pekeleke (pekeleke) wrote in snape_potter, @ 2012-06-11 22:03:00 |
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Author: pekeleke
Pairing: Severus Snape/Harry Potter
Word Count: 5360
Rating: N-17
Summary: Four years after the final battle Severus Snape wakes up to HELL!
Warning(s): Strong language. Violence.
A/N: English is not my mother tongue so mistakes are to be expected.
Beta: None
Disclaimer: The characters used in this fiction are not mine. No money is being made from it.
THE VOICE UNDER ALL SILENCES. Chapter 24
Author's note: Everything written between {} is part of a conversation held through a link established by Legilimency.
His arrival at the school shocked him so utterly that he simply stood there, like some kind of weak-minded nincompoop, for well over five minutes!.
He blinked, dazedly, through the chaotic miasma of his own rattled thoughts. His reeling senses recognised his own chambers at Hogwarts with a deep sense of belonging, and he attempted to wrap his buzzing mind around the idea that he had not only apparated himself, half-way across the United Kingdom, but he'd also managed to bypass the complicated set of wards that protected the ancient building itself!. This was just too... bizarre!
The rooms were exactly as he remembered them. Silent. Shadowed. Refreshingly cool. Their very familiarity was a welcome reprieve that soothed his altered senses and allowed him to breathe, with something approaching his usual self-possession, for the first time since he'd abandoned the coffee shop where he'd spent the first part of his afternoon.
His precious books were all here. He could recognise most of the covers with the ease of a man who has read every single one of them, at least twice!. He smiled: dizzy with relief, with genuine, unmitigated joy, as he realised that somehow, against all the odds, his beloved books had actually made it through the war intact!...
He recognised the little marks of constant use that he'd left on them: a ripped binding here, the shadow of an inky fingerprint there, the delicate edges of the foreign bookmark that Draco had brought him from his first trip to France, poking out of the last book that he'd been reading...
He recognised every nick-knack that he'd accumulated along the way, too. All of them perched exactly where they should. As if he'd never abandoned these rooms!. As if he'd never been forced to leave the safety of Hogwarts!.
As if he'd never returned: shrouded, like a Dementor, within the shameful glory of his new position as the Dark Lord's second in command, to inhabit the bedchamber of the very man he'd murdered in order to achieve such recognition...
Albus...!
The old man's presence felt more immediate now than ever before. His memory was here, imprinted on the chair he'd so often sat on. It echoed around the fireplace that they both had contemplated, until their eyes had crossed with the effort, during thousands of interminable nights filled with nothing but despair and powerless dejection. They had tried so hard!... and they had failed so often!...
War had been their whole life, for so long, that it had felt as if they'd never really known peace!.
Albus's touch seemed to have left echoes everywhere: on the mantelpiece. On the chairs and table. On the very walls themselves. On the books, and spoons, and forks. On the handle of the cup that he used to drink from: a purple monstrosity, with yellow and white daisies, that Severus could see perched inside the cabinet at the other end of the room, exactly were Albus always left it...
His old chessboard, chipped on the the left hand corner since his late teens, awaited them. It still sat atop the small table, under the window. White and black pieces quiescent as they lay, carelessly abandoned, still holding the positions from the last game they'd been playing. Patiently awaiting for the end of a match that now... would never come!...
Severus walked very slowly towards it: heart banging wildly in in his throat and a lump the size of China squeezing his chest with strength enough to kill him!. His dark eyes settled over the board, looking at it thoughtfully for a very long time. Finally he forced his trembling fingers to pick both: the white rook and king. With a heavy heart he proceeded to exchange their positions with one another. Castling them.
On the other side of the board, the black rook now faced forwards, directly in the path of the white one...
Suicide, of course!. He should had seen it earlier. The pale tower's fate had always been death!. It was the only way to move the game forwards, after all!...
He pushed the opposing rook into attack. It destroyed his equal firmly. With great relish... But it left it's king exposed in the process...
A lone knight: pale and short and... truly insignificant to the game, until that very second, had now access to the black, imposing piece that was the dark king!. One more movement, then: a short, decisive push, and the game they'd been agonising over, for well over a fortnight, had been finally won!. A bloody, but clever victory, for the white pieces...
"That'll be check-mate, then. Albus... Well played, of course!. Diabolical, like every other plan that you ever devised but... brutally effective, in the end. Well played!. Well played, indeed..."
