Harry takes a deep breath and raps on the potion master’s door. He knows he needs to do something, and he knows this is what he should do, but he still doesn’t really want to. Not that She is exactly giving him a choice in the matter. And, truthfully, it is better than the alternative. Firmly telling himself to just get it over and done with, he obeys the smooth voice calling him to enter.

The dark man looks up from his desk, his eyes widening slightly in surprise as he identifies his visitor before his usual sneer slips into place.

“Potter. What brings the Gryffindor golden boy to the dungeons?” Harry swallows hard. This is it, this is his chance.

“Professor, I heard you were the one to go to if… and, well, She said… Ineedyoutocometothehospitalwingwithme.”

“I apologise, but I do not speak dunderhead. Say that again so I can actually understand you.” The sarcasm is poorly concealed, but the familiarity of the tone settles him. Closing his eyes, he takes a calming breath and tries again.

“I need you to go to the hospital wing with me.”

Snape’s eyebrows rise briefly at the statement, but he stands and walks over to hold open the door. It is the one request that, particularly when presented in such a manner, he can never refuse.

“Very well, Potter, but if this is some sort of joke…”
Harry flashes his professor a quick grin, relief flooding through him. First hurdle passed.

“You’ll turn me into potions ingredients, I know.”
_______

Harry walks into the hospital wing, then half-collapses onto the nearest bed; his dark shadow coming to lean against the wall as the mediwitch bustles over.

“Madam Pomfrey, I think my wrist is broken. Can you check if there is anything else too?”

The mediwitch gives a sharp look at the watching professor then raises her wand, waving it in a complex pattern. Strange symbols and lights start flashing over his body. Her eyes flick to follow them, her face paling as her wand movements change and become more urgent. At the same time, her free hand pulls a familiar potion vial from her pocket and thrusts it into his hands.
Gulping it down, Harry finally relaxes, sighing in relief. It is only now that Snape realises just how tense the boy was before.

“Thanks Madam Pomfrey, that really helps. So, is it broken?”

She doesn’t look up from her wandwork as she replies.

“Yes. In two places. But that is the least of your problems. Please be quiet so I can concentrate.”

Curiosity piqued by her unusually brusque reply, Snape leans forward to get a closer look at the scan. His gaze sweeps over the symbols still glowing with a variety of colours. Once. Twice. He stops and stares at the boy before him, failing to hide his shock at the results.

“Mr Potter. Might I ask how it is that you are arriving at school with such injuries?”

Harry just shrugs.

“I’ve had worse.”

Snape loses the struggle with his eyebrows and they rise incredulously.

“Mr Potter, if you had not come to us when you did you quite likely would have died!”

The boy nods.

“As I said, I’ve had worse.”
_________

Silence fills the room, and Harry looks up to see both adults staring at him in shocked confusion. Telling himself once again that this is the purpose of his visit, that this time he is supposed to talk about it, he takes pity on them and explains.

“Well, you see, sometimes when Uncle Vernon or Aunt Petunia got really angry they’d take things a bit further than they meant to and I’d have to spend some time with my parents. Mum and dad said they’re not angry at me for dropping in to visit, and it’s great to get a chance to talk to them, but it was getting a bit awkward having to send me back again so often. Even if I am – what do they call it – prophecy-bound. They said they love me, but given how well last year at school went, and the problems over the summer, I really should tell someone else about it so they can actually fix things. I have to say, it will be nice not having to deal with the Dursleys over summer, although it’s already loads better with being able to escape here most of the year.”

He turns to face his teacher, ignoring the slightly shell shocked expression.

“I also have some messages for you, professor. Dad says that he is sorry for what he did in school, but you really need to get your eyes checked. Because you are being incredibly blind for such a smart man, not to be able to tell that you are talking to me not my father. Speaking of, can I get my eyes looked at too? According to Hermione, I should be able to read the board from further than the front row.” He flashes a look at Madam Pomfrey who nods dazedly and makes a note, before returning his attention to the professor.

“Anyway, mum asked me to tell you that she forgives you, but you had better remember your promise and follow through on the rest of it. I wasn’t too sure about that plan, but we had a long talk at the end of last year after Quirrel, then discussed it a couple more times over the holiday. Eventually she convinced me. After all, even if you are the greasy bat of the dungeons almost anything would be better than going back to the Dursleys.”

