Adult-FanFiction.org : Harry Potter

Morgaine\'s Thread	By : Escritora80 Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Snape Views: 17362 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: This is a work of fanfiction set in the Harry Potter universe – all recognisable characters and settings are the property of J. K. Rowling and her associates. No copyright infringement is intended. No profit is made from this work.

Chapter List
- 1
- 2
Warnings: AU (no HBP or DH), some violence, blackmail and coercion (of a sort), forced bonding, blood magic, sex magic, frottage, quasi-exhibitionism, angst, bottom!Harry. Umm, and OOC!Snape, for reasons that will soon become clear.

Summary: Harry understood the dangers to himself when he broke magical law to save Snape's life, but he didn't realize that Snape would end up returning the favour that same night with unexpected consequences. Now Snape wants compensation for his "injuries" and the wave of popularity he has suffered as a result. Harry has to decide if he's willing to risk his heart as readily as he risked his life.

Chapter One

"First hall to the right, second staircase to the left," Harry muttered.

He knelt on the floor just inside the doorway of a dark, empty classroom, huddled under his invisibility cloak with his lit wand in one hand and the Marauder's Map in the other, carefully navigating a route through the castle to the lower dungeons. The name Bellatrix Lestrange floated over the yellowed parchment not far from the statue of the one-eyed witch, only two corridors down from where Harry had stopped to get his bearings, but it was another name, motionless from the time he'd first opened the map, that filled Harry's heart with fear.

"Move, you stubborn bastard," he said, nudging the name with his wand as if he could somehow prod its owner into action, but Severus Snape remained where he was, rooted to a hallway in the lower dungeons, the very place Harry was trying to reach.

First hall to the right, second staircase to the left, he repeated to himself, waiting until Bellatrix had moved further away before he stuck the map in his trouser pocket, stepped out of his hiding place and ran along the pitch-black hallway in the direction he'd chosen as the safest, quickest way to get to Snape. He prayed the staircases didn't change on him in the meantime.

The infiltration of Death Eaters into Hogwarts, first spotted by Nearly Headless Nick on the third floor, had come to light just as the students were getting ready for bed. Professor McGonagall had gathered Harry and his fellow Gryffindors in the common room with strict orders to stay inside. It was more experience than ego that brought Harry to the conclusion that he was the real target of the attack, and he'd pulled out the Marauder's Map so he could see which of Voldemort's followers had been sent this time. He hadn't expected to see Snape's name frozen in place on the parchment. Fearing the worst, he'd impetuously decided to conduct his own search and rescue. His cloak made it easy for him to sneak out unnoticed during the chaos following McGonagall's announcement, and his map allowed him to avoid his enemies while plotting the best path to take through the castle.

His reasons for disobeying the rules and running headlong into danger were more personal than what Hermione deemed his 'hero complex.' It had started in his sixth year during a chance detention that had included re-labelling all the specimen jars in Snape's office by hand. Snape had demanded that Harry's penmanship be perfect, making him write out the labels again and again until Harry's fingers were cramping. The arrival of a Slytherin in search of Snape to break up a fight in their house's common room had given Harry a moment's reprieve, and he'd taken advantage of the time alone to explore the room while his fingers recovered.

Snape's office hadn't afforded much entertainment, but a stack of textbooks half-hidden beneath a long, black cloak on Snape's desk had served as a momentary distraction. The books had all been related to Potions, of course, except for a volume on Ancient Wizarding History that featured a stern rendition of Merlin's face as its cover illustration, enchanted so that the famous wizard's eyes would follow you around the room in a disturbing, paranoia-inducing way. Harry had cracked open the history book out of sheer, restless boredom, but it was what he'd found between the pages that truly caught his attention. Wedged between chapters on the Arthurian Age and the Wizarding Renaissance had been a photograph of a young Snape, aged sixteen or seventeen, at what had appeared to be a Slytherin Yule celebration, a jaunty paper crown smashed down on his head and his face occasionally obscured by the dark hair of the male classmate he was snogging.

