The Order was gathered around the kitchen when Snape slammed a broken, charred chalice sharply on the table. Harry started, watching its two black halves come apart upon impact.

“The last Horcrux,” said Snape, glancing coldly at the assembled Order members. “Now. Let me explain to all of you why the destruction of this chalice -- the cup of Helga Hufflepuff -- marks a turning point in our strategy.”

And, as if giving a class lecture, Snape explained the existence of the Horcruxes.

“The Dark Lord,” Snape said, glancing around the room, “is now mortal.” Snape hesitated uncharacteristically; his gaze flicked to Harry for a split second before he continued. “If you have been wondering why Dumbledore preferred to hold back rather than strike, but the answer is simple: had the Dark Lord been killed any time prior to now, he would simply have reformed. Now, however... we shall go on the offensive.” Snape’s eyes were dark and cold. “It is time to kill him.”

Silence. Harry was confused, almost disbelieving.

“And as you’re so clearly in the know, Snape,” said Moody, pushing himself off the wall, “how do you suggest we go about that?” He gave a predatory leer, fully expecting to disagree with Snape’s answer.

Snape’s lip lifted in a cruel, anticipatory smile. “The Dark Lord knows that he is now without protection, and he is not one to risk death lightly. He will withdraw to Malfoy Manor, shut himself within, do nothing until he has found some other way to secure his immortality. Therefore, we must draw him out.

“You have all noticed,” continued Snape, “how closely he has coveted his little puppet government. He has always wanted to rule the world, and he will not relinquish control lightly...”

“So what, we try to take control of the Ministry?” Moody scoffed. “Even Dumbledore couldn’t do that. Half the government are Voldy’s sympathizers.”

“We won’t take control,” said Snape delicately. “We’ll level it.”

Moody’s living eye went wide. After a beat of silence, the Order was in an uproar.

“Please,” sneered Snape over the ruckus, as if he were talking to a group of unruly first-years. “The Dark Lord has spent years building his little empire: taking the Ministry, ensnaring the economy, indoctrinating the people. We cannot take control of it from under his nose. We are barely fifty; his Death Eaters are thousands. No --” Snape smiled nastily -- “we must kick it down: Send the world into chaos, undo his neat little house of cards. That will lure him out of his lair --”

At that point, Snape’s voice was lost in the tide of shouting and outrage and indignation. Tonks and Lupin were standing; Molly was slamming her fist into the table; Moody was scowling, his eye spinning wildly in his head.

“What you’re calling for is terrorism!” shouted Molly.

“Why, yes, I suppose it is,” said Snape.

“Out of the question!” she cried. “We won’t bring down the world we’re trying to save!”

“Then I’m afraid you’ll end up doing nothing at all,” said Snape, “but hiding in this house, waiting for a salvation that will never come.”

“Molly’s right,” said Moody, stepping forward. He gestured sharply at the charred chalice. “Now, what you’ve done has been very helpful to us, Snape, but I think we’re done listening to your suggestions. Voldy’s mortal now.” He scowled. “We’ll find some other way to do him in.”

“Like what?” said Snape quietly.

“We’ll rally the people. The Muggleborns. The magical creatures. The halfbloods and purebloods, who Voldy’s alienated, but who have been too afraid to act til now --”

Snape’s lip curled. “That will take years.”

Moody barked out a horrid laugh. “You just don’t get it, do you? You honestly would watch everything blacken and burn, just to kill him?”

Snape didn’t answer.

With one final glare, Moody turned to the rest of the Order members and launched into the meeting. Slowly, the Order members calmed down and returned to their seats; after a few distrustful gazes, they began to ignore Snape, and soon the room was filled with their intelligence reports and suggestions for the war.

Through all this, Snape watched silently, his expression impassive but his eyes full of bitterness. And as Lupin launched into a controversial report about the werewolves, Snape slipped out of the room.

The other Order members didn’t seem to notice; they were engrossed in conversation on the other side of the room. Harry glanced between them and the open door, and feeling suddenly apprehensive, darted after Snape, determined to confront him.

Snape was at the front entrance door when Harry caught up. “Professor!” he shouted, leaping down the stairs.

Snape turned, a faint scowl etching itself across his face. “What is it, Potter?”

Harry stopped at the bottom of the stairs, the entrance hall stretching out between them. “You’re actually going to do it,” spat Harry. “Destroy the Ministry.”

“How perceptive, Potter,” Snape drawled. “And here I was beginning to think you were deaf.”

The bad feeling in Harry’s gut compounded. He raised his chin. “You can’t do it alone --”

“Yes,” Snape said, sneering, “I absolutely can.”

Caught off guard, Harry simply stared in disbelief.

“Four years after my graduation from Hogwarts, I had already become one of the Dark Lord’s most trusted servants,” said Snape. “I was doing so well, in fact, that he was willing to grant me a rather large favor, had the stars aligned. Do you think me a mediocre wizard, Potter?”

Harry hesitated.

“You will quickly come to see --” Snape’s expression twisted -- “that it is far easier to destroy than to protect. The Ministry buildings have many points of entry, and I know how the Death Eaters operate. Forcing my way in will be easy, and from there, demolishing the place will be nearly routine. And if that does not suffice to draw the Dark Lord out into the open... there is always Diagon Alley.”

“Diagon Alley.” Harry’s heart began to beat -- Snape was utterly serious. “You can’t -- you’ll destroy everything!”

Snape sneered, turning partially away and placing a hand on the doorknob. “I was never particularly fond of it all. But that is quite enough talk. Good-bye, Potter...” Snape’s eyes glittered strangely. “May we never see each other again.”

“No!” shouted Harry, but Snape wasn’t listening. He had opened the door, the light behind casting him in silhouette, and soon he would be gone.

Harry was desperate. Snape was his enemy now, and Harry’s wand was in his hand before he knew it -- he aimed -- “Stupefy!”

Snape reacted in an instant. There was the bright flash of a shield, then the blue of a retaliatory spell -- Harry was hit in the chest, his wand arcing high into the air, and Snape caught it with his left hand, shoving it into a pocket.