He felt strange as he stood there. Pale hands holding the small pieces. Black eyes filled with old hurt.
"You knew that he'll try to kill me. Didn't you, old man?. You knew that he'd make that mistake about that blasted wand... You must have!. The wand's allegiance was the only card left in the wind...
It couldn't have been left to me, of course!. That was the whole point!. The one mistaken assumption that the Lord couldn't be allowed to ever question...
You used Draco, just as badly as you used Potter!. You knew that my love for my Godchild would keep me silent, when the time to sacrifice myself finally came, while my loyalty towards you would force the rest!. Did Draco actually disarm you, or did you allow him to do so?... "
The sigh that rent the air was heavy and weary. Forlorn. He felt trapped within a vortex of old hurts. Of old betrayal. He didn't want to remember any of this!. Didn't want to taint what remained of his love for that old man with the bitterness brought on by actions that had actually been necessary...
It had been war, after all!. Those were the words that he himself had used to fend off Minnie's unwanted apologies. He'd do well to try following at least some of what he preached!. But... He had been betrayed and used. Manipulated, by two bloody experts, before being sacrificed by the both of them!.
Betrayal felt like a wound that'd never heal!. Like a cancer. Like the acid touch of a bitterness that he wasn't even certain he could swallow!.
It had been his choice, of course. Albus had explained his plan and then ignored Severus's every attempt to make him see reason... But it had been his own dismal failure to provide an alternative, that had forced him to reluctantly agree to the only thing that might actually work!. And his choices, as correct as they might have been, had still left him bleeding to death on that shack's floor...!
Only Draco had stayed true to him until the very end. Only Draco had wanted to save him!...
His godchild wouldn't be very happy to discover that Severus had decided to repay his efforts by forfeiting his new life to Potter, in order to see Draco himself safe...
It didn't really matter what the gryffindor's true intentions may had been at the time. They had sworn that idiotic vow upon Draco's life!. An Oath that demanded that Severus himself resided with the brat!... Never to abandon their joint domicile, with the intention of living somewhere else!...
Panic seized him as he realised what he'd done: he'd escaped the brat!. Transported himself hundreds of miles North from their current residence, without so much as a by-your-leave!. He had to return to London!. AT ONCE!. Before the auror decided to start believing that he had reneged on their pact!.
Horrified awareness, painted shadows of determination across the depths of his eyes and he swirled in a half-arch, mind ablaze with an image of endless beige. He failed to feel the uncomfortable constriction so typical of apparition. Failed to perform the simple magical task that had brought him here, in the first place!. And his whole being froze into the utter immobility of sheer terror!.
HE. HAD. TO. GET. BACK!. NOW!
He tried and tried. And. Tried! AND. TRIED!. He cleared his mind and brought forth an image of that ridiculously soulless place that Potter dared to call home!. He pictured it, so hard, that he started to fear that the stupid image would be forever imprinted in the back of his skull, but... It didn't work!.
He took his wand out and held it before him: pale birch wood responding to him with the same lack of interest that it had shown him in the past weeks. He had no clue as to how he'd managed to apparate himself!. And now he found, to his increasing horror, that he could not repeat it!.
Panic seized him. The kind of abject, shocked trepidation that could freeze a man's blood inside his veins!.
He needed to find the boy, then!. Explain to him that he was trapped here, without recourse to transport!. But... how could he do that?. He had absolutely no idea if the child even had a floo connexion in that ridiculous place!. And, even if Potter did, how did he call out for it?: Did the flat have a name, like most wizarding properties?. Was it warded against unannounced calls?. Would Potter even be there?. He'd left him behind, on that patch of grass, in the bloody middle of London!.
He wasn't even sure if these rooms were still connected to the network!...
He whirled around, wildly. Widened ebony eyes searching for something around him, anything, that might actually inspire him with something even approaching a solution!. But nothing came to mind. NOTHING!.
That was when he felt the first touch of Legilimency. A knock-like connexion. The uncalled for contact: oddly hesitant and urgent at the same time, reminded him of the one point of contention that had kept him truly at odds with the child in recent times.
He detested the very idea of allowing Potter in. But he knew that this must be him!. He recognised the familiar touch of the boy's magic, with the same kind of ease with which he'd learned to recognise Albus's own cadence of fast knocks upon his door. Or Minnie's.
His shields dropped one by one. Slowly. Reluctantly. Hoping that the child would be willing to offer him some... help!...
