Chapter Seven of 'Wolf's Choice'- Walk the Walk

[lomonaaeren]

Chapter Six.

Title: Wolf’s Choice (7/60)
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Pairing: Main story is gen, a few GoF canon pairings mentioned
Content Notes: AU of GoF, angst, gore, violence, torture, present tense, minor character death
Rating: PG-13
Summary: AU of GoF. Harry begins his summer with horrific visions that come true much faster than he was expecting. He’ll have to rely on his circle of friends, both his guardians, and all his allies to cope with the results.
Author’s Notes: This is a long fic that is a sequel to my fic Other People’s Choices. Make sure you read that first before you start this one.

Thank you again for all the reviews!

Chapter Seven—Walk the Walk

“Should you be out of bed, Harry?”

“I’m fine, Blaise. Even Professor Snape would say—”

“I will be the judge of that, Harry.”

Harry turns around and scowls at Snape, who is standing in the doorway of the bedroom with his arms full of potions. Blaise prudently takes a step back. “That’s not what I thought you were going to say, sir.”

“It is what is happening, regardless.” Snape puts down the potions on a table that holds stains from more than one dripping vial in the past and steps forwards, laying his hand on Harry’s forehead. Harry resists the urge to fidget as best he can. He doesn’t want to put Snape off and act resistant, and he’d still prefer not to deal with things like the newspapers, but he’s also so bored of lying in bed.

“You have a slight fever,” Snape says.

“Can I please just get up? I’m so tired of staring at the walls and nothing else.”

“I brought you books.”

“I’ve read them all.”

“You are not to go flying.”

Harry winces before he can stop himself. That was something he had to admit he knew Snape wouldn’t allow, but he had been going to ask for it anyway. He’d thought that if he did well enough, with trembling lips and big eyes, then maybe Snape would let him. Blaise told him the other day that he does that kind of manipulative pout really well.

“No flying, Harry.” Snape’s voice is soft and his eyes compelling. There’s no laughter in either. “You may do something else. If I find you flying, you will be confined to bed for a week more.”

“I mean, what if I take someone with me?” Harry bargains, a little weakly. Sirius and Remus are coming over today, and he really hoped he could meet them on his broom and show them he’s all better. They both worry so. “What if I don’t go very high off the ground?”

“No flying. You still have a fever. If you fall asleep as suddenly as you have in the last few days, then you could fall.”

Harry meets Snape’s eyes, then reluctantly looks down and nods. The flip side of having Snape protect him from people like reporters is that Harry has to do as he says. That’s the side he somehow forgot about when he was asking Snape to protect him.

But a glow of warmth fills the center of his chest anyway.

“We could play chess?” Blaise offers. “Maybe you would lose less awfully than you usually do. Some of the fever-dream hallucinations would probably be better moves than what you make on your own.”

Harry glares, but Blaise only grins at him. Harry finally allows himself to smile back. “Yeah, okay,” he says. “Chess it is.”

“After your potions.”

Blaise’s empty hands say he’s not going to get in the middle of this. Harry tries another half-hearted glare before he scoops up the nearest potions vial and drowns it in one grumpy gulp. The heat pulls back from his forehead, and he takes a deep breath as a weight seems to lift off his chest at the same moment.

It’s Snape’s theory that one reason werewolf victims so often sicken is the shame and horror from what happened to them. So his experimental potions tend to affect Harry’s mind as well as his fever. So far, Harry doesn’t have any complaints about that.

Then Harry has to endure another salve being rubbed on his face that Snape thinks might alleviate the scars (it’s not that he hates the texture or anything, it just feels so intimate with Blaise standing right there), and a potion specifically for long-lasting fevers, and a berry-tasting one that will make him sleepy in a little while. Harry has slept more in the past few days than he has in his whole bloody life.

Telling Snape that makes no difference. The man only nods and pours more potions down Harry’s throat when he tries.

