Walk the Shadows

echo of children's laughter lingered for a moment, then silenced, and a flicker of movement on the carousel drew Harry's eye. The children had vanished.

He turned to the young man beside him, to point this out, and the man was staring at him, his dark pupils almost encompassing the whole of his eyes. 'Only you can bring them back, Harry Potter,' he said.

'How?' He couldn't look away from the strange eyes. He didn't want to.

'The sun. If you will the cloud to pass, the children will return. They're innocents, Harry. So happy and carefree. Nothing can harm them while they're here, remember?' The young man smiled. 'Don't you want them to return?'

'Of course,' Harry said and focused his will on the cloud until it slid past, uncovering the sun and bringing back the laughter, the children. The happiness. The shadow passed from his mind.

The young man leaned back on the bench, eyes half-lidded, watching the scene, and Harry relaxed again. That was close, he thought. I have to clear my mind of doubt, or fear. Only then can this remain.

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Severus appeared on a field of yellow and red flowers. The sound of gaily tinkling music carried to him on the breeze, and he turned. The music was familiar . . . Ah. Harry's low humming, back in the waking world. And indeed, on a bench in front of a carousel sat the Brat Who Lived, next to a young man . . . whose appearance made Severus shudder in recognition. They both looked relaxed, gazing at the spinning raised platform and its multi-colored figures.

Severus headed for the bench, his long strides eating up the distance. As he neared the pair, he caught another glimpse of the carousel. What he'd thought were children, laughing and skipping in amongst the unicorns and dragons and broomsticks, were clearly Inferi. Their dead flesh hung in tatters. Hollow eyes bored into him, accusing him of unknown crimes, as he approached.

At the same time he recognized the 'children' for what they were, the flowers he strode through were revealed as long dead and dried to husks in the stifling heat of the sun. The trees, leafless and blackened with rot, were still, with no breeze to move through them, and the ground was barren sod.

But Harry, he could tell, saw none of this. His smile was fixed, his eyes curiously blank and unmoving. He wore school robes, like the young man beside him, though neither of them with house emblems.

'Potter!' he called.

No response. Oh, not this again.

'Potter!' he shouted this time. 'Harry!'

The boy turned. His eyes widened a fraction. 'Professor?'

The young man -- the younger version of the Dark Lord -- put a hand on Potter's -- Harry's -- arm. Harry twitched, but did not pull away.

'Po -- Harry. Come here. Come away from that man.'

The young Dark Lord's eyes flashed red before fading back to black, and he hissed something incomprehensible. Harry's expression hardened.

'I don't know what he's told you,' Severus said quickly, 'but he does not mean you well. He lies. I told you that. All this is a lie.'

Harry shook his head. The sun glinted on his hair, oddly casting a wreath of gold on his head. Bright green eyes were narrowed, suspicious, as they regarded him.

'Look around you!' Severus took another step forward. 'These aren't happy children. This isn't a pastoral Sunday afternoon. You can't just bury the truth with pretty lies and hope it goes away. It doesn't work like that. Life doesn't work like that.'

'I don't know what you're talking about,' Harry said. 'You can't see what I see. You don't know--'

'I see the truth, Potter!' Another step. 'And I do know a thing or two about life. Even about wanting to hide. But it is not in you, Harry. You're a Gryffindor.' The last was a grasp at straws, he knew, to appeal to the boy's house identity. But if it was the only way his courage would manifest. . .

The boy mumbled something that sounded vaguely like 'Hat wanted Slytherin,' but Severus did not countenance it, especially when the Dark Lord, in the form of a charismatic, handsome, and demanding Tom Riddle, tugged on Harry's arm, hissing again, and Harry answered him the same way.

Severus took another step toward them. He was close enough now that he could grab Harry if he needed to, but he kept his hands carefully by his sides. 'Look, Pot -- Harry,' Severus pleaded. 'Look around you, truly.'

The boy made no effort to do so, but leaned back against Riddle, as if for support.

'LOOK!'

When Potter still did not comply, Riddle smirked at Severus. He sidled closer to Harry and whispered in the boy's ear. A dark look passed over the boy's face and he continued to glare at Severus. Sudden foreboding made Severus' heart stutter in his chest, but he held his ground. Then Riddle snaked an arm around Potter's back and slid his body along the teenager's side, in a blatant attempt to show Severus how much control he truly had over Harry.

But he'd gone to far.

A cloud passed over the sun, dark and angry, as a look of horror appeared on Potter's face.

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Harry leapt to his feet. 'Don't touch me,' he hissed at the young man, who suddenly seemed nauseatingly familiar.