There had been something so mesmerising about watching a teenage Snape shove his tongue into another boy's mouth that Harry had found himself pocketing the photograph when the sound of footsteps on stone had alerted Harry to the adult Snape's return. On his way back to the dormitory that night, he'd told himself he nicked the photo to show to his friends so they could all have a good laugh at Snape's expense, but in the end he never showed it to anyone else, not even Ron. Over time, he'd found himself studying the way Snape's fingers slid across the boy's shoulders, up his neck and into his thick, dark hair, imagining he could hear Snape's moans as the boy's hand would disappear mysteriously beyond the bottom edge of the photo. In less than a week, he went from merely watching the two boys to mentally inserting himself into the picture as Snape's partner, and his imagination had taken off from there.

A photograph, that's how it began, that strange infatuation with Snape that had taken hold of Harry's thoughts, haunting him through the rest of his sixth year. When Harry had requested to spend the summer at Grimmauld Place, it had been Snape who grudgingly watched over him between bouts of spying and potion-making, and Harry's feelings had grown without him even realising what was happening. It was incredible, impossible, and if Sirius had been alive to witness it, he would have yanked Harry out of the country altogether in a bid to weed out those feelings before they took solid root. As it was, Harry's feelings had been allowed to run rampant, and what had started out as harmless teenage lust mellowed into something deep and serious.

By the beginning of his seventh year, he'd admitted to his friends that he was gay, but his humiliating feelings for Snape were still a secret, more out of a need to preserve his ego than out of fear of what his friends might think. It hadn't been a happy revelation, after all -- even if Snape hadn't been twice Harry's age and his professor, there was the undeniable fact that Snape despised Harry. Trelawney herself couldn't have predicted a more doomed first love for him.

So here he was, dodging shadows as he made his way swiftly and silently to the lower levels of the castle, intent on finding Snape. He wasn't looking forward to telling Ron and Hermione why he'd gone off without them on this particular adventure, but it was probably time to come clean. Hermione kept trying to set him up with that cute Hufflepuff sixth year who turned lobster red every time he passed Harry in the hallway.

A year ago, I would have jumped at the chance to let Hermione play matchmaker, he thought with a rueful smile. He eased his way down a narrow, spiral staircase that led into the lower dungeons. He was almost there ...

Harry smelled the blood before he ever saw any sign of Snape.

The pungent, coppery scent hung so thickly in the air that Harry could taste its bitterness on his tongue. He looked down at the map again, hoping to find that he'd read it wrong, but he could see his own name hovering beside the south entrance to the lower dungeons with Snape's name remaining stationary just around the corner, the same place it had been when Harry first started this search. Was it his imagination, or was the inky black of Snape's name growing greyer and greyer?

Pull yourself together, Potter. He folded the map and took a deep breath, at the same time snuffing out the faint glow of his Lumos spell since this area of the dungeons remained lit by torchlight. There were no Death Eaters on this level of the castle according to his map, so he had a very good chance of getting Snape out of there without having to fight anyone. It all depended on how badly Snape was hurt.

"Snape, if you can hear me, do us both a favour and don't curse me when I come around the corner," he called out. The snort of derision he heard in reply was all it took to put the speed back in his feet. He sprinted the last few feet to Snape's location, pulling off his cloak as he went.

Snape sat propped up against the wall like a discarded doll. His shirt and trousers had been slashed into tatters, presumably by the same spell that led to his incapacitation, and the blood seeping from the gashes on his chest and legs was dripping onto the floor and creating a warm, wet puddle beneath him. A ring of blood around his lips painted his mouth a startling crimson, a vibrant splash of colour against his sallow skin.

"Come to save the day, have you?" Snape asked with a sneer before a coughing fit seized him, expelling a fine red mist from his mouth with each violent hack.

