All That You Leave Behind

Hi, Angst here. Sorry for the long wait for an update, RL intruded for both Q and myself, and along with the time difference between here and there, we've only just gotten back in sync again. Many thanks to all our reviewers, especially Cravedom and Miku, and to all who've faithfully waited for updates. We hope everyone enjoys this chapter.

On now then, to our version of "The Prince's Tale."



By the time they arrived back at Spinner's End, Severus was shaking with fatigue as much as he was with anger at Albus Dumbledore. Inside the door, he made his way wearily to the old armchair, too tired to be annoyed with Harry, who insisted on helping him. He let himself fall into the chair with a heavy sigh and closed his eyes. The next thing he knew the boy was prodding him awake.


"Sir...Severus," Harry said insistently, "It's time for your potions again, and I think you should rest properly, in your bed."


He squinted up at the boy and then grunted his assent. A nap would be nice, he thought, struggling to get up.


Upstairs, Potter was again hovering and fussing after giving him his potions, and Severus snapped out at him to leave him alone, that he was perfectly capable of undressing himself, as his foot tangled in his trouser leg and he fell back onto the bed.


"Just shut up and let me help you!" Harry shot back, yanking Severus's shoes off his feet and then his trousers off his legs, "obviously this was all too much. I told you it would be! You're still weak, not surprising considering you've come back from the dead!"


"No thanks to you!" Severus hissed, glaring at him.


"Yeah, well, it's done, so you're just going to have to live with it, aren't you?" Harry scowled back, "you'd think this time round you'd turn over a new leaf and be less of a git!"


Severus glared at the boy as he roughly settled him into the bed and yanked the blankets up over him, although the boy's words made him think about Albus's again and he remained silent. He watched him as he went about the room folding his trousers on the end of the bed, straightening his shoes alongside his slippers, disposing of the used potion vials. He could see the boy glancing at him surreptitiously every now and again as he did so, could feel him wanting to ask something. Severus was too tired and unprepared to speak of Lily right now, and sighed heavily as he lay back on his pillows. Eternal rest was never going to come with this hanging over his head.


"What was so important that you had to speak to Dumbledore's portrait today?" Harry muttered, "you should have waited until you were feeling stronger at least."


"Yes, well," Severus said tiredly, "I'm surprised you and your Gryffindor stubborness didn't try forcing me into the infirmary."


Harry's head snapped up and he stared at the man on the bed, astounded at his own stupidity. Of course! They'd been right there!


"I...I didn't think of it," he mumbled and waited for the jeering smirk that was sure to come at his lack of forethought. Surprisingly, however the man only shook his head.


"Just as well," he said, his voice laden with exhaustion, "I would have resisted. I'm not to be seen, as I'm assumed to be dead. Something else you've obviously forgotten." He was, however, lacking the usual venom and Harry considered asking about his mother but knew the man should rest.


"Right," he said instead, "I'll let you rest then," and went out.


**********


Much later, after Severus had finished his nap and insisted on getting up and coming downstairs, they sat across the table from one another in silence as they ate dinner. Severus could see the boy fairly burning now to ask whatever it was about his mother he wanted to ask. Could feel him trying to gather all that ridiculous Gryffindor courage and bravery. After twenty agonising minutes watching the boy squirm and pick absently at his food, Severus could no longer endure.


"If I had known I'd be living another lifetime, I never would have given you those memories," he said abruptly.


Harry nodded silently and continued to push his food around his plate. Well that was that, he thought to himself. The man wouldn't talk about his mother if he did ask, obviously regretting what he'd done. He stared at his plate, biting his lip in frustration and thinking it wasn't fair. Whether he regretted it or not, it was done and he, Harry, had every right to ask. He considered trying to goad him into an argument about it, but he was so tired of them snapping at one another. Just as he was thinking sourly to just go to bed and leave the man to tend to himself since he was so surly about taking Harry's help, the man suddenly began speaking.