{Potter?}
The mind that was attempting to reach him seemed to sag with relief. There was no more pushing against Severus's own consciousness. He could feel no more force being directed towards his mental barriers, in order to enter further than the figurative hallway of his awareness. But he could sense that the presence remained there: a strong, unwavering companion that seemed to anchor itself into position before answering him frantically.
{Severus?. Are you injured?. Did you splinch yourself?. Oh! Gosh! I. AM. SO. SORRY!. I should have never pushed you like that!}
Severus had to pinch the bridge of his own nose, hard!, in order to avoid screaming at the little miscreant's mind the more than obvious fact that now was NOT the time to have that conversation!. Now they were in the middle of an actual crisis that had to be resolved. Immediately!.
{I am all right, Potter!}
The child's presence became stronger. Warmer. Closer to him, somehow, and that unnerved him immeasurably. He wasn't accustomed to this kind of interaction. Avoiding all forms of mental communion was the primarily goal of Occlumency, after all!. And he had excelled at that particular practice, for as long as he'd been aware of it's existence!.
{Severus?}
{What?}
The boy retreated suddenly. There was a terrifying second or two when he could not feel that foreign presence and he floundered. He knew that he'd been short with the menace, but... for Potter to have just... severed all connexion with him, because of a little show of temper, was a bit on the ruthless side!. Even for James's Potter's spawn!...
He needed help, dammit!. He needed it now!. He could not imagine what he'd do, if it turned out that the auror had just left him to his own devices!.
{Potter!. Potter?... I can't believe you'd be so selfish that...!}
{I am here, Severus!. You've got to calm down!. I have no idea of what we are doing!. OK?. I panicked when you disapparated and I couldn't immediately follow!. It was exactly the same when you went out that first time: Your lack of magic makes you untraceable!. I have Hermione here with me. She's the one who suggested trying to contact you this way again!. I know how much you hate it, and I'm sorry! OK?. But we couldn't think of anything else!}
Somehow that disjointed rambling made things better and he felt strangely soothed by the fact that the child had actually thought clearly enough to find some help!.
His legs turned to water and he collapsed, into his old high-backed chair, with a mix of trepidation and sheer dread... It was hard for him, truly hard!, to put his faith in others. And Potter's track record in relation to himself was... inauspicious... at best!.
He understood that he was trapped here, at least for the moment. That if he was to return to the boy's flat and, therefore, fulfil the requirements of the oath he'd sworn on Draco's life, he had to allow himself to be... dependent!... on the child!.
The sole idea chilled him right down to his very marrow, though!. He couldn't, in good conscience, doubt the abilities of both, Potter and Granger. He doubted that the last third of the fantastic trio would have been left out of this, so... He felt reasonably certain that his fate was in the hands of the wonderful team extraordinaire!. The very same that had brought down the Dark Lord!. He knew that these three could do anything that they set their minds to do, but... he had never been a recipient of their best efforts!. At least not while he'd been conscious of it!...
{Severus?. I need you to concentrate on your body. Try to feel every part of it. See if there's anything, anything at all!, that feels odd to you!. Are you certain that you are not hurt?}
He felt like snorting. What was wrong with the idiot?. He had already informed him that he was perfectly fine!.
{There's nothing wrong with me, boy!. Now... How do you propose I get back?. I have tried to apparate out of here, but I've failed!}
That admission was so hard that he started shaking. To have found himself in the position of having to confess such a thing to Lily's child was simply... humiliating!.
{You tried to apparate?. Severus!. It's bad enough that you managed it in the park!. You could have killed yourself!. Apparition is one of the most dangerous acts of magic!. It's accountable for more wizarding deaths a year, than any other hex or potion put together!. Promise me that you won't try it again, unless someone is there with you!}
His mind boggled. Was the child truly attempting to... manage... him?.
{I need your assistance to return, Potter!. Not a lecture on the safety of a procedure that I have been executing, with utmost perfection, for longer that you have been alive!}
On the other side of the link the auror became clearly irritated. There was a strange pause, almost as if their connexion had been severed, before he felt the whole pressure of that uncomfortably alien awareness focus on him once again.
{Hermione thinks that this accident might have helped quick-start your magic back. Have you attempted any other charm?. Do you have your wand with you?}
He considered the thought. It was a possibility, of course, but he... he still felt mostly empty. He'd felt no connexion with his wand when he'd held it earlier. No thrum of... power, coursing through his every vein. Through his being... He'd... Wouldn't he have sensed it, if his magic had returned?...