"Just shut up for once in your life and let me help you," Harry said as he rushed to Snape's side. He discarded his cloak and the map on the floor next to Snape and started casting healing spells on Snape's wounds, but the gashes didn't close.

"You can't play hero this time, Potter," Snape said with a crooked smile, but his taunt lacked its usual bite. "The Dark Lord has personally seen to my destruction."

Harry lowered his wand. He'd seen plenty of Death Eaters' names on the map as he searched for Snape, but he hadn't noticed Voldemort among them. Maybe he was able to cloak himself from detection by certain magical artefacts? "Voldemort is inside Hogwarts? How?"

"My brilliant theory is that someone let him in." Snape tried to push himself into a more comfortable position but soon gave up with a groan. "I would have given the matter more thought but I've selfishly allowed my impending death to distract me."

"What curse did he use? Is there a counterspell?"

"He deemed the Killing Curse too merciful a death for me. I believe I'm meant to drown in my own blood." Snape knocked Harry's hand away when Harry continued to cast ineffectual healing spells on him. "Those won't work, Potter. Save your energy."

"I won't let you die," Harry said with a conviction that defied all logic, refusing to accept that now, when it mattered the most, both his hope and his luck would run dry.

Snape gave Harry a look that bordered on pity, the kindest expression he'd ever shown him. "You don't have a choice."

"There's always a choice," Harry insisted, already mentally thumbing through every protection spell he'd ever learned, every healing spell, every footnote on life and death and how to prolong one or prevent the other. He could vaguely recall a few lectures Snape had given on the subject in Potions, but lately Harry had been more interested in the sound of Snape's voice than the actual words he'd been speaking, and it wasn't as if he had his cauldron handy to whip up an antidote anyway.

Hermione would have thought of ten different solutions by now, Harry thought, a tad bitterly. Of course, Hermione's head was full of the future these days, planning the sort of wedding ceremony she wanted to have with Ron and whether she wanted to keep it traditional or go the route of a magical bond ...

That's it. A giddy laugh escaped Harry's lips before he could contain it. Why hadn't he thought of this sooner? He didn't need Hermione's expertise this time. He knew a way to save Snape's life -- a highly dangerous, completely criminal way, but since when had Harry ever shied away from reckless behaviour? He remembered Sirius once telling him that the risks only made the reward that much sweeter, and he tended to agree with that philosophy, never more so than when the reward involved keeping Snape alive.

"I don't have the strength to slap you if you're going to act hysterical," Snape said sourly, referring to Harry's odd laughter, "so I suggest you pull yourself together." His words were coming slower now, his breathing shallow and laboured. Harry would have to act quickly.

"I'm not hysterical," he said, a calm confidence in his voice as his Gryffindor mentality kicked in. He took Snape's left hand and touched the tip of his wand to Snape's palm. "This is going to sting."

"I'll be sure to distinguish your little sting from the overall agony I've been feeling up to this moment."

Harry ignored the snark and slowly moved his wand tip over Snape's skin, magically cutting into the flesh as he traced a winding path over his palm that left a beautiful but bloody design in its wake. He studied his handiwork with a critical eye once he finished, gave a quick nod of his head when the results satisfied him, then reached for Snape's right hand to give it the same treatment. Snape brought his left hand up to his face while Harry worked on the right one, squinting his eyes as he examined what Harry had done to him.

"This is ... some kind of brand?" Snape seemed to be having trouble getting a clear look at the design carved into his hand, not only because of his failing health but also due to the blood seeping from the wound. "It looks familiar, but ... what possible purpose could this..."

He froze, staring at his palm in disbelief before slowly looking up at Harry. "Morgaine's Thread?"

"I've always thought it was a funny name for a bonding spell." Harry pushed up the sleeve of his own robe so he could use his wand to form a small cut on his arm, massaging and squeezing the surrounding area to bring more blood to the surface.

