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Chapter Nineteen—Locked in Nightmares

Severus opened his eyes and found himself standing in a dark tunnel.

He moved back with a hiss, staring around. The walls seemed to be perfectly black stone, although they reflected the light of the rare torches in rippling blue and purple sparks that he associated with the Department of Mysteries, the one time he had visited. The silence spread around him like water.

“Who has done this?” Severus raised his voice. “Release me!”

Silence did not reply.

Severus reached for his wand, and found it missing. In fact, when he looked down, he saw that his entire wand hand was missing, as if in a more severe version of the wound Potter had hit him with when he’d destroyed Severus’s old wand.

That at least soothed his anger, because now he knew where to direct it. Potter. The brat had been nothing but trouble ever since he had come to Hogwarts and been Sorted into Slytherin. What had he been playing at? No Potter would belong in Slytherin, so he must have asked the Hat for it to annoy Severus.

Severus stepped forwards, and then started more violently than he would ever admit as a shimmer of color formed in front of him. It had a crimson tint to it, and Severus braced himself against any number of curses.

But he was helpless against the figure that stepped out of the light.

“Sev.”

Lily, her eyes fixed on him, brighter than they had been the day she repudiated his friendship, and so full of sorrow and anger that Severus recoiled back against the unyielding wall behind him.

“Lily,” he whispered. “What are you—did you come to—”

“I came to ask you what you were thinking, treating my son the way you did.”

Severus’s crawling guilt and rage dived down his throat again. He took a step towards her. “Come out, Potter!” he called, his eyes darting back and forth. “I know that you conjured this apparition! Come and let me destroy you for it!”

“How would Harry know your nickname, Sev?”

Severus shook his head. “Someone could have told him. The wolf. Someone I don’t remember from our school days. Maybe Potter made his way to Azkaban and learned it from Black! I don’t care. I know this is not real.”

“Then it ought to be simple for you to wake up.”

Severus closed his eyes, reorienting himself to the center of his own mind, not this maze of black walls and nonexistent dead women. He reached down into the discipline of his thoughts that had allowed him to become a skilled Occlumens, and reminded himself of what was real and what was not.

What was real was that Lily was dead, and Potter an arrogant bastard like his father.

When he opened his eyes, he still stood in the dark stone corridor, and Lily still stood in front of him, although with a mocking smile twisting her lips that Severus had only seen on her son’s face.

“Still convinced that this isn’t real, Sev?”

Severus turned and walked down the corridor in the opposite direction, without replying. Conversing with the figure that Potter had somehow burned into his mind with a discharge of magic was fruitless. He would have to find a way out, by convincing himself of what was real and what was not.

The silence felt real. So did the stone that his reaching fingers met a moment later.

But he would not allow it to be real. Severus shook his head and moved on, ignoring the mocking laughter from behind him. That was not real, either. His Lily would never have laughed like that at him, no matter what he had done.

*

“Nothing?”

“Nothing.”

Albus leaned back against his chair and shut his eyes. Fawkes gave an anxious croon, and Albus reached up to ruffle his familiar’s breast feathers. “What did the Dursleys say about Harry?”

“They called him a freak the entire time they were talking about him.” Kingsley’s voice was soft, subdued. “They said they hadn’t seen him since summer, and good riddance. The son, the cousin, he was home for a holiday from his own school, and he said—he said that he’d hunted Harry.”

“It wasn’t a good situation.”

Albus opened his eyes and nodded to Hestia Jones, who was standing next to Kingsley and looked nearly as upset. “I am sure you are right about that, Hestia.”

“Why did you send him there, Albus?”

“There was no place safer.”

Hestia’s face grew sharp and stubborn, but Kingsley was the one who spoke, with a warning glance at his Auror partner. “And if they molded him into the boy you described, Albus? The one who attacked you and Snape?”

“I have told you to call him Severus, Kingsley. You are colleagues in the Order of the Phoenix.”

Kingsley stared at him, and Albus reckoned that it was hard for anyone who had not been present when Harry had attacked Severus to feel much sympathy for the man. He sighed and leaned forwards. “Yes, I do believe that. And I believe that there is nothing to be done for that. Many Dark wizards had sad childhoods. That does not mean that we need to excuse them their deeds.”