Snape’s expression was rigid in fury. He crossed the room with quick strides until he had Harry pressed against the wall, shoving his wand tip into Harry’s chest. “How very like you, Potter,” he breathed. “I am doing your work for you: vanquishing your greatest enemy, without your even lifting a finger! But it’s not enough for you, is it --”

“It’s not about that!”, cried Harry, though he could hardly hear his own words over the frantic beating of his heart. “You monster! You --”

“Silence!” Snape’s wand pressed harder into his chestbone, as if he were trying to run Harry through. “I did not ask for your lies, Potter. I know why you tried to stop me. You’d like me at your beck and call, just like the rest of the Order -- you’d have me do everything your way, at your command, because the Chosen One always knows best. The Chosen One is born to lead the world!” Snape leaned in, snarling into Harry’s ear. “But I am leaving. You will just have to learn to take a little disappointment.”

“No! You can’t, no -- I won’t let you --”

Snape’s lip curled. “Let me?”

“You’ll be just as bad as Voldemort!”

“Well,” said Snape darkly, finally drawing back and taking a step away. “I suppose that would be my concern, Potter, not yours.”

And as Snape took another step back, Harry launched himself forward in a tackle.

Snape’s eyes widened; they collided, and Harry was on top of Snape, scrabbling desperately to get at his wand. But it was concealed in the folds of his robes, and all Harry could grab at was cloth -- and suddenly, a sharp blow to his ribs sent Harry skidding away, across the floor, out of reach.

Harry rolled, slamming into the open doorframe. The cool outdoor breeze brushed against his skin; outside, oblivious pedestrians walked by.

Harry staggered upright, throwing his hands to both sides, barring the doorway: No matter what it took, Snape had to be stopped. “Help!” he shrieked -- the Order meeting was two floors up, they had to hear -- “Help!”

Snape had righted himself slowly, his hair clumped and clinging to his skin, his wand raised. He was tense, his eyes livid and murderous. “I am done with games,” he spat. “Step aside.”

“No. You can’t do this!”

“Step aside, or I will force you!”

“I won’t.” Snape was keeping his distance; Harry didn’t stand a chance of getting his wand back. He scanned the room, desperate -- there was a painting a foot to his left, and he could grab it, use it as a shield as he charged once more.

But Snape followed his gaze; with a flick of his wand, the painting went soaring out of reach, and Harry had nothing. “This is your last warning, Potter,” said Snape, every line of his face etched with hatred. “Stand aside.”

Snape could not get past this door. He could not destroy the wizarding world.

And Harry was out of options: there was nothing to do but to be brave. He drew in a deep breath. “No.”

There was a sound of footsteps pounding from above -- help was coming, getting closer with every moment. Harry gripped the doorframe harder: Snape would not get past. Snape was holding still, his eyes fathomless and empty, his wand pointed directly at Harry’s face.

And then something shifted in Snape’s expression. Slowly, very slowly, he released his grip; the wand clattered to the floor.

Harry dove, grabbed it, then righted himself again in front of the door. With one arm still thrown across the doorframe, he took aim at Snape’s chest. A Stunning Spell was at the tip of Harry’s tongue, his hand poised to slash downwards.

But Snape was staggering back now: utter shock was written across his face, and his eyes fixed wildly on Harry as if he’d seen a ghost. A chill went down Harry’s spine; abandoning all caution, he glanced back, but saw nothing but the street and the overcast sky.

Far behind Snape, a door on the landing slammed open and Moody was there, wand drawn. “Is there a problem?” he barked.

Harry’s eyes were locked on Snape. His skin had gone alabaster white, and he was gaping, mouth open, in a total loss of composure Harry had never seen before. He continued to stagger backwards, reaching behind him in search of a support that he could not find.

“Problem?” Moody repeated, now halfway down the stairs.

“Snape?” said Harry sharply. “Hello?”

Snape blinked; finally, second by second, he seemed to come back to his senses. He gasped in a breath of air, breathing heavily, looking at Harry in disbelief, as if seeing him for the first time. “I...” Snape trailed off, at a loss.

And Harry was confused; didn’t know what to make of any of it, but he knew that this was not an act. The raw emotion in Snape’s eyes jerked at Harry’s gut; Snape’s world seemed to have shifted and fallen on its axis, and though Harry didn’t understand it in the least, he was moved -- he couldn’t help it. “Does this mean you’re not going to --” Harry jerked his head, indicating the world outside.

“No,” Snape whispered. He took an unsteady step back, then another, his eyes still wild. “Of course I won’t, I... I...”

The seconds passed on, and in a blind leap of faith, Harry chose to believe him.

Harry lowered the wand slowly, his hand shaking. “No, Mad-Eye,” he said. “No problem.”

A week later, Snape reappeared at the next Order meeting.

Moody had been about to start the discussion, but Snape stepped out of the shadows in the corner of the room, cutting him off. “I believe,” he said, “that a radical re-evaluation of our priorities is in order.”

“Not this again,” snarled Moody. “When are you going to get it into your head, Snape, that we aren’t a terrorist cell --”

“On the contrary,” said Snape. “I understand that very well now. In fact, I would propose that we take our passivity one step further and begin making overtures of peace to the Dark Lord.”

“What the bloody hell,” exploded Ron, jerking forward from Harry’s side. He was joined by a similar chorus of disbelief.

“Cut it, Snape,” snapped Moody, speaking over the voices. “Having a bit of trouble figuring out which side you’re on, eh? I guess this wouldn’t be your first time.”

“I am merely pointing out the futility --”

“But last week,” growled Moody, “you were all for doing anything -- absolutely anything -- to kill him...”

“And so I was,” said Snape, his lip curling. “Yet I have realized the merit of several arguments I’d previously dismissed. Moody, even you must acknowledge that the Dark Lord is one of the greatest wizards history has ever known. It would be a shame to kill him and erase the decades of unique knowledge he has accumulated. We should instead attempt to find common ground. You only need get past your Gryffindor pride to see that...” Snape’s voice was lost in the sudden din.

“I told you!” cried Ron, looking wildly at Harry. “There’s something wrong with him -- did you hear that!”

“Severus,” said Lupin, his calm voice somehow cutting over the shouts of outrage. “I think you have a rather inaccurate idea of the purpose of our organization.”

