lomonaaeren

Chapter Four.

Title: Love, Free As Air (5/?)
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Warnings: Sex, angst, profanity, a bit of violence. Ignores the epilogue of DH.
Pairings: Snape/Harry/Draco.
Rating: R
Summary: Trapped in his Animagus form, Harry stumbles on Snape and Draco, who disappeared from the wizarding world years ago. His first task is to become human again. His second might be to help Snape and Draco with the same problem.
Author’s Notes: This story is being written for

heeroluva, who won a charity auction at

gulf_aid_now to raise money for the oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. She gave me the plot, for which I thank her. I’m not sure how long this story will be, though I estimate somewhere between 15 and 20 chapters. The title comes from a quote by Alexander Pope.

Chapter One.

Thank you again for all the reviews!

Chapter Five—Within the Net

Harry swore. He liked the way that his words sounded when he was a parrot, harsher and sharper and breaking against the air as if he were more offended than he actually was.

It was small compensation. Either Snape and Malfoy had strengthened the wards recently, or they were harder to break out of than into. Harry was trapped against the net of magic that stretched above the garden, with no way to chop through it.

Harry clung to the thin lines of magical energy that marked the wards the same way he would have clung to the bars of his cage and cautiously tested his beak on them. They stung back and made him screech and shudder. That wasn’t the way to get out, then.

He could try to break through them the way he had when he came in, but he had only been willing to do that in the first place because he was already wounded and had thought for sure he’d found the Auror camp. The last thing he needed when he’d finally healed enough from the singing to fly again was to weaken and burn himself by breaking through these wards, especially when he still didn’t know where the Auror camp was.

Now…

He dropped from the wards and flew carefully around the garden, just under the net, looking for the weakest place in it. But it seemed Snape didn’t know the theory that said there should be one weak place in any net or cage where a desperate prisoner could break through if they needed to. The wards were all the same length and strength and thickness. Harry landed in a tree—after making sure that it didn’t have a net of the same kind that had caught him last time—and swore again.

“I think you’d be better served to come back inside.”

Harry peered down. Malfoy stood beneath the tree, arms folded and grin steady as he looked up. Harry thought about shitting on his face for spite, but doubted that would really advance his cause.

“Yeah, I know that trick,” Harry said. “You don’t want to waste the effort gathering Snape’s next batch of ingredients.”

Malfoy shook his head. “I actually persuaded him to listen to reason, though it was hard after you destroyed his lab,” he said. He paused. “Why did you do that?”

“Because of what he was doing to you,” Harry said, with an agitated flap of his wings. He wanted to bite Snape just from thinking about it, and he had to say the words, even though he doubted that Malfoy would understand them. “You were so close to breaking free, and then you gave up and fell back into his clutches. You’ll never escape them now. There’ll always be some excuse, some reason to stay.”

*

Draco had to bite his lip to keep from laughing. Did Potter realize how melodramatic he sounded? Really, Severus’s clutches? Who said that kind of thing anymore and meant it? Except transformed Gryffindors, apparently.

“I appreciate you thinking of my safety,” he said. “But it’s for the best if you come back in. I suggested that he was careless for not securing the lab’s wards when he stepped out to…convince me, and he agreed. If he’s the one at fault, then he won’t punish you as badly. Although you might have to put up with a day or two of sulking.” He paused and lowered his eyelashes and let his voice become reluctant. “And maybe there’s something to what you say, about my never getting away from him without help. Will you come back in and try to remind me of that if I start falling under his spell again?”

Potter didn’t even seem to notice the pun. He stared down with his beak open instead, and then cocked his head to the side. Draco remembered, distantly, that birds needed to do that to see people better with one eye. It probably wasn’t a cute gesture that Potter had invented just to make himself seem more bird-like.

Probably.