"Your mother and her sister grew up a few streets away from here," he said, staring at his own plate, "A better part of town. I spent as much time away from this house as possible when I was a child, outside, anywhere but here, waiting for my Hogwarts letter to be able to escape. My father was a Muggle, and he did not appreciate what my mother, who was a witch, and myself were capable of..."


"Why did he marry her then?" Harry asked quietly, wondering if Dumbledore hadn't had something to do with that, as he had in placing himself with his magic hating relatives.


It was a long moment before Severus answered, "It was what was done in those days when...when one has...compromised a woman. The "honourable" thing to do. The only honourable thing my father ever did," he added grimly, "though he needn't have bothered. My mother and I would have fared far better without him."


"You...you mean he married her...because she was going to have a baby. You," Harry said warily.


"Yes," Severus snapped, and then closing his eyes, changed his tone and added, "because she found herself pregnant with me. She hadn't told him what she was, and when she did, he forbade her to use her magic, forbade her to see her family, forced her to live like the Muggle he was. My mother's family were unsympathetic to her plight, feeling that she got what she deserved, messing about with a Muggle, and disowned her. As you may have surmised, I did not have a happy childhood. I learned from a very early age that magic was forbidden around the neighbours as well as my father, particularly when he was drinking, and he was always drinking. He was a violent man, and became more so when he drank. I spent as much time as possible away from this house, outside, anywhere but here, and used to haunt the playground that was not far from here. My mother tried shielding me from my father's wrath as best she could, but the very sight of me would sometimes send him into a rage, and then he would take it out on her, blaming her for his own miserable lot in life."


"Did he...hit her?" Harry whispered, eyes wide, remembering what he had seen in Severus's mind the one time he'd managed to penetrate it during the misbegotten occlumancy lessons of his fifth year.


"When I was younger....yes," Severus said quietly. That hung in the air for several moments and then the man, seeming to shake himself to rid him of the memory, began to speak again.


"I had seen your mother and her sister at the playground, watched them from the bushes, long before I worked up the nerve to actually approached her. I had often seen her perform small bursts of magic, heard her sister reprimand her every time she did, and I could see no evidence that Petunia, your aunt, was capable of the same. I thought, at first, that perhaps Petunia was a squib, and that her reprimands to your mother were simply to keep the other Muggle children from discovering the secret, but I came to realise that Petunia was simply jealous of your mother, that your mother was a muggle-born witch, and that she had no idea that she was. When I heard her say that she didn't know why she could do the things she could do, I could no longer resist coming from my hiding place and telling her what she was." The man stopped and stared at the fireplace for several moments, and Harry waited patiently for him to start speaking again, hoping he would not stop here with his story. His expression was immeasurably sad, and Harry felt a pang of guilt at his own eagerness for the man to relive what he knew must be intensely painful memories, but his need to hear about his mother was too great to let him say anything.


Eventually, in a quiet voice, Severus began speaking again. "What she was....what she turned out to be....was far more than just a witch. She was kind, and she accepted me the way I was. She never made fun of me, she was loyal to me, even in the face of her friends making fun of her because of me. How could I not love her for that? She was my friend. My first and only true friend, and the love of my life, and I...I threw that away in a moment of rage....because of your father....James." Severus's expression became grim and bitter at the mention of the hated name of Harry's father, but then changed to a sort of ironic amusement as he said seemingly to himself, "Lupin. I wonder if James ever knew?"


With a confused frown Harry questioned, "Knew what?"


Severus blinked, as if becoming aware he'd spoken aloud, and looked at the fireplace again. "Lupin.....was also in love with your mother, Harry, much for, I would imagine, the same reasons I was. She knew he was a werewolf, yet she accepted him as he was, as she did me, and he, like I, could not help but love her for that." He shook his head slowly. "He...Lupin....he wasn't like them. He never participated in the tormenting of me, or anyone for that matter, that your father and godfather were so very fond of...."


