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The Third Time is a Charm	By : ladyedgecombe Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Snape Views: 45346 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I don’t own the HP Universe. I admire. Rowling for entertaining us with her world of make believe. I don’t make any money from writing this story, I just like to have fun and borrow her characters for a while but I promise to put them back

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The Third Time is a Charm

Summary:
Warn-language, child abuse, M/M SS/HP AD/RW/HG bashing
Explicit sex scenes. Severus will be very OOC and a host of other characters.

Disclaimer: I do not own or have interest in any of the Harry Potter universe. I admire J. K. Rowling for entertaining us with her world of make believe. I do not make any money from writing this story, I just like to have fun and borrow her characters for a while.

CHAPTER 3: A Word with Severus

Harry actually drifted off to sleep for a few minutes. Since he hadn't been sleeping well for the last week or so, he stayed tired all day long. When he did the tempus spell, it showed he only had twenty minutes before his 'detention' with Severus. A quick shower and fifteen minutes later he was on his way to visit the 'greasy git'. Even though he didn't need to, he got under his invisibility cloak before leaving the dormitory. It had become a habit so he wouldn't be seen. He went through the common room and out the door undetected. When the portrait of the fat lady closed, he hugged the wall in the alcove as he saw Ron and Hermione were coming up the stairs, as usual having another heated debate.

"..and Ginny has decided to go to Professor Dumbledore and plead our case. We put ourselves in danger and we are not getting our bonus this year. She wanted to get new robes with the money and is very upset. I mean really, it's not like Harry will ever miss the money." Ron was speaking in a whisper but Harry could still hear him. It was a wonder that no one else could. If this was the way they were talking, it amazed him that he had not heard them before, or that no one else in the dorm knew about it. Don't they have any sense of discretion? The differences between Gryffindor and Slytherin were very noticeable when one was looking for it.

Hermione was now saying something about saving so she could go to university and needing the money for tuition. She wanted to go into the legal profession and help change the laws for enslaved creatures. That meant at least four more years after she graduated from Hogwarts. Harry breathed a sigh of relief when they disappeared into the common room and then he quickly went down the stairs and made his way to the potions classroom. His only thought was to get to Severus, he didn't dare think on what the others had said. It was still devastating, even knowing about their betrayal, to hear how they really feel about him and how they only want his money and not to be a friend.

Harry knocked very lightly on the door and waited for the smooth "enter" before opening the door and closing it behind him. Severus was standing, hip against the side of his desk, arms folded across his chest with a scowl on his face. The scowl changed to an expression of confusion when no one came through the door. "Harry?" he asked to the seemingly empty room. It still unnerved him that Harry could move around the castle like a ghost and had been doing it since first year.

Harry stepped further into the room and removed his cloak. "Yeah, Professor, it's me." Harry looked around the room to make sure they were alone. It wouldn't do for Dumbledore to be there and hear Harry call his supposedly most hated professor by his first name.

"You are late. Had problems getting here?" Harry was glad to hear the concern is his voice instead of the acidic tone the older man usually used but it was his undoing, as the tears started to well up and fall. Severus started to walk towards the young man, uncrossed his arms and looked at Harry as if searching for an answer on his face. Harry looked upset and he silently waited for his soul mate to answer. Yes they were soul mates (he took pleasure in the knowledge still); it was proved every time they just touched hands and a magical current ran through their skin. As if their magic recognized each other and couldn't wait to merge. Even now, Severus unconsciously stretched his arm forward to offer his hand for Harry to take. But Harry didn't take it just looked at it and Severus could see the silent tears slowly flowing down his cheeks one by one, making their way down high cheekbones and then dripping on his shirt.

Severus quickly warded the door with locking and silencing charms and whispered, "Harry, what's wrong?"

Harry started to answer but Severus could barely hear what he was saying. The tears were still coursing down to his face as if Harry didn't even know they were there. "The two of them were talking in the hallway, just in front of the Gryffindor Tower door. They were talking about not getting a bonus this year, you know? I mentioned that before." Harry's breath hitched as he tried to tell Severus what he overheard. "They said Ginny was going to speak with Dumbledore,,, as she had plans for the money and then they said I wouldn't miss the money anyway, so there was no reason to withhold it." Harry looked at Severus and then asked him,"Am I so hard to get along with, so undeserving of real friends and family, so horrible a person that I don't deserve to have someone 'befriend' me or that people have to be hired just to like me? Am I such a freak that I really don't deserve a life or to be loved? I feel as if I am only a weapon to the Wizarding world and then I could just quietly die and no one could care less except to fight over my money and property. Maybe my uncle is right, I am a freak and no one will ever care about me."

"No, you are not a freak," Severus firmly retorted, "you are not deserving of this, you were just unprotected and the wrong people infiltrated your life before the right ones found you." Severus put his arm around Harry's shoulder and continued, "Let's take this conversation into my private office. There are some other things we need to talk about before it gets too late and you have to return to Gryffindor." Severus actually considered putting this off another day, but knew there was really no other time. Harry would be leaving and they needed to go over this as soon as possible, but Harry was so distraught and he didn't want to cause the young man any more undue stress.

