Adult-FanFiction.org : Harry Potter

An Urn For Her Ashes	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Snape Views: 8570 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am making no money from this story.

Chapter List
- 2
- 3
- 4
Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter Three—Making Alliances, Making Gifts
            Severus slowly opened his eyes, feeling the cold hand that had brushed his brow retreating. He stood at the Dark Lord’s whispered command, although he kept his gaze on the floor in front of him until he heard the rough order to look up.
            The Dark Lord had become a strange creature in the last few years. Severus suspected—at the bottom of his soul, behind private Occlumency walls so strong that not even Albus had ever breached them—that the Elixir distilled from the Philosopher’s Stone hadn’t worked exactly as the Dark Lord had hoped. Either that, or he had added other potions and herbs to it, trying to achieve even more magical strength.
            Now he lounged on his throne, human from the waist up. From the waist down, he twisted into a pair of scaled trunks that resembled nothing so much as a split shark’s tail, at least in shape. He could bring them together to walk, and he could swim with a deadly grace and speed. Severus had seen scales ringing his wrists, too, in the rare moments when the thin sleeves around his arms fell back.
            It might make him harder to defeat. Since Severus had learned of the Horcruxes, however, he was not certain of that.
            “Interesting news you bring me, Severus,” the Dark Lord hissed softly. In the shadows beside him, his serpent moved, never far away, and always hoping that the Dark Lord would let her prey on whatever Death Eater was now kneeling in front of him. This time, however, his attention remained on Severus. “One would have thought you would bring it to me the moment the boy appeared.”
            “Without knowing everything?” Severus asked, raising an eyebrow. Sometimes he could get away with this, and other times he suffered. But with senses attuned to the Dark Lord in a way they’d never been to anyone save Lily, he thought he could risk it this time. “I didn’t know how the boy had survived at first, my Lord. Or the most dangerous secret, the one I revealed to you this evening.”
            The moment froze around him like black amber, and that was the moment when Severus thought he might not escape with his life. But the Dark Lord’s chuckle answered his gambit, rustling like paper on fire, and Severus lowered his gaze.
            “Yes. It does please me that Albus’s weapon should have a mind of his own and wish to turn against his master. I hope that Albus may know it, before I kill him.” The Dark Lord reached out and explored Severus’s jaw and mouth with fingers that Severus knew must have lost some of their sensitivity in the past year. He had seen the Dark Lord refuse to flinch from fire a few times, not even seeming to notice it. “And you will heed my instructions for getting rid of that weapon?”
            His hand tightened, making Severus’s eyes water as his teeth ground together. But he managed a nod nonetheless, and the Dark Lord retreated and began hissing to Nagini without paying any attention to him.
            Severus backed out of the room in a low crouch. Then he turned and made his way through the darkened, musty corridors of the house the Dark Lord had adopted as his own to the Apparition point.
            His eyes marked the placement of torch sconces, the doors that careless Death Eaters left open, the number of house-elves that worked here—always looking for small advantages, gaps in the defenses, ways that might hurt the Dark Lord. It had only been an intellectual exercise for years now. Severus had come to accept the Dark Lord’s ultimate triumph while hating it at the same time.
            Now he felt his memories leaping to life with the new insights behind his eyes, joining together, breeding like rabbits.
            Now, anything might be important.
*
            “What news do you bring us from the heart of Voldemort’s domain, Severus?”
            Severus watched the people around the table sway as if from wind in a wheatfield, and it occurred to him, for the first time, that Albus used that name almost exclusively to strike fear into others. When he was alone with Severus, the motive might be different, but not here, with Order members who had good reason to fear the Dark Lord.
            It would hardly do to display his emotions and his discoveries so openly, however. Severus simply bowed and murmured, “He knows of Potter, of course. He seems, at the moment, to dismiss him as a threat.”
            His eyes met Potter’s across the table. There was a faint lift to his lips that someone could mistake as many things. Only Severus knew it was a response to his own message, that he had told the Dark Lord the truth as they had planned, about Potter having his own mind.
            And Potter was thrilled. It meant the Dark Lord would dance to their tune, and not Albus’s.
            If this works. If we get it right.
            But the doubts would not help him right now, and Severus set them ruthlessly aside and continued to brighten the twinkle in Albus’s eyes. “He told me that I should have the task of killing Potter.”
            “You’d like to anyway, wouldn’t you?”
            Severus didn’t bother looking at Moody. “Silence your hound, Albus, or I will.”
            “Now, Severus,” Albus said, with one hand raised as though he was conducting an orchestra. “Alastor is allowed to have his reservations.”