He pauses and bites his lip nervously, running out of steam.

“Please? You will do as you promised mum? I can stay with you instead?”

Snape looks at the pleading in the boy’s eyes and dazedly nods his head, mind whirling. He doesn’t know what to think about the child’s story. It is too much. Lily said… and James said… and the boy talked, visited, with them… which means… and his relatives… and him…
He wonders if the child realises that he has just turned his entire life inside out.
_______

One thought stands out from the jumble in his mind. He talked to Her. He knows it’s crazy, but he has to ask. After all, surely that isn’t the only method the boy has to communicate with them, surely it didn’t happen that often…

“I don’t suppose, at some point, I could get you to ask Li- your mother…” The question slips out before he fully makes up his mind, but he trails off at the child’s expression.

“No. Nonono.” The boy shakes his head emphatically. “Not allowed. I got in so much trouble with them the time that I took myself to visit. They said my aunt and uncle send me more than often enough, and I can only decide to come myself if I really don’t have any other option. Dad kept yelling about how if I abuse the magic it will stop working and I won’t be able to come back – I didn’t use to see the problem with that, but I guess now I’d miss Ron and Hermione – and mum also said something about it being a sin.”

He leans closer, his tone conspiratorial.

“But sometimes, when I really want to see them, I try to make Uncle Vernon extra mad so he’ll send me to them again. Of course, if I don’t get him angry enough then it just hurts more; I hate it when that happens...”

Snape sees a shiver run through the boy at the memory, but a moment later his face breaks into a smile.

“But I got really good at telling how to set him off; it’s much simpler than trying to stop him in the first place. And once he gets started it’s easy to keep him focussed.”

Sweet Merlin. He’s dealt with suicidal students before, but never anything like this. The boy has absolutely no concept of the value of life. Suddenly he is incredibly grateful for the Potters’ rule – parenting from beyond the grave, although that is less of an obstacle than most cases. But really, how do you protect someone for whom life and death have lost their traditional meanings?
____

Nine months later

Snape feels his muscles finally relax as he looks at the small boy before him, the filthy and bloodstained robes contrasting disconcertingly with the excited grin now spreading across his face.

“Sir, I got to see them! The basilisk bit me, then Fawkes cried on it; but I got to see them, just for a few minutes. Dad said he was proud of how I fought and Mum approved of me coming to help Ginny. They said you’ll do fine this summer but they’ll be around watching anyway. It’s sad that I won’t see them again for a while but it’s going to be great having a proper summer holiday.”

He smiles and nods at the right places, leading the child firmly towards the hospital wing. Merlin, the boy had actually died. Again. While in the school. Also again. The Potters might have faith in him, and Harry might be able to bounce back and forwards between life and the afterlife, but the Chosen One will be the death of him yet. He knows it.

Year 3

Severus Snape sits on the edge of his bed in the hospital wing and seethes. This whole evening was a disaster just waiting to happen. What with Black on the loose while his pet werewolf masquerades as a teacher; and the dementors, around a school! He doesn’t know what the Ministry was thinking. Sure they managed to catch the man eventually – more through luck than anything else – but almost at the cost of a student’s very soul. Really, with a quarter of the school population being reckless Gryffindor teenagers – not to mention Potter and his ability to find trouble – what did they expect?

He glares at the boy in question, sleeping in the next bed. He thought he had broken the boy of his reckless habit of running face-first into danger but tonight’s events show otherwise. Chasing after a known mass-murderer who is trying to kill him. Trying to Disarm him, a teacher, and knocking him unconscious – ungrateful brat. Standing right beside a werewolf as it transforms. Trying to rescue previously mentioned murderer – even if he is apparently innocent – by running into the largest clutch of dementors ever seen outside of Azkaban. Is the boy really trying to get himself killed? He pauses for a moment. They have talked about this, a bit, over the last year, but he knows the child still has an incredibly skewed view of mortality.

A sudden movement catches his attention and he watches as a now-awake Potter sits up and fumbles for his glasses, the boy’s dazed confusion turning to familiarity as he looks around. Snape stands and walks over to him.

