Hadwyn found the black dog from the Forbidden forest to be a mystery. The creature followed him everywhere loyally, and enjoyed every type of food he offered it, but at the same time, there was something strangely off about him.

The dog seemed to like watching him in the potions lab, and had even intervened once by getting in his way to keep him from adding an ingredient too soon. Another time he had found the creature looking at the Daily Prophet with an odd amount of understanding in its face, although at the time he had tried to convince himself that he had imagined it.

The dog was too smart, and Hadwyn had been around animals enough to know that this wasn't typical. There were only a few possibilities that could explain why the dog was like he was; perhaps he had been another wizard's familiar at another time in his life; or maybe he was under an enchantment of some kind.

On the other hand, and Hadwyn was leaning towards this option more than the other two, the dog might actually be someone's animagus form, which would easily explain why the creature was so damned intelligent.

Hadwyn had thought to peruse the list of registered animagi, but hadn't found anything exactly matching "his" dog's appearance. Thus, if he were right, it meant that the creature wasn't registered, and therefore the only thing standing between him and the truth was one simple little spell.

Of course, then there was also the question of why someone would voluntarily stay in their animagus form for such a long time (it had been over a week since he had found the dog, and they hadn't really been apart since then). Was his creature in some kind of danger?

He liked the dog, he really did. He liked the companionship and he enjoyed having a furry friend around to play with and love. He hoped he was wrong, but he didn't think he was. His hunches—no matter how annoying—tended to be right, or at least rooted in truth of some kind.

He sighed and glanced down at the foolish animal lying at his feet. The creature lifted his shaggy black head and looked back up at him, his tongue out and tail wagging as though he knew that Hadwyn was thinking about him.

"Utterly ridiculous," Hadwyn murmured, standing up with a slight wince. He'd been sitting for too long pondering nothing and everything.

"Come on, let's take a walk," he said, jerking his head at the door and waiting for the dog to scramble to his feet.

The black dog barked once and trotted on ahead of him, weaving through the stone corridors of Hogwarts happily. Abruptly, he found himself in front of a stone gargoyle, and without pause, he whispered its password, "Sixlets."

Glancing down only once to make sure the animal was still with him, he moved quickly up the spiral staircase, barely waiting long enough to let Dumbledore issue him a welcome before speaking his mind.

"I may have a problem," Hadwyn said in greeting, not bothering to sit down.

"Oh?" Was Dumbledore's mildly spoken response.

"Yes." Then without preamble, he pulled out his wand, pointed it at the dog—the now moving dog—and silently thought, Animagus revealio.

And then there was a man in the place of his dog and he watched with some interest as a Stupefy was issued from Dumbledore shot over his shoulder, stopping the haggard looking man from making it out the door.

Turning around, he raised an eyebrow at the dumbfounded Dumbledore and asked in a calm voice, "Someone who owes you money?"

. . .

Harry was running. He had to get away. He scrambled over the road that he and Severus had used to get there. Severus, the thought stuck in his mind and he determinedly kept moving, trying not to think, trying not to remember.

He had been studying, or at least trying to.

He slid over a pile of loose rocks and caught himself roughly on his hands, his feet kicking out on the offending stones angrily.

Severus had been trying to get him to study for days now, and finally had suggested he try doing so alone in his room.

But he couldn't focus, and it was driving him crazy.

He tried to keep to the shady, dark spots of the forest. He didn't want anyone to find him. He was such an idiot; such a horrible, worthless, over-emotional, simpering wimp of an idiot. Harsh tears threatened to fall, but he refused to give them his attention.

"Harry, have you still not gotten any farther?" Severus had calmly asked him. He hadn't accused Harry of wasting his time, but he'd been able to hear it in his professor's voice nonetheless.

Why on earth couldn't he do better? Why couldn't he get better? Feel better? Move on?

His guardian might not choose to say it, but Harry had no such inhibitions. What was wrong with him!

Feverishly, he ducked under a branch and then changed directions, heading off to the right slightly before doubling back for a while. He didn't want to be found. He didn't deserve to be found.