At least he manages to get out into the drawing room and set up the chessboard with Blaise. Blaise is looking straight at him now while he mocks the way Harry moves his pawns, at least. That’s a difference from the first days when he seemed afraid that staring at his scars would irritate Harry.

“You really don’t mind being scarred?” Blaise asks, during a pause when Harry is staring at the board and trying to remember how a knight moves.

“What?” Harry looks up. His friend’s eyes are intent now.

“You just—don’t act like it bothers you. My mum had a boyfriend that got clawed, and not on the face even, and he spent weeks on end moaning about how terrible it was and how horrible he felt. Then he—” Blaise stops abruptly. “He didn’t moan anymore.”

Harry reaches across the table and squeezes Blaise’s hand. It must be terrible to have a mother who murders people and not even feel you can do anything about it. Sometimes Harry gets sick of hearing stories about his parents and being compared to them, but at least he knows they were good people.

“I’m sorry,” Harry says quietly.

“I know.” Blaise sighs out and shakes his head as if he’s getting rid of all his grief that way. Then he sits up. “Anyway. So why doesn’t it bother you?”

“It does,” Harry says slowly, frowning at the chessboard. “But not as much as it would otherwise, I think, because I have the other scar. You know? People are going to stare and point at me in the streets anyway. I have to go to school and bear people whispering and gossiping about me anyway. I have to fight Voldemort anyway. So I might as well go straight ahead and work on ways to defeat him and change my life for real, instead of moaning about things I’ll never be able to change.”

Blaise is quiet. Harry glances at him and finds him sitting there with his brow furrowed and his glare aimed at the chessboard.

“It’s horrible you feel you have to struggle like that,” Blaise finally says.

“But it’s not a struggle. It’s the way life is.”

“It shouldn’t be.”

“Someday, it won’t be,” Harry says. “Now, why don’t we go back to my struggles with chess?”

*

Remus looks carefully at Harry as he and Sirius hug him. Harry’s smile is small and tired, but he hugs back with enthusiasm. He does look better than Remus thought he would just a week out from the attack, and better than when they last visited three days ago, too. The scars have faded—a little, or at least Remus hopes they have, he hopes he isn’t deceiving himself—and his face is pale instead of hectic and flushed.

“Remus, Sirius, good to see you!” Harry says. His friend, Zabini, nods to them, his eyes cautious. “I’m sorry we can’t go flying. I wanted to, but Professor Snape said no.”

Sirius opens his mouth. Remus glares at him, long and steadily, from the corner of his eye, and Sirius shuts it with a grumble. Remus nods to him and faces Harry again. “That’s all right. We’ll be more than happy to do whatever you want to.”

“Then that will be eating lunch, first.”

Remus jumps despite himself when Snape sweeps into the room, his eyes cold. He largely left them alone during their last visit with Harry. Now he’s watching as if he thinks they’re going to kidnap Harry and take him to Greyback.

A growl tries to rise in Remus’s throat; he strangles it. He knows Harry chose to be here with Snape, and that means they’re going to support him.

Even if it means that Sirius’s ribs are going to be very, very bruised from Remus’s elbow before all is said and done.

“All right, sir,” Harry says agreeably, and waits until Snape’s back is turned to roll his eyes at Remus and Sirius. That makes Remus smile. Harry is thriving here, and he obviously isn’t cowed by Snape, the way Sirius had been afraid he might be.

The lunch is the most carefully-made thing Remus has seen in a long time, even though Sirius also has a house-elf. (Of course, Kreacher isn’t fond of either of them). There is an exact amount of steamed vegetables, skinless cooked chicken, simmering soup with tantalizing hints of beef and tomato, and some kind of drink—pumpkin juice for Sirius, water for Remus, Snape, and Zabini, and milk for Harry—for all of them.

It is a shame that, this close to the full moon, Remus doesn’t care much for vegetables. He eats his chicken and his soup slowly, with great care, and drinks the water, then plays expertly with the carrots, corn, and potatoes so that it looks as if he’s been eating.