The two men passed through the hidden side door in the classroom to go into Severus' office. There, on the desk, were the statements from Gringotts, the Wizarding bank. These statements arrived as a response to a letter Harry had Severus send. Harry had signed a statement with a drop of his blood so that they could find out what was going on. The Gryffindor didn't get normal statements from the bank and he didn't know who did, but he signed a letter giving Severus permission to inquire about his account. Little did he know he was not ready for the answers that were about to come.

"Harry," Severus started speaking first to get Harry's attention, "we first have to find out who your enemies are, and then we will find out who your real friends are. We will start with your statements; it may shed some light on your missing funds and who withdrew them." He sat Harry down in the chair next to his desk and Severus sat down across from his younger soul mate, pulling out the parchment from the bank as he did so.

"Alright Sev, have you looked at them yet?" Harry asked but Severus shook his head and replied.

"I haven't had the time between classes, but before we start, did you eat? I didn't see you in the Great Hall during dinner."

"No, I wasn't hungry and I fell asleep." Harry said quietly. Severus looked at Harry's face and could see the dark circles under his eyes. He knew the child, no young man, had not been sleeping properly lately and this was just confirmation that maybe he should take some dreamless sleep potion tonight.

"Would you like some tea? We can call one of the house elves to bring some tea and biscuits if you are hungry." Harry just kind of shrugged but said nothing. "You should eat something, we could be here awhile." Harry nodded and Severus called upon an elf to order tea. The elf returned almost immediately with a porcelain pot of fragrant chamomile tea, chocolate biscuits and to Harry's delight, his favorite treacle tart. The tray also included some fresh fruit and a light cucumber sandwiches.

After Harry had eaten half a sandwich and a piece of treacle tart he did feel a little better. Then he looked at Severus and said, "Let's get started on those statements, they're not going to change or go away so we may as well get this over and done with."

Severus nodded and handed the parchments to Harry, they were after all, Harry's accounts. As Harry opened them and looked at the statements for a few minutes, he looked up at Severus, "I don't understand some of this, would you look at it and explain it to me?"

"Sure, Harry, that is why I am here." He smiled fondly at the young man and took the parchments back to start looking at them. Harry had a bad feeling about it when Severus remained expressionless as he looked at the statements more than one time from page to page as if cross referencing items from one page to the next. When a dark cloud shadowed his face, Harry's unease grew exponentially.

"Harry, do you remember at any time getting tutoring or extra study sessions with another instructor not at this school?

"No, why?

"There are expenses noted here as being paid, mostly out of your trust fund account but a few out of your parents vault. I am surprised about that; I didn't think Gringotts would allow your parents vaults to be touched until you were of age. It says here you went on vacation during Christmas holidays to Romania during first year. You went with the Weasleys to Egypt during summer before third year. There are tutoring fees as far back as three years before you started school, mostly paid to the Weasleys, Bill, Charlie, Arthur and Molly but some to Dumbledore too. There are notes here for payment to take you to an amusement park when you were ten and other amusement parks before that. Another statement has charges for premium box seats at the Quidditch World Cup; didn't you tell me you were high in the rafters? This says you bought six seats in the box next to the Minster of Magic's box. Those are the most expensive seats at the stadium.

"Mr. Weasley said he got the tickets from someone he knew at the ministry. I guess he forgot to tell me he paid for them with my money. We didn't sit in those seats so I guess he must have traded them in for the other ones because more people came. Bill and Charlie were there also. I bought programs and stuff for everyone with my own pocket money. They should have been buying them for me." Harry interjected before Severus continued.

"Harry, the price difference of those seats to the ones you actually had is twenty to one. You could have bought one hundred and twenty seats in the rafters for the price of the box seats." Severus interjected. "Did you know that you are the heir to Sirius Black's property and vaults?"

"No, no one told me."

"Harry, I don't know how to tell you this but, there is over a million galleons missing from your vault and your parents vaults." Harry's face went ashen. Severus didn't notice at first because he was still focused on the statements in front of him, so he continued as he recapped what he was reading as if he couldn't believe it either. "There are fees here for living expenses, vacation expenses, entertainment expenses, health expenses, tutoring expenses, security expenses and a wide variety of other miscellaneous expenses." Severus said incredulously. Now Harry started to breath heavily and Severus jerked his head up as he heard the teenager starting to hyperventilate.

"Damn!" he muttered under his breath. He accioed a calming potion and handed it to his mate but Harry didn't take it from him. When Severus took a closer look at Harry and noticed that his eyes were glazed over and he really wasn't seeing anything, he noticed the young man"s hands were shaking and so was the rest of his body. The professor quickly got up and went to Harry's side, gently held his face and was able to get him to drink the potion down slowly. When the potion vial was empty, Severus watched him closely, holding his hand, as he slowly returned back to the present.