"Potter, Morgaine's Thread is dark, dangerous magic. By binding your life to mine, you risk sharing in my fate."

"Or I could save you from that fate." Harry dipped his finger into the blood welling on his arm and leaned forward, raising his hand to Snape's forehead.

"Don't be daft," Snape hissed, weakly shoving at Harry's chest and leaving two bloody handprints on his clothes. "Are you trying to kill yourself?"

Harry pushed Snape back against the wall before drawing a line of runes on Snape's forehead with the blood from his arm. "It's the strongest bond there is."

"It's illegal. Even if I gave you permission, which I don't, you would still be guilty of breaking magical law. The Dark Arts are always punished severely, regardless of intent. The last known wizard to use this spell received the Kiss. Is that what you want?"

"I don't think this is the proper time for a snog, sir." Harry cut the same symbols into his own hands that he'd drawn on Snape's hands, careful to cut deep enough to draw a good deal of blood but not so deep that the blood loss would rob him of his concentration. He looked up at Snape with a cheeky grin that masked his nervousness. "Ask me later?"

"This spell could kill you, Potter. I won't let you --"

"Fighting me will only make this harder on both of us," Harry said, taking hold of Snape's hands so the bleeding wounds on their palms touched. He met Snape's fury head-on, his bold grin hardening into a grim smile. "You and I are going to bond, whether you like it or not. You're dying anyway -- what have you got to lose?"

"I have everything to lose if you succeed," Snape growled.

Harry's eyes narrowed. Did Snape hate him so much that he preferred death to being connected to Harry? "I know it's a forced bond, but we can get rid of it after you've recovered."

Snape's brow furrowed in confusion -- or pain, Harry couldn't be sure which -- and he looked ready to continue their argument further, but Harry interrupted him.

"Look at me," he said, unable to physically force Snape to meet his eyes while their hands were joined. When he spoke the spell, he needed to be connected to Snape in as many ways as possible. Maintaining eye contact would help Harry form the bond faster, and it would also give him a stronger connection to hold onto at the moment of crisis. "Look into my eyes."

Snape scowled and looked away, his head lolling listlessly to the side.

"No, you have to look at me," Harry said, his voice cracking for the first time as his confidence faltered and panic set in. He didn't need Snape to be a willing participant for this spell to work, but without constant eye contact a powerful wizard could resist a forced bond for hours before succumbing. Harry didn't have any time to waste on waiting for Snape to give in. He clenched their hands together tightly, feeling the warm spurt of blood between their joined palms. "Look at me, damn you!"

Snape winced and glared at Harry. "Should you really be bullying a dying man?"

"When he's being a stubborn git? Yes. Be quiet so I can get this right."

He held Snape's eyes with his own as he spoke the words of the ritual, his voice steady despite his frazzled nerves. He'd memorized the spell after discovering it in an ancient grimoire in the restricted section of the library near the beginning of his sixth year. Losing Sirius had shaken him to the core, so he had decided to find a spell that he could use to protect his friends, a "last resort" method of keeping Ron and Hermione alive. Morgaine's Thread, a bond so powerful that it could pull someone back from death, had been the perfect solution. There hadn't been much information on the spell other than its strength and how to perform it -- and that it had been outlawed for centuries -- but Harry had rationalized that saving his friends' lives would be worth a stay in Azkaban for performing a forced bond.

As he approached the end of the ritual, he was well prepared for the burning sensation in his palms, though the constriction in his chest caught him off guard. When he spoke the final word of the spell, "Arakalë," it was with the quiet authority of a wizard confident in his craft, not the tremulous uncertainty of a novice who just happened to recall a spell he'd memorized on a lark.

"You sound as if you've done this before," Snape accused, a suspicious glint in his eyes, but his voice was remarkably softer, not only in volume but in pitch as well, and Harry felt Snape's magic flare and fade through their bond, like a wave rolling onto the shore then retreating back into the ocean.