“And you know what I think?” said Moody. “I think maybe you ought not to spy in on our meetings, Snape, now that Dumbledore’s not here to keep you on a leash.”

Snape’s eyes bored into Moody, but finally he turned away, as if he had always expected defeat. He strode to the door, turning on the threshold one last time. “Fight the Dark Lord all you like, then,” he said coolly. “Brag to each other about your courage in battle. Proclaim yourselves the defenders of freedom. ... And all the while, remember that you are fifty and they are thousands.” He surveyed the scene coldly and then said, without breaking stride, “Harry, I need a word.” Then he vanished, the door shutting behind him.

“He’s a maniac,” snarled Moody. “Whatever he wants, Potter, don’t bother.”

But Harry was driven by a nearly morbid curiosity. Whatever the issue was, perhaps it would shed some light on Snape’s inexplicable behavior the week prior. Ron and Hermione were attending this meeting; whatever Harry missed Ron would tell him later. Harry shrugged off their concerns and followed after Snape.

Snape was waiting for him just outside in the hallway. The minute the door closed behind him, Snape said without preamble, “You are a Horcrux.”

“I -- what?” He was bewildered. The broken chalice came to mind, but Harry was not a cup.

“When I said that the Dark Lord is now mortal,” said Snape, “I lied. You yet tie him to this earth; while you are alive, he cannot be killed. Albus was quite sure of that, as am I.”

Harry blinked. Comprehension seemed to elude him. “You’re saying I have to die to rid the world of Voldemort?”

“The Dark Lord,” Snape corrected sharply. “Yes. That is precisely my meaning. Therefore, you more than anyone else must come to terms with the Dark Lord’s existence. He will be a fixture in your life for the rest of your years, and it would be fruitless to spend your energy hating what you cannot change.” Snape’s voice became flat and emotionless. “He is a skillful and charismatic leader, and his only fault is an over-preference for purebloods. I am sure that in time, you will come to tolerate his rule -- in time, you will --”

The meaning of Snape’s words seemed to catch up to him in a rush. “I’ll die if I need to!” he cried. “I’ve been willing to do that all along --”

His breath caught, his mind still having trouble grasping this. What -- he had to die?

“You’re lying,” spat Harry. “You hated my father and this is the perfect revenge, isn’t it --”

Snape’s eyes glittered intently in the gloom. “Would you like to see the very memory in which Dumbledore told me that you must die?”

“You can fake memories,” spat Harry. “If anyone could, it would be you. You were spying on Voldemort. He’d have asked for all your memories of your conversations with Dumbledore -- he’d be stupid not to -- and how would you keep your cover, except by faking them?” Harry rode on a wave of bitter triumph, certain of Snape’s deceit. “Nice try --”

A bitter smile curled Snape’s lip. “Very well,” he said silkily. “Here’s your proof...”

And there was too much of it for Harry to bear: Harry’s Parseltongue, his visions, the pain in his scar.

Against his will, Snape’s argument was starting to make sense. Harry’s mind raced desperately, grasping at alternate explanations -- anything, anything that didn’t involve killing himself -- but they were just out of reach.

Once Snape saw the slow horror of Harry’s increasing conviction, his voice became impassive. “You would be best served creating a new identity. Put that vast fortune of your father’s to use. Forge transcripts from Ilvermony and pass as an American pureblood; keep your head down, stay out of the Ministry’s sight, and if all goes well you may even live to old age.”

Harry wasn’t listening. He was working with the idea of his death, turning it around in his head, and at last he found a way to think about it. It was all a hypothetical -- If Snape was right, if he had to die, then...

Answers were suddenly rushing at him. He saw a way forward. “If I have to die,” said Harry, “I can launch a suicide mission against Voldemort.”

Snape’s expression grew suddenly harsh. “Have you been listening to what I’ve said? Your death is not necessary!”

“Right,” said Harry, his voice dripping with irony. “All I have to do is live with Voldemort’s rule.”

“Yes, that’s precisely --” Snape cut himself off sharply, realizing Harry’s sarcasm. Snape’s usual control seemed to be slipping away: He was sickly pale now, and his lips were trembling slightly. He seemed to make a great effort to pull himself together, staring at Harry, his eyes glittering in the dark, dingy hall.

“Perhaps the reason the Dark Lord’s reign is successful,” Snape said softly, “the reason there is none but this band of fifty to oppose him, is because the world is rotten to the core. Let the masses suffer under the Dark Lord’s rule; it’s no more than they deserve. And with your money, his Ministry need never affect you. You can find everything you need in Knockturn Alley. It is a world in itself, and in its depths, even the Dark Lord holds little power.” Snape paused. “I can show you how to live there...”

Harry didn’t know why Snape suddenly wanted to save him, but he didn’t care. Snape -- everything about him -- was twisted and wrong, and Harry wanted nothing to do with him. If Harry went along with Snape’s suggestion, abandoning the Wizarding World out of cowardice, he would be tacitly agreeing that the Wizarding World was rotten, that it was not worth saving.

Harry thought of Hogwarts and felt a rush of warmth. He would fight to protect it; he would die to protect it...

And, once Harry had accepted that he would die, it suddenly seemed fitting: a neat little bow on his life, as payment for his failures. Cedric’s and Sirius’s deaths still loomed in his mind; it was not as if he was any stranger to death, in all its horrific suddenness.

And so that was it, then, thought Harry uncomfortably. That was the decision made... He was going to die, and do his absolute best to take Voldemort with him...

He shivered.

