The End of the War: Part Four

Warning!  This story does not currently, but will eventually, contain yaoi/slash pairings.  This means male/male.  This story will also eventually contain eroticism, please pay attention to the age when reading.    On a further note, the pairings are going to be Snape/Harry possibly some Draco/Harry.  If any of this does not interest you, please do not even bother reading.  Also, there are likely spoilers, as I have read the first 6 books, and that is reflected in my stories.  You’ve been told, if you’re still here, enjoy.

These characters don't belong to me, more's the pity, they belong to J.K. Rowling, lucky her.


The End of the War
Part Four: The Cauldron Never Lies

Even if he had been my favorite teacher, I hadn’t ever expected to see him as I was, bound to Weasley’s.  Or perhaps it is because he was my favorite teacher that I felt this way.  Honestly, seeing Professor Snape filled me with a cross between pleasure and pity.  I may be conceited, but I knew my limitations.

I wouldn’t have survived alone without my parent’s.  I wouldn’t have made it if I had gone to the Ministry, my mother had told me to find Severus, and he would protect me.

Right now, I felt like I was protecting him.  I put a hand under his arm and around his waist to steady and guide him into the room.  He let me get him to a chair, where he sat down gratefully.  I wondered where he’d been living, his face wasn’t nearly so pale as I was used to, his hair was mid back length and had a healthy sheen to it.  In fact, over all he looked… well… alive.

Even though I’d always liked Professor Snape, he’d had this, “I may have recently crawled out of a crypt” look about him.  I adored that.  There was a teacher everyone else would hate, and I would like.  The only teacher I would have put up with the title, “Teacher’s Pet” from, though I’d’ve jinxed anyone who dared say it around me.  It didn’t hurt that I’d heard about him my whole life, my parent’s even had photo’s of him so I knew him instantly upon arriving at Hogwarts.  There was Professor Snape, the greatest potions master the world has ever seen.

Apparently that wasn’t enough for him, as it was never enough.  He wanted to be pure blood, so many people did, and Voldemort had promised him that.  I never used to understand what my father spoke of when he said the impure would become pure, but as time went on, and I grew up, I did.

Of course, this was neither here nor there.  I shook my head slightly to clear it, focusing on my current issue: Professor Snape, alive, in front of me.

“Sir, are you tired?” I asked quietly.

“Exhausted Draco, I ache all over from whatever it is Potter did to me.  I *had* been about to go to sleep when he “called”,” he spat out the words as though it was a curse or unpleasant in the mouth.

“Well sir,” I began, but he cut me off.

“Stop with that too Draco, I’m no longer your, no longer anyone’s, professor.  You may call me Severus, I suppose,” he said, slightly moodily.  I smiled again, wondering if he’d be able to handle me calling him Severus.

“Severus then,” the name flowed off my tongue like dew from a flower.  It felt right to use the name, as though it should be spoken, not hidden.  He raised his eyebrows at me, and I shrugged lightly, trying to contain the pleasure I felt at being able to call him as though we were equals.  “Your room will be off this way, would you like to sit for a moment before I show you?”  He nodded once, then glanced at the nearest cauldron.

“You’d better tend to that one,” he said, slightly sharply, “it’s getting too thick.

I nodded and rushed over to add the four cups of icy water it needed, monitoring its behavior closely.  “Still as sharp as ever sir, that is, Severus.”  I fumbled with his name a bit, but tried not to blush.  He said nothing.

Once the silence had stretched on for several minutes, he shrugged.  “It doesn’t take much to remember the sounds a potion makes, not when you’ve been around them as many years as I have.”  I nodded.

“I’m going to be really glad to have you here, to be honest, as I won’t have to tell you what to do, and maybe you can help me with a few problems I’ve been having.”  I could tell he was trying to remain uninterested, but his eyes watched me closely.

“Oh?” he questioned at last, and I stopped stirring to look up at him.

“Certainly you’re too tired to answer my questions now,” I said with a small smirk.  His eyes narrowed.

