FORTY-SEVEN: Master

He hadn’t told them what was important – not the half of it. The way Snape sat silently at his bed after a bad nightmare, not saying anything perhaps from the fear of saying something wrong, just sitting there quietly until Harry had dropped off to sleep again. The strain giving way to long, comfortable silences, where Harry read yet another Potions text or one of Snape’s few novels. The dinner arguments, where cautious civility fell away to reveal brutal contests of logic, which his professor almost always won. The self-directed smirk on Snape’s face when Harry finally succeeded in out-maneuvering him. Snape finally admitting he had known Lily Potter and admired her, at least as much as Snape would admit to possessing a beating heart; Snape digging around in a worn wand box until he found an old, faded photograph, where a small redheaded girl, a dark-haired boy, and a handful of others mugged for the camera.

Having just received the memory, it was definite as Avada in his mind. Snape had an odd expression on his face. Is that Remus Lupin? he had wondered aloud, as an almost pathetically small boy with dark gold hair grinned up at Lily.

It was. And before Harry was really aware what they were doing, Snape was pointing out Sirius at the photo’s edge, trying to shove his way to the center, and a small, mousy Peter Pettigrew. And Alice Kemper… Something in the bright, pale eyes caught Harry’s attention, and he realized that Alice had to be Neville’s mother. There had been a curious look on Snape’s face, then, and Harry had found himself wondering whether Snape had a hand in her torture, or capture, or felt his hands had been tied… or even had not realized Voldemort’s plans in time to save either Neville’s mother or father…

The memory was a golden one, though, one of Harry’s best. It would produce a corporeal Patronus, he was certain of it. It had been while he was still mostly ill, and the kindness from Snape, such as it was, had been unexpected enough to seem nearly suspicious. Healing and helping Harry might have been explained away as necessary, but no amount of duty would justify showing him that picture, nor telling him he should keep it.

And where was it now? Probably back in Snape’s musty wand box, as though the scene had never happened… perhaps Snape wouldn’t be offended if he reclaimed it? It was his favorite picture of his mother and Remus, and seeing them in a picture with Snape obscurely pleased him.

Well, there was no help for it; he wasn’t anywhere near sleep. His mind was still awhirl with the fresh new memories, still attempting to assimilate far too much information; and perhaps his sleeplessness also had to do with the fact that Snape had rubbed at his left arm while Harry accepted his memories.

Harry must have drifted off for a moment, because he was seeing cool green light reflected on the floor by the window and hearing raised voices from beyond the Tower out on the grounds... Sleep left Harry very suddenly, leaving him wide-eyed and adrenaline-charged. He didn't bother rushing to the window. Instead, he reached to the bunk above his head and shook the shape he found there, huddled under the covers. "Ron. Ron!"

Ron sat up blearily. The expression of dazed disgruntlement dropped off his features when he saw Harry. "He's here, isn't he? What do you need me to do?"

"Fetch Hermione and Yolande and start waking the others. I'm going to go find Dumbledore." Harry locked eyes with Ron until he saw the slow fire of realization overtake Ron's dark blue eyes. Harry dashed to retreive the Marauder's Map.

Then, he ran.

“My loyal friends,” Voldemort hissed; and only he was unhooded, undisguised. Severus wondered at that, as a young man. Surely, of all the circle, it was the Dark Lord who ought to have been disguised, hidden. Now he understood the thrill of shock it had given him, long ago, to look on the man and the monster that the man had become. If only they could see what I have seen, know what I know, he had thought: after the thrill of horror came the thrill of danger, excitement, and belonging. There was the sense that he could brave things that others could not, and, therefore, that his rewards would be all the greater. He saw it now, around their dark and cowled circle – grown men preening under the press of their own importance, importance lent them by his regard.

“My Death Eaters,” he murmured, and something in the monster’s tone froze Severus, pricked his ears. He noted several others – those clever enough to hear the sinister note and comprehend its meaning – doing the same. Voldemort’s eyes shone red, then dimmed to dark embers. “So many, to offer me such devotion,” he added softly, striding the circle. “So many to give one man the whole of their hearts. Would you not say so, Draco?”