Harry had the sudden feeling that he was standing before a slaughterhouse, about to be euthanized and then pushed through a meat grinder, tendons and flesh ground into strings and pushed out the end of a machine. It was horrible. It was necessary.

~~~

It was a year later that Harry appeared at Grimmauld Place again. His scar, which had once shone bright-red, was now only a faint white line. He’d just escaped from Malfoy Manor with his second life, and now stood awkwardly on the street, just outside the door. He supposed he’d Apparated here instinctually, but he hadn’t spoken to any member of the Order -- nor anyone he’d ever seen in Grimmauld Place, for that matter -- for the entirety of the year.

Harry hadn’t meant to Apparate here, but he Harry forgave himself the little lapse in judgment. He still felt shaky. He’d gone into Malfoy Manor that morning with wand blazing, a year’s worth of learning at his fingertips, and it had been terribly disorienting to find himself fighting his way back out after his death. Harry had been so certain it would be a one-way trip, and to find himself back here was utterly confusing, as though he’d Apparated somewhere only to get turned around in the ether and reappear right where he started.

He shifted uncomfortably on his feet. He should be dead right now, by all rights, and he found himself suddenly looking at the world as if it were the afterlife. He gazed at the grimy bricks of Grimmauld Place, amazed at their solidness... Then he shook himself out of his reverie, somehow fixed his mind on more mundane necessities, and Apparated to his little London apartment.

Poor choice.

He appeared in the middle of the tiny studio apartment, surrounded by the Aurors of Voldemort’s Ministry. There were eight of them at the least, crowded around the walls of the cramped room, seemingly in pairs. One of them rummaged through his bookshelf, pulling out book after book on Dark Magic, while his partner took copious notes on a clipboard. Another pair had violently upended his chest, and they were standing far back from the spiky pile of objects -- admittedly, most of them Dark -- and levitating them out of the pile with wary jerks of the wand. Behind the Aurors, sequestered into a corner, stood his landlord and several journalists.

There was one still moment in which he registered the Aurors’ presence and they registered his. And oh, he realized, I didn’t pay last month’s rent. I was going to die, I thought; there was no reason for me to care what happened after that. But the landlord must have called the Ministry here to evict him, and the bureaucrats had walked in to find all this.

And then, in the next moment, his apartment was a frenzy. Some object was hurled at him from the side; a dozen spells were shouted, the incantations mingling in the air, bolts of light flying at him from every direction. He had never defended himself before, but some sudden intuition seized him; he snapped his wand back and levitated the bed before him as a shield, giving him just enough time to spin and Apparate out.

He appeared once again on the threshold of Grimmauld Place, this time gasping for breath, his eyes wild. The sidewalk before the house was protected by the Fidelius Charm as well. Hunched over, panting in the muggy drizzle, Harry took one long minute to regain his senses.

It didn’t help. He still felt like he was living in an afterlife or a dream world, waves of disorientation and confusion washing over him. He shook his head, trying to clear it, and forced himself to consider the problem that now presented itself: Harry had no place to go. Everything he owned had been in that little apartment: Sirius’s Firebolt, his dad’s Invisibility Cloak, and the last sack of gold that remained of the once-significant Potter fortune.

It struck him that he should have kept the Firebolt and the Cloak in his Gringotts vault. But how was he to know that he would go on to live? He should have left the broom to Ron and the Cloak to Hermione, at least! But in the past year, focused on nothing but perfecting his desperate suicide attack, he had fallen out of the habit of thinking into the future. Now he was reaping what he’d sowed.

There was nothing to be done about it now but to move forward. He set his shoulders and walked into Grimmauld Place.

~~~

Some semblance of normal thought seemed to be returning to Harry as he walked through the house. He was standing now outside the kitchen of Grimmauld Place. Angry voices could be heard through the door, and Harry assumed an Order meeting was in progress. His mind raced through what he would say when he stepped through that door. Hello, he might say nonchalantly. Sorry I’ve been missing. I went to a mystical spa in the mountains, and look, it’s cured my scar! So, how’s the war going?

He hadn’t been following the papers the last year. He was clueless about what was going on.

But the Order should be equally clueless as to what he’d really been doing while he’d been gone. They knew he’d disappeared, of course, but they would not know of his attack at Malfoy Manor. The Order had never had a spy in the Death Eaters’ ranks, and as for Voldemort and the Death Eaters, the incident -- a vicious attack on their own headquarters, and Harry’s subsequent escape -- was embarrassing enough that they’d keep their mouths shut. Harry suspected that, momentous battle though it had been, it would be forever lost to history.

Lingering outside the kitchen door, Harry strained to make out the argument within, but the wood muffled the words too badly. So he focused on crafting his story carefully. He would put them on the defensive. When they questioned him about where he’d been, he’d shout indignantly, I had Voldemort in my mind for a year! Poisoning my thoughts! I couldn’t tell where he ended and I began! And through all that, none of you helped me, not one! And now you’re saying I was wrong to take a year off to get my scar cured and get the voice out of my head? Now you’re saying I should’ve just sat here and borne it? You don’t know what it was like!

He thought through the possible twists and turns of the conversation, how he’d respond to their most likely questions. He’d gotten scammed of half his fortune in Knockturn Alley in the process of learning what he needed to know, but at least it had taught him the cunning that he’d never learned at Hogwarts.

And so Harry strode into the room, head held high, casual expression fixed firmly on his face.

The Order was indeed at a meeting; it seemed like a full thirty of them were crammed in the room. He glanced at Moody, Lupin, a host of Aurors, and then Ron and Hermione at the other side of the room.

Silence had fallen as soon as he’d entered the room, and they were looking at him with hatred. He waited for it to fade into welcome, or shock at least, but it never did. And then his eyes slid to the newspaper on the table before Tonks. It was The Quibbler, a special urgent edition, and splayed across the front page was a moving picture of his London apartment being ransacked by Aurors. At the top hovered the text, Potter Gone Dark: Incontrovertible Evidence.

A chill went through his blood.

It would have been one thing, he thought, if the Daily Prophet had run the story. He could dismiss that as propaganda, and the Order would side with him. But The Quibbler had been invited to his apartment. The Ministry had brought in an enemy newspaper, with what must have been elaborate promises of safe conduct, so that they could turn own Harry’s side against him.

And it had worked. The Quibbler reporter had seen the truth of the evidence, and Harry realized that thousands of his former supporters must be reading that newspaper right now.

Harry’s prepared speech collapsed completely and his instinct told him to just leave. He wasn’t welcome here, and it was time to disappear to some hiding place. Without a word spoken by anyone, the room still heavy in silence, Harry turned to go.

“Harry!” shrieked Hermione.

He turned around. His gaze upon the other Order members had been cold, but looking at her and Ron, his two best friends, he felt a sudden affection and guilt rise up.

