 'Where's Professor Snape?'

'In his room. Muttering imprecations. I think he's marking exam papers. What sort of fruitcake would make him a teacher?'

'That would be Professor Dumbledore. What happened last night? Harry asked. Then, seeing Jane's reaction, he rather wished that he hadn't.

She stared at her own hands, her fingers knotting. 'He was going to obliviate me.'

'Snape?'

'No! How could you think that?'

'I'm sorry. Why?'

'Dumbledore . . . he said I'd be better off.' Swearing under her breath she turned away. 'I'm making sandwiches. Do you want to help? You don't have to.' She disappeared through the kitchen door.

Harry put the books away in his room and then went to the kitchen to find her cutting mushrooms rather clumsily. 'Shall I do that?' He was afraid that she would slip with the knife.

'Ok.' Jane started viciously buttering bread. Harry washed his hands and then picked up the knife. 'So what upset the Dursleys?' Harry recognised this for a distraction, but decided to go along.

'They don't like magic.'

'What did you do?'

'It was more what I am. A wizard. A freak.'

She had stopped tormenting the bread. 'What was Dumbledore suggesting that they should be punished for?'

'Using me as a house-elf, dressing me in Dudley's cast off clothing, starving me, encouraging Dudley and his gang to bully me, keeping me in the under stair cupboard until I was eleven -'

'Pardon?'

'Until my Hogwarts letter arrived, I slept in the cupboard under the stairs. After that I got Dudley's second bedroom.' Harry continued cutting up the mushrooms, watching for her reaction in his peripheral vision.

'And no-one did anything?' He could hear her disbelief and anger. 'Why . . . what the hell were you doing living with them?'

'Dumbledore left me with them as a baby, after my parents were killed by Voldemort. My mother died to protect me and Petunia is her sister. Blood Magic was supposed to protect me.

'Dumbledore left you with them?' She hissed in disgust. 'And he's the good guy?'

'Trust me, you don't want to met the other one,' said Harry.

'Ok, if he comes around, I'll hide behind the sofa.' Slamming doors, Jane found a frying pan in one of the cupboards and started hunting through the fridge. 'Do you want to make some tea?'

As he made tea, Harry wondered just how much Snape had told her. 'How much do you know about Voldemort?' he asked.

Jane froze for a long moment and then moved the pan off the heat. 'I know about my father,' she said 'if that's what you mean.'

'Right.'

She was still, with her back to him. 'The Moldywart's Minion thing.'

'That's . . .' different from the Dark Lord, thought Harry.

'He just didn't know any better.' She turned around slowly, not looking at him. 'Sometimes decent people get fed lies, believe the wrong things.' Harry didn't reply. 'I'm told that wizarding society is pretty unsophisticated, even primitive. Imprisonment without trial. Shit like that.'

'Yes,' said Harry, thinking about Sirius.

'Strange, especially when they've got so many effective ways of determining the truth.'

It did seem rather strange when Harry came to think about it. Surely Sirius must have said something. Did no one ever listen? Carefully, Harry laid the knife down on the table.

'Harry?' He stared at the ground.

'Harry?'

Please don't sympathise, thought Harry, realising with dismay that while he could fight antagonism, he could not cope with kindness and most definitely not from this girl, Snivellus' child. He heard her step forward and then he was throwing open the kitchen door and running down, through the neglected garden, towards where a section of broken wall revealed the beach and sea beyond.

He scrambled over the wall and threw himself down in its shelter. Pushing his hand into the warm sharp sand, he pulled his knees into his chest, closed his eyes and tried to stop the silent shaking that had overwhelmed him. Sirius . . . It hurts. His hands clenched. It hurt beyond belief. Burying his face between his elbows, he curled up on the sand amongst the rocks and wildflowers.

* * *

'Harry?'

Wincing, Harry opened his eyes to brightness and disorientation. He discovered he'd a headache and was uncomfortably thirsty. Somehow he had fallen asleep on the beach. Straightening his glasses and blinking against the light, he looked up.

'Tonks?'

The look of concern on her face became a tight smile. 'Wotcher.' Late thirties, smart clothes, with a smooth bob of black hair, today Tonks might have worked in the city. Harry wasn't sure it didn't suit her 'What do you think?' she said, tugging at the hair.