“If you’re trying to be coy Draco, your advances are wasted on me, and you should try someone else.  Either tell me or don’t but do *not* string me along for a ride.”  I grinned.

“Of course sir, that is, Severus, I wasn’t trying to be coy.”  I lost my smile and engaged him in a lengthy conversation about common herbs, and the uncommon uses I had found for them.  Needless to say, he didn’t get to bed until it was fairly early morning and I was going to bed myself.

The next day, Severus didn’t wake up.  Hermione had warned me that that could happen, but at first, it startled me.  I shook him for five minutes before giving up.  His brow was sweat soaked, so I got a washcloth to wipe it off.

A quick look over the rest of his sleeping form made me return to his bathroom to get a bowl of lukewarm water so I could wipe off more than his face.

It was amazing really, how much a sleeping form could tell you.  I learned that he was ticklish at his wrists, he hated having his Dark Mark touched, and there was something wrong with his right side.  He never moved, but he made expressions and small moans here and there that told me these things.

It was an interesting half hour, one that I enjoyed very much.

As I was leaving his room to enter the main room, the alarm went off.  Several people rushed off to rooms, locking doors as they went.  I made sure to lock Severus’ room behind me.

Harry knew most of the people Hermione and Ron had saved from death.  He did not know about all of them.  It was a dangerous game those two Weasleys had started playing, almost more deadly than the one involving us all residing in her hospital.  If Potter found out about the ones Hermione or Ron had saved and not told him about, he might do something nutty, like destroy the building.

Ron and Hermione set up an alarm that would sound as soon as Harry entered the enclosed passageway to come to our part of the hospital.  That would give us exactly two minutes before Harry would enter our main room.

I’m probably the only one who understands what Hermione did, and that’s partly because I helped her do it.  It was a long and tedious process, but well worth my time.  After all, I wasn’t planning on staying here forever.  Someday I’d leave, and be free, something I’ve never been.

I moved to each of the cauldrons, checking them and tending to their various needs.  Much sooner than expected, the main door opened.

“False alarm!” Hermione said cheerfully, waving her arms around in the air.  I rolled my eyes and returned my gaze to the cauldron I had been stirring.  Ron ignored me to go talk with Arnold Swank, an accused Death Eater, and Hermione walked purposefully over to me.

“Hello Draco, how is he?”  I finished my tenth stir before looking up at her.

“Out cold, completely unaware,” my words came out quickly, and I returned to counting my stirs.

“I had a feeling he’d be that way.  I was afraid of forcing his body to be animated because of the consequences.  Harry just wouldn’t tell me what he did, and now that he’s…” she paused deep in thought.  I finished twenty and then thirty stirs before she spoke again.  “I’m glad we did this, but it’s very tough on Harry.”

“That was your point though, wasn’t it?” I asked, starting my next batch of stirs.  She sighed and took a seat in the nearest chair, looking somewhat defeated.  Forty stirs and another sigh came from her.

“Yes, I just wish I didn’t have to see him like this.  I just wish he’d seen one of the healers, he’s still refusing, but I hope he’ll give in soon.”

Fifty stirs, I looked up at her fully.  Her face was slightly pink, and she was slumped in her seat.  I gave an exasperated sigh.

“Hermione, you can’t blame yourself for the decisions Harry has made.  You also can’t blame yourself for his mental state, all of that is out of your hands.  This is one thing I know from personal experiences, you can’t force your wants on others.  They’ll take them or deny them, but you can’t make them what you want.”  I paused for a second of thought.

“I’ll go visit him,” I said finally.  She looked up at me and I saw a flicker of hope.

“You will?” she asked in, I think, excitement.  I nodded my head and handed her the ladle I was using to stir.

“It’s been through its fifty swirls, so you’ve just got to watch it and make sure it doesn’t bubble.”  She stood up and flung her arms around my neck, something I felt she did way too often.

“Careful,” I said, briefly returning the hug, “your little husband will get jealous.”  She giggled, something that I had to say was tolerable coming from Hermione.

“He won’t be, I told him you were gay.”  I laughed at that, letting her go.