Draco was proud of his appeal. It had some truth; he did want Potter to give him visions of a better option. It was a guard against his becoming exactly what Potter seemed to think he was, Severus’s little caged bird, who didn’t dare sing without permission from him or spread his wings unless it was to fly on some chore for him. If he had to leave, Potter was the one who would provide him with encouragement.

But it was also a lie, the best way to get Potter to return, by appealing to his Gryffindor instincts. Best of all, he could talk about it that way if he wanted, and Severus would simply discard it as more of his mad ramblings about Draco not being valued or wanted enough.

Potter hopped to a lower branch without taking his eyes from Draco. Then he turned his head and picked at a feather in the middle of his back with a crackling, rustling noise like flames. Draco settled on a stone bench beneath the tree and watched him. If Potter intended to make him impatient, he would learn it took more than that.

Putting up with Severus’s indignities and ignorance for six years had taught Draco a lot of patience.

Potter finally turned around again and said, “Say I stay. Why should Snape help me? There’s no reason for him to care about my presence the way you do.” Draco bit his lip to stop himself from laughing. Perhaps he needed Potter to stay, but that was a distance from saying he cared about him, especially since he knew Potter wasn’t a pet bird he could confess everything to without judgment. “There’s no reason for him to help me after I destroyed his lab. That was one reason I was leaving. I didn’t want any help from someone who’d done what he’d done to you, and that meant I didn’t have to care about his lab.”

Draco stared at him levelly. “I refuse to believe that you didn’t enjoy pulling his books off the shelves, no matter what your motive for breaking into his lab in the first place might have been.”

Potter turned away to preen again, which Draco thought was an admission. Finally Potter said, “Yes. Well. It doesn’t matter, because there’s no way that he would ever agree to help me again, unless I apologized. Which I won’t.” He gave Draco a challenging look.

“There are two reasons he should.” Draco held up his fingers and watched as Potter focused on them. Do they look like carrot sticks to him, I wonder? “First, as I said, he’s convinced that it was his own carelessness that didn’t keep the lab safe from you. He takes things to heart when they’re his own fault, and won’t blame you for that much. Second, he enjoys the challenge. And there’s probably even a third reason. If you left in the shape of a parrot, you could still have told other wizards about us.”

“I wouldn’t!” Potter squawked.

“Forgive us for not believing you without the Unbreakable Vow.” Draco rose to his feet and held out a commanding arm. “Will you come back inside with me now? I’ll be helping Severus with the potion, so I can at least promise that it won’t be poison or an acid that melts your fathers or whatever else you’re afraid of.”

The word afraid seemed to go to Potter’s heart, as Draco had thought it might. He fluttered down to Draco’s arm and stood there with his feathers so fluffed out that he looked much bigger than he was. “I’ll go with you,” he said. “And protect you from your own tendencies to surrender to Snape.”

Draco smiled temperately and carried him inside. Potter hopped up to his shoulder as they went, and Draco adjusted to the weight without thinking of it.

I could almost miss not having him around as a bird. On the other hand, if he’s an Animagus, then he could become a bird again at any time once we have him back to human.

Then Draco blinked. That thought argued that he was anticipating a longer association between himself and Potter than the time needed to brew a potion could account for.

Well, and why not? he decided a moment later. If I need him around, then I’ll hang onto him. Be nice enough to him, and he might speak a good word for me once he goes back into the wider world. Or I might have to go with him.

The thought made him feel as if he were ripping himself up by the roots. But then again, if Severus was as hostile to him as all that, it was better to leave the cottage before the soil grew poisonous.

That’s enough of plant metaphors, Draco told himself as he opened the door of the cottage and marched inside, Potter swaying on his shoulder and digging his claws deeper for balance. Draco winced but put up with it. I’m a human being with a heart and a will of my own.

Both Severus and Potter are going to find that out.

*

“I do not understand why you agreed to come back inside.”