Draco’s cowled figure started at being addressed by name, but his startled hesitation did not linger long. “When one man has a vision so very worthy of following, my Lord, it is not surprising when those around him take notice. What is more startling is that the entire Wizarding World has not yet done so.”

Severus made an approving noise, noting as several others around him did the same. At the same time, he could not help noting the childish incomprehension coloring Draco’s naturally aristocratic, unctuous tones, or wondering whether the attitude was feigned.

“You find that startling, do you?” Voldemort inquired. “How very naïve. Power is the meat and drink of the world, my friends. And starving dogs will kill to be fed.”

Ah, Severus thought with an internal sigh. Fortune-cookie philosophy.

“No,” Voldemort repeated. “There are those who disagree rather strongly.”

“Fools and incompetents,” Draco dismissed.

Severus saw the Cruciatus before it hit, saw the pain forming in the Dark Lord’s eyes. Draco should have long since learned, he reflected, that the flippant answer was never the proper one, either in class or at home.

“Those who you call fools,” Voldemort intoned, not bothering to raise his voice above the blond’s screams, “have bested me at every turn.” His eyes smoldered fire-red. “And do you know why?”

Silence. Even the most foolhardy amoung them recognized that this question had no proper answer.

“Finite,” the Dark Lord said dismissively. Draco fled back to his position, Severus yanking him up by the scruff of his robes. If the boy stayed down, he would only bring himself the reward of an additional Crucio until he stood under his own power, or lost consciousness.

“No,” Voldemort mused. “No, I suppose you would not. Severus, have you a speculation?”

The Dark Lord had not yet peered into his mind – he had mental failsafes to alert him. The defenses which then followed were practically automatic in Severus. Voldemort’s words were a guess then, and nothing more.

“Speculation?” Snape echoed, without taking so much as a calming breath. The pause would have been taken as an admission of guilt, and the word gave him precious seconds to think. He decided to answer honestly. “While Potter,” he said, lip twisting, “is merely a boy, he has the power of the Headmaster behind him. It is not only that mere boy whom we fight. Rather, he is the sharpest, most powerful tool in the old man’s arsenal.”

Severus could not help but note that the Death Eaters had gone silent and still at his words, near-sacrilege for their circle of liars and murderers; Draco made a small, odd noise at the back of his throat. Voldemort’s eyes, however, glinted with some dark pleasure.

“Albus Dumbledore,” he hissed, “is not the only Professor at Hogwarts who stands behind Harry Potter.”

Severus remained silent. Anything he said could easily be twisted to further incriminate him. He knew Voldemort, knew his labyrinthine, dark and twisted thoughts to their rotted core. The man was waiting for the Potions Master to destroy himself; and that he would not do.

Voldemort laughed then, cold and high and terrible. “Clever,” he crooned. “Clever Severus. But not quite clever enough, for quite long enough. And to think, you were mere moments from retirement…”

The Death Eaters scattered, leaving Snape standing alone, as though treason were a communicable disease. Severus, however, only had room for one thought: that there had been an incredibly limited number of wizards who had known his status as a spy, and fewer still who understood that Draco Malfoy was shortly to replace him; that amoung those were Professors Dumbledore and Lupin, the Holy Trinity, and Draco Malfoy himself.

His dark eyes found Draco’s; the boy’s own eyes were wide, and frightened.

Oh, Draco, he thought. Oh, no. Oddly, there was no room in him for anger. Now that his death was certain, peace settled on his shoulders, crept into his limbs. Thinking of Draco only brought him a real yet slowly fading pain. He had seen the good in the boy the way that Albus had once seen his own potential. Eventually, Draco would no longer be able to live as a Death Eater; and when that day came, he would defect, die, go mad. Perhaps all three in the logical order. Severus wished, briefly, that he could spare Draco, but his usefulness as a wizard, a spy, and a force on the earth was over, and he knew it. For a moment, he saw his and Draco’s dance as a cycle, an angry young man growing up with a heritage of hatred and suffering, learning to visit that hatred and suffering on others – watching the next angry young man make such familiar, naïve mistakes.

“Tonight,” Voldemort continued, oblivious to Severus’s silent insight, “we strike – at Hogwarts.”