"I'm a quick study," Harry said.

He placed his still-bleeding palm on Snape's chest over his heart. He would have to time this perfectly, but it was tough to concentrate when each slow, struggling beat of Snape's heart called out to Harry like a distress signal, an involuntary cry for help that he had to ignore. If Harry wanted to save Snape, he would have to watch him die first. He had never known pain like this, not when he'd seen Sirius fall through the Veil in the Department of Mysteries, not even when reliving his parents' murders through the Dementors. It was as if the sun was setting for the last time, all the warmth of the world slowly consumed by the encroaching night, every second of sunlight made more precious because there would be no dawn. Harry wanted to be doing something more to fight off that darkness, to hold back the night for as long as he could, but instead he was forced to sit quietly by Snape's side, looking into his eyes, watching that keen black gaze grow dull and unfocused as Snape's injuries overtook him. Harry's hand trembled. What if he failed? What if he let Snape's life slip through his fingers?

A rough, raspy chuckle startled Harry out of his anxious thoughts.

"Afraid, Potter?" Snape laughed again, coughing with the effort, a thin line of blood trickling out of the corner of his mouth. "Shouldn't ... I ... be the ... scared one?"

"Don't talk," Harry said, pressing harder on Snape's chest as that stuttering heartbeat grew faint and elusive.

"What about ... my last ... words?" Every breath Snape took now rattled in his throat, thick with blood, but he persisted in talking. "I have ... something ... to tell --"

"You can tell me later, after I've saved your life."

"This can't wait ... in case --"

"If you distract me into letting you die, I will find a way to resurrect you just so I can kill you myself," Harry snapped.

Snape mustered a look of outrage. "I am ... trying ... to make a ... deathbed confession, Potter. If ... you would just ... shut that ... fool mouth of yours, I would ... tell you that --"

Snape choked on his words and he grabbed at the front of Harry's robe, his eyes widening in alarm as he lost the battle to breathe. Harry braced one hand against the wall while he kept the other hand pressed against Snape's chest, concentrating on the erratic rhythm of his heart that was only a few beats away from stopping entirely.

"Don't fight it," Harry said, his voice hoarse with emotion. "I won't let you go, so you don't have to fight it. Let me do the fighting for you ..."

Snape's fingers relaxed their hold on Harry's robe. Tha-thump. Their eyes met, and a resigned, bitter-sweet smile curved Snape's lips. Tha-thump. Harry felt their bond stretch tight, like a string pulled taut between them; if he failed, the threads of their bond would snap and Snape would be gone forever.

Tha-thump.

The silence that followed Snape's final heartbeat wrenched at Harry's own heart, the strain of their bond as Snape faded into death causing a physical pain in Harry's chest, but the bond was still there, wire-thin and fragile, keeping Snape well within his reach. This was what he'd waited for -- it would have to be now.

"Arakalë," Harry said, his voice so forceful and commanding that he didn't recognize it as his own. Their connection deepened as he laid claim to Snape's life once again, spanning the void that widened between them now that Snape was crossing over into death. Harry latched onto that connection with his magic and his mind, feeling their bond within his grasp as surely as if steel-strong threads had been wound around his fingers. He pulled with all his might, fighting against the dark currents that wanted to drag him down into death along with Snape, hardly knowing if he would have the strength to rescue him but strangely content in the knowledge that whatever happened, they would be together.

Just when it seemed he and Snape would be dragged into the abyss, Harry gave one final tug and that terrible gravity released its grip on them, Snape's chest surging against Harry's palm before he sagged back against the wall, limp but alive, his heart thumping a strong, steady beat. His first few breaths of air sounded like tortured gasps as his lungs sought their old in-and-out rhythm, but soon that desperate wheezing eased and Snape began taking deep, clear breaths. Harry quickly reached for his wand and began healing Snape's injuries, a task made much easier now that Voldemort's curse no longer repelled Harry's spells. His hand shook when he healed the slashes on Snape's leg, his strength deserting him, and he paused for a minute to catch his breath. He was both physically and magically exhausted from performing the bonding spell, but he hid his deteriorating condition behind a smug smile.