“Yeah?”

“You can’t just leave! I’ve been telling all of them --” she flung a hand out to the Order -- “this whole year, that there must be some explanation for all this, that you had to be coming back. And you just show up and -- leave?” Her voice rose to a hysterical pitch.

Harry glanced at all of them again, but directed his apology only at his friends. “Sorry,” he said quietly. “I never thought it would turn out this way. I mean, once I knew I’d have to die, there was no use in you two spending any more time with me. It would have been a dead-end --”

“You what?” said Ron. “You thought you’d be dead?”

“Cut the crap,” snarled Moody. His face was twisted in menace, and he moved forward quickly to thrust the newspaper in Harry’s face. “I don’t care about your death-wish or whatever it is. What is this, Potter, hm?” He shook the newspaper. “What is this?”

He would already have left, but he supposed his friends deserved to know what had happened, now that he was actually alive. So he stood his ground and told his story, explaining his status as the last Horcrux and briefly summarizing what he’d done in the year he’d been gone. “I’m no match for Voldemort,” said Harry, “but I had several key advantages here. For one, I wasn’t afraid to die. So I focused on offense, wild destructive tactics that no one in their sane mind ever uses, in order to throw them off guard. Because I wanted to die anyway, I could go utterly berserk against Voldemort in a way that no one else really could. I didn’t succeed.” He looked to Ron and Hermione, meaning this warning for them. “He has a new wand or something, and he’s more powerful than I’d imagined...”

And Moody cut in at this point, questioning him aggressively, cross-examining him. During the entire exchange, he felt that they were on the edge of deciding that he was an enemy. With a sense of idle calculation, Harry hoped that wouldn’t be so. He would have enough on his plate without having fifty new foes.

But he wasn’t surprised at their attitude, not in the least. Dark Magic was a heated subject. It created horror and contempt even in Hogwarts students, and the Order had spent their lifetimes fighting Dark Magic and watching their friends die to it. He didn’t expect his own short story to inspire any change in their attitudes.

But Ron and Hermione had taken his side. Bless their hearts, he didn’t deserve such kindness; he’d abandoned them for a year without explanation, and then showed up mired in the Dark Arts, and still they supported him.

For a short while, Harry remained in the kitchen, trying to fight off the Order with his words. But it was becoming clear that the longer they were at odds -- the longer he refused to cave in and beg forgiveness -- the more and more suspicious they became. Harry was beginning to give it up as a lost cause and leave before wands were drawn. When he saw Hermione approaching him, a thousand questions burning in her eyes, Harry panicked suddenly and nearly tripped over himself in his haste to leave.

He got out into the stairwell, slamming the door behind him and rushing down the stairs. He nearly collided with Lupin around the bend.

Lupin had slipped out of the room right after Harry’s tale. Harry frowned at him, wondering what he was doing.

“Ah, Harry,” he said kindly. “There you are. I was just about to come looking for you.”

Suddenly wary, Harry backed away, afraid Lupin would try to detain him out of some misguided desire to protect him.

But Lupin seemed to read his thoughts, and he stepped to the very side of the stairwell, as if to illustrate that Harry was free to leave. “It’s done now,” he said quietly, his eyes flicking up to Harry’s scar. “You have no more reason to kill yourself, and I don’t suspect you would try again -- would you, Harry?”

“Of course not.” But Lupin’s words stuck in his mind: He had no more reason to kill himself. How bizarre that felt.

Lupin hesitated. “And what will you do now?” he said quietly.

“What do you mean?”

Lupin spoke carefully. “Your situation is far different than it was last year.”

Lupin could say that. He was penniless and his reputation had been ruined so badly that even the Order couldn’t trust him. But that wasn’t all. Beneath his rather routine disillusionment, something more intangible had shifted, and Harry found himself looking at the world with a curious confusion that he couldn’t quite place.

And that might be why cared so little about this bad position. He shrugged. “I don’t know what I’ll do.”

Lupin grew sad at that. When Harry did not elaborate, Lupin said, “In any case, that wasn’t what I came to speak to you about. I think you should talk to Severus.”

Harry felt the hint of a scowl forming on his face. “Why? Hadn’t you heard what I did after he told me I was a Horcrux?”

Lupin seemed resigned. “It was the talk of the Order --”

“But if you still think I should speak to him,” interjected Harry, “maybe something got lost in translation. Here’s what happened: the minute he realized I was going to launch a suicide attack, he tried to Obliviate me. He missed and I backed into the kitchen as he tried again -- everyone heard his second attempt at Obliviate -- surely you heard about that. And when Snape tried to tell the Order that I was suicidal, I shouted over him, accusing him of trying to Obliviate me to cover up a crime. I didn’t even have to go into details; the Order all believed me immediately! And so they kicked him out, barred him from this place.” Harry shrugged. “My bridge with Snape is well and truly burned.”

Lupin met Harry’s challenging gaze with calmness. “That’s all past, Harry.”

“Somehow I don’t think Snape is quite as forgiving as you are.”

“For the past year he’s been trying to find you to undo his mistake. He enlisted my help, as you must have guessed --” (Lupin had sent him letters during that year) -- “and I did all that I could. But between Tonks, my monthly cycles, and my duties to the Order, I wasn’t able to do as much as I hoped, nor as much as I should have.” Lupin averted his eyes briefly. “But Severus had no such restrictions. I believe he searched Knockturn Alley high and low for you, and when he found nothing, several foreign black markets as well.”

Harry’s brow creased. “Why?”

“Well, I imagine it’s...” Lupin cut himself off, almost guiltily. He glanced down the dark stairs towards the Floo hearth in the sitting room. “Perhaps he will tell you himself. Regardless, he wishes quite strongly to speak of you.” And after all he’s done for you, you owe it to him. The words were unsaid, but Harry heard them.

Harry considered refusing but found himself once again driven by a morbid curiosity. After the utter disaster of their last meeting, what would Snape want this time?

As for the potential danger, Harry could not find it within himself to be particularly concerned. Just this morning, he’d charged into Malfoy Manor.

“Alright,” said Harry. “How do I meet him?”

Lupin looked faintly relieved. “Call for Spinner’s End,” he said. “Severus’s is the only house on the block connected to the Floo Network; that’ll take you right over.”