On the other hand . . . thought Harry, 'I liked the pink.'

Tonks obliged and then helped him to his feet. 'Come on, I've got a car full of your stuff.'

He followed her back over the wall and waded through the knee-high grass and flowers of the lawn to the terrace. Beyond an open wooden gate set into the wall to one side of the house a dark blue estate car had its back open. Jane and Hedwig confronted one another through the bars of the owl's cage.

'Hi, Harry. Can we let him out?'

'Her. But, yes, do that.'

Carefully Jane unlatched the cage. Hedwig hobbled out and then took off in a brief storm of feathers. 'What's her name?'

'Hedwig.'

'She's beautiful.' Shading her eyes Jane watched her fly. ' I'll give you a hand to get this stuff indoors, if you want,' she turned to Harry, 'or perhaps you'd like that cup of tea now. Maybe something cold?

'Something cold. For me anyway. I don't know about Tonks.

Jane blinked at Tonks' pink hair.

Tonks screwed up her eyes for a moment and her hair turned a vivid green.

'Is that what's meant by Metamorph . . . whatever?' asked Jane.

'Metamorphmagus. Yes.' Tonks grinned.

'Ok, so what's an Auror?'

'Not unlike the Spanish Inquisition,' declared Snape emerging from the garden accompanied by Professor McGonagall. 'Except, of course, that no-one expects the Spanish Inquisition.'

'Our chief weapon is surprise,' agreed Tonks evenly.

'Fear and surprise?' enquired Jane.

'Fear, surprise and an almost fanatical devotion to the Minister,' Snape concluded.

'Snape, that is sick! You do know that?' said Tonks, revolted.

'And you missed out ruthless efficiency,' said Jane.

Snape looked extremely dubious. McGonagall just seemed bemused. 'Severus,' she murmured, 'would there such a thing as a cup of tea?'

'Just as long as you're not proposing moving in Minerva.'

* * *

Harry had heard several unfamiliar but entirely unforgettable expressions as Tonks helped him to carry his trunk up the narrow turning stairs. Grinning, he returned downstairs to find Snape pouring iridescent ink onto clean parchment that had been laid out over a small table in the middle of the floor. As he watched plans of the house and garden were drawn out. These completed, runes appeared. Finally Snape handed the parchment to McGonagall.

She pursed her lips. 'This doesn't look like your work Severus.'

'Miranda's.' Snape's voice was soft. McGonagall looked at him questioningly. 'She had a couple of books.' The silence lengthened. 'That information was quite sufficient. Given two or three apparently unrelated facts, Miranda could construct an entire theory and would usually be correct. She would have been invaluable to us.'

'What was she like?' asked Tonks.

'Ferociously bright, decent, funny . . .' Suddenly Snape appeared to snap to. 'You asked for tea, Minerva?' He strode out into the kitchen.

'Well,' said McGonagall. She rolled up the parchment. 'I have something for you,' she told Jane. As she snapped her fingers, a Gladstone bag appeared on the table. The parchment went into the bag and a wand came out. McGonagall offered it to Jane. 'This was made by my great grandfather, whilst he was at sea. He had been drinking in a dockside pub and woke up with a hangover, without his wand and eighteen miles off land. He was obliged to construct one with what came to hand: mermaid hair and borogrove.'

Jane took the wand and began to examine it closely.

'Borogrove?' said Harry, 'I thought that was just a poem.'

'A poem by a mathematician: Charles Lutwidge Dodgeson or Lewis Carrol. I'm doing Maths at university. 'Jane looked up, clearly delighted.' Thank you.'

'Well, if you decide to replace it, you can return it then.'

'What sort of wood is this?' asked Jane stroking the dull green with its oddly metallic graining.

'Borogrove.'

'Oh. Sorry. According to Humpty Dumpty, a borogrove was some sort of scruffy-looking bird,' said Jane. She smiled at McGonagall. 'But I always thought that borogroves were actually something like mangroves.'

'Just so. McGonagall actually smiled back as she accepted a cup of tea from Snape and sat down. They grow on floating islands in the South Sea. Muggles were forever stumbling across them until they were all made unplottable.' Jane gave Snape an exasperated look and then went into the kitchen.

'Dudley broke my wand,' said Harry.