            How did I not notice that he guides me in dislike of them as well? I wonder if part of it was that he thought I might seek to preserve Lily’s legacy, once I knew of it, and wanted to deny me allies.
            Severus paid no attention to Molly Weasley. He had sent her an owl telling her to leave her Floo open at home later that day, if she was interested in a message that might help guarantee Potter’s survival. She was turning a bit red now, but maintaining her silence.
            “And I am allowed to have my expertise on the Dark Lord,” Severus said, with a sneer that he knew should convince Albus Severus was still his tool if anything did. “He intends me to both succeed and fail.”
            “How is that?” Albus was almost leaning across the table now, one hand spread out as if that would coax Severus to speak faster.
            “He wishes me to destroy Potter for him but preserve the Horcrux,” Severus began, spinning out a lie he had hammered out with Potter last night. He held Albus’s gaze, and grimaced. Albus was the only one here, bar Potter, who knew the full story of his involvement with Lily. Albus was the only one who would attach the meaning to the words that Severus wanted. “He thinks he can prepare a vessel that will capture the shard of spirit as it flies.”
            “But Professor Dumbledore told us that Mrs. Potter’s spirit is wrapped around the Horcrux.” Hermione Granger, fussy and upright and her arms braced on the table as if she would push herself up to shake her finger at anyone who disagreed. “How are you going to take the Horcrux away from her? Shouldn’t she have changed it enough because she’s good and it’s evil?”
            And this is why the girl will never be brilliant, Severus thought, his disgust thick enough to float a ship on. Minerva might sing Granger’s praises in theoretical understanding, but Granger preferred theory to practice, and had never accepted that something which violated the rules or bent the laws--or broke them--might be practical or ensure triumph.
However, Severus need not exert himself or change his behavior to act as he always did around the Granger girl. He briefly held her eyes, then turned away, the very brevity saying what he thought of her interruption.
“He appears to think that the Horcrux is untouched by the spirit,” Severus told Albus. “That he can retrieve it and it will be whole. He wishes me to lure Potter into a trap and destroy his physical body only.”
Albus chuckled a little. “Does he think that a Horcrux survives the destruction of its physical vessel? The protective spells he has wrapped around the other Horcruxes argue otherwise.”
Careful, careful, Severus told himself, and allowed his body no motion. Albus is still clever, and you should have expected him to disbelieve at least part of your story.

            “He seemed to believe that a Horcrux contained in a living being might be different,” Severus muttered, and cast his eyes down as he allowed hostility to shade his voice. “I could not convince him that he might be wrong. In fact, he might be right.” He leaned back and crossed his arms and stared at Albus again. “How much does anyone know about living Horcruxes, Albus? They’re not exactly common.”
            Molly stirred as if she would open her mouth, but in the end, closed it again. Severus was as glad. It would never do to tip his hand when they might actually have a chance at winning the game.
            “I have had sixteen years to make a study, my boy,” said Albus. He put a hand on Potter’s shoulder. Potter stood up under his touch and radiated sincerity. Severus took a moment to admire that. His own acting job would have to hold up under considerable scrutiny from two powerful wizards, but Potter had maintained an illusory willingness to die that would have been beyond Severus.
            “I am confident in my conclusions,” Albus went on serenely, and abruptly turned and swept the whole table of the Order of the Phoenix with an appealing gaze. “Would I ever sacrifice a young life needlessly? Or, one could say, two lives, joined together?’
            One life, Severus thought. Haunted by memories. He stared at Potter with an expression he hoped would come across to Albus as seeking and not finding the answer in Potter. And of course you would sacrifice people, Albus. You always have. You’re in love with the poetry and the romance of it, sending people off to martyrdom and speaking movingly of what the world lost in them.
            I’m not even sure if you would have the barrier of guilt in this case, though. How much do you believe in Potter as his own person? How much, to you, is he Lily, her second chance at life?
            “Of course you would never do that, Professor Dumbledore.” Granger was sitting like a soldier at attention, all her worshipful young righteousness concentrated on Albus. “I’m—sorry, Harry. I would have liked a chance to get to know you better.”
            Potter gave her a soulful smile. “It’s all right. I’m glad that you got the chance to know this much of me. And you know the best parts of me, anyway. My mum’s soul, and my willingness to die for the sake of the world.” He bowed his head, but otherwise stood there unbending under Albus’s touch.
            Severus’s breath came short for a moment. Potter was good. He wove his armor of courage and heroism, in a way that Severus had woven his of shadows and concealment, and he made others fall in love with an illusion.
            Severus wished he could be alone with Potter right now, in a place they could speak freely of how he had learned to do that. He must have learned by himself, or rather from the opposite of the example that Albus had set him, since he had no one to teach him.
            “I would have liked,” Molly said suddenly.
