Unleashed | By : lordoberon Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Snape Views: 17651 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 3 |
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling does. I make no money in the writing of this fanfiction. |
NOTE: This chapter quotes some of the content from Book 7, Chapter 33, "The Prince's Tale", of the U.S. Edition
I was hesitant to use it, but it felt necessary to this fanfic and Harry's character development.
Thank you so much for reviewing! I made this chapter a little longer as a thank-you.
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UNLEASHED
by lordoberon
A Snarry fanfic
Ch. 5
Harry
=====
There was a burning red convulsing in every direction…and pain flooding every limb…but then, suddenly, they all needled down to one red point.
The point expanded. It became a red blob. Then the blob grew waves, and fine hairs, and suddenly, it was a head, and the person was laughing.
With her laughter, the face became clear. The young girl sat in a copse of trees next to a playground. Her fire-red hair swathed her shoulders, contrasting the clean white of her blouse. She was slender and beautiful. Freckles dotted her nose. Her eyes were a brilliant shade of green.
The vision focused on her laughing face, and then it spread out. A boy sat across from the redhead, also laughing. He wore strange clothes – a too-large shirt with crooked buttons, and trousers that showed his ankles. A bright green cloth was twisted around one wrist. He had long, unruly hair with a badly-cut fringe that he kept shoving out of his eyes. He was pale.
Their mouths moved, but no sound came out. Then, suddenly, came one sentient reference in the blurry pain and sight of the two – “Lily.”
From there, they came in a flood. The two were always together. First, their meeting – he, a young boy, delighted in finding that the girl he kept watching was, like him, magical – then, leaving on a familiar train to a place that felt like home – later, her anger, as he began to associate with unpleasant characters –
What stood out, though, was the man who gripped her picture tightly, as tears rolled down his face. What stood out was the man who stood amidst a group of fearful minions in white masks, and stepped forward boldly, to speak to the horror who was front-and-center of the group.
Then there was – yes, he remembered this person – Dumbledore! He was standing behind his desk and speaking to Snape – Severus Snape, yes, that was the man who had been a boy in previous memories – but Harry couldn’t hear what he said.
Harry. His name was Harry.
Then the name Potter bled through, once, twice…and Snape said, “I thought…all these years…that we were protecting him for her. For Lily.”
…again, darkness. Then, in the same scene, Dumbledore – “How many men and women have you watched die?”
“Lately, only those whom I could not save,” said Snape. Then he stood up. “You have used me.”
“Meaning?”
“I have spied for you and lied for you, put myself in mortal danger for you. Everything was supposed to be to keep Lily Potter’s son safe…”
Again, key words missed, his mouth moved, but Harry could not read his lips.
Dumbledore: “But this is touching, Severus. Have you grown to care for the boy, after all?”
Snape was silent. But the fury in his face, the outrage at some hurt that Dumbledore was giving him – some harm to Harry? – told everything. The answer was clearly yes.
Instead of admitting it, Snape waved his wand. “For him? Expecto Patronum!”
A silvery doe, beautiful and delicate, burst from his wand and danced around the office room before disappearing.
“Still? After all this time?” Dumbledore’s voice was quiet.
“Always.”
Harry wanted to keep the vision of the doe in his mind. He knew whom it meant, and it brought an immense comfort awash over him. He wanted to keep her with him. And the man who had conjured it, with so much fury in him, for Harry’s sake, instead of at Harry…
Who was he, really? Who was Severus Snape? Harry burned to know.
But before he could grasp it, or know anything, he plummeted back into pain.
Harry woke up, but he didn’t open his eyes. He kept as still as possible, and thought.
Severus Snape had known his mother when they were children. He had told her about Hogwarts – and Petunia, accidentally – and he had watched her. He had tried his best to keep her friendship, and later, her safety during Voldemort’s first rise…
And he had loved her, more than he cared for anything or anyone else, it seemed.
And somewhere within him…he carried something for Harry, as well. What that was, Harry didn’t know. But he had the feeling it was something good, something protective. And the idea that Severus Snape felt something good towards him was like a bolt through his system.