When Harry emerged into Spinner’s End, he thought he might have come to the wrong address. The room he emerged into looked like part of a broken-down warehouse. The walls were full of bookshelves, but books were missing at random, their neighbors slumped into each other across the empty spaces. The missing books were sprawled on the floor and propped up in various places, pages open like pale dead birds. The curtains were all closed viciously against the pale light from outside, and the only thing to fight back the gloom was a single flickering candle-lamp hung from the ceiling.

Snape was pacing when Harry came in. The floor was littered with loose notes cast among the discarded books, but he seemed to have kicked them aside to form a narrow corridor along which he walked. At Harry’s entrance, he turned sharply to face him.

“Expecto Patronum!” called Snape, conjuring a silver doe which dazzled the room. “Go to Harry Potter,” he said, and at a snap of his fingers, the doe bounded over to Harry, gazed at him for a second, and then vanished into mist.

“So it’s you,” said Snape. “What happened?”

His voice was tight. His arms were crossed in front of him, but he was clutching his arm hard, digging into the fabric of his robe, and every line in his body was rigid. There was a horrible tension in the air.

“What do you mean, what happened?” said Harry. He sought a more balanced stance and cast a quick glance behind him, locating the bag of Floo powder on the mantle.

“Lupin said you told the Order of your training and of the battle. Tell me how you (em>survived.”

There was a hungry, feral gleam in Snape’s eyes.

“My blood’s in Voldemort’s veins.”

Snape was frozen for a moment, and they stared at each other across the room, faces half-obscured by shadow. Then, almost imperceptibly, the tension eased out of Snape’s body. And though he barely moved a muscle, Harry got the impression he was slumping in on himself.

“I see,” said Snape. Deliberately, he untangled his fingers from his robes, though he continued to stare, his eyes black and fathomless. “Pure luck. Pure chance.”

Harry didn’t respond.

“And your scar is inert?” said Snape.

“Right.”

“Well.” Snape’s lips slid into a mocking smile as the last of the rigidity eased out of his body. “Fortune smiles upon you, as always. And what will you do now?”

Harry felt uncomfortably off balance, and he glanced around at the dark walls uneasily. Something felt strange. The Order had asked him about his battle with Voldemort and, after that, hounded him with accusations about being Dark. Snape seemed not to care. It was as if the topic of Harry’s missing year and his suicide mission had already been handled and dismissed, and now, bewilderingly, Snape was moving on to the next concern.

What now? Harry shifted uncomfortably. “I’d still prefer the Dark Lord’s Ministry gone.”

Snape tensed. “And how do you intend to do that?” He said, his voice softer now. “Ah -- my mistake. You’re Harry Potter; surely they will all abandon their posts the moment you snap your fingers and command them to do so.”

“I won’t --”

“You had your chance and you ruined it,” said Snape, suddenly harsh. “You are no longer immortal, for he will figure out the blood connection and purge it, be certain of that. Your attack this morning accomplished nothing but losing your immortality and your element of surprise. You had a chance this morning -- yes, I believe you did -- but now all your cards have been played, and you are back where you started.”

“Worse,” said Harry, looking steadily into Snape’s sallow, sickly face.

“Yes.” He smiled cruelly. “Worse. So tell me: how precisely do you intend to take down the Dark Lord’s Ministry?”

There was another silence, every second of it seeming to heap more tension upon the room. But Snape seemed unaffected. Lithe and smooth, he crossed the shadows and came to stand in front of Harry. The firelight sharpened the shadows around his face.

“If you have no outstanding plans, Mr. Potter,” said Snape, “allow me to make a suggestion.”

“Alright.” The heat of the fire behind Harry was searing his back, but he backed further towards the hearth. Harry realized he was taller than Snape now by at least two inches -- Merlin’s beard, it’s really been a year -- but it gave him no sense of ease.

“You recall Sybill Trelawney’s first prophecy, I hope,” said Snape. “She has said that you have a power the Dark Lord knows not. Well, try to figure out what it is. I’m afraid the task will not be nearly as glamorous as charging heroically into the enemy stronghold, but at this juncture, you should take what you can get.”

“I don’t think I have a hidden power,” said Harry.

Snape had been about to say something serious, but at Harry’s words, his lips curled into a malicious smile. “My, my,” he said. “Are you sure you’re ready to be so honest with yourself? It’s a dangerous path -- for you...”

“I don’t think I have a hidden power,” repeated Harry.

Snape’s sneer faded and he watched Harry closely, narrowing his eyes slightly. The harsh light made his face look pale and skeletal. “Indeed you may not,” Snape said smoothly. “The Prophecy might not be true, as Dumbledore has insisted over and over again. And if it is true, if you do indeed have a hidden power, I think you would have realized it by now.

“But perhaps not,” said Snape, once more with a lazy vindictiveness. “It wouldn’t be the first time something’s gone over your head, would it?”

An angry retort came to Harry’s mind, but it faded just as quickly. Something nagged at him. He was missing something important, a key part of this interaction which would explain why Snape, who had always hated him, was behaving like this. Nothing since their first confrontation a year ago made sense. Harry’s inability to piece together Snape’s motivations, while standing so vulnerable in Snape’s own house, made him deeply uneasy.

“So what do you think I should do?” said Harry shortly.

“Figure out the next best approach to investigate your power,” said Snape. “Consider it carefully. If there is an answer to be found, we must assume at this point that it will be rather esoteric. Come speak to me later and I will assist you; I have skills and resources which you --” his lip twitched into a sneer -- “badly lack.”

Harry was sweating and his back felt prickly from the heat. Seeming to notice, Snape took a small step back, but Harry did not move. He watched Snape carefully.

“You know,” said Harry casually, ignoring the heat, “You ought to be bullying me for lying and getting you kicked out of Grimmauld Place. You ought to be calling everything I’ve done in the past year selfish and arrogant and conceited. You do it all the time for far, far less. Why haven’t you?”

“What’s this?” said Snape mildly. “You actually think you’re to blame, the one time in your life you aren’t?”

“What?”