'It's being repaired.' McGonagall sipped her tea. 'Mr. Ollivander is not a man to be hurried, especially not with that wand.

'So when will I get it back?'

'That will be for Professor Snape to decide.'

Harry took a deep breath. 'How long will I be staying here?'

'I'm sorry, Mr. Potter, we don't know.'

Jane came back with three glasses. 'Orange juice and tonic water,' she explained handing iced drinks to Tonks and Harry. When Harry tipped the drained glass back she smirked at him. 'Would you like some more?'

'I can get it,' said Harry. 'Half and half, right?'

Tonks handed Harry her own glass with only ice remaining. 'Yes please.'

'Potter's choice of so ostentatious a familiar is unfortunate.' Snape's lip curled. 'I regret that you will have to take the creature back with you.'

McGonagall sipped her tea and said nothing.

His house, thought Harry sickly, as he fetched a drink for Tonks. His own glass, he had rinsed and left on the draining board. Then he went out into the garden and waited for Hedwig. She came to him at once, hooting excitedly. With a heavy heart, Harry carried her into the house. Abruptly fur and claws struggled for purchase on his shoulder and then an enormous cat thumped to the ground and stood, white and black fur raised, back arched and hissing.

'She'll get used to it,' said McGonagall, tucking her wand into her sleeve. 'I did.'

'If you will recall, Minerva,' said Snape, steadying himself against a sofa back, 'it takes a great deal more energy to hide the use of magic than to actually use it. I must ask you to exercise some discretion.'

'Sorry Severus.' McGonagall did not sound in the least contrite. She stood up and put down her cup, snapped her fingers and the bag disappeared. 'Thank you for the tea.' She walked away.

Harry dropped to his knees in front of Hedwig who opened her mouth and gave a silent meow. 'Sorry girl. We'll have you back as soon as possible.' Hedwig butted her head into his stomach and he stroked her soft fur. After a while she began to purr.

* * *

'Wingardium Leviosa!'

Nothing happened.

Jane was sitting on the terrace steps attempting to levitate a seagull's feather that she had found on the beach. 'Are you sure I'm doing this right?'

Harry took the wand. 'Swish and flick. Like this.' He demonstrated the movement and handed back the wand.

'Wingardium Leviosa! Bugger!'

'That's not the incantation.'

'Isn't it?'

Snape and Tonks were in the kitchen cooking dinner. In practice this meant that Snape was cooking and Tonks was sitting well out of the way with a glass of wine.

'Wingardium Leviosa!'

Harry put his hand onto Jane's wrist and guided her though the movements. 'Again.'

'Wingardium Leviosa!'

Harry held onto her wrist and guided her again. 'Wingardium Leviosa!' The feather twitched. 'Breeze?' suggested Jane cautiously.

'I don't think so,' said Harry, letting go. 'Try again'.

'Wingardium Leviosa!' This time there could be no doubt. Jane gazed at the feather with an expression of awe. Then she snatched it up and ran into the house.

Harry stood up and stretched, a gesture echoed by Hedwig, who had been curled up on a cushion in the doorway, sunning herself. She had adapted surprisingly quickly to being a cat. He bent to scratch behind her ears and a resounding, rumbling purr was his reward. Harry ambled through to the kitchen to find Jane hugging Snape and chanting ' . . . I did it, I did it, I did it . . .'

'Quite,' said Snape, 'by all means open something.'

Jane threw open the fridge and pulled out a bottle of wine. 'Cava,' she said, happily undoing the wire cage and easing out the cork. Four glasses were filled and Jane proposed 'Wingardium Leviosa!'

Harry emptied the glass and then noticed that the others had only drank only a little of theirs. Jane refilled his glass, and he took another sip. Not butterbeer, but nice.

'Wingardium Leviosa!' The feather floated and Snape plucked it from the air.

'Enough,' he said lazily. 'Not in the kitchen.'

'What next?' Jane asked Harry.

'Incendio,' replied Harry, remembering a certain Quidditch match from his first year at Hogwarts.

* * *

'Incendio.'