A low murmur ran along and through the Death Eaters there assembled, an eager buzz. “Tonight?” one man exclaimed. “But, my Lord… the preparations… the plans…”

“You misunderstand me,” Voldemort murmured with a small smile. “Hogwarts is shining with Dark Magic as we speak, Morsmordre standing above its walls…”

“But… who…?” the man stammered.

Voldemort’s smile grew and darkened. “Surely you do not believe that you are my only loyal friends?” he inquired dangerously. “We will join in the festivities soon enough. Meanwhile, we have important matters to discuss…” His eyes trailed to the Potions Master. “Isn’t that right, Severus?”

At the moment that the staircase finally reached its new destination, another group of students spilled from a nearby doorway and began clambering down it, with much panicked cries and harsh whispers. Hermione’s eyes lit on a fall of gold hair and she grinned. “Yolande!”

The pale-haired Slytherin whirled to face Hermione, her group of young charges milling wide-eyed around her as they met on the landing. “Hermione!” Yolande exclaimed, throwing her arms around the other girl.

Ron’s eyes traveled swiftly from the recalcitrant staircase and back to Yolande. “Come on, you lot!” he ordered. And the newly swollen group took off down the stairs again.

“What’s happened?” Yolande demanded, keeping pace with the harried Hermione. “All I heard was the commotion.”

“Death Eaters,” Hermione tersely explained, “fired off Morsmordre in the courtyard. We were separated from Harry in the scuffle, and now the Castle won’t let us back into Gryffindor Tower.”

“You’re welcome in Slytherin,” Yolande said with a lopsided grin that acknowledged the irony of the situation. If, hours ago, Hermione had been told that Gryffindors should be welcome in Slytherin, she would have imagined that her efforts and Yolande’s had finally yielded fruit. As it was, her triumph tasted bitter.

Ron grinned at Yolande, the tightness around his eyes the only betrayal of his tension. Hermione could not help but note that, for every corner they turned, their small group gained a handful of frightened children; that, soon, they would be too large a congregation to avoid attracting notice. With every turn towards Slytherin, the hallways became less familiar, until even Yolande appeared confused.

“The Castle’s keeping our attackers at bay,” Hermione reasoned. “But to do that, it’s moving things about.” She turned to view her charges, now perhaps forty strong, eyeing them thoughtfully. Ron had placed Lilac down to walk under her own power, and now she and Rae clung tenaciously to one another. In Hermione’s eyes, they briefly ceased being Slytherin or Gryffindor, Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff – they were frightened children, and they were her responsibility. To think if, perhaps, Slytherin and Gryffindor had never argued… if Gryffindor had been willing to see the truth…

Hermione stiffened, an idea invading her thoughts. Behind her closed lids she saw cool tile, heard the sound of Draco Malfoy’s voice, smelled and tasted the metallic tang of standing water…

Yes. Yes, she knew where to go. The only problem was getting in – oh, and getting out again. She took off at a rapid, ground-eating stride, Ron and Yolande close behind her.

Dumbledore at his side was a comforting presence, but Harry was too used to depending on his own skills to pay him any more heed than that. He strode along the hallways by the older man’s side, wand drawn, eyes darting for signs of motion, noting Ewan at his side do the same. The hours since Harry had rolled back out of bed and down into the Gryffindor Common Room, felt as much as seen the green light bathing the Castle, and been separated from Hermione and Ron had all bled together to a confusing jumble of images. Now all that had fled him; all he knew was the darkened corridors, the thump of his heart and the rasp of his breathing.

A sharp hiss filled the air around them. Nagini, Harry thought, placing his back against the stone of the walls, but the hiss was not approaching or receding; it was all around them.

“Potter,” a sibilant voice whispered. “Do you hear the screams? The ones who die merely because you exist?” A small pause, in which Dumbledore cast a small seeking charm, a bright, red-gold orb which hung before them uncertainly before dividing into three and moving swiftly in different directions down the corridor.

“Perhaps you are too far removed to care,” the voice mused. “Or perhaps it is that you are simply unaware of their suffering?”

A high-pitched scream shattered the air, and Harry winced, the muscles in his jaw twitching before his expression hardened. He and Dumbledore moved down the abandoned corridors like ghosts, silent and grim, nodding and parting when the searching spells separated; Ewan left his side to follow the third orb.