Kingsley and Hestia exchanged silent glances, but in the end, they didn’t contradict him. Kingsley turned back to Albus. “You don’t intend to call for the boy to be officially brought in.”

“No. It would weaken people’s hopes to know that their Savior has gone Dark.”

Kingsley inclined his head, but said nothing outright. “And how are we to find him if we can’t utilize the Aurors?”

Albus gave a small, painful smile and reached down to a drawer in the desk. It yielded to a tap of his magic, and he took out a vial glimmering with Preservation Charms. The blood inside was as fresh as it had been when it had been drawn from Harry’s veins as a baby.

“As it happens, I have the means for an excellent tracking spell.”

*

Harry felt as though his jaw and fists had both been clenched for the entire ride to Azkaban’s island. Mrs. Tonks had stared at him a few times, but hadn’t commented on it. Helios had simply looked at Harry before they left the house and advised him not to burn everyone at Azkaban to a crisp.

Theo was by his side, as steady as though they were just walking to the Slytherin common room. When Harry glanced at him as they came out of the Apparition onto the island, Theo smiled at him.

“Why are you so bloody calm?” Harry hissed under his breath as they entered the small guardhouse that shone with bright silver anti-Dementor wards. Some form of modified Patronus, from what Mrs. Tonks had said.

“Because we’re together.”

Harry swallowed. Theo reached down and slid his fingers gently into Harry’s clenched hand, and Harry nodded and focused on the floor ahead.

Yes, all right. They were together, and they would be for the rest of their lives if Theo had anything to say about it, Harry knew.

He needed to relax as much as he could.

“Mr. Potter?”

The breathless voice made Harry snap his head up, staring. He hadn’t heard that tone since his first year at Hogwarts, when people still expected him to be some kind of hero.

Either the Auror in front of them hadn’t heard all the rumors about what a terrible person Slytherin Harry Potter was, or he didn’t care. His hands were fluttering and his breath misted in the air as he came over and pumped Harry’s free hand. “It’s so wonderful to meet you! Imagine! I’m in the same room as the person who defeated You-Know-Who…”

Vague memories of what it had been like when everyone was shaking his hand in the Leaky Cauldron, his first trip there with Hagrid, managed to keep Harry from yanking free. He smiled as politely as he could. “Thank you.”

“For what? Oh, no, Mr. Potter, I should be thanking you! Just giving back a little of what you gave to us…”

The Auror was off again, grey eyes misty. Theo snickered next to Harry, but he made no sound. Harry just felt it through their joined hands.

“Be that as it may,” Mrs. Tonks said at last, “we do need to get on with seeing Sirius Black if we’re to be out of here before most of your coworkers arrive for the day.”

The Auror, whose name Harry hadn’t bothered to listen for, started guiltily and nodded. “Of course, of course, Andromeda. I’m so sorry. My word! I was just hoping—” He glanced at Harry and bit his lip. “If Mr. Potter here would mind signing an autograph?”

Mrs. Tonks looked at Harry calmly, which was a nice change from the way the Auror had treated him. “Would you mind, Harry?’

And at least she sounded sincere in the question, like she wouldn’t blame him if he didn’t want to.

Harry would do whatever he had to so he could face Black, though. He smiled at the Auror and spun the fingers of the hand Theo wasn’t holding. A ward shaped and sharpened the air, turning into a solid surface. “Do you have a quill and parchment?”

The Auror left off gaping at him long enough to scramble for them.

Harry wrote his name in a flowing, looping signature that he usually didn’t bother with, and then sank the ward into it. The parchment started to fall, but Harry caught it and handed it back to the Auror. “Here you are.”

“Th—thank you!”

As they followed the babbling Auror down the stairs that apparently led to the part of Azkaban where Black was kept, Mrs. Tonks eyed Harry and murmured, “Was it the wisest course to leave your name behind? That could give anyone who came looking for evidence of you a clear trail.”

Then why didn’t you raise the objection before I signed it?

But Harry had no right to expect her to do that, really. They didn’t know each other. She had no reason to make any sacrifices for him. He shrugged a little. “I put magic into the signature so that it’ll destroy itself if he tries to show it to anyone.”

Mrs. Tonks stared at him.

