Walk the Shadows

Disclaimer: None of this is mine. Honest. She's rich, I'm not.

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Aug. 14

I can't think anymore. I've been thinking and thinking and going round and round about this . . . clusterfuck of bombs Snape hit me with. He wants to be my guardian. He was friends with my mother. He got her killed.

It's too much.

Closing the book, Harry rested his head on his arms. He was back out in the sitting room, after spending most of last evening in his room, thinking, brooding and occasionally, though he hated to dwell on it, crying. He was really sick of doing that, but it was like his body didn't care what he wanted anymore, and just started producing tears whenever he thought about certain things. Like Sirius, or Voldemort. Or the prophecy.

He didn't want to kill anyone, so it was unlikely he would be the one to survive their next meeting. It was only because of others that he was here, now at all. Only because McGonagall and Tonks had come to get them, and because Snape had helped him escape from the Voldemort inside his mind. He didn't know how he kept surviving things, but he knew one thing for sure. He wasn't going to survive the final battle.

Snape let him sit there, unmoving, for maybe ten minutes before he rose, putting his book down, and went to the kitchen. Harry groaned inwardly. He knew the tea was helpful, giving his hands something to do while they talked, but he was really getting to hate tea . . . now that it was irrevocably intertwined with these talks.

What did Snape want anyway?

'What do you want, anyway?' he asked.

Snape, filling the kettle with water, looked up at him through his greasy hair. 'World peace,' he said with a sneer.

Harry snorted softly. 'Yeah, er, I agree. But that's not what I meant.'

'I know.' He put the kettle on the hob and leaned against the counter, closing his eyes half way, waiting for the water to boil.

From his seat at the writing desk, Harry watched Snape's face, thinking about how almost completely blank it always was, except for a few tells. When he was amused by something, one corner of his mouth would twitch, as if he had to force himself not to laugh – he wondered for a split second what Snape laughing would look like, but then decided that it would probably herald the end of the world and so wasn't worth thinking about. And when he was listening intently, Snape leaned forward, just a smidge. When he was anxious about something, which didn't happen often, obviously, he laced his fingers together and held them perfectly still, whereas if he was trying to figure something out, he often did the same thing, except his thumbs tapped lightly together.

And of course, when he was angry . . . well, Snape had many faces of rage, actually. He had the sour, 'I smell something foul, oh it's you, Potter' look, and the 'I'm going to skin you alive and use your still beating heart for my potions' look, and Harry's personal favorite, the 'I'm about to kill you and everyone you've ever talked to, so you better run' look.

He also had the cold rage, the one that actually made Harry afraid of him. That one wasn't hard to tell either. His face was completely without expression, everything still and calm, except his eyes, which could freeze over Tahiti with a mere glance.

The tea tray hit the table with a whispered scrape, and Harry automatically reached for his cup and stirred in a bit of cream. He blew over the top of his drink, then lifted his gaze to meet Snape's after a moment. 'Will you tell me now?' he asked. 'Sir?'

Snape squeezed lemon into his tea and stirred deliberately, as if he were mixing a potion. 'I have a number of reasons, Po . . . Harry. Not least is what I told you yesterday. You have been subject to a series of incompetent guardians, which has left you flailing about without purpose, discipline or security. I would take it upon myself to help you discover these.'

'But what do you get out of it?' Harry pressed. He refused to think about what he had just been offered, not now anyway.

'I fulfill an oath I took to protect you.'

'What?!'

Snape set down his cup and folded his hands around it, holding them very still. 'I took an oath, when I first eschewed the Dark Lord, that I would protect you to the best of my ability. I have not yet done so, to my utmost regret. I plan to rectify that oversight.'

'Oh.' Harry stared into his tea. He should have expected that. Snape didn't want him, just wanted to rectify an oversight. Whatever. 'I see.'

'And, of course, I want to assist you in preparing--'

'To meet Old Voldie again. I know.' Everyone wanted their weapon in top form. Nobody wanted Harry.

'No. I would help with that in any case. The assistance I offer is somewhat more . . . personal. I would like to prepare you for when you one day leave Hogwarts and are on your own. I know you own the Black house now, but how much do you know about running a household? Or balancing your asset reports, or selecting an appropriate wardrobe? If you don't plan to live in that old house, do you know how to find a flat, secure reliable help, or cast household wards?'

Harry had snorted again over the appropriate wardrobe bit, thinking it was ironic for a man who wore nothing but black to suggest that anyone else's choices in clothes might not be up to snuff, and then looked up at him again. 'So, you'd be . . .'

'Your guardian, Harry. I would have rules, of course, that I would expect you to abide by, concerning curfew and acceptable past times, for instance.'

'Of course,' Harry mumbled.

'And I would be the first one other professors would go to, if they thought you were having difficulty in class,