"It's not working," Harry had said, feeling horribly out of sorts.

"What's not?" Severus had leaned in closer, his voice far gentler than his classroom persona had ever managed.

Harry's eyes had filled with tears as he had tried to explain that he couldn't think anymore, couldn't make his brain work. The quiet of his room didn't help him focus; it made him remember Lupin and what had happened instead.

He was lost and he knew it. He was in the middle of a forest in a dragon preserve, and he was never getting out, because he didn't deserve it. His lungs burned as he kept moving, kept escaping, kept running . . .

"Then we'll work out another way," Severus had been so calm, so collected as he had tried to soothe his fears.

For some reason it had just been too much for him.

"It's not going to GET better!" He had screamed back. "There isn't another way! I can't think anymore! I can't feel; I can't BE!"

"Child," Severus had said, touching his arm.

His eyes were blurring with tears. He couldn't see. It was dark and he was alone and—he gasped aloud at the pain in the centre of his chest. Oh god, what had he done?

"DON'T TOUCH ME!" He had screamed, his magic surging forward, trying to protect him, no matter how belatedly.

He couldn't see the branch that slammed into his head. All he heard was a crack and then a sick pain rocketed through his skull and he dropped to the forest floor moaning and clutching his head.

His magic had thrown Severus backwards into the wall. His magic had knocked his guardian unconscious . He had hurt Severus—the man who had done so much for him; he had hurt him.

Panic had flooded his system, and he had tentatively tried to wake the man up. It wasn't until he was closer that he had realised that Severus was bleeding; that his head had actually indented the wall.

The sight of blood, of real damage had snapped the rest of his tenuous control.

"AAAAHHH!" He screamed blindly in his self-imposed solitude there amongst the trees.

What had he done! Severus, the man whom he had privately begun thinking of as a parental figure; the man who had helped him more than anyone else in his entire life; how could he have been so horrible as to hurt him!

He sobbed aloud; his body hunched over, the final dregs of his dignity finally lost. He rocked back and forth, his arms holding his middle as his shoulders shuddered under the combined weight of what had happened to him and what he had done to his Severus.

He screamed again, screamed until he couldn't breathe or swallow. He screamed until his magic spread out around him, touching the trees and other creatures and filling them with his misery. He screamed until his head had threatened to split even wider open, until he couldn't tell whether it was blood or tears dripping down his face, until his muscles clenched hard and his nerves flared and he felt so horrible that he briefly wished for it all to stop—for his life to end.

And then he slumped down, his mind teetering on the edge of unconsciousness as his blood continued to pound without mercy through his body.

Then merciful blackness claimed him and he knew no more.

. . .

Severus opened his eyes with a groan. Mentally, he chastised himself for touching Harry when he was so obviously uncomfortable.

Harry.

The thought made him sit up quickly, the world swimming in front of his eyes as his head pounded painfully. He reached into an inner pocket of his robe and pulled out a pain potion, downing it quickly before finding a handkerchief and cleaning his face of the blood he could smell dried there.

"Harry?" He called out, not liking the silence that greeted his question.

Slowly getting to his feet, he ignored the swaying of the room and the slight blurriness of his vision. He could focus on himself when he knew that Harry was safe.

He turned his mind to the cabin's wards and tried to find where his ward was, only to learn that he was alone.

Fuck!

Taking a chance, he asked the empty room one other question, "Snitch?"

There was a squeak, and then he heard the flap of wings and suddenly a little furry red and orange body appeared beside him, and Severus let out a soft breath of relief. He had no idea why the creature was not with Harry, but it didn't matter. Snitch would be able to help him find Harry, and it would be faster than any magic he could perform.

Snitch squeaked again at him, and he held out an arm so the little creature could land on him. Soon, a small clawed hand was touching his face and he strode to the front door with the creature perched securely on his shoulder.

Once outside, he breathed silent thanks that it was relatively warm for a spring afternoon.

"We have to find Harry," Severus informed Snitch. "I need you to lead me to him."