“Yes, Mr Potter, tonight’s adventures have landed you in the Hospital Wing… again. Mr Weasley is also in here, sleeping as Skelegrow repairs his leg; I believe Miss Granger is currently sitting with him, although at least she possessed enough luck and sense to avoid significant injury. Your soon-to-be-ex Defence Against the Dark Arts Professor is no doubt still stalking the Forest, howling at the moon.”

“Sirius?” Snape winces slightly at the worry and hope in his voice.

“Currently in Ministry custody.” He really doesn’t want to be the one to tell the boy his godfather’s likely fate. For knowing each other for only a few stressful hours they seem to have formed an unreasonably strong bond. While it is just possible that Black will finally get his trial and this whole mess will be sorted out, that would require the Ministry admitting that they made a mistake. No. Particularly given the way he eluded them these last months, they are more likely to just have him Kissed and be done with it.

The reminder of the dementors’ powers has him glaring once more at the boy before him.

“Potter, just what were you thinking, running off like that? Between Black, the wolf and the dementors you could have been killed, or worse!” In fact, he shudders at how close the boy came to both those options, several times.

He is pulled back to the present at the incongruous sight of a small smile flitting across the boy’s face. And did he just hear him whisper ‘expelled’?

“I’m sorry, but I had to. Sirius needed my help. If I hadn’t gone then, the dementors would have gotten him!” He shivers, then, his voice quieter. “I didn’t expect for there to be so many, or so strong. I tried to cast my patronus, but all I could hear was screaming; my mum. Then I thought I saw my dad, and a bright light. But there were too many dementors in the way; then it went all dark and silent and cold… so cold. And they weren’t there. I looked for them – they are always there and waiting for me – but they weren’t there.” He realises he has moved closer when the boy’s hands clamp tightly around his arm. “You won’t leave, will you? Promise me you won’t abandon me too.”

Snape’s eyes narrow, a retort on the tip of his tongue – unhand me – when he pauses. This is Harry Potter, his ward. His ward who has just come far too close to being Kissed. He freezes. Or had it actually happened? Maybe that was why he couldn’t find his parents. Could his strange power protect him even from that?

Pushing his speculations to the back of his mind he hesitantly lays his free hand over the child’s smaller ones, pressing them against him.

“Hush child, I won’t leave you; it was part of the oath I swore when I took you in. As long as I live, you are stuck with me. And they might not have been there yet tonight, but I know that your parents love you and will be there when it is time for you to join them. Just remember that there is also those of us here who… care about you. Do try not to leave too soon.”
__________

Year 4

“They were there, in the graveyard.”

Snape looks sharply at the boy seated on the couch across from him. Harry had reported the basics to Dumbledore, but otherwise hadn’t spoken of that night in the weeks since. Not while awake, at least; his nightmares are a different matter.

“Who was there?” His voice is calm, trying to coax out the details the boy clearly needs to share.

“My parents; they visited me this time.”

That explains why his ward is talking to him, at least. While they have developed something of a rapport – it was impossible not to after spending two summers living together – the boy still mostly prefers to share his thoughts with his Gryffindor friends rather than his Slytherin guardian.

“In what context?”

“We were casting spells, me and Him, then two of them collided and turned gold, tying our wands together. Some sort of shield formed around us then beads of light appeared in the middle of the link. I don’t know how, but I knew I had to keep them away from me and pushed them towards His wand. When they reached the end they were sucked in; then They came out. Oh, not my parents, not yet. It was…” He takes a shuddering breath. “It was Cedric first. He was all sort of pale and ghosty but not; but otherwise he looked just the same as before… before he…” Harry trails off, lost in his thoughts, before dragging himself back to his story. “I didn’t know the next two who came out. There was an old man – I think I had a vision about him at the start of the year – and a woman.

“Then my parents came. It was strange seeing them being the ghosts, not me. They were so proud of what I’ve done over the last two years. They told me it was time to break the light, then they distracted Him so I could get to Cedric’s body and the Cup.

“I wanted so much to be able to hug them, or even just sit and chat for a while like I used to, but at least they were there.”

Snape hesitates for a moment, then lays a comforting hand on his shoulder. He doesn’t know if he should feel gratefulness that the boy’s parents were there to save their – his? – son, amazement at the rare magics the boy continues to produce to save the day, or exasperated relief that, this time at least, it was his parents’ journey. After all, only Harry Potter could be prisoner of honour at the rebirth of the Dark Lord and not die in the process.
__________

Year 5

Looking at the teen slumped before him, Snape shudders slightly at the thought of the words he knows he must say. The mutt owes him for this; although he will have to wait to collect.