It felt alien to have Snape wish him well. Yes, Snape had saved his life before – but hadn’t that been obligation, playing his part for Dumbledore? It had all been a fraud, when actually Snape was as selfish as Harry thought him, and as subservient to Voldemort as any Death Eater…right?
But…There was truth in the memories Harry had seen. They had not felt like the warped memories that Slughorn had modified for Harry last year. They had felt real, and the emotions visible in Snape in all of them had felt real. Harry was one who went for his instinct, when Ron might hesitate, and Hermione would analyze.
Something in him said it was real. Snape was just a man, after all. He was not Voldemort, who had no ability to love. He was a man, with a past and a future, a time and a place. He had grown and known before and beyond Harry. He had been a Death Eater…but who he was now, part of that was his love for Lily. For it had been there – a deep, yearning, aching thing, living within him for years, driving him – and maybe it still was. “Always.”
Harry hoped he was right. But…it couldn’t be! It was too ludicrous. Maybe he had only dreamed those visions, thinking they were memories…
Why would Snape have sent him those memories? What had happened? He was burning…his skin itched…Harry tried to scratch it, and a hand grabbed his tightly.
“Don’t,” the man said harshly. It came out a growl.
Harry opened his eyes.
The man holding his hand so tightly was Snape. He looked like the walking dead. His face was paler than Harry had ever seen it, his hair not only greasy, but unkempt. His robes hung dully on his frame, and there was a familiar frown etched into his face.
Harry supposed he should be angry with Snape…but then the question came in, why? He was so tired…much like Snape looked.
“Wh…what happened?” He croaked.
Snape sighed heavily. It was a deep, haunted sigh, longing for relief and for sleep. Harry searched the dark eyes for an answer before Snape said, quietly, reluctantly, “The demons…took you over again. A fellow student was injured, but he’ll be alright. You broke his wand as well, but he’ll get another. I…” he cleared his throat, “took great risks. But you’re all in one piece. The itching will leave within a day. It’s Madam Pomfrey’s cure for burns.”
“Burns?”
The man grunted, conjured a chair, and sat on it heavily. “Burns. I hit you with fire to repress the demons. Well, I suppose repress isn’t quite the word…torture would be more accurate.”
He smirked, and a little light returned to his eyes that hadn’t been there before. But then he was all doom and gloom again.
Somehow that made Harry angry. He didn’t understand anything right now, and he itched all over; he wanted to sleep, but he didn’t think he would be able to.
“How long will I be here?”
“Just one day, Potter,” the Potions Master sighed. “Then we can return to our party in my neck of the woods.”
Back to the dungeons? Ugh. It was so dark and cold and smelly down there. “Hmf.” Harry shut his eyes. Then words shot out of his mouth before he could stop them: “Get some sleep.”
“…What?”
Argh. Why had he said it? He shouldn’t care at all. So what if Snape was tired? Harry shifted onto his side, determined to keep his eyes closed. He didn’t want to think, or talk, especially when things were so Merlin damn confusing. “You heard me.”
The Potions Master coughed. “I heard you, you whingeing fool. You never did learn to respect authority.”
“Of course not, professor.”
He lay as still as a stone, itching all over. When he reached a hand to scratch again, he was handed a vial, and dutifully drank it. Then sleep rolled over him again.
When he woke, it was to the sound of swearing. Harry kept his eyes closed, listening. He hadn’t heard quite so many uses for a broomstick before. It was even funnier coming from Snape. Before he could stop it, a snort of laughter choked out of him.
Immediately the low voice was hovering over him. “Awake, eh? Good. The guinea pig is ready for testing.”
Harry shot up to a sitting position. “Guinea pig! I’m not your experiment!”
Snape shot a glare over his shoulder, and hefted a sizeable cauldron across the room, to where Harry lay, again, on that blasted couch.
“You are,” he hissed, setting the cauldron down on the floor in front of the couch, “because there is no alternative. Nothing I give you will kill you. Minerva said to start small.”
“‘Nothing I give you will kill you.’ Is that supposed to make me happy?”