Snitch squeaked and licked his cheek and then jumped off his shoulder and started flying away. Severus immediately began jogging after him, his head automatically complaining about it. Burying the pain behind his occlumency shields, he continued after his ward's familiar.

He was glad that Snitch was so overwhelmingly loyal to Harry; otherwise, it was all too easy to imagine being led into some kind of trap and never leaving the very dense forest they now found themselves in.

The direction in which Snitch was leading him was frighteningly dark; and more than once, Severus heard the roar of dragons coming from various directions around them. He heard the sounds of strange creatures clicking and crawling around him and he shuddered to think what might happen should one of them happen upon his Harry.

It was completely dark by the time Snitch finally stopped and landed back down upon his shoulder. Severus held his wand aloft, its tip alight with a brightly cast Lumos.

"What is it?" He asked, trying not to gasp from the combination of exertion and likely concussion. His pain relieving potion hadn't worn off yet, but that didn't change the fact that he still needed to lay down and rest.

And then of course, there was the leaden feeling of worry that was sitting at the bottom of his stomach, filling every thought, straining every breath even further.

A shimmer of magic revealed itself as he took a step forward, and his eyes widened at the very ancient feel of it. Before them was a grove of trees, and he had to stoop a bit to fit under the low branch of the nearest.

Of course he had been in heavily guarded magical places before, as well as ancient and protected or holy places. Unfortunately, the ritual and standards for each was different, but luckily there were a few standards of practice that translated from place to place.

"I'm not here to hurt," he announced, speaking in a low voice and taking another cautious step forwards. "Only to retrieve someone of my . . . clan who stumbled here by accident."

Another step and the ancient wards covering the small empty space between the trees seemed to relax around him a bit. Something flickered in front of him and he gasped as the sight in front of him suddenly came into focus.

A woman clad only in bark and leaves was standing before him. Vines like those hanging down from the tree behind her covered her limbs, revealing small patches of light green skin here and there across the expanse of her body.

Barely breathing, he felt his knees bending and he carefully kneeled down in front of the tree dryad.

"I mean no disrespect," he voiced softly. Still resting on his shoulder, Snitch squeaked in what sounded vaguely like agreement.

"You have been granted entrance because you asked, stranger," she said in a strangely enchanting voice. It sounded like trickling water and rustling tree leaves and he tried to commit the sound to memory.

"My name is Omorike," the tree spirit told him in that odd lilting tone of voice.

"I am Severus Snape," he responded with.

"And what do you seek, Severus of Snape?" Omorike asked; staring into his eyes the way a hungry snake might.

"A boy—my s-son, Harry," Severus answered, knowing better than to try and explain the convoluted relationship that existed between them.

Besides, it isn't as though we aren't beginning to work in that direction—provided that the events of the day didn't set them back irrevocably, he thought in the deeper part of his mind.

She continued to look into his eyes, her face intensely focused on his. Finally, after another minute of unending silence, she nodded and broke eye contact. Shifting to the side, he watched as the vines around her feet merely repositioned themselves, sliding her across the ground like a living, writhing body of smoky green.

"Take what you seek and leave. Your passage is safe until the sun rises," she said, her form beginning to melt into the backdrop of the dark branches behind her.

Severus managed to creak upright, his stomach trying to rebel against the movement until his focus abruptly shifted to the spot of ground where the dryad had previously stood. Now alone, he rushed forward, dropping back down—this time in a crouch—as he came upon the unconscious form before him.

Rolling the boy over on his back, he winced at the darkening bruise over one side of Harry's face and the blood that had dried under the child's bitten lip.

"Harry," he whispered as Snitch crawled down his arm and buried his little furry face in the front of the child's jumper. "Come along please," Severus said, picking up the boy's still light body and turning to leave.

"Thank you for keeping him safe," he murmured just before exiting the sacred grove of trees. He did not bother to look back to where they had been.

He thought it unlikely that he would ever be able to find the spot again, and indeed, as soon as his back was turned, the green space behind him pulled away from sight once more.

It was just as well.