“Harry look at me. You are allowed to feel angry, you are allowed to feel sad. Your godfather just died, who you loved very much, and you are allowed to grieve.”
The boy is silent for a moment, his face twisting as he tries to put his feelings into words.

“I know, but… that’s not it! Or at least that’s not all of it. It’s my fault he went to the Ministry, my fault he died!”

Snape supresses the urge to roll his eyes. Of course, he should have known. The boy and his foolish Gryffindor hero complex; always rushing to the rescue, always taking the blame.

“It was not your fault. Black was an adult and chose to leave the safety of Headquarters; Bellatrix is an adult and chose to send that curse. You had not control over either of those.”

Harry is shaking his head and he can see that it will take some time before he can succeed in getting his point across. Watching the boy’s posture he groans silently; there is something more. How did he end up as the Boy-Who-Lived’s personal counsellor, anyway? Oh, right, when the child’s mother coerced him into becoming his guardian.

“While you do not believe me now, I will keep telling you until you do. But there is something else bothering you. What is it?”

“It’s nothing, silly really…” Harry twists his fingers together, his voice dropping to a whisper. “I guess I’m… well, kinda jealous.”

He blinks. Jealous? Where did that come from?

“Sirius is dead and I’ll miss him, but he’s free now. Happy. I saw them, just for a moment, when Voldemort was possessing me. Sirius was with my parents and they were hugging and laughing and happy and together, and I just wanted to be there with them.”

A bubble of hope rises in him. Painful as it is, he can use this. On one level, the child clearly sees his godfather’s death as a good thing; freeing him from his life as a fugitive and reuniting him with his lost loved ones. Perhaps that can be used to counteract the guilt he is feeling at supposedly causing said death.

He takes another look at the teen. Who is he kidding? This is Harry feels-too-bloody-much Potter. With his history, he’ll just have a double dose of guilt to work through.
__________

Year 6

Harry sits slumped on the couch. The room should be familiar, he has been in there often enough, but recent events make them seem different, alien. After all, while they were His rooms first, it has been several years since He insisted they are their rooms. But now, after last night… he doesn’t know. Did he even know Him at all?

“I didn’t do it, you know, in the cave.” His tired voice falls flat amongst the empty shadows. “It would have been so easy. Just let the inferi take me and I could see my parents again; Sirius. It’s not even like you’d end up losing your precious Boy-Who-Won’t-Die. But I didn’t. You would have been so disappointed, and I had to help Dumbledore.”

He scowls, his voice rising to a shout.

“With the locket being a fake, it was already an almost wasted trip. Then I finally get him back here and you go and kill him! He was pleading but you just AK him and run off with your Death Eater friends!”

He collapses back, panting. Only the dead silence of the dark room allows his next words to be heard.

“I should have just gone to my real parents.”

Harry blinks away the afterimages of the green flash, his body trembling with suppressed adrenalin. Even doing it deliberately, surrendering to the Killing Curse hadn’t been easy; and he hadn’t been quite sure what to expect. Overall, he decides, while more stressful, it had been a lot less painful than most of his past visits.

That thought in mind, he reaches out to brush the door in front of him. It swings open and he steps inside, finally relaxing as the overwhelming feeling of home washes over him.

The entrance opens onto a cosy sitting room, floored in smooth wood, the cream-painted walls accented by blue window curtains. A set of stairs lead to an upper storey while a doorway shows glimpses of a sun-filled kitchen. Clustered around the cold fireplace are a collection of brown armchairs and a sofa, worn but comfortable. Part of his mind notes that four of these are occupied – three heads of black hair and one of red – before he is distracted by a niggling sense of familiarity.

The room should be familiar – he did after all visit rather too frequently as a child – but the sight sparks a more recent memory. A moment later it clicks. The room is undamaged and slightly different, but it is clearly based on the front room of the cottage at Godric’s Hollow.

Just as his mind makes the connection, his attention is caught by a door he doesn’t remember seeing before; in either version of the house. There is nothing special about it. Just a plain wooden door like those in hundreds of other houses, yet he is drawn towards it. He steps closer. No, wait, he was wrong, the door is not plain after all. There is something in the middle… red… a plaque… with bright gold writing. Harry’s Room: his room.