Snape smirked at Harry in a sidelong glance while tapping a vial with some golden, shimmery substance inside of it. “No, Potter. If my goal was to make you happy, our relationship now would be different.”
Harry frowned. His tongue stuck to his mouth and he felt foggy from sleep. Snape’s jarringly ordinary replies caught him off guard, and he didn’t know what to say. He sat up more, and glared at the golden potion in the small vial.
“What will it do to me?”
Snape rolled his eyes. “Don’t you know the meaning of a guinea pig? This is a test. I don’t know what it will do. Drink up.”
His insides squirming, Harry reluctantly took the vial and gulped it down in one go.
It tasted…delicious. This was the first thing that Harry registered. He was so used to potions tasting nasty, it was alarming to have a tasty one. The only thing he could compare it to was…
“The Lucky potion…Felix…it tastes sortof like that…”
Snape had a spelled quill busily writing down what Harry had said immediately. “And?”
Harry’s stomach was suddenly not queasy anymore. Instead, it felt strangely light. His entire body felt light, like he could float away at any second.
“I feel like I have helium inside me…like a balloon…like flying in Quidditch, I mean.” Were wizards familiar with helium and balloons?
“I’m not a Pureblood, Potter, I know what a balloon is. And I’m not an idiot wizard who doesn’t expose himself to the Muggle world sometimes, either.”
The comment made Harry wonder what Snape would look like with Muggle clothes on. He couldn’t quite picture it. He remembered the time Neville’s dementor had appeared as Snape in a dress and the memory made him laugh.
“What’s so funny?”
Harry couldn’t stop laughing. He bent over, laughing louder and louder. When the laughter reduced him to gasps, he felt the pain of it twanging in his side.
“I…can’t stop…”
His fingers were tingly now. And he had a sudden memory of times when he had scared Dudley with his wand over the summer, and when Ron and the twins had rescued him with the flying Ford Anglia, and when he had seen his parents in the Mirror of Erised…
“I think I should start flying right about now,” he laughed, but nothing happened.
“Why is that?” Snape had a smirk curling his mouth still. Did he have to be so amused with everything?
Harry didn’t want to reveal it, but somehow he seemed unable to be cautious and keep it to himself. “Happy memories. You know, like J.M. Barrie’s – I suppose you don’t know it -”
Snape rolled his eyes. “Peter Pan, yes, I know. If I trusted you with a wand I would tell you to try a Patronus. If you can do that, then the demons are considerably weaker. But I don’t think we’re there yet.”
The words went in one ear and out the other. Harry’s entire body was tingly now. He stood up suddenly as a burst of energy rushed into him. Without comment, he slipped past Snape and ran down the corridor out of the room. Immediately the professor was running after him, bellowing something. Harry laughed as he doubled back and ran past Snape. He felt like he could run forever!
He ran around the room, leapt onto the bed and bounced across it, and then vaulted over the back of the couch to flop back onto it. There, with a sigh, he lay with a smile on his face. It seemed like a strange, beautiful strain of music was percolating in the background. His body felt strong, and he itched to cast spells with his wand. He would make fireworks appear, and a Patronus just to show Snape up.
“Hmmm.” Snape returned to his chair, and then recited aloud for his attentive quill:
“Giddy. High energy. Unstoppable laughter. Increased stamina in comparison to demon possession; more like a normal young man’s stamina…Happy.”
He leaned forward, a smile on his own face. “How do you feel now?”
Harry shut his eyes and pushed his head further into the pillow. “Good. I wish I had my wand, though…”
He knew he never smiled at Snape, this thought bounced in the back of his head, but by some odd work of the potion he found himself doing so. He turned and asked, “Can I have mine back?”
The Potions Master’s smile fell. He sat frozen for a moment, and then leaned back. “No.”
Harry shut his eyes and lay back down. Snape tipped forward once more. “Potter, I want you to lie very still. I’m going to check on the status of the demons.”