He took the precious length of birch out of it's holster with shaking digits, lifting the wand very slowly and pointing it precisely at one of the shelves. His dry lips whispered the most simplest of all charms as he held on to the mental picture of Albus's purple cup flying across that small distance, straight into his hand...
Nothing happened: Not. A. Thing!... And he slumped, against the backrest of the chair, with utmost dejection.
His hands rose: pale, long fingered, trembling... to cover the whole of his face in a gesture of sorrow so profound that, for a second, he was utterly certain that it might kill him!.
{Severus?. Severus what has happened to you?}
Panicked terror had entered the voice within his head and he jolted upon hearing it. Startled. Perfectly horrified by the suspicion that the boy... the boy could sense his every emotion!.
{I have not recovered. I am still a squib!}
Heartbreak...
He perceived it like a shadow inside his head. Like the echoes of a memory long forgotten. Like the imprint of an emotion left behind... He could not hold it or change it. He could only... feel it!. And it was so potent, so absolutely frightening, in its enormity!, that it shook him to his core!. It left him reeling...
Potter... These were Potter's own feelings!. They had to be!.
{You are not a squib, Severus!. You are just... I don't know!. Unable to reach your power!. That doesn't mean that you've lost it, or that it won't return!. We just have to... try harder to get it back!}
He didn't know how to answer. He could not bear the thought of attempting to... soothe... the child's sorrow while his own felt so raw!.
He'd have preferred to just... ignore the whole issue for now!. But, of course, Potter being the gryffindor that he was could understand no such instincts...
{Severus?. Are you still there?. Didn't you hear me?. We'll make you better!. I swear it!. We won't give up until you are back to having full, and terrifying, command of that wand of yours again!}
He sighed. Disheartened. Frustrated. Fed up with all that incessant pushing of his every touchy button that the boy liked to engage in!.
{I must return to you, Potter!. At once!. Our Oath requires me to “remain under your roof at all times!.” My actions have put Draco in terrible danger!. I won't have my godson suffer because I made a stupid mistake!}
The link wavered as if Potter's concentration had just broken. He could sense the auror's distress spear through his mind with the sharpness of a dagger.
{OH!. Oh, shit!... Dammit!. I hadn't thought about that!... I can't believe how stu...}
The flow of that thought was cut abruptly. A wall had suddenly appeared between them and, for half a second, Severus found himself once more completely alone within his own head!. He discovered then, to his unending surprise, that he particularly detested the feeling in his current circumstances!. And the idea that he might have come to believe that Lily's child would, in fact, actually help him, stunned him so profoundly that when he felt the boy's thoughts once more, it took him almost a minute to respond!.
{Professor? I can't apparate straight to you, no matter how hard I try it!. Are you blocking me in any way?}
{Blocking you?. How could I?. I have no magic, Potter!}
The presence in his head became as irritated as he felt.
{It doesn't make any sense, I know that!. But I am picturing you as hard as I can and still nothing happens!. There's no pull at all!. It feels as if... as if you are behind a wall of some kind!...}
He pondered that over. It fit with his own knowledge about the anti-apparition wards set all around the castle. But then... he himself had been able to cross them. Potter had done so, too, if it was indeed true that he'd been brought here on the day of his release from Azkaban!. He remembered screaming at the little menace loud enough to put himself into respiratory arrest, and the auror had removed him from these very rooms!. Apparated straight out of them!...
{Wait!... Wait, Professor!. Were you just thinking that I... I... Are you at Hogwarts?. Oh!, Merciful Godric!. These are wonderful news!}
He was staggered by the sudden wave of unadulterated relief that flooded the mental link. There was just... so much of it that his head began to pound!.
{Potter!. You've got to tone down your emotions or you are going to overwhelm me!. I am unaccustomed to dealing with this amount of... feeling!}
The link wavered once more. A blank wall began to appear, forming a shaky barrier between their minds.
{I'm sorry, Severus!. I'm not used to doing this while you are awake!. In all the time I spent inside your mind, while I was trying to bring you out of your coma, you only ever bothered to actually interact with me once!. And it was to block me off!}
He swallowed uneasily. He disliked this particular topic in the extreme!. He was reluctant to engage in any kind of discussion that involved this matter, under normal circumstances, and had absolutely no intention of doing it while he had the bloody brat inside his head!.