"He never tried stopping them," Harry interjected, not wanting to face the ugly truth of what James and Sirius had done to the man before him. 'He admitted that himself, he..."


"He couldn't have if he had tried," Severus said surprising Harry. Severus sighed and ran his hands over his face. "Inside....I...I couldn't blame him. After I knew what he was, a werewolf, I couldn't blame him for sticking with those who accepted him in spite of it. I knew too well what it was like to be shunned and reviled, to be alone because of what you are. Even if he couldn't stop them, he didn't participate, refused to, and that was enough. He never said, of course, anything of what he felt for your mother, but I could see it in his eyes, the way he watched her. and I doubt your father ever noticed. No, he'd noticed the way I looked at her, and that was what really drove him, more than just simply my existance. I had what he wanted, and despite his constant teasing and baiting of your mother, he could not persuade her to leave me behind, and that infuriated him. Your father was spoiled and coddled all his life, the apple of his doting parents' eyes, their only child as well as their only son, whom they adored. That is the truth, whether you choose to believe it or not, and he was quite unaccustomed to not getting his own way."


Severus caught the wounded look that briefly flashed in those emerald eyes, and rather surprised at himself, hastened to reassure the boy. "He loved her, your father loved your mother, it wasn't just that he wanted what, at the time, he could not have, he loved her. And because of that, he took his frustration out on me....and I....I let him get the better of me, I allowed him to push me too far, and I...I was as bad as he was. He took his frustration and anger out on me.......and I took mine....and my humiliation....out on your mother."


Harry had seen the anguish the man had went gone through, losing Lily because of what his father had driven him to, had felt the man's humiliation at it all over again when he'd caught him in the pensieve, and could now hear the pain and regret in the man's voice as he lived it again. He understood what it was like to be driven to lash out at those you cared about most because of the actions of another. After all, hadn't Draco Malfoy done the same to him, humiliating him in front of others, and hadn't Ron and Hermione borne the brunt of his anger and humiliation in the face of it?


"After I saw that, in the pensieve," Harry blurted out suddenly, "I asked ..I asked Sirius and Remus about that....about what my father had done to you. About why he did it. I saw what you didn't, how my father had goaded you and attacked you simply because Sirius had said he was bored. I didn't want to believe....that what you had always told me about my father was true, but when I saw that....I...I know, I tried to tell you then....I knew what it was like to be in your shoes, to be embarassed and humiliated at the hands of another, and to lash out at people because of what that one person did to you. It was Draco Malfoy for me...and I hated you because you never did anything about it when you knew what he was doing. I used to think it was because he was in your house, the son of your friend, that you were evil....but after I saw that memory in the pensieve....Sirius, he brushed it off, saying they were all ignorant berks at 15, but...he also tried justifying it, saying my father hated you because you were into the Dark Arts and my father hated everything to do with the Dark Arts. But then....I....in my heart, I couldn't quite believe it was just that. There were other people who were also into the Dark Arts, plenty of them, and so why was it you he singled out? I told myself there must be some other reason, some other memory that you kept from me, of, of you doing something to him, and you just wanted me to .......but after I saw the memories you gave me.....and what you just told me.....I know you're right. He hated you because of my mother, because he wanted her and you had her and he couldn't stand it. To not get his way, and even if he loved her, even though he loved her....that doesn't make what he did to you right. And I realise now why you never did anything to Draco. Because you saw me as my father, and you as a teacher couldn't do anything to me, so you let Draco do it for you, as revenge, and I don't blame you...."


Severus made a sound somewhere between a strangled laugh and a grunt of pain. "Undoubtedly, I deserved that, your low opinion of my motives, in light of my own conduct, but you are wrong. It is true that I saw your father in you, you are a carbon copy of him lookswise, that cannot be denied, and yes, I admit that looking at you brought back all those old horrible memories of what he did to me. But....as I'm sure you've often been told, you have your mother's eyes....and they have been, at least to me....your saving grace. You...."