“Did you now?  Then why is he glaring at me?”  She turned her eyes to look over at Ron, who turned away just before Hermione could see the daggers that had been shooting out of his eyes.

“Oh, he’s just being silly,” she took the ladle and made a shooing gesture towards me.  “Go on, I think you can do good things for Harry that I can’t.”

I allowed myself to be shooed, leaving the main room after I gave a smirk towards Ron.

Out of everyone here, I think I was one of the most trusted.  It was an odd sensation, to be trusted by the three who hadn’t ever trusted me in school.  I’d only been here for a year, yet Hermione had complete faith in me.  Because of this trust, I was the only one who had access and knowledge of the whole, complex passage system that was in the building.  It took me just under a minute to make my way to Harry’s room.  I didn’t knock, I never did, I simply opened the door and stepped into the sty that was Harry Potter’s personal room.

Dobby would have a fit if he saw this room the way it was right now.  Clothes littered the floor, old cafeteria trays were stacked in a box, three sheet sets were tossed in a corner, and Harry Potter himself was lying across his bed, face down, fully clothed.  I shook my head, closed the wall door behind me and walked over to him.

“You’re a state.”  I sat down on the bed next to him and tried to push him over onto his back.  He didn’t budge.  “Well, now that I know you’re awake, how about you face me?” I said dryly.  He didn’t move.  “I still remember where you’re ticklish the most.”  This comment caused quite a commotion, which I knew it would.  Harry pushed himself up and away from me very quickly, murder in his eyes.

“You stay away from me!” he half shouted.  Quite the reaction, I raised my eyebrows.

“Well, now that we’re back on speaking terms, I have a question for you.”  He looked as though that was the strangest thing I could have said to him.  He calmed down instantly, amazingly enough.

“Do you hate yourself so much you don’t really care about what you do to your body?”  He blinked at me a few times, then shook his head.

“Draco, what the hell are you talking about?”  I gave a small shrug.

“Your emotions and your mind are part of your body Harry, accept them, learn from them, and know when it’s time to amputate.” I said simply.  He remained focused on me, but looked completely confused.  I sighed.

“Okay, let’s try a different approach.  Say you have a potion,” Harry groaned and fell back down onto the bed, “I’m going to make this very simple Harry.  Say you’re brewing a potion, and you made a mistake.  Do you chuck the whole thing out, or fix it?”  He looked up from his hands.

“How important is it and do you have the time to make a new one?” I nodded then nodded again.

“You have the time to remake it, and it’s incredibly important, but you only had enough ingredients to do one potion.”  He shrugged.

“Then you try to fix it of course,” he sounded annoyed.

“Oh, I’m glad you agree with Hermione and Ron, shall I tell them to set up your first healer appointment?”  It took a moment for my words to register, but when they did, he narrowed his eyes.

“I have no intention of seeing one of Hermione’s healers!” he said angrily.  I raised my eyebrows.

“Are you saying you aren’t worth fixing Harry?  Because if you aren’t, then I could kill you, I’d be in no worse shape than I am currently.”

“What are you talking about?” he tried to stay angry, but Hermione’s wards were kicking in.

“Harry, *you* are the potion.  Something got messed up along the brewing of the potion, which is your life.  Your life is incredibly important, but you only have it once, so it’s time to fix you.  If you won’t want to see a healer, that’s your option, but remember that a potion that simmers too long goes foul, and will eventually be worthless.  No one, not Ron, not Hermione, not even me, want to see you lose to your anger.”  I stood up.

“Think about it Harry.  Not the pitiful self loathing think, or the woe is me think, but honest, open thinking.  Write it down if you must, but *think* about how important you are to yourself, and whether you deserve to be fixed.”  I walked to the door and opened it.

“Don’t answer me, answer yourself.”  He kept his eyes on me and finally sighed.

“How do you know what to say to me anyway?” he muttered.  I gave a smirk.

“What can I say, the cauldron never lies, and I’ve been watching your cauldron for years.”  I slipped out of the room quickly before he could stop me.

Honestly, I think I might be going soft.