Severus spoke the words in a neutral tone, keeping his gaze fixed on the potion in front of him. His latest attempt to break the spell on Potter, it was a thick, clear green, and bubbled and steamed in ways that made him sure he would come closer to success than on any of his other tries. He added a bit of powdered ruby and waited until the red color it added to the potion had cleared, then glanced at Potter.

Potter squatted on a perch next to the repaired window, looking out of it. He seemed determined to ignore Severus’s question, but Severus thought, in truth, that he was simply waiting to answer. Severus was more patient, however, and the silence in the lab increased until Potter at last clicked his beak in irritation and turned his head. Severus watched the bright green of his eyes and cursed himself for a fool. He should have realized that no natural African grey would look like that, and guessed at once that it was Potter.

Potter, who was always finding a way into Severus’s life whether he was welcome or not. Severus had imagined he was free of that after Albus died, and he had nearly died—saved at the last moment because Draco had come back for him and known what antivenin to use—and they had managed to leave the wizarding world. But of course not. Potter was like a virus. You couldn’t leave him behind for the wishing of it.

“Just in case you’re doing yourself the honor of thinking I came back in for you,” Potter said stiffly, “I didn’t. It was for Malfoy’s sake.”

Severus nodded as if he cared, while adding one more flake of ruby to the potion. It turned and swirled, and then a bubble rose and popped on the brim of the cauldron. Severus took a deep breath to master his excitement. Revealing it would make Potter mock him, especially if this turned out to be another failed attempt. “I knew that. But I assumed that you would accept no help from me at all, someone whom you think makes him miserable, even if it is only in the brewing of potions.”

Potter snapped his beak again. “Why are we here alone?” he asked suddenly. “Where’s Malfoy?”

“Meditating,” Severus said, with a sneer. He thought Draco’s newfound habit ridiculous, especially since it consisted of sitting out in the garden and staring blankly at the flowers. What is the difference in that from what he was doing before? “He also said that he needed time alone and wanted us to try and get along. He can’t always be here to defuse the quarrels we may have.” He scooped up a drop of the potion in the nearest ladle and held it to the light.

No. A shade too dark a green. Severus was more glad than ever that he’d hidden his excitement as he returned the drop to the cauldron and considered whether he could continue to use the potion or should banish the ingredients that filled the cauldron instead. In the end, he Vanished it and began to clean the inside of the cauldron with salt in preparation for another trial.

“He acts sometimes as though we’ll live together for years,” Potter muttered. There was another clicking noise as he shifted on the perch, and Severus tried not to show how the sound made his shoulders stiffen. At any moment, Potter might be bored enough to slide down from his perch and go “exploring” in the lab once again. “I don’t understand that. It might take you a while to find the solution, I reckon, but it won’t be years.”

“Thank you for that vote of confidence in my skills,” Severus said, and added molten silver to the bottom of the cauldron on top of the salt. Contrary to what he had told his students in Hogwarts, cleaning a cauldron of stains and the gunk that stayed within it was not the most important task. The brewer would have to remove all trace of magical influences so that they did not interfere with the next potion. That kind of cleaning, Severus had always done himself. He could deal with Longbottom melting cauldrons if he must; he could not deal with dragons summoned into the castle, as had happened once when he was a student and Slughorn had failed to cleanse a cauldron used for brewing Amortentia.

“How in the world did you ever wind up here?” Potter asked, after another period of silence. “Why would you want to come here and live in—in isolation, with just Malfoy? It seems as though you would need a larger audience for the bragging rights.”

Severus smiled without responding. Potter had no idea of the false name that he used to put his research out in the world, and Severus had no intention of revealing it. Potter might keep his promise according to the Unbreakable Vow they would have him swear and not tell anyone that the name belonged to Severus, but there were things he could do, especially with contacts among the Aurors, to diminish the pseudonym’s reputation.

“I asked you a question!” Potter snapped, and there was the sound of feathers flying, as there often was when he shook himself in irritation. Severus ground his teeth. He would have to clean again before Potter left the lab. “Why would Malfoy agree to come with you? He hadn’t been tried yet. He could have escaped his parents’ fate!”