{Potter!. Get in here and bring me back to your place, for Salazar's sake!}
The boy laughed, apparently too relieved to bother picking up a fight right at that second.
{I can't apparate to Hogwarts!. You'll have to wait a while!. OK?. I'll ship myself to Hogsmeade and walk up from there!. Did I hear correctly when you thought about being back in your old chambers?}
He was frustrated by the boy's reluctance to get on with his relocation back to London!.
{Don't be ridiculous Potter!. Even though I'm absolutely magic-less, at the moment, I managed to apparate here without any trouble!. Although I was dying at the time, I clearly remember you crossing these wards before!. There is no need for this delay!}
Potter's side of the link turned warm and kind of... mushy?. There was a strange, gentle feeling of... affection... flooding his senses as the youth's thoughts filtered into his:
{You are the HEADMASTER of Hogwarts, Severus!. And you are not magic-less!. You are just a bit... weak!.
I managed to cross the wards because YOU were with me at the time!. You were unable to apparate on your own that day!. It was a matter of life or death: your life or death!... I believe that the castle allowed me to transport you, over to the infirmary, in an attempt to protect you!}
He was flummoxed by the boy's account of those particular events. He'd seen them so very differently at the time!. He wondered if this was true. If he'd... misunderstood the whole situation so completely!... If it was, indeed, possible that he could have been so utterly wrong about... EVERYTHING!.
A weakening sense of longing enveloped him as his memory settled on that brief glimpse of Poppy that he'd caught, just before unconsciousness had claimed him, and he fancied that he could literally touch, with the tips of his fingers, the powerful desire to just... see her!... that had, so suddenly, seized him!.
{Severus...?. Do you want to stay there?. For tonight at least?. You could visit with... Madam Pomfrey, Severus!. For real!... She's been so flooded with work that she didn't manage to coincide with you at the hospital, while you were awake!. Professor Flitwick had the same bad timing... He is the one we consulted about the shield that we ended up putting on your arm!. And... Draco!. He... he is there as well!. I'm sure that you'd love to have dinner with the lot of them!...}
Potter!... He'd forgotten that the boy was still linked to him!. Snooping inside his thoughts with his own given permission!. He was absolutely incensed with himself!. With the auror. With the whole god-awful situation!.
{Even If I wanted to do that: I can't, Mr Potter!. Or have you forgotten the letter of our Oath?. I'm to stay under your roof!.
As far as I am aware this school doesn't qualify as such!. It's pointless to engage in futile yearnings, that can never come to be, while my godson's very life hangs on the line!}
There was a void of all thought. Of all feeling. A moment were the brave gryffindor seemed to hide from him completely. Then he was back with a fiercely determined resolution. Potter's mind seemed to be... awash with purpose!. With that kind of abrupt, stubborn passion that had helped him win the war in the end!.
{But you want to stay!. Do you not, Severus?. What's more: I'd say you NEED to stay!. You haven't seen any of your old colleagues properly and you've... missed them!. You haven't been to the castle, at all!. You...
I can't believe I didn't see it before!. You... you apparated there, the moment that you felt threatened, because that's the place that you call home!. Being there will do you good, even if it's not completely safe for you yet to wander around the castle by yourself!}
Severus's eyes burned with unutterable emotion. He felt chocked by the awareness that the boy... the boy knew... this... about him!.
{I can't stay!...}
{Yes. You can!. I've been living in the castle for almost three years, Severus!. I was given a permanent set of rooms there as a token of recognition, after the war!. They are just down the corridor from your current position!. You... you are not really in your original rooms, don't you see?.
You are standing in a set of chambers that have been reconstructed, very recently, to look exactly like the old ones. You are not even in the dungeons, any more!. You needed to be closer to the Headmaster's tower, anyway, and we assumed that you wouldn't want to go back to Albus's quarters, so...}
The name of his former mentor cropped into the conversation so unexpectedly that he flinched. His mind lost it's grip on the boy's and the connexion that linked them together was suddenly and quite brutally severed!.
{Severus?. Severus!. I'm sorry! I... I won't mention him again. O.K?}
He took a deep, calming breath. Feeling humiliated, beyond all possible recovery, by the fact that he had shown this much weakness to the child!.
He felt vulnerable and uncomfortable with the level of... intimacy... that sharing a mental conversation seemed to achieve, when compared to having a regular one.