Theo laughed quietly, and the sound rang in the staircase in a way that Mrs. Tonks seemed to find disturbing. She turned and walked quickly after the Auror, leaving Harry and Theo to make their way down the stairs into silence.

“You’re brilliant,” Theo breathed.

Harry had been experiencing the heavy effects of the Dementors more the more they descended, but those words made them lighten to the point that he could have flown.

*

Black was on a level of Azkaban that was apparently reserved for the criminals the Ministry considered worst. Theo curled his lip as he walked past the cells where people yelped or screamed or lay silent. Father had been a Death Eater, and he hadn’t heard of any murders that Black had committed during the war. Not until the thirteen at the war’s end. Black wasn’t like Bellatrix Lestrange or even Augustus Rookwood, whose information passed from the Unspeakables had seen countless Muggleborns and halfbloods betrayed and murdered.

Then again, the Ministry was probably reacting to the fact that it was the Boy-Who-Lived’s parents Black had betrayed.

For what he did to Harry, he definitely belongs here.

They halted at last in front of a cell whose bars looked grimier than the rest, although that might have been Theo’s imagination. There was a movement far back in the cell, and then someone flung himself at the bars.

Or something. Theo took a long step back. Why in the world was there a black dog in the cell? Since when were Azkaban inmates allowed pets?

“Sirius?”

Mrs. Tonks’s voice trembled. Theo shot her a narrow look, letting his hand rest on his wand for a moment. Had it been a mistake to bring her? Was she so sympathetic to her cousin that she might betray Harry?

“Sirius Black.”

Harry’s voice was low. Theo turned to look at him in turn, and watched the way that the light from Mrs. Tonks’s glowing leopard Patronus was hitting his face. He swallowed. Harry wasn’t blazing with fire or burning with light the way that some people got when their magic was stirring around them, but still.

He looked magnificent. He looked like someone Theo wanted.

“Harry.”

The voice was low, so savage a growl that Theo whipped back to the cell, putting himself between Harry and the bars. But it turned out that he would have been useless, because he was left staring with his mouth open as the dog transformed into a man.

“Sirius,” breathed Mrs. Tonks again.

He’s an Animagus? Theo supposed that was typical of someone who was so powerful and so dangerous that he’d managed to be a spy on the Potters for years and the Dark Lord’s second-in-command. And it also made sense of how he was sane enough to stare at Harry and recognize him.

It didn’t mean Theo liked him, but it was better to understand an enemy even if you despised them.

Black ignored Mrs. Tonks, and he ignored the way that Theo had stepped in front of Harry. He stared at Harry, only Harry, and his eyes were hungry. He just stared.

“Black,” Harry said. “What do you have to say for yourself?”

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

Theo blinked. He’d never heard of Dementors making someone genuinely remorseful, only driving them further and further into their worst memories. Then again, people who went into Azkaban either didn’t come out or came out after only a year or two. He had no idea what someone who had been in for as long as Black really felt.

“Then why did you betray them?”

The air in the corridor turned tense and vibrating. Theo could feel it like the snap of a rope against his skin. He took Harry’s hand again, and Harry turned his own to capture Theo’s, although he didn’t remove his eyes from Black’s face.

“I didn’t!”

“You said it was your fault!”

“Peter Pettigrew’s fault! We switched Secret-Keepers, and that little rat betrayed James and Lily! He never could have if I hadn’t suggested they switch! It’s my fault they’re dead!”

Theo opened his mouth, but nothing came out. To be fair, he didn’t know if he could produce coherent sound when his head was reeling so hard.

“Sirius?”

Mrs. Tonks was the one who spoke, but she wasn’t the important one right now, Theo thought. Only Harry and Black were. He herded Harry a little closer to the bars, which Black gripped as he stared at Harry with a dark, powerful yearning.

“What?” Harry croaked.

Black didn’t say anything, so Theo took it on himself to ask the obvious question. “Why did you kill the Muggles, then?”

“That was Peter. He was always quick. He blew up the street and cut off his finger to leave behind. He knew they would blame me. Blacks are all mad and have Dark magic. That’s what they said.”

Black mumbled it in a quick voice, leaning forwards so that he almost poked Harry with his nose. Theo asked, since Harry was obviously in no shape to do so, “And why did Pettigrew manage to do that?”