“Come, Potter,” the voice taunted. “Surely you know I have no difficulty casting Avada Kedavra. Of course, there are other ways of destroying a person. They require far more attention and time, and yet they are infinitely more pleasurable.”

The orb darted around a corner, Harry in pursuit. It paused hesitantly at the door to the Great Hall.

Inside was a scene literally out of one of Harry's nightmares. Death Eaters ringed the Hall, dozens of them, more than he ever knew existed; and at their centre, huddled in a small, whimpering group, were a knot of Hogwarts students.

And then at the dais, seated at Dumbledore’s traditional place, his booted feet resting upon the long, low staff’s table, was Voldemort.

“Forgive me for failing to rise,” he said with an ironic flourish, “but as you can see, it’s been an incredibly long night.”

Harry scanned faces and bodies, looking for hurt and injury. All of the students in the center of the circle were unharmed, Harry realized swiftly. Ginny Weasley, seated at the Dark Lord’s feet, had a small rivulet of blood running down her cheek from a head wound, and a murderous expression on her face. Apparently, the man had recognized her.

He had to then wonder what Voldemort’s game was.

“It is quite simple,” Voldemort said, not reading his mind so much as anticipating him. “Even traditional. Your life for theirs.”

Harry shook his head. “No,” he said.

“Then they will die. Starting with this one,” he said, gesturing with a casual wave towards Ginny.

Harry realized suddenly that what he had taken for mud dropping from the man’s boots was, in fact, half-congealed blood. A glob fell from his boot, landing obscenely in Ginny’s red hair.

“You’ll kill them in any case,” Harry said, bringing his wand to bear.

“Now, Harry,” Voldemort said, in a voice that might have been sympathetic in anyone else. “Be realistic, won’t you? You may have been able to best me before because I insisted on your death at the end of my wand. I won’t be so foolish again, you know. I won’t mind who hexes you, Harry, so long as you manage to die permanently.”

Harry couldn’t help but allow his eyes to flicker anxiously towards the circle of Death Eaters, doing a mental tally. His jaw firmed as his eyes narrowed. The best he could hope for was to create a distraction or mass confusion, and engineer the escape of as many students as he could, perhaps separate Voldemort from the group in the chaos. Severus Snape aside, the Death Eaters were not exactly known for their brilliance, and they were likely helpless without him.

“What? No heroics, Harry?” Voldemort wondered, eyes flashing red with the growing temper he was attempting to hide. “You’ll disappoint me. Here I was counting on you to provide myself and my Death Eaters with some entertainment before I destroyed you.”

“Why haven’t you killed me already?” Harry wondered. “Why offer me a deal? If you’re so powerful, why not kill me now?”

Voldemort chuckled, low and rich. “I hear they praise Gryffindor for bravery, but you ought to be using your Slytherin mind,” he advised in a hideous parody of a professor’s cadence. “If you make the deal, you will die, and all of your friends will see you helpless. If you fight, you will die, and they will all finally understand that resistance is hopeless. Either way, Harry, I win. A single curse just won’t do, however.” He smiled. “Well, what shall it be? Will you fight? Or will you negotiate?”

“Negotiate,” Harry said.

Voldemort’s smile grew. “Excellent.”

“But I want them all to walk away,” Harry returned slowly. “I want to see them leave, and then I want a half an hour after that before anyone else leaves this room.”

Voldemort chuckled, high and sibilant, and the Death Eaters joined him, a timed laugh-track. “I have a better idea,” he whispered, and Harry had to strain to hear the words. “For every minute that passes, one student will pass through the doors.” He smiled, revealed very white teeth that briefly reminded Harry of Tom, of the boy the monster once had been. “When all the students have gone, that is when you will die. In return, you will not resist me.”

Harry didn’t see any choices, except to stall and hope for aid. “How do I know you’ll keep your word?” he demanded.

Voldemort’s lips slipped once more into grim lines. “If I wish to rule the world, Harry – and I do – I cannot murder the future soldiers of my armies. What I want is you, your friends, your Headmaster. Nothing else will satisfy me; and nothing more is necessary. I have no interest in keeping or killing them, boy. What should I do with a bunch of sniveling brats to look after?”

Harry nodded, slowly. “Ginny first.”