Harry, he notices, is doing the same thing.

“You are not hungry this afternoon, Harry?”

Harry freezes for a second—he might always do that when there’s food involved, Remus thinks sadly—and then glances up at Snape. “Sorry, sir, but I have more of an appetitive for meat,” he says.

Snape freezes in turn. Harry nods, his eyes a little sad. Remus realizes with a jolt that Harry is sad about reminding Snape of his experience with a werewolf, not sad about disappointing him or something like that.

He’s a lot more empathetic and observant than most kids his age would be, Remus thinks, swallowing hard.

“Very well,” Snape says a second later, as if he never hesitated, and he gestures for a house-elf. One appears, and Snape gives it a quiet order. The plate with a steak covered with bloody juices appears maybe five minutes later.

Harry cuts into it with enthusiasm, then stops and looks at Remus. “Do you want some, Moony?”

Remus catches Snape’s eye and knows that no matter how hungry he is, he’d better refuse. They have steaks waiting at Sirius’s house, anyway. So he just smiles and shakes his head, and goes back to playing with his vegetables. Harry eats most of the steak, then has a quiet argument with Snape about whether he actually needs to eat all of it.

The most surprising thing is that a plate appears next to Remus’s with a smaller steak, done even bloodier than the one the house-elves gave Harry. Remus’s eyes immediately dart over to Snape’s back.

The man, still leaning over as if he’s going to pick up the steak like a parent bird and shove it down Harry’s throat, gives no signs of noticing.

Remus does catch Sirius’s eye. His mouth is wide open in a gape. Remus nods to him and begins eating.

That gesture does more than anything else to convince him that Snape wants peace between them.

*

Harry looks up suspiciously as he hears someone Apparate outside. Snape wouldn’t do that. He’d just walk through the wards. And Sirius and Remus would either Floo in or tell Snape ahead of time they were coming. He looks at Blaise and sees that he’s thinking the same thing.

“Your mother?” Harry asks quietly.

“I don’t see how she’d have any way of knowing I’m here.”

But Blaise looks pale under his dark skin anyway. Harry squeezes his hand and then stands up. “Why don’t you go hide in your room? It might be a reporter or someone for me anyway.” He leaves the thought unsaid that it can’t possibly be one of the parents of their friends. They’d owl first before they came.

Blaise doesn’t argue with him like a Gryffindor would about hiding. He just darts off. Harry moves slowly towards the front door and looks out the window that Snape’s enchanted so that it shows most of the front garden and the path that leads up to their door at an angle.

For a second, Harry thinks a bright blur is standing there. Then it resolves itself as he blinks through the sunlight and sees Dumbledore in his bright-spangled robes, his hands folded behind his back as he looks at some of the flowers that Snape has growing in the garden for Potions ingredients.

Harry feels his breathing speed up. He swallows. He’s sure that it’s not a coincidence that Dumbledore has come over at a time when Snape isn’t here.

His brain whirls for a second about who he ought to Floo. Flooing a Death Eater doesn’t seem like a great idea, but Sirius and Remus wouldn’t see what’s wrong with Dumbledore being there, and the same thing might apply to Mrs. Weasley, and the Grangers don’t have a Floo connection, and Harry doesn’t know anyone else’s parents’ Floo addresses.

Wait.

It seems silly, but Harry walks over to the Floo and throws in a pinch of powder, calling, “Malfoy Manor!”

*

Dumbledore takes a long time to walk over and lean his magic against the wards, which is the equivalent of a knock and makes a soft alarm ring out in the house. By that time, Harry is stepping back from the fireplace and giving his guest a nervous smile.

“Thank you for coming, Mrs. Malfoy.”

Narcissa Malfoy’s smile is a little sharp, a little quiet, a little thoughtful, but she only says, “Thank you for inviting me, dear. This is a beautiful house. A shame that some guests disfigure it so.”