            Albus turned to her, all benignant brightness. “Yes, Molly?”
            But faced with Albus, or perhaps, as Severus hoped, remembering the note that had offered her some hope to save Potter, she backed down. She slumped back in her chair and only shook her head at Potter. “I wish the same thing,” she said hoarsely. “That I could have known you better. And that you could have known my boys.” She swallowed. “They were proud to die for the war. I was proud to let them.”
            And the truest sign of Albus’s blindness is how he accepts that, Severus thought, as Albus began a speech in praise of the Weasley twins. He seemed to have forgotten that this was a woman who would sacrifice anything for her children, who would have placed their lives before the whole world, and who had slaughtered two Death Eaters who had taken her daughter prisoner. She would have done the same thing to the twins’ captors if she could have reached them in time.
            Albus thinks everything is subordinate to his own vision. He can’t imagine someone not serving it unless they’re allied with the Dark Lord. Not now.
            But Severus saw the way Molly looked at the table instead of Albus even as she nodded along to his speech, and he smiled in the innermost secret places behind his Occlumency barriers. Yes, she was ripe for conversion.
*
            “Severus?”
            The stunned whisper Molly uttered as Severus moved through the fire gratified him more than he cared to admit. As it was, he only inclined his head and drew the cloak from his shoulders, then turned to help with Potter’s. The more kind gestures he could make towards the boy, the more they stood a chance of convincing her. “Hello, Molly.”
            Potter took over from there, bar a slight shudder as Severus touched him. “Hello, Mrs. Weasley,” he said, and stepped forwards to take her hands between his, radiating charm. “I’m so happy you agreed to meet with me.”
            Molly left off staring at Severus to grasp Potter back, and then catch him in a hug that he bore gracefully. Severus watched their flame-bright hair mingle for a moment before he turned and cast the necessary spells that would tell him if there was anyone else in the house.
            No. Of course, Molly’s youngest children were at Hogwarts, but her husband had spent much time with her since the loss of the twins. It appeared as if she had followed the instructions in Severus’s note to the letter, however.
            “I’ll do anything I can to save you,” Molly whispered, and stepped back to stand staring at Potter with eyes like stars. Severus had last seen those eyes when she was after the Death Eaters she’d killed. “Isn’t it bad enough that one mother died for you already, and you never got to know her?”
            Potter flushed a little. “I do have her memories, Mrs. Weasley.”
            “Call me Molly.” In short order, Molly had them both settled on either side of a polished wooden table, and biscuits full of sugar in front of them. Severus took one, although the sweetness crunched like sand between his teeth. “And it’s not the same. Never the same…” She paused and focused on the middle distance, then looked at Potter again. “Did Albus ever have any witch in to teach you or raise you?”
            Potter looked a little confused, but answered readily, “No, Mrs.—Molly. He thought he was enough of a dad for me.”
            Molly closed her eyes and swallowed enough breath for a burst of righteous wrath. Severus hid his smile behind a mask of grave attention and another biscuit. They had her now.
            “It’s exactly as I expected!” Molly exclaimed, slamming her hands down in the middle of the table. The plates and Potter both leaped. “That man never had children! And he never treated you like a child, either, dear,” she said to Potter. “Otherwise, how could he consent to sacrificing you?”
            Tears shone in her eyes. Potter took her hand and patted it a little, shooting Severus a look. Severus waited. Potter would have to do this by himself.
            Or perhaps not. Molly was well on the way to joining their side, keeping the argument running against an invisible Dumbledore.
            “Why did he wait until you were seventeen to introduce you to us?” she demanded of Potter.
            “He thought it would be too dangerous—”
            “It was so he could present you as being of legal age and having the right to die if you wanted to!” Molly’s pointed finger nearly hit Potter in the nose. He moved a little back and looked at Severus. Severus silently shrugged and kept watching Molly. “So we would think of you as an adult, and not a child! A calculated, disgusting move!” She was huffing so hard that Severus wouldn’t have been surprised to see fire come out of her nose.
            Potter blinked, once, twice. Severus wondered if the boy was caught off-guard by the depth of Molly’s indignity, her way of expressing it, or something else. Severus had warned him what to expect.
            Then Potter smiled.
            His smile would have revealed too much to Molly had she not been caught up in ranting, and Severus nudged Potter in the side. Potter at once bowed his head and went back to playing the part they had agreed on, the sacrificial lamb who was astounded to have someone trying to lead him a different way.
            But the smile had revealed much to Severus, as well. Besides the burning desire to live, there was something in Potter that could take joy in other people fighting for him, and in manipulating them to do so. Even if they had been able to approach other members of the Order openly, Severus thought suddenly, Potter would not have wanted to. He would have preferred to do it like this.