Voldemort tsked under his breath, but after a moment he waved Ginny forward. The young witch stood, resolute yet wary, striding woodenly towards Harry without looking back. “Who shall I look for?” she whispered softly.

He wrapped his arms around her, slipping her the Marauder’s Map. “No one,” he said. “I want you to wait outside the doors, Ginny, and tell the others where to go. Best place is the secret entrance through the Whomping Willow; the map will tell you what to do, and besides, Ron’s told you the story enough. Tell them to go to the Shrieking Shack and wait there for you. When the last wizard’s through, take them and run, Ginny. Run as fast as you can, because they’ll be looking for you and the others. Count on it.”

Ginny eyed him, her red hair flyaway and her face white.

“Ginny…?” He put stress, feeling into the syllables, willing her to get the others to safety. It was more important they stay safe – far more important than any one wizard, even the Boy Who Lived.

She nodded, tears filling her eyes. “I will, Harry. I’ll get them safe, I promise I will.”

Then she was going, shoulders stiff, awaiting the curse that ought to hit her in the back, but Voldemort was good as his word. Harry had a strange thought, that the man was that fond of the drama he had created; heroine exits stage right, and the climax of the story begins.

Death Eaters, nameless, faceless, grabbed on to Harry and hurled him at Voldemort’s feet. It was almost obscene, that thing in Dumbledore’s chair, and Harry swallowed, his mind whirring with desperation, with half-formed plans which grew then dissolved around him. Then one plan brightened in his mind, one he rapidly buried beneath a barrage of inconsequentials, the barrage necessary to prevent the man from glimpsing it through Legilimency.

Several Death Eaters circled Harry hungrily, stepping away from the group, which immediately contracted to cover their absence. Harry stood quietly in the center, searching for some way to steel himself; but he never had been able to. There was no way he had, no technique to prepare, really…

…or…

Harry pulled on Obscura, swathing himself in the absence of feeling like a cloak. Just then, the Crucio hit him, and every nerve jangled and racked, and someone was screaming, and it was him…

But there was no panic, no desperate thrashing of the mind to escape the pain or the truth of his situation. While his body thrashed, while his throat grew raw and sore, his mind was still functioning with more logic and order than he naturally possessed.

“Finite,” Voldemort hissed. “I wonder,” he drawled while Harry caught his breath, “if you can manage to call me ‘Master’ before we are through. Wagers, anyone?”

The inner circle of Death Eaters laughed again, and Harry could make out Macnair’s voice easily, could effortlessly separate it from the others; and, unless he missed his guess, Bellatrix Lestrange was the woman to his left.

It was she who replied. “I will wager you the newest recruit,” she said with her mad laugh.

“Ah, Bella,” Voldemort crooned. “What should you do with such a prize, were you to win it?”

Lestrange licked her lips, then threw her head back to laugh, wild, mad.

Voldemort smiled an indulgent smile. “Crucio!”

Harry screamed wordlessly, but he managed to deduce they were discussing Draco. Draco… he was to be passed around from Voldemort to Lestrange? Harry was not certain at whose hands Draco would fare worst. When he had the breath, he hissed.

“What?” Voldemort wondered. “Oh. Finite.”

“Two… minutes,” Harry wheezed.

Voldemort waved a hand, bored, and two small students scampered for the doors.

Then, it began in earnest. Harry counted silently to himself, shouted out when another minute had passed; he gained true satisfaction watching another terrified student dash through the door, knowing they would reach Hogsmeade in ten minutes at most. When half of the students had escaped, Voldemort paused in his ministrations.

“Do you know, Harry,” Voldemort wondered, “perhaps this is not the right sort of torture for you. Is it?”

Harry frowned, sweat-streaked face turning to the sound of the man’s voice.

“No, you’re entirely too sane for so long under the Cruciatus Curse… Longbottom’s parents lasted nearly an hour, but they were both older and wiser than you… perhaps we’re going about this entirely the wrong way.”

Bella smiled wickedly, stooping to take Harry’s face in her hands. “Give him to me,” she implored, scanning his features with her dark eyes. “I want him. Give him here.”

Voldemort kicked her casually out of the way, but to Harry’s surprise, the raven-haired woman laughed wildly, licking blood away from her split lip. She growled, then barked at the Dark Lord, but her barking quickly slipped away to laughter again.