Jane was sitting cross-legged on the floor, with Harry's first year 'Charms' textbook open beside her, attempting to light a fire in the fireplace. 'Sod it,' she said finally, finishing her wine. She rose fluidly, and fetched a bottle of Cava from the kitchen. She filled her own glass and turned to Harry. 'Be careful not to get too dehydrated,' she warned. 'Shall I get you a soft drink?'

'I'm fine,' said Harry, holding out his glass. Jane filled it.

Harry did feel fine. He had a bit of a headache, but it wasn't bothering him, and he felt more relaxed than he had in a very long time. He found himself telling Jane about Ron and Hermione and the troll that wasn't in the dungeons. When he told her about Fluffy she laughed out loud.

'You know I don't believe you?'

'Ask your father.'

'Fluffy?'

'Hagrid has some rather odd ideas about magical beasts. You have to be very wary of anything that he thinks is interesting. Hey, have you seen the book he set for us one year?' Harry got up. Most of his schoolbooks had been dumped in the library. Not this one. Harry went to fetch it from his trunk. While he was upstairs he drank a glass of water in the bathroom, then he went to his room and found the 'Monster Book of Monsters'. Stroking the book's spine he rendered it quiescent, untied it, and carried it downstairs. Then he closed it and put it down on the table. When Jane reached for it, it snapped at her, fell onto the floor and then attempted to bite her ankle. Jane hastily pulled her feet up onto the sofa and stared at the book wide-eyed as it scuttled underneath on its covers. Hedwig awoke and watched for a few moments before stalking over. Harry sat down to watch the interaction between owl-cat and mad book.

'Accio book!' Snape quieted the book and handed it to Harry. 'Put it away,' he said coldly. He turned to Jane. 'Dinner.'

Harry put the book away in his trunk and returned downstairs. In the kitchen a fourth place had been set at the table so he sat down and rather nervously finished his wine. Before he could protest, Tonks refilled his glass. As the others helped themselves to some sort of curry he realised that he was becoming rather drunk. He served himself carefully and concentrated on eating.

'Harry was telling me about a giant three headed dog. He's having me on, right?'

'Fluffy,' said Snape. 'Now resident in the forbidden forest, except on very cold nights, and whenever it's feeling lonely, which is apparently quite often, when it sleeps in Hagrid's hut.'

The curry was hot so Harry took a gulp of wine. There was a jug of iced water on the table and he would fill his glass as soon as it was empty. He was beginning to feel distinctly strange.

* * *

Harry knelt on the bathroom floor. His naked forearms rested along the toilet seat. He didn't actually remember going to bed the previous night, and he felt absolutely dreadful. Some time ago he had stopped being afraid that he might die. Right now he was afraid that he might not.

'Get up Potter.'

Had he really thought that it couldn't get any worse? Shivering, he sat back on his heels. He did not dare let go of the toilet in case he fell down the precipice that was threatening to swallow him up. He started to shake his head and stopped immediately.

'Drunk,' he mumbled, eyes tightly shut.

'That I can see,' said Snape. The unutterable bastard sounded amused. 'You would be well advised to exercise greater discretion, not to say caution. What would your fan club think? The "Boy who Lived" . . .'

'With his head down the toilet. Yes, I know. Only, I don't want to be him. I'm sick of it.' It had been an unfortunate choice of words. As his stomach began to tighten he just wished that Snape would go away.

Harry retched emptily.

As the thunder in his ears subsided, he could hear the tap running, and then Snape was bending over him. 'Drink this.' A glass was held to his mouth. Poison. Oh good, thought Harry. The liquid smelt of lemon and elderflower and with immense difficulty he managed to swallow some. The relief was almost instantaneous. He took another mouthful and then he took the glass from Snape's hand.

As he knelt in the darkness sipping, Harry realised that while he had never felt anything towards Snape for saving his life, for this he was grateful. 'Thank you,' he whispered sincerely.

'If there were another bathroom I'd have left you to it,' Snape growled. 'How much did you drink?'

'I don't know. Too much. Sorry.'

'Clean up.'

Snape left. Harry found a cloth and disinfectant. When he had finished he turned to the old bath. The worn enamel felt smooth and dry, almost powdery. He put in the plug, turned on the taps and locked the door. He had discovered that he was wearing his towel over his jeans.

When the bath was full he undressed, climbed in and lay down. Floating easily in deep warm water he watched as the sky grew brighter beyond the window.