“Weren’t you listening?” Black asked, and although he didn’t take his eyes off Theo and his face was still hollow and staring and mad, that question alone proved he was capable of keeping track of a conversation. “Peter was a rat. An Animagus, like me. He knew he could escape. Probably dodged into the sewers. Little rat.” A growl rumbled out of his chest that it was frankly amazing anyone in human form could make.

Harry closed his eyes for a long moment. Theo let him be. Mrs. Tonks seemed paralyzed, and he didn’t think she would interfere, either.

“You were my godfather,” Harry whispered. “Do you ever think that you could have—not run after Pettigrew, and raised me instead?”

“That’s what I should have done. That’s what I regret most, Harry. Lily and James are dead and I can’t bring them back no matter what happens.” Black’s voice was ragged along the edges. “But I could have saved you.”

Harry whirled away from the bars, his hands clasped across his face. Black stared at him with the same longing that he’d shown for so many minutes so far, but he didn’t reach for him.

Mrs. Tonks still stood frozen when Theo glanced at her.

So Theo acted, because it was obvious to him that someone had to. They couldn’t leave Black here even if he was lying or had somehow gone mad about this one specific thing while managing to sound sane otherwise. They had to give Harry a chance to question Black and lay his ghosts to rest.

Theo swung his wand. Black went to sleep as a result of a nonverbal spell, and Theo broke the bars with a Blasting Curse. Mrs. Tonks jumped and said something sharp about the Azkaban guards that Theo didn’t pay attention to, except to say absently, “If magic reached past the bars from inside, it would alert them, but not from the outside.”

“How do you know that?”

“How do you think?” Theo sneered over his shoulder at her, and then focused on Black. He had only ever read about this spell, not cast it, but the desire to help Harry was pounding so strongly through him that he had no doubt he would manage it. “Animal creo!”

The spell would Transfigure most humans into an animal, but with someone who had an Animagus form, it should force them into it. For a moment, the light swirled white and gold around Black, shifting sluggishly back and forth, and Theo wasn’t sure it would work. But he bore down with the force of all he was—

I am Harry’s betrothed. I am my father’s son.

--And it smoothed out and grabbed hold of Black. He became the enormous dark hound once again.

Theo floated him out of the cell and then repaired the bars with a single swirl of his wand. Dementors were blind. They wouldn’t notice that a particular cell was empty any more than they had noticed Black had been a dog all these years. And if they noticed the feel of Black’s mind and memories missing…while the Ministry could communicate with Dementors enough to control them, Theo had never heard of the Dementors being able to talk back.

Theo Disillusioned Black and turned to face Mrs. Tonks, keeping his arm around Harry. “Let’s go.”

“We can’t—we can’t just—”

Mrs. Tonks’s voice faltered, but Theo knew it wasn’t because of weakness. He could feel it himself. Cold, flowing towards them. Hopelessness, descending the stairs. The light of her Patronus was already flickering.

Theo rolled his shoulders. It seemed that breaking the bars had alerted them after all, or maybe the Repairing Charm. It didn’t matter. He didn’t know the Patronus and he couldn’t deal with Dementors by himself, but he knew someone who could.

“Harry?”

*

Things could have been different. I could have lived with my godfather, and not the Dursleys.

Harry had fallen so far down the hole of blackness and what-if inside his soul that it was an incredible effort to drag himself out of it. He hadn’t seriously considered being able to stay with anyone except the Dursleys since he came to the magical world and saw how people had shunned him for Sorting into Slytherin. He’d put idle fantasies out of his head and focused on leaving the bloody country as soon as he could.

But now…

Now despair was howling and pinching at him, but so was something else, something that cut through the cold and rose at Theo’s voice.

Rage.

Harry looked up. The wavering shadows of Dementors played across the walls, and then the hem of a tattered robe, or what looked like one, drifted around the corner.

Harry had never mastered the Patronus Charm. But he lifted his hand, and his magic answered his call, forming into a ward as splayed and wide as his fingers.

Harry infused it with his own magic, the way he had that morning he had broken Snape’s wand and wand hand in the Great Hall, and all his rage at what he had just learned.

Destroy.

The ward snapped outwards from his hand, and the darkness filled with the sound and the light of death.