Harry understood the implication that Voldemort was treating her like some mad dog, but he also understood fully just how far from sane the woman truly was. He found himself wondering if he ought to call Voldemort ‘Master’ just to lose her the bet.

“There are other ways of breaking minds, Harry,” Voldemort went on, as though he had never been interrupted in the first place. “Pain is only one facet of the art, isn’t that right, Bella? Pleasure often works equally well, if not better. They say you catch more flies with honey.”

“T-twenty t-two,” Harry panted.

Voldemort scowled, but his anger broke soon enough into a dark smile as he pointed his wand at Harry. “Vivicus gaudium.”

Harry was seated at his writing desk in the room that faced westward, frowning irritatedly as the sun’s ruddy light crept slowly away from his page. Soon he would have to rise and turn the lights on, but for now he was content to write in the encroaching darkness; he was working particularly hard on this one passage, and he had no desire to rise, to interrupt the flow of thought.

“What are you doing sitting in the dark?”

Harry turned to grin ruefully at his mother as she flipped the switch on his wall, wincing at the sudden change in light.

“You’ll burn out your eyes one of these days, young man,” she scolded, her own green eyes, just like his, flashing with merriment.

“Yes, mum,” Harry sighed, with the exasperated tone he’d so often heard from Ron. He was so very happy to see her, though he couldn’t imagine why; he’d seen her an hour or so ago at supper.

Deciding that his work was muddling his mind, he stood, stretching, his mother automatically stepping into his arms for an embrace. “Don’t you work so hard tonight you won’t be able to get up for Quidditch tomorrow,” she warned. “And your sister made the cookies with the chocolate centers because she knows your exams are close. If you don’t go down and sample at least one, you’ll be blacklisted.”

Harry grinned ruefully; no one wanted to be on the receiving end of one of his sister’s tempers. He moved down the stairs, his mother’s hand resting familiarly on the small of his back, and –

…A strange man was glaring at him, turning his insides to mush, adrenaline flooding back through his system as he blinked away the memory.

No… not a memory. Not anything that had ever happened at all. His heart twisted. Mum…

“Vivicus gaudium,” the man said, and Harry was –

…standing at the front of the classroom, anxious because he was about to give his report to the whole school. Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia were in the audience, beaming up at him, and that gave him the courage to begin. He looked down at the notecards in his hands before realizing that he didn’t need them; he had long since memorized his speech, and it would be the best fourth-grade project ever.

When he finished speaking fifteen minutes later, the audience leapt to their feet, clapping – clapping for him. Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia told everyone that he was their boy, and even though they were not his parents, he knew what they meant and he glowed with pride.

It was too bad Dudley couldn’t come; he was locked up in his cupboard again, locked up for doing what his Aunt and Uncle wouldn’t call magic…

Harry reeled, shuddering from reaction. He had no idea how much time had passed, but he noted only five students left.

“Vivicus gaudium.”

Harry was standing atop the Astronomy Tower, kissing Cho…

Harry was kneeling in the garden, weeding the bed at Number Four Privet Drive, where his godfathers Sirius and Remus lived...

“Thirty-one,” Harry hissed, and the last student scrambled for the door. After a desperate glance behind her, the frightened first year dashed away.

“Are you certain you don’t wish to continue, Harry?” Voldemort inquired, thumbing away the tears Harry hadn’t been aware were on his cheeks. “Although I shall kill you now, if you desire.”

Harry rose into a seated position. “I’d prefer it if you didn’t – Master.”

Voldemort blinked at him; it was the first time Harry had ever seen the man at a loss. Then he barked a laugh, loud and rich and almost human-sounding. “Beautiful, Harry. Perfect. And why shouldn’t I?”

Harry kept his eyes lowered, both as a show of respect and to prevent Legilimency. “Because I can be useful to you,” he whispered, his voice catching. “Because the Wizarding World will fall at your feet if I help you. Those truly devoted to me, to the idea of me, would despair. And the undecided might actually change their minds.”

“Perhaps,” Voldemort replied. “However, I would be sparing you to kill you now. Amongst my Death Eaters, my most dear, loyal friends, there is much affront on my behalf; so you would not last the night in any case. And now, Harry,” he said, feigning sorrow, “good-bye.”