Harry did as he was told, and waited. When Snape returned to the world, his eyes were bright. Exhaustion fell from his features. Harry had never seen Snape look this happy, except in those boyhood memories with Lily…
“It’s working,” Snape told him. “Your core is stronger.”
Harry yawned suddenly. “Yes, but…you still won’t give me my wand back.”
Frustration tickled at him, and he couldn’t help it, even though maybe frustration would bring the demons on. He wanted to be able to do little things; he understood now, after the damage he’d done, that he would be stuck in this dungeon a long while. But how could he help Snape, without his wand?
When he voiced this opinion, Snape stood up, packed his cauldron things, and walked towards the door. “No. You’re far too dangerous. But here, have something to do -”
He left down the hall to his office, and when he returned, he plonked a pile of books on a conjured table next to Harry.
“Homework. Your dear little friends brought it.”
Harry sat up. “Ron? Hermione? How are they?”
Snape scowled at him as if it was a personal insult for Harry to inquire about his friends. “Coping.”
With that, he whirled away back to his office.
Harry pulled the table closer to him with a groan, and got to work. What else was there to do?
=====
Severus poured himself a glass of Firewhiskey and sat down at his desk. He usually liked to keep his off time in his quarters only, but with Potter there, he couldn’t. Not now. Not after Potter had nearly killed him…not after seeing the burns he had created all over Potter’s torso, before Madam Pomfrey had shooed him away…not after just seeing Potter run around his quarters like a giddy child, and wishing he could have Potter for himself, and that Potter would one day actually feel at home with Severus…and not after that beautiful smile that Potter had flashed him, drugged under the potion…
He had been a gawky boy once, but now he was a man. Beyond his body though, which Severus longed for, was the beatific smile. Severus rarely got the privilege of seeing it, and never was it directed at him. The smile had been in Potter’s eyes too, glowing in the brilliant green.
Severus cursed, and emptied the glass of Fire Whiskey. Having Potter around him was too much. When the young man wasn’t possessed with murderous demons, his mere presence in the room was a torture.
Plus, something had changed. Ever since they had left the Hospital Wing earlier today, Potter had been very quiet. Severus had waited to give himself time to think about it, but now that he had it, worry prickled through his body and left him cold.
What did Potter think of the memories Severus had given him? He had retrieved them, duly, but that did not mean Potter forgot them. He would know that Severus had known his mother Lily…had loved her…and couldn’t stop, even now.
It was horrifying to think that the boy knew Severus’ best-kept secret. Dumbledore had urged him over the years to share it with Harry, but he never could. How could he? It would only put him one step closer to revealing how he felt about Harry. When had he started calling him Harry in his head? Bollocks. Telling Harry his secret, he had argued, would jeopardize his position as a double agent in the midst of Death Eaters. This was the excuse he had used to fend off Dumbledore’s eager urgings. Dumbledore thought that if Harry knew, then the relationship between him and Severus would improve.
What if it didn’t?
The real reason that Severus had taken so long to reveal the secret was that he was terrified. Severus was not scared of many things that would put another, stronger man to tears…but to have the Potter boy reject him, when he actually saw beyond the façade and knew some of the contents of Severus’ heart...
And tell Harry his feelings? A rejection after that would feel even worse. He would rather live miserably for years – as he had been – than risk that blow again. Lily’s had been bad enough.
He nursed his next glass of whiskey slowly, remembering the anger and sorrow flashing at him from another beautiful pair of green eyes.
So distant was he, that he missed it when the door opened.
“Can you tell me…what she was like? What she was really, really like.”
Severus head shot up at the same time that he brought his wand forward. He stood, shaking, staring at the young man that was leaning awkwardly against his office door. Potter’s hair was mussed more than usual, and he looked tired. He held a few leaves of parchment to his chest like some sort of shield, but gave no more than a glance to the wand in Severus’ hand.
“How did you get in?” It came out a growl.
Potter shrugged. “You forgot to lock it, like some sort of dunce.”
“Hmph.” Severus gave a baleful frown and sat back down in his chair. “Get out. Now.”
“No. I asked you a question,” Potter spat, “And I was nice about it. Are you going to answer?”
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