Harry gives her another smile out of sheer not knowing what to do, and goes to disengage the wards and open the door. Snape is going to be angry at him, but Snape isn’t here; he’s off somewhere gathering ingredients for the latest experimental potion he wants to use on Harry’s scars. Harry has no idea if an owl will reach him in time, and he still doesn’t want Snape walking around defying Dumbledore openly anyway. Dumbledore could sack him.

Snape would say Harry doesn’t need to worry about that. Harry does anyway. He has to when no one else is home.

But maybe Snape and Healer Lyndell will be proud of him for fetching an adult? Harry hopes so.

“Ah, Harry,” Dumbledore says, nodding and smiling at him. Harry keeps his eyes stubbornly fixed on the Headmaster’s chin, so that he’s kind of looking at him but not really. He doesn’t want his thoughts read, and he doesn’t trust Dumbledore not to Legilimize him, and he doesn’t trust his own Occlumency to keep him out. “Is Severus home? I have something to discuss—”

He stops and blinks. The look on his face when he catches sight of Mrs. Malfoy makes Harry want to laugh. But he just nods and asks, “Do you know Mrs. Malfoy, sir? She decided to come over here today.”

“Indeed.” Dumbledore’s eyes are narrow when Harry dares to look up at them. “Does Severus know about this?”

“Oh, he keeps a close watch on the Floo and the wards, sir.” And now Harry knows that Snape will be proud of him, because he’s managing to lie without actually lying. “Do you want to sit down and have something to drink?”

“That would be a good idea, Headmaster,” Mrs. Malfoy says, right on cue. She sounds gentle and keeps one hand on Harry’s shoulder exactly as if Professor Snape did ask her to come over and watch Harry. “Hospitality is always a good idea.”

Dumbledore gives her yet another baffled glance, although Harry doesn’t think it’s because he’s helpless. Snape is always telling him to remember that most of his enemies won’t be helpless. “No, I think—I think that my business should be confided to Severus in private.”

“He’ll be sorry to have missed you, sir,” Harry says, yet again speaking with perfect truth. “Do you want me to write down a message for him or something?”

“No, it is rather sensitive. I did want to see how you were doing, though, my boy, after everything.”

“Well, it’s summer, sir. So you know that at least means I don’t have homework and things like that.”

“You were wounded by a werewolf, Harry.”

Harry keeps himself from touching the scars, although he’s less worried about what Dumbledore would think than Mrs. Malfoy thinking he’s weak. “Oh, that. Yeah, it was boring to stay in bed for as long as I had to.” Don’t tell him how long you had to, don’t give him any specifics, breathes Snape’s voice in the back of Harry’s head. “But I think I’m going to be all right, sir. It’s not like he could infect me, after all. It wasn’t a full moon.”

“Nonetheless, you will have a few important restrictions at Hogwarts, my boy.”

“What restrictions would those be, Headmaster? I also have a son at the school. I would be interested in hearing of them.”

Mrs. Malfoy’s hand squeezes his shoulder again. Harry keeps quiet, even though part of him is getting tired of this. Thoughts clash and whirl in his head. Is this what would make having a mum different from having a dad?

But he doesn’t have a mum, and if he isn’t used to it by now, he should be, Harry tells himself ruthlessly, and waits for Dumbledore’s answer. He has the distinct impression that Dumbledore would like to talk to him alone, but, well, he can’t. That’s the way it is.

“I mean that you will have to be kept away from students at the full moon until we are sure that you will not change,” Dumbledore says finally.

“Oh, but I’ll have two more full moons at home, Headmaster. So we’ll know by the time I go back to school.”

“You may need to watch out who you touch, as some students have a phobia of werewolves.”

“Then I really hope I can teach them better just by being around them and being normal, Headmaster.”

“You may need to disguise the scars, as their presence in the classroom could distract—”

“This excuse is the one you offer, Albus? After doing nothing when another student was attacked by a werewolf?”

The voice is like soft thunder, rolling from the doorway of the house. Snape is home.

And Harry’s heart lifts in gladness.