            A sensation Severus found hard to describe unfolded in him. But if he had had to describe it, he would have said that his inner predator was stirring and sniffing the air.
            There was the scent of another like it, nearby.
            “…And that’s why he never introduced you to me,” Molly finally wound down. “He knows I wouldn’t stand for it.” She stood there fuming, her face blazing and her wand bouncing gently up and down in her palm. She didn’t seem to realize she’d drawn it.
            Potter cleared his throat when some moments had passed in silence. “You won’t stand for it? I mean, now? Not just that you wouldn’t if you’d met me when I was a boy?”
            He had the perfect eyes for this, Severus thought. Large enough not to need widening, and so bright and vivid they were hard to forget. He didn’t even think his own preference for Lily’s color was warping his judgment on this.
            “Of course I won’t,” Molly said, and turned to Severus. “Why did you decide to bring him here, Severus? Not that I’m not grateful, but I didn’t think you’d care whether James Potter’s son lived or died.”
            Severus tilted his head to the side so that his hair fell down in a sheer black curtain over his face. He had his own natural advantages, and he had had twice Potter’s lifetime to learn how they suited him. “But he is also Lily’s son. You forget.”
            Potter didn’t narrow his eyes at Severus or make any other motion of doubt. That was quietly pleasing, Severus decided. It meant he hadn’t decided that Severus was going back on his word and doing this to honor the “spirit” of Lily that lived inside him, instead of to help Potter himself live. Potter kept all his attention on Molly instead.
            “I did forget. I do forget.” Molly turned back to Potter with a stricken expression and came around the table to hug him. “Poor boy! You must be so tired of everyone reducing you to your parents.”
            “I am,” Potter breathed.
            You’ve created a monster, Albus, Severus thought in some satisfaction. Or you would have if he’d decided that he wanted to rule or join the Dark Lord instead of simply live. With that will…
            Severus regretted, with a force he rarely spent on trivial twists of fate, that Potter had not come to Hogwarts as a student. After all, he would probably have been Sorted into Slytherin, and Severus would spend more than a single moment getting to see the expression that would put on Albus’s face.
            “Now we have to decide how we’re going to do this.”
            Another nice point of plotting with Gryffindors, Severus decided, was that they would convince themselves and then get straight to the point, without demanding more explanations.
            He nodded. “I have some ideas.”
*
            “I expected you to show more enthusiasm.”
            Severus could have called the words back as soon as he spoke them. He should not have let Potter’s grim, glazed eyes irritate him as they began to walk through the corridors of Hogwarts towards Severus’s quarters. They had agreed that, if Albus found them and needed a story, Severus would say that he had found the boy on his way to try and find a Horcrux, and had brought him back to scold him.
            “For the plan?” Potter shook himself like an otter. “Yes. I do. I have to admit that even if I die, it’s a less certain chance than it would be if I listened to Albus.”
            His voice was low. They weren’t passing any portraits at the moment—Severus had discreetly removed them from this section of corridors long ago—but Severus admired his caution.
            “Then?”
            Potter looked at Severus and frowned. “There’s something I’m trying to come to a decision on. It’s one of those tricky things where I don’t know how many of the emotions are my own and how much are gleaned from my mum’s memories.” He stopped and turned around to face Severus. “You were in love with her.”
            Severus crouched a little. “You dare.”
            “It wasn’t a question. It was a fact. I know that from her memories.” Potter shrugged once, and then leaned in and said, “That’s why I don’t know the truth of what I’m feeling right now. Her emotions or mine? I don’t know.”
            “What emotions—”
            Severus was prepared for a punch or a curse. Perhaps Potter was reliving the moment when Severus had turned his back on Lily and felt ready to strike at him.
            He was not expecting a kiss.
            Potter leaned in and brushed his lips up and down across Severus’s, then from side to side. He did it all slowly and thoughtfully, as though he wanted to see what the taste of Severus’s mouth was more than anything else.
            Severus shoved him away a moment too late. There was no doubt what he was feeling. Shock.
            Potter nodded once, eyes on him, and said softly, “I thought so.” Then he turned and melted away up the corridor.
            Severus found his way into his own quarters and sat down on his favored chair in front of the fire, clearing his mind the way he would if he wished to practice Occlumency. He stared into the flames and concentrated on their patterns.
            He did not think.
*
Joy: Thank you so much!
starr: Not evil as such; Dumbledore is still not Voldemort. But he didn’t look that hard to find a solution other than destroying the Horcrux in Harry.
Jan: Thank you! Here’s the third chapter.
- 2
- 3
- 4
You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.
Report Story

An Urn For Her Ashes