"If you still want to make that deathbed confession, I'm all ears," he said, mocking Snape's belief that Harry wouldn't be able to save him. When Snape flashed him the inevitable glare, Harry was relieved to see that Snape's gaze retained its ice-cold sharpness, as dark and piercing as ever. "No, you're right, the moment has passed. Maybe someday -- far, far in the future -- you'll get another chance to make one."

He used the sleeve of his robe to wipe the blood from Snape's mouth and chin. The bloody runes on Snape's forehead had disappeared once their bond was completed, but both Snape's and Harry's palms remained marked with the intricate crimson brands that signified Morgaine's Thread, as if an invisible needle had embroidered the magical symbols into their flesh. It would take a heavy glamour to hide the brands, and Harry wasn't sure he could count on Snape to keep their new connection a secret, so he decided that the best course of action would be to tell Dumbledore the truth and hope for leniency.

"You shouldn't try to move just yet." Harry draped the invisibility cloak over Severus. His shoes slid on the blood-slick floor as he stood up, and he steadied himself against the wall with one hand as he adjusted the cloak to cover every visible part of Snape's body. "Stay here and don't make a sound. The cloak will keep you hidden while I go find Dumbledore."

Snape followed Harry's direction and stayed silent and motionless, unexpectedly obedient, but Harry decided Snape was probably just too tired to argue.

Harry ran through the halls blindly at first, spurred on by adrenaline and a heady sense of success, but his brain soon caught up with his body and he slowed to a walk, reminding himself that there could be Death Eaters around every corner. He needed to check his map so he could pinpoint Dumbledore's location and plot the safest route to get to him.

Oh gods, the map.

Harry patted his pockets. Empty. He'd left the map behind with Snape. Any other night he would have shrugged it off as an inconvenience, but there were Death Eaters roaming these halls, so his little mistake had the potential to get him caught or killed. Knowing what he did about how Death Eaters treated their prisoners, Harry hoped for the latter.

Where should he look first? The last he'd seen of Dumbledore had been a glimpse of him in the Great Hall directing the other teachers in a defence of the castle as Harry crept past them under his cloak. Members of the Order would be arriving soon, as well as all the Aurors the Ministry could spare, but Dumbledore needed to know that Voldemort himself had invaded Hogwarts and they had to be more cautious than ever until reinforcements arrived. With Snape incapacitated they'd lost one of their best duelers, and Harry was so weakened from performing the binding spell that a First Year could have disarmed him. He would be no match for a Death Eater, and as for Voldemort ...

A sharp pain shot through his chest and Harry doubled over, stumbling into the wall. His hand flew to his forehead out of habit, his body naturally linking thoughts of Voldemort to the pain he felt, but aside from a mild burning sensation his scar wasn't bothering him. This pain originated somewhere deeper, where magic had carved out a scar that couldn't be seen.

It's the bond, Harry thought, waiting for the pain to pass before pushing off from the wall and running down the dark corridor. He must be trying to move. I told him to wait, but of course he wouldn't listen to me ...

"Harry!"

He stopped and turned around to see Ron emerge from behind a suit of armour. The old relic had been burned black with dragon's fire, which helped it blend into the shadows that blanketed the corridor. Harry wouldn't have even known Ron was there if he hadn't called out to him.

"Ron? What are you doing out here?"

"I couldn't let you go off on your own with Death Eaters on the prowl," Ron said. His eyes were huge in his freckled face, and he kept darting looks up and down the hall only to look back at Harry with a glassy expression, as if he'd been jinxed into a permanent daze. He seemed to mentally retreat even more when he noticed the blood on Harry's shirt, arm and hands. "Are you hurt?"