He found out that he could not hide his thoughts away!. Nor his reactions!. Everything, everything, that he felt or pondered upon was out in the open. Exposed!. Put on display, like the exhibit in a museum, for Lily's child to see...
{I'm sorry, Mr. Potter!. I... I seem to be unable to control the constant bleeding of my own... reactions... through our link!}
The apology left his mind with a dreadful sense of urgency. He didn't want the child to continue eroding his defenses any more!. He wanted to... cast a veil over his weaknesses, allow himself some time to hide them!...
Surprisingly Potter followed his lead, after only a second or two of clear hesitation.
{Don't worry, Severus!. I don't think anyone has used this kind of magic to talk to another wizard in centuries!... We couldn't find any record of it since the floo network was invented!. But that is a discussion that we can have another day. Now listen: I think you should stay!. I believe that the Oath will allow it!.
My private rooms are actually right there!. Fifth door to the right from your own!. You can get in and spend the night there!. It'll still be my roof, you see?. That way you can... have some time for yourself!. Unless you... Do you want me to come and stay there with you?. Or would you prefer it if I bring you back, instead?}
Those last two questions sounded breathless somehow. Expectant. There was some sort of very weird vibe that he was getting a hint of, through the link!. He could not understand it though. It was like a... fluttery... kind of nervousness!. A jittery agitation that permeated his senses, like a cloud of suffocatingly dense tension.
Potter seemed to be literally entrapped by it!. Tangled, like a moth, within this web of helplessness and... fear. Of confusion and hope. Of mind-numbingly deep Terror...
That whole mess emotion shocked Severus. It unnerved him. Unsettled him. Made him crave the sheer relief of the child's... absence!.
Like a veil of fog that obscures everything within it, Potter's thoughts vanished suddenly and their disappearance was as frightening as their presence had been!.
{I see... Severus. It's all right!} Those six words crossed over to him without any effort, though. They were thought out gently but... also with a heartbreaking kind of sadness. A veritable well of uncontainable misery shone through the wobbly cracks on the wall that the boy was trying to build between their minds.
Severus floundered as he sat in his old chair. He felt trapped within the soothing darkness of these chambers that were so very reminiscent of the ones they mimicked that he couldn't tell them apart!.
He was too far away from Potter to be able to offer him... What?: Solace?. Comfort?. He didn't even understand what it was that the bloody brat wanted from him half of the time!.
{Of course you don't, Professor!. How could you?. It's too soon for all of that!. I knew that already!. Only... It's hard, you know?. So hard!. You are right here, all the time, and I've been waiting for so long that I just... sometimes I lose it, Severus!. I am sorry!}
He blinked in the gloom of the room. Utterly spooked by the ease with which the boy traveled through his mind.
{I wish you wouldn't do that, Potter!}
{I told you before that I don't do it on purpose!. It is instinctive, don't you see?. I've been doing it for so long that I... It's like it became my first reaction, or something!... Every time I so much as think about you needing help, the next thing that I notice is that my mind is already trying to cast the Legilimency spell!.
I'm going to send a Patronus to Professor Mcgonagal. She'll go around to collect you. OK?. Stay there for tonight and I... I'll come visit you tomorrow. We'll talk about this mess, then. How about that?}
He wanted to do it, so badly, that he could not keep the pleasurable warmth that filled his whole being, at the very idea of it, from spilling out into the link...
The boy responded to it immediately. With a rueful, somber tone:
{Then you stay, Severus. It's that easy, you see?. I want to make you happy!}
He could feel the unbearable sense of dejection that was filling his whole chest with a cold sadness. He understood that the awful feeling must be coming straight from the auror's head, but he could not bring himself to address the boy's obvious distress. Not within his mind. Not aloud, in words. Not in any way that would force either of them to acknowledge that there were... things... about the current state of their damaged friendship, that were harming them both...
{How would I... Will your wards even allow me to enter your personal chambers, Mr. Potter?. I won't be able to fiddle with them, if they don't!}
There was laughter then. Amused, gentle, yearning. He could feel the touch of Potter's caring magic seeping down, into his very bones, even as his every braincell pulsed with the genuine sincerity that reverberated, clear like a teardrop, through the gryffindor's simple answer:
{Of course they will let you in, Severus. No door of mine will remain closed to you, for as long as my heart beats...}
TBC....