Suddenly he knows that if he can just open that door he can have everything he has been looking for; what he has wanted since he was a small child with the Dursleys. He reaches out, but a hand catches his fingers, stopping them from touching the handle.

“Harry, honey. You can’t go in there, not yet.”

The trance-like haze begins to fade, though he continues to stare at the door longingly.

“But, it’s my room…”

“I know, that’s why you have to wait. Come sit down and we’ll explain.”

Reluctantly he allows himself to be drawn back towards the rest of the room. Turning away from the door he freezes, finally noticing the feeling of another hand clasped around his own. With a gasp of shock his eyes fly up to meet the matching ones beside him.

“Mum… how… touch… we can’t… but we can…”

She smiles at him. “All part of the explanation.”

Harry just nods, his face buried in her shoulder, his arms wrapped tightly around her. He doesn’t cry – he hasn’t truly cried in forever – he just clings to her, trying to absorb the feeling of being held by his mother for the first time in fifteen and a half years.

Harry is barely aware as his mother guides him over to the sofa by the fireplace, pushing him to sit. It is only then that he realises that the other side is occupied.

“Dad.”

He reaches tentatively towards him; not quite daring to touch, to hope. His father bridges the gap, grasping his hand and pulling him into a hug of his own.

“Harry. I’ve wanted to do this for so long.” Harry blinks hard, gripping the hand – warm, solid, real – still clasped in his own.

A long minute later he feels the sofa shift as someone sits down on his other side.

“What, no hug for me?”

Releasing his father, he turns to meet the laughing grey eyes of his godfather. Once again, he lunges forward to wrap his arms around his lost loved one. He should feel embarrassed by all the hugging – he is seventeen after all – but instead he just feels loved… and guilty.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have gone to the Ministry; I should have realised it was a trap. I should have remembered your present and checked the mirror. I should have been faster. I was just trying to rescue you but then you had to rescue me instead and then you died and it was all my fault and it’s always my fault…”

“Harry. Harry. Pup.” Sirius shakes him lightly, halting the garbled flow of words. “It’s not your fault, you didn’t cast the curse. Besides, I’m the one who chose to leave the safety of the house, who didn’t pay enough attention during the duel. You only did what any of the rest of us would have done.”

“Is that enough for you, now do you believe? I have only been telling you the same thing for the past two years.”

Harry swallows thickly at the smooth voice, final looking at the man sitting on the chair opposite. He is familiar, moreso than any of the other adults really, and looks just as he has for the most of their years together – not thinking of the last time he saw him, not thinking of the blood, so much blood. Snape glares at him, a rare glimmer of warmth lurking in his eyes.

“Don’t you dare get emotional at me, Potter. You saw me not two hours ago and we both knew it would most likely end that way. In any case, we have more important things to discuss at this time.”

He takes a deep breath and nods, trying to obey. In some ways it is hardest to keep his composure faced with the spirit of his foster-father. It is too new, to raw; he can remember the feel of his dead body lying in his arms, the blood drying on his hands. But in other ways it is easier; it hasn’t sunk in yet. With everything else that has happened it is easy to pretend it was just a bad dream. Pulling himself together he frowns, remembering Snape’s last comment.

“What do we need to talk about? I did my job; I followed your instructions and now I’m here. Isn’t the rest up to them?”

Snape nods.

“I gave you what I could with my memories, but it seems there are a couple of extra key points.”

He turns to Lily who nudges Sirius out of the way and takes his place beside her son.

“The horcrux in your scar didn’t act like his others. Partly because it was made accidentally, partly because it is in another living person; but there is more than that. We had hoped that the basilisk bite in your second year would deal with it – I have a feeling Fawkes held off healing you for a few minutes just in case – but that obviously didn’t work. What we think happened is that the soul fragment got caught within the protection I wove around you. The barrier kept it separate from you and mostly stopped it from influencing you, but included the horcrux in its protection from outside forces. Only Voldemort’s Avada Kedavra was able to reach it; the same wand and spell that caused it to form in the first place.”

Snape scowls as Harry turns a questioning look on him.