"No, I'm fine." Harry clenched his hands to hide the brands on his palms. He didn't think Ron would know what they meant, but on the off-chance that he might be aware of their significance, Harry wanted to avoid telling Ron of his bond with Snape. "I need to find Dumbledore. Do you know where he is?"

Ron stared at him blankly, his brain apparently on a time delay as he processed Harry's question, but then he jerked as if waking from a daydream and nodded his head. "Dumbledore? Yes, yes ... I saw him go this way." He took off running down the halls, not waiting for Harry to catch up.

Pretty odd, even for Ron, Harry thought, but he didn't have time to analyse his best friend's unusual behaviour. He decided to chalk it up to bad nerves; the average wizard would probably react the same to knowing there could be a Death Eater waiting for him around the next corner. I'm glad I didn't tell him about Voldemort ...

He put his skills as a Seeker to good use as he raced after Ron, taking corners at full speed regardless of who might be waiting for him on the other side. His lungs were nearly bursting from the effort of forcing his body to its limits, first with the bonding spell and now with this 'follow the leader' chase through Hogwarts' halls. Twice he called out to Ron to slow down, but Ron ran like a wizard possessed. He dashed up a set of stairs and disappeared out of sight, leaving Harry to ascend the stone staircase at a slower pace, trudging up each step as if wading through a swamp. When he finally reached the top step, his scar began to hurt, that mild burning sensation sharpening to a painful sizzle.

Voldemort. He's close. Harry's first thought was for his friend, and he looked around frantically, trying to figure out which way he went. "Ron! Ron, come back! I think that Vol-"

He never had a chance to finish his warning as a white-hot surge of Crucio electrified his body and robbed him of all speech and thought. He lost his grip on his wand and it fell to the floor.

"Dumbledore has truly lost his mind, allowing you free reign of the school when your life is on the line." Voldemort's voice grated on Harry's ears with a harsh, underlying hiss to each word. He sent another agonizing jolt of Crucio into Harry's body before Harry could even think of blocking him. "If only the wizarding world that idolizes and adores you could see you now ... so vulnerable, so weak. Why is it, Potter, that such a worthless wizard has proven to be so much trouble for me?"

"I suppose that says more about you than it does about me," Harry said with a cracked smile, so close to breaking that he couldn't even muster the energy to be scared. His only regret at this point was that Snape would be experiencing a fraction of Harry's pain through their bond, and he held onto the hope that saving Snape had given the Order a fighting chance at defeating Voldemort after Harry was gone. Dumbledore and Snape together would be a potent combination.

"You should be begging for your life, insolent boy," Voldemort snarled, torturing Harry for a third time as a means to assuage his wounded pride.

The pain twisted through Harry's body and threatened to tear his mind apart. He had suffered this curse before, but never when his defences were so low or his strength so depleted. He wasn't sure how he managed to stay on his feet, except that something deep inside seemed to hold him steady through the curse, like unseen hands propping him up whenever his knees started to buckle. He felt so relieved when Voldemort released him from the curse that he barked out a short laugh and wiped a shaking hand across his mouth, surprised to feel a wetness trickling down his cheeks -- tears he didn't know he'd been crying.

"I'd rather die than beg you for anything." He leaned against the wall, wondering if he should summon his wand or simply give up and allow the inevitable to happen. He didn't much like the second option, but he wasn't sure he could concentrate hard enough to achieve the first one. He felt as magical as a Muggle after expending so much energy on the bonding spell. What would he do with his wand once he had it back in his hand? Poke Voldemort in the eye and make a run for it? A steady rumble of pain in his chest, separate from the aftershocks of the curse, stole the choice out of Harry's hands as he closed his eyes and clenched his teeth against the urge to scream.

"You'll have your wish soon enough," Voldemort said as he slowly approached Harry, readying himself for one final spell. "Your very existence offends me, so I've decided to erase you altogether. It will be a pleasure for me to watch the unbirth of Harry Potter ..."