Severus took in a deep breath and let it out shakily, damning Albus Dumbledore to the darkest pit of hell for making him do this, drudge up all these memories, deal with this boy. Lily's boy. Perhaps that boy had been right about him after all. Perhaps he was a coward, afraid to face his pain; he'd already told the boy far more than he'd intended to and was afraid to face the responsibility he'd now incurred because of it. To give the boy his mother, his, Severus's, Lily.


"There is a saying....that the eyes are the window to the soul, and you.... with your mother's eyes....you are more like her than you know," Severus said painfully, "and I will admit to you now, that....I saw that from the moment I saw you but....I let your resemblance to your father harden my heart...I tried to. I refused to allow myself to see your mother in you because it was simply too painful to face. That and I could not allow myself to....be a friend to you knowing what I did...knowing what you had to face in your future. I had to keep you alive, teach you to be strong, prepare you for what was to come. Albus was allowed the luxury of caring about you, I was not. I couldn't afford to care about anybody; in begging the Dark L...begging Voldemort to spare your mother I had already displayed weakness, I could not do it again in appearing to care about you. Especially with Draco Malfoy about. I could not take the chance that he would run back to Lucius and tell him that I had shown you favour. Draco is Lucius's son, but Lucius is not my friend, and Draco is the spoiled brat he always appeared to be. Do not allow yourself to think for a moment that the war changed either of them..."


"Mrs. Malfoy saved my life," Harry said, "she..."


"I am aware of what happened after my death," Severus said, "Miss Granger told me during the time she spent here, and while Narcissa may have had a change of heart, Draco and Lucius never will. Lucius Malfoy would cut out the heart of his own mother if he thought it would benefit him, and never show a moment's remorse for doing so. Lucius will always do what's best for Lucius, no matter what that may be, and now that Voldemort is gone, you can be sure that he will try to ingratiate himself and his son with you. You are, after all, a hero, and..."


"Draco owes me a life debt twice over," Harry interrupted, "he can't deny that."


"And you owe Narcissa a life debt," Severus pointed out, "and you can be sure that Lucius is, even at this very moment, trying to find a way to twist that to his advantage, if he hasn't already."


"Well he won't get very far," Harry said grimly and got up to retrieve the letter he'd received from Kingsley Shacklebolt. He handed it to Severus, sitting down again. "He'll think twice about messing with me when I'm an Auror."


Severus read through it and then sighed as he handed it back. "Congratulations," he said, "I do believe that makes you the youngest person ever asked to join the Auror office. Usually there is a barrage of testing done before anyone is even invited to train. Obviously Shacklebolt is willing to make an exception in your case. Of course...you have already proven yourself."


This was said with a distinct lack of the usual malice Harry had come to expect from the man in regards to any accomplishments he managed. So....did that mean Snape had just paid him a compliment? Harry wondered.


"Well, I'm sure I still have to pass the training," he said modestly, "I mean...I'll be the first to admit there's a lot about the Dark Arts I don't know. Everything I did was mostly...luck, and help from others."


Severus made no reply. He was thinking to himself of how the boy in front of him was so
much more like Lily than James. Despite his appearance, to Severus, this boy was Lily's son, not James'. How could he tell the boy this without it seeming as if he were running down the man who was his father?


Harry saved him the bother. "I ... I realised something recently, I never knew either of
them, but just accepted other people's views of my Dad, well, not your views because
you were ... you."


Snape snorted in reply to that, but made no other comment.


"It wasn't til I saw your memories in the pensieve that I started to think about whether I should be so happy at being called James' son. No one ever mentioned my Mum, except to say I have her eyes, really. That's not enough for me. I want to know what her favourite colour was, what subjects she liked, and which she hated, her favourite song, just... everything."


He turned those eyes to Severus. He said nothing. His silent appeal was eloquent
enough.


Sighing to himself, Severus settled himself in his chair and told Harry what he
wanted to know.


As much, at least, as his tired brain could summon up at that time.