“Of course you would have insisted on sacrificing yourself the minute you believed it to be necessary. What else would you have done? No, I could hardly hold that against you.” He paused, his eyes glittering as he considered Harry. “I do have one grievance, however.” Another still pause, black eyes boring into Harry. “You’ve escaped death twice,” he said, “once when you were an infant, and again just today. You’ve had two second lives, if you will, two miraculous chances to live again. My question is: why couldn’t one of those have been spared for your mother?”

~~~

“Harry, as I have said,” said Lupin wearily, “this isn’t my story to tell. You didn’t even try to ask him --”

“I don’t want to ask him,” said Harry. They were in Grimmauld Place. The sitting room by the Floo hearth was abandoned, and as Harry shifted in his armchair, clouds of dust went up into the air. “Let me tell you a story,” he said. “Once upon a time, in Knockturn Alley, I was trying to sell a huge crate of potions I’d acquired. I was Polyjuiced, of course. Everyone is always Polyjuiced there. I ended up selling the potions to a witch. It was only later that day that someone mentioned casually that he’d seen who she was before she’d taken her Polyjuice: it was Alecto Carrow, the Headmistress of Hogwarts.”

Lupin was pale. “What did you sell her?”

“Well, that’s the thing. I don’t bloody know what was in the crate.” Lupin was asking a question, but Harry spoke over him. “If I’d known who she was, obviously, I’d probably have checked to see what I was giving her. Now -- who knows? Maybe I sold her gallons of healing potion. Maybe I sold her gallons of some liquid Cruciatus.”

Harry could see Lupin’s mind trying to race through the story, but Harry was not interested in explaining to him the mechanics of Knockturn Alley. “The point is,” said Harry, “I’d really like information now about Snape.” It could never hurt, only help.

“Harry --”

There was more arguing and wrangling. Then at long last Lupin began to relent.

“The reason Sirius and I never mentioned this to you is because -- we believed, at least -- that Lily herself came to regard her previous friendship with Severus to be a mistake.”

Harry said nothing, only stared, content to draw out the silence for all it was worth. Lupin shifted uncomfortably in his seat, not really meeting Harry’s eyes, and Harry felt like an interrogator.

“After we graduated from Hogwarts,” said Lupin, “Lily never spoke of Severus, not to me and not even to James. There was a time, though, when our squad of four -- me, James, Sirius, and her -- were fighting during a pitched battle within the Ministry.” Lupin gave a mild shrug. “Well, they still trusted me back then.

“We’d all gone through the same training, and one thing was important: we never deserted each other. But that day, when we were fighting a congregation of Death Eaters, Lily took off without warning, charging down the Ministry halls. We lost her and James was frantic. We caught up to her eventually in a deserted stairway, only to find her pounding her fists against a Cursed Barrier, screaming insults up the stairwell which shocked even Sirius. It was Severus that she’d seen across the battlefield, she later explained; the Death Eaters all tended to look the same, but it was some minute mannerism -- a flick of the wrist, I believe -- which had given him away.

“The look on her face in that stairwell, Harry, as she’d realized that Severus had escaped...” Lupin was staring into the distance, immersed in the memory. “It was hatred, complete and utter hatred: it seemed to course through her, utterly without barriers, utterly without inhibition. There was no ambiguity to make her pause in her hatred; there was no condition nor nuance which made her think, perhaps one day I can forgive him. It consumed her completely in that moment. And then she apologized for abandoning us and we returned to the battle, but all the same, there was a distance in her eyes that didn’t go away until a couple days later.”

The recollection finished, Lupin drew back into himself, and he reddened slightly as if ashamed. “But that could have meant anything,” he said quickly, “Or maybe it was my own overactive imagination --”

Harry had the strong urge to rest his head in his hands, but he didn’t do so here. Instead he said, rather aloof, “Don’t you think I ought to have known a little earlier about this? My mum knew something about Snape that caused her to despise him -- that’s important.”

“She wouldn’t have hidden anything from us,” said Lupin hastily. “Especially not something about him that she thought would be relevant to the war. No, it was nothing like that.” Lupin’s voice became quiet. “But still she...”

Lupin’s eyes shifted restlessly around the ground. He trailed off, then said with new energy, “Remember this at least. Severus may have changed a lot since the end of the last war, and if you were to judge him only by his actions from twenty years ago, your picture of him may not be accurate.”

“Why are you so reluctant to tell me all this?”

“Your mother would have preferred --” Lupin hesitated, starting again. “We’ve had only so much time together to talk about Lily, and I preferred to focus on the happier times of her life. This holds no relevance to --”

“But I don’t know,” said Harry, leaning forward, angling for a reaction. “It seems like it’s more than that. If I were to guess, I’d say you’re afraid to speak against Snape.”

Lupin looked startled. “Harry, we have enough dissension within the Order without more fighting...” Lupin continued on that tack for some time, talking about harmony between everybody.

Harry listened for a bit, and at a convenient pause, excused himself. He left the dreary sitting room, closing the door behind him and barricading himself in a dark, narrow stairwell. He sighed, leaning against one of the walls, staring up at the black ceiling.

He missed Knockturn Alley -- so much! At that moment, he would have liked very much to be walking down its twists and turns, utterly anonymous, surrounded on all sides by people who were just as unknown as he was. That place held a very peculiar kind of humanity, strange and cruel -- yet free, unlike this dusty warren which pressed down on him from all sides.

And Harry turned his thoughts grimly towards the Order. Upon Harry’s return from Malfoy Manor, he’d been ready to walk out the door the minute he’d seen the hostility in the Order’s eyes. Yet, so far, it hadn’t become violent. And tense though the atmosphere was, Harry didn’t think it would escalate too quickly, either.

And so, Harry realized that at some point during the last several hours, he’d decided to continue to interact with the Order. Some deep curiosity compelled him. His initial dismissiveness turned into some kind of raw desire to act, to dispel the mystery, and to find himself on solid footing once more.

And, Harry knew, that meant speaking to Ron and Hermione, rather than fleeing. Harry felt all his newfound resolve nearly go out the window at that; he didn’t know what he would do if they hated him just as much as the Order did, if their support for him earlier had just been a front. But he forced himself to move forward. Soon he was standing in front of the door to Ron’s room, as he remembered it from last year. He knocked on the door and, when answered, open it to find Ron and Hermione both sitting on the covers of the twin bed, discussing something intently.

Harry’s heart stilled for what seemed like an endless moment, but he ought to have had more faith in his friends. Barely had they registered him – barely had they understood that he wanted to speak to them, intended to stay -- when Hermione was striding across the room towards him, wrapping him in a vicious hug. “How could you!” she cried, her voice shrill and wild in his ear. “How could you! How could you!” And all that time she was wrapping him tight enough to leave bruises, clinging to him, as if she couldn’t bear to let go again.

And Ron was coming up to his side, twiddling with his fingers, shifting from foot to foot. He looked concerned. “You shouldn’t have done all that, mate,” he said, “you really shouldn’t have done all that...”

Harry felt like a rag doll in Hermione’s arms, so weak was he with relief.