Severus snorted and Vanished the mixture of silver and salt from the cauldron, then checked critically to make sure that no trace had remained behind. “Do you believe that the Wizengamot that found me guilty enough to condemn to the Dementor’s Kiss, despite your memories, and Lucius and Narcissa guilty enough to warrant Azkaban, would have spared Draco? His age did not matter. Some of his contemporaries were imprisoned.”

My Slytherins. There had been Blaise Zabini, accused of participating enthusiastically in the Carrows’ torture of other students, and Pansy Parkinson, on what Severus thought was mostly a set of charges trumped-up to obscure the fact that she’d suggested throwing Potter to the Dark Lord, and even a few of the younger Slytherins. They had tortured to save their lives.

The Wizengamot did not seem to understand that.

He allowed himself to taste the bitter memories for a moment only, before he shook his head and faced Potter. He would have to cast another spell on him that would give him renewed information about Potter’s capacities and magical signature as a bird—or rather, the lack of a magical signature, since his enemies’ spell had worked so well. The information was necessary to construct the potion, but since he worked with a different combination of ingredients and a different theory each time, Severus had to keep renewing his “acquaintance” with Potter.

“That’s—I didn’t know that,” Potter said, and stood on one leg as he looked up at Severus. He made a good bird, Severus thought inconsequentially. Perhaps he did not have to despise himself so much after all for not figuring out Potter’s identity from the green eyes. If he had not spoken, they would not have known. “About the other Slytherins being imprisoned, I mean,” he added, just as Severus was about to scold him for sheer stupidity.

“Why should you?” Severus asked levelly. “After all, the longest sentence of that nature was ‘only’ six months in Azkaban. And you had never been concerned with them when you were students in the same school.”

Potter nearly stumbled taking his left leg out of his feathers and returning it to the perch. “That has nothing to do with it! I didn’t think their crimes were that bad. I would have spoken up and defended them, if I knew.”

“That is the point,” Severus said, and he didn’t hide the scorn in his voice. Why should Potter care about it? He was more likely to be upset about Severus daring to address him in that tone than about the students being sentenced. “You did not have to know about it. Whereas no one could escape your fame. And it is likely that Miss Parkinson was sentenced not for what they accused her of, but because certain powerful people remembered or heard the tale of her wanting to sacrifice you.”

“I would have told them not to sentence her for that,” Potter said. “If I’d known.” He still sounded stunned and distant.

Severus snorted. “You testified in my case, and for Narcissa Malfoy. That did no good, either. The wizarding world was determined to have their orgy of punishment and revenge after the war.” He took a deep breath and wondered why he was speaking so honestly to Potter of this. Perhaps because Draco already knew the history and Potter would refuse to absorb it in any case, so eager was he to defend the decisions of his side. It was venting for Severus’s sake alone. “Well, I decided to deprive them of that in my case, and Draco’s, too.”

Potter stared at his claws this time, as if he found the way they gripped the perch absorbing. Severus cast the spell that would give him the information he needed about Potter, waited a moment until the whispers in his skull had ceased, and then turned to face the cauldron.

“You still could have fled on your own,” Potter said from behind him. Severus worried about destroying his enamel with the grinding of his teeth. The sooner he finished the potion, the sooner Potter would be able to leave them. Did he not understand that, or did he not care? “You didn’t have to take Malfoy with you. You certainly don’t want him here now!”

Severus didn’t respond. He owed Potter no answers about the complex feelings that had animated his own heart when he looked up and saw Draco’s face staring back at him through the bars of his cell, or the ones that had touched him when he awoke after being “dead” and saw the same face hovering above him. He did not think Draco, either, would appreciate Potter learning of the tender, desperate words he had spoken, the avowals he had made.