Unbirth? The word swam in Harry's consciousness, too slippery to grasp. He was accustomed to hearing Voldemort speak a load of pompous nonsense right before he tried to kill Harry, but how could someone erase another person from existence? Whatever happened to a good, clean Killing Curse? Underneath all that pain, Harry felt a twinge of annoyance that Voldemort was taking the opportunity of Harry's imminent demise to show off. The ache in his chest tightened, but suddenly Harry found it easier to stand straight and tall, facing off against Voldemort with his dignity intact.

"Get on with it, then," he said in a firm, unwavering tone. He'd faced down death once already tonight. It held no fear for him now. "Let's see if you can actually manage to kill me this time. Judging from past experience, the odds that you'll fail are in my favour ..."

Harry's flippant response to the idea of his own death seemed to infuriate Voldemort. He raised his wand with an angry howl, a flash of blue light erupting from his wand, but the spell never reached Harry. Instead, it appeared to bounce off the air between Harry and Voldemort, rebounding on its caster. Voldemort's shout of surprise quickly turned to horrific screams, and noxious fumes were expelled from his body as he fell prey to his own curse.

Though the spell never reached Harry, a violent spasm of pain ripped through his body at the same instant that the spell seemed to ricochet off the air, and he sank to his knees clutching his chest, gasping for breath as an agony worse than Crucio seized his body. The worst of the pain lasted only a few seconds, but it left Harry stunned and incapable of movement for several minutes. By the time he opened his eyes, he was just getting the feeling back in his hands and feet, his body reawakening from its paralysis. Across from him, dimly lit by a nearby torch, he could see a thick, oozing pile of blackish goo, the light catching on the pale white of an exposed bone and what looked like a human hand half-submerged in the vile remains of what had been the most feared dark wizard of modern times.

Harry's stomach attempted a weak revolt, but he was too exhausted to be sick over the sight of liquefied Voldemort. He blinked several times, trying to bring the world back into focus. He looked down at his hands and dimly recognised that something was wrong, his palms bloody but unmarked.

Then he saw the feet.

They seemed to be sticking out of thin air, as if abandoned by the body they belonged to, cut off right above the ankles so Harry could see the beginnings of a pair of grey and green argyle socks emerging from the top of the shoes. Harry stared at the socks for a long time, oblivious to the shouts of his name from down the corridor or the sounds of footsteps on the stone floor. Fear crept back into his heart, followed swiftly by despair, and he crawled across the floor until his hands bumped into something solid. He slid his fingers over the air in front of him and felt the silky texture of the invisibility cloak beneath his fingertips. The discovery tore a sob from his throat.

Dumbledore came running up the corridor towards him. Ron was nowhere in sight. "Harry! Harry, are you alright?"

He ignored Dumbledore's question, closing himself off from everything but the still-warm body that lay beside him on the floor. He curled his fingers into the fabric of the cloak and pulled it away, revealing Snape's dark-clad figure, his body curled in on itself with one arm flung over his face as if shielding his eyes from some terrible vision. He looked smaller and thinner, and Harry's first thought was of Cedric's body and how there had seemed to be so much less of him after he'd died, as if a person's spirit puffed out their body like hot air and a corpse was nothing more than a popped balloon, shrunken and shrivelled.

"Is that ... Severus?" Dumbledore knelt down beside Harry and reached out to move Snape's arm away from his face, but instead of the lined, world-weary face of an adult, this Snape had the face of a teenager, perhaps no older than Harry himself, his sharp, angular features softened by youth. His skin was pale but with a hint of colour in his cheeks, not the deathly pallor that Harry expected. He watched, hope fending off devastation, as Dumbledore pressed his fingers to Snape's throat.

"He's alive."

Those were the last words Harry would remember hearing before he succumbed to injury and exhaustion, sinking into the sweetness of a long, dark sleep.
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