“Yes, the old fool theorised that was the case, and no I did not agree with his method of testing his hypothesis. I spent too many years trying to convince you that life is worth something to have him talk you into walking to your presumed death.” He sighs. “In the end, however, events conspired against me, leaving me with little choice but to pass on his instructions; and thankfully Dumbledore proved to be once again infuriatingly right. While I am not pleased with what I allowed the Headmaster to ask you to do, I am… I am proud of how you carried yourself; Gryffindor bravery as it should be.” His dark eyes glisten for a moment before he looks away, visibly uncomfortable with expressing such emotions.

Sirius takes up the story next, more serious than Harry has ever seen him.

“Prongslet, there were a couple of important side effects when that AK hit. Firstly, it fulfilled the prophecy; one of you succeeded in killing the other. You’re not the Chosen One any more. Removing the horcrux also weakened Lily’s protection. Without the added strength from being prophecy-bound, it only has enough juice for one more miracle. You need to make a decision now. You can stay here; open your door and live with us, dying in the real world. Or you can leave; finish your visit and walk out the front door back to the battle. One door or the other.”

His father nods.

“Padfoot is right. It is your choice, but this is the last time it will be offered. Even if you leave now, the next time you see us you will have to stay; no more visits.”

Harry ducks his head, trying to avoid the four pairs of eyes fixed intently on him.

“I don’t… I don’t want to go back. I want to stay here with all of you; home.” He wants – needs – them to say it. Say that he can stay, that they want him, love him; that he is not being abandoned again. He can feel the same longing in his parents’ eyes, yet they remain silent.

As usual, it is Snape – damn his knowing look – who points out the practicalities, reminds him of his duty.

“But.”

Harry nods in defeat. The man knows him too well.

“But they need me. Voldemort should be mortal now – assuming one of the others managed to get the snake – but we still need to kill the monster himself. Even with his skill and power it shouldn’t be impossible, except that the other part of his plan worked too well. Everyone knows that Dumbledore is the only one he ever feared; everyone knows that I’m the only one who’s defeated him. With me dead as well, most of them will just give up.”

He glances sideways at the dark-robed man, remembering their second attempt at occlumency lessons.

“ ‘You can’t succeed if you tell yourself you’ve failed before even trying.’ And, I guess, there is my friends; Ron and Hermione, Ginny, Neville, Luna. They’re still there. But the longer the fighting goes on, the more danger they are in. And Teddy. He’s lost his parents, I don’t want him to lose his godfather too, even if I don’t know what I’m doing. Then there’s the other children, families. The longer the war lasts, the more lives are lost or ruined.”

He looks at his parents – mother, father, godfather, foster-father – and sighs.

“I’m going back, aren’t I?”

His father smiles; a strange combination of sadness and pride on his face.

“It’s your choice, but look at it this way. In one form or another, the war has controlled your whole life. This is your chance. You can win this war, then your life is yours. You can build a family; you have your friends. Make a future you want to live in.”

His mother rests a hand on his arm.

“Remember, we’re not gone, we’ll watch over you just as we always have. And when you have finished with your new life, your room will be open and we will be waiting to welcome you home.” Her voice turns teasing. “But not, I hope, before you have presented me with at least two grandchildren and half a dozen great-grandchildren.”
The room bursts into laughter, Harry blushing slightly as he tries not to think too hard about a certain other red-haired witch.

After a few minutes the laughter dies away and Harry stands; the weight of the real world intruding into the dreamlike interlude.

“I guess this is it, then. If I’m going to leave, I’d better do it now before I change my mind again.”

James sighs, glancing over at Lily, then nods.

“You’re right. I wish we could talk longer, but you need to return now. If you want to end all this today, timing is crucial.”

A moment’s awkward silence follows, then Sirius steps forward to grab him in a bear hug, his voice thick with emotion.

“Good luck, kiddo. Lils said it best, but it bears repeating; we love you, we’ll miss you, and we’ll watch over you. And we’ll be waiting for you when you come back. Now go and kick some Volde-butt for us!”

Chuckling at his godfather’s attempt at a motivational speech Harry looks around the room one last time, memorising their faces. Exchanging a final encouraging smile he spins and walks determinedly towards the front door, towards life.

“Harry.” He pauses, hand on the doorknob, and looks behind him, meeting his ex-Professor’s dark eyes. “Remember what I have told you over the years. Do not worry about us, do not trap yourself in the past and ‘what if’s. Remember to live.”