Things had not worked out as either Severus or Draco expected. Those feelings Severus had experienced was feelings only of the moment, forever dispersed like the soap-bubbles they resembled after a certain period of time. But Potter would misunderstand and treat as wrong any information they gave him.

“Snape, are you listening to me? It doesn’t matter what kind of hatred you’re inflicting on yourself as punishment for not saving my mother. Malfoy doesn’t deserve it.”

Severus stood still for a moment, fingers resting on the cauldron despite the danger of leaving prints and grease. Then he turned about. Potter was leaning forwards on the perch and had to catch himself with a quick flutter when he was realized he was overextended.

“Not everything that I am and does goes back to your mother,” Severus said softly. “I repaid my debt when I nearly died saving you. You have saved the world now, and no longer need my protection. For you to assume that the Potter family is still central to my life is insulting.”

“But that’s it, isn’t it?” Potter was undaunted, although he did crane his neck to the side as if he wanted to see Severus’s hands before they could swing out. “You went to Dumbledore in the first place because you felt guilty over what your reports of the prophecy did to my mum. You protected me because of her. You wanted to see my eyes when you were dying because of her. Are you telling me you got rid of that and it never affects you now?”

Severus decided that he would cast a spell to check his remaining enamel later. “I am healed from those psychological difficulties, yes. Or do you want me to begin a catalogue of your traits that undoubtedly date back to the war with the Dark Lord?”

Potter snorted, or made a sound that might have been a snort if he had an actual nose. “I changed my life. I was never a friendless recluse acting like I deserved to be punished for one of my sins.”

“No, of course not,” Severus said coolly. “If only because you did not notice the effects of your sins. Did you know that Draco suffered greatly in his childhood because of you? He had wanted your friendship. You rejected him. That was the source of much frustration for him, and for many of his reactions towards you. Do you care about that? Or would you say that he needed to grow past that reaction?”

Potter hopped sideways and flared out his tail. Severus did not know what the gesture meant. “I would say that I was sorry, that I didn’t know—”

“As I said,” Severus murmured. He had recovered control after his unfortunate lapse, and, in truth, was surprised at himself for losing control in the first place. “You are not required to know us. We are required to know you and understand you, first as enemy and then as hero. Your guesses about us will be necessarily partial, the wounds you inflict on us unnoticed.” He turned back to the cauldron.

Potter said nothing. When Severus looked again, he had tucked his head into the middle of his back and stood on one leg, asleep.

Severus rolled his eyes. At least the impossible bird-brat had not flown off, which would require Severus to track him down the next time he needed the “feel” of him for a potion.

He became involved in the next concoction, then, his thoughts rising and falling to the rhythms of his hands and the currents that bubbled in the potion as he brewed it, and forgot about Potter for a long time.

*

Harry sat there, and thought for a long time about what Snape had said. He would have liked to deny it, but he hadn’t even known about the other Slytherins sentenced to prison, and he didn’t think Snape would have made that up just to fuck with him. If nothing else, Harry could ask Malfoy.

I have to do something.

That was the reason he had ultimately left the Aurors. He could help people if he was an Auror, yes, but there were so many rules and regulations that the ways he could help them were severely limited. It was better to be what he had become, a private investigator who could use his Animagus form, among other tactics, to figure out the best solution in circumstances that might be really complicated or involved. Sometimes he worked with the Aurors, but those weren’t his most common cases, since Harry had to hide too many details if he did something illegal.

Malfoy and Snape both needed help. Malfoy needed help in resisting Snape; that was clear, and Harry was glad to have the task, if only because it might make Malfoy freer.

But Snape? Did he need help recognizing and coming to terms with what had happened to him, or did he need help reconciling with Malfoy?

Or did he need to be able to return to the wizarding world? Would it help if Snape and Malfoy didn’t feel they had to stay here forever?

Harry dug his beak further into his feathers and concentrated fiercely. He was good at solving problems. This one was complex, but he would pick it apart in the end, just like all the others.

And sure enough, before evening, he had the first idea for a solution.