"Are you feeling better?"

Harry nodded, "I don't understand, what expenses got paid? I have never been on a vacation in my life and my relatives always said I should be lucky that they took me in because I cost them too much money. I have never received even one stitch of new clothing the whole time growing up. I always had to wear Dudley's castoffs. The only new clothing I have ever gotten was what I bought with my money for school and I know I didn't take that much out of the bank. I didn't even know I had that much." While Harry was speaking he didn't notice he was becoming more vocal and his voice was actually getting shrill.

"Calm down, Harry. We knew that things haven't been right. We will not be able to straighten this out over owl post though; we'll have to plan a trip to Gringotts. You have one more day of classes then leave on the train three days after. Let's make an appointment to go as soon as the train gets to London. We can send a message to your relatives to not pick you up and I will meet you there, in disguise of course, and we will go together. At least then I can be sure you are safe and no one will try to stop you. Maybe you should tell everyone that your neighbor is coming to get you as your Aunt and Uncle are too busy or on an important trip, that way it won't seem strange when I meet you. Be sure to tell the people you would regularly confide in and maybe make a comment while passing through the walkway on the train. This is one time we will take advantage of everyone trying to find out what you are doing and putting their nose into you business." Severus said with a mile.

"Is this your Slytherin mind at work, Severus?" The older man just quirked an eyebrow as if wordlessly asking, 'What do you think?'

Harry was starting to feel better now that Severus was able to explain some things. He knew he had at least one person on his side; someone who actually cared for him. It really was strange when you thought about it. If you had told Harry six months ago this would happen, he would have most likely blown his temper and rushed into the common room and shouted at his two friends, letting everyone know what was going on and alerting every one of the perpetrators to what he knew about them. Now, Severus was teaching not only Occlumency lessons, but what Harry liked to call Slytherin lessons. He would eventually let the people who betrayed him know how much he knew but he would plan for his revenge with Severus at his side. Yes, things were bad, but they could be a lot worse.

It was almost curfew now and Harry knew he had to leave. The feeling of reluctance was very strong. He held on to Severus tightly around his waist as if holding on for dear life and buried his face in the crook of the other man's neck. Severus soothingly rubbed his soul mate's back, telling him that they would make this right and he would be free from the current circumstances soon.

"Harry, it is almost curfew, you don't want to be late getting back to the dorm. Remember to ward your bed after pulling the curtains closed, just as I taught you a few months ago. You need to be extra careful now that we have an idea of what has been going on."

"Yeah, I know. Don't want Ron attacking me while I am sleeping because he isn't getting his 'bonuses'." Severus knew what it was costing Harry to joke about that. It was such a personal blow to know that his friends were only his companions because they were getting paid. Soon they would know the extent of the damage to his vaults at Gringotts. He was actually looking forward to seeing the Goblins faces when they found out. They prided themselves on keeping everyone's money safe and didn't really like some wizards and their thieving ways. This would not go over well for the people involved on the receiving end of these transactions.

With one last soft kiss, Harry cloaked himself in his invisibility cloak and silently stepped out of Severus' office. He headed toward the Gryffindor rooms just as silently. When he reached the door with the fat lady, he whispered the password and slipped past the portrait. Hermione and Ron were sitting in front of the fire talking.

"So where do you suppose he is now?" Ron was saying.

"He is in detention, at least that is what he told us, but he should be coming in soon. We should keep an eye out for him so we can ask him. I'm sure Professor Dumbledore will want to know. Did you make note of what time he left?"

'What is this now', Harry thought, 'they keep track of my every movement? Don't I get any privacy? I'm sure glad Severus made a big fuss in the class and gave me detention in that snarly attitude of his. At least they won't be suspecting something from that.'

"No, I didn't really notice what time he left. He had that detention so I figured Professor Dumbledore already knew about it. Why report information he already knows?"

"How many times do I have to tell you, we should be keeping as accurate an accounting of his time as possible? It might be important!" Hermione, at this point, was almost shouting at Ron. Harry wanted to laugh and, in fact, covered his mouth with his hand to stay silent. They were really funny sometimes.

Harry, sitting on the stairwell to the dorm, decided to go up and get into bed. Today had been a very stressful day. Just as he went up about 4 steps, he heard Ron telling Hermione that he was going to wait 5 more minutes and then go to bed. She could wait up for Harry if she wanted so she could give Dumbledore an 'accurate accounting' of Harry's comings and goings. Ron was not losing sleep over that stupid loser.

Harry rushed up the remainder of the stairs and quickly got into bed where his night clothes were already laid out (courtesy of the elves) and closed his drapes and warded them so no one could open them or hear anything from inside. Let Ron deal with that. He wouldn't know for sure Harry was inside or if he had just warded his bed before gong to detention. He settled down, practiced his Occlumency exercises and eventually started to drift into sleep
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The Third Time is a Charm