~~~

Hermione was bursting with accusations, angry questions, and shrill criticisms. Ron, pulling his features into a scowl once they had settled down on the bed, had begun to say something about Mrs. Weasley and a watch. But then, suddenly, something changed in his expression; he leaned over to Hermione and whispered something into her ear, and she quieted too, and the anger melted away from her expression.

“Mate,” said Ron, his brow creased in concern. “Have you eaten today?”

“Er,” said Harry. He was still trying to find his voice. He was perched on one end of the bed, feeling as though his thoughts had just scattered in all different directions, torn by the way he’d hurt them, touched ineffably by the way they’d forgiven him. “Er. No, I don’t think I’ve eaten today.” Dryly, he added, “Things have been a little hectic.”

“Well then.” Ron stood with the air of going on a great mission. “I’ll be right back.”

And so, for the first time that day, Harry relaxed. And for the first time that year, Harry was in the company of his friends. Ron arrived soon after with a plate piled high with at least twenty sandwiches, shoving them all at Harry without delay. Harry leaned back against a corner of the wall, eating, and Hermione sat at the foot of the bed while Ron dragged in a chair for himself.

And they talked. Harry saw some concern and some resentment lingering in their eyes when they glanced at him, but it seemed overshadowed by their relief to have him back. He could hardly believe it was all turning out as it was. And by unspoken agreement, they never brought up his Dark Arts or anything he had done in the past year.

They told him what they’d been doing in the past year. “Hermione couldn’t go to school last year,” said Ron, “but I did. It was...”

Hermione jumped in quickly. “The DA’s going really strong, Harry. It’s incredible. With the school administration being what it is --”

“Being Death Eaters,” supplied Ron.

“It’s been really easy to recruit people. Nearly everyone from Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, and Hufflepuff joined up, all the way from first years to seventh years. It’s grown so much.”

“It’s a little hard to get a job as a blood traitor nowadays,” said Ron casually.

“Or as a Muggleborn,” agreed Hermione. “So starting from now on, we and the rest of the Alumni DA are planning to do all we can to help the members who remain at Hogwarts. Fred and George are going to keep helping us. If we can keep the organization secret and smuggle enough weapons --”

“She means prank items,” said Ron.

“Into Hogwarts, we’ll be able to make a difference if there’s ever a battle at Hogwarts. I know it.”

“Maybe we can act even before that,” said Ron.

Harry remembered the DA with a twinge of sourness. Zacharias Smith had tried to challenge Harry starting from their very first lesson, and hadn’t a lot of students just come for the drama of that? And then there had been Marietta’s betrayal, of course. But not wanting to ruin the mood, Harry smiled at his friends. “That sounds great,” he said cheerfully.

As Harry leaned back against a pillow, they told him all about how the different members of the DA were doing. Neville had kept on getting better and better at dueling, and he’d gotten together with Hannah Abbott. Luna was seeing fewer Wrackspurts and more Heliopaths.

The setting sun cast a cheery glow into the room, and the pillow behind him was beyond soft. Harry felt he could melt into the cushions where he sat and never move again. At some point, Ron had brought out a chess set, and Hermione was glancing rapidly back and forth between the state of the board and a book on chess strategy. Ron was leaning back casually, grinning at her as she steadily lost the match, piece by piece.

After she’d lost, the board devolved into chaotic fighting between the pieces, and Hermione turned to Harry deliberately. “So,” she said cautiously, “what are you going to do now that you’re back, Harry?”

She seemed to think the very topic might bring Harry to tears. Harry just shrugged; his situation wasn’t that bad. Then he thought the question through.

“D’you know how the Prophecy says I have a power the Dark Lord knows not?” said Harry casually. “Any ideas what it might be?”

Ron gaped at him; Hermione blinked in confusion. A pawn dove off the chess board as Harry repeated the question helpfully.

“Er,” said Ron, his eyebrows scrunched in frustration. “No, I have no idea, mate. But -- are you really supposed to, you know, actually think about it?” When Hermione looked at him questioningly, he said, “I mean, I always thought you weren’t supposed to game the system, when it comes to prophecies. Didn’t Trelawney say they’re supposed to just... happen?”

“I don’t know,” said Harry, “but Snape thinks this is our next best lead, considering how powerful Voldemort is now.”

“Snape?” he said, making a face. Then he turned to Hermione, rolling his eyes. “I know what you’ll say. You’ve always said to trust him, and you’ve always been proven right and all that. But still --”

Harry jumped in before Hermione could respond. “Snape offered to help me figure out what my hidden power is. I think he’s got the right idea; we can’t hope to beat Voldemort conventionally, he’s just too strong. We need to be looking for some kind of cheat. That said...”

Hermione leaned forward. “What?”

Snape makes me very uneasy. Harry shrugged. “Nothing,” he said casually. “I think I’ll talk to him more about it tomorrow, before lunch. Yep -- That’s where I’ll be. If I don’t come back, tell the Order that he was the one who murdered me, and that they can avenge me at Spinner’s End.”

Looking at their suddenly solemn faces, Harry realized that he’d ruined the mood. They didn’t view death as flippantly as he did. “I was just joking,” he said quickly. “Exploding Snap, guys? I haven’t played it in ages.”

“Oh, sure.” Ron got up, eager for a distraction. “Where’d I put the cards...”