Jigsaw

CHAPTER 3

“I can’t believe it’s been eight years!” Harry nodded in agreement as he sat down between Neville Longbottom and Ginny Weasley, opposite where Ron and Hermione were cuddling together in their own seat.

“Yeah seems like yesterday.” Neville muttered as he added his own special blend of herbs into his drink to make it taste better. The ‘Broken Broomstick’ was an unassuming little pub in Northern Kent, and had become the new base for the ‘Order of the Phoenix’ after Grimmauld Place was burnt to the ground by a death eater attack in the early stages of the war. When the war had come to an end however and the ‘Order’ had officially disbanded the members still came to this little place to tell stories, drink their sorrows away and talk of years gone by. When the original ‘squib’ owner had passed away Albus Dumbledore had jumped at the chance of buying it, and so it was that the retired headmaster had brought the place and was still running it now with the same organized chaos that he used to run Hogwart’s with. Harry liked it here and he felt almost at home sitting amongst the wizarding artifacts, books and paraphernalia that Dumbledore had brought with him. To muggles the place looked abandoned with some shifty characters coming and going but it was in reality teaming with life, and was quite a hub for the hero’s of the war.

“Alright if I can have everyone’s attention, we’ve got a surprise for our birthday boy before we cut the cake. So if we can have some silence please, and Albus if you can dim the lights, I’ll let Colin start.” Harry blushed a little as everyone clapped at him, after Mrs. Weasley had announced the surprise. Truly Harry didn’t really want a fuss to be made but his friends had gone to the effort and he knew it was pointless refusing. As Mrs. Weasley sat back down with Arabella Fig and Headmistress McGonagall, Colin Creevey stood up and pointed to the blank wall at the front of the pub. Colin Creevey had not changed much over the years, he was still a spotty little geek, but boy was he making money with his photographs. He was rich and that was saying something.

“Hi everyone, now it took me a while to get this collection together but I do hope you enjoy watching it.” Harry was intrigued as Dumbledore who was standing behind the bar waved his hand and dimmed the candles. Almost immediately a moving picture appeared on the wall, it was Harry and the Gryfindor team standing in the middle of the Quidditch pitch having taken out the Quidditch Cup in Harry’s last year at school. Harry smiled as he watched the pictures move, and listened to Ron telling Harry that Slytherin were spewing. Harry remembered the photo being taken and how fucking happy he’d been that day.

The pictures moved on slowly, most of them pictures of Harry at school doing stupid stuff with Ron and Hermione. Harry remembered some of the pictures being taken but most he didn’t know had ever existed. Not that it was surprising Colin had snapped him at every possible moment with or without permission. As the pictures rolled on Harry began to see faces of the witches and wizards no longer with them. Tonks, Moody, Seamus, Pavarti Patel, Arthur Weasley, Hagrid. They were faces Harry would never forget but it was painful seeing them there smiling at him and waving like nothing in the world could touch them. There were different reactions with each picture, some awing, some laughing and some shouts of shock from people who hadn’t known they’d ever been taken a photo of. One picture however made the lump in Harry’s throat choke more than any other. Snape.

It was one picture in the entire selection and the only one not moving. It was taken obviously at Grimmauld Place before it burnt down. The potions professor was sitting in the window seat in the front lounge, a crimson pillow under his head and propped up against the frosted glass fast asleep. He looked drained, tired and completely broken. Admittedly the constant fighting had been a drain on all of them but Severus the worst. Voldemort had found out quiet early on in the campaign about Severus’ deceit, and the man had been continually bombarded with unspeakable pain through the mark on his arm. Harry had once caught the man in the bathroom, intoxicated with a blade in his hand with every intention of cutting off his arm in an attempt at ending the constant pain. Harry had talked him out of it, but it wasn’t hard considering he was drunk. Severus had been with Harry those last hours before the end, had sat with him in the middle of the field his hands uselessly trying to stop the bleeding from Harry’s multitude of injuries. Harry remembered dimly the man’s silky voice singing to him, even as the looming presence of Voldemort drew ever closer. The rest was a blur the curse, the sudden strength he’d found, the pain in his scar, and the lose of those arms wrapped around his waist which had until that point been supporting him all the way. By the time Harry had awoken in hospital six weeks later no one knew what had happened to the potions master. Rumor was that Snape had died like some other of the death eaters with Voldemort, but Harry didn’t want to believe it. A body was never found after all. Some said he disappeared ashamed of his past, others said he’d just disappeared to get away from the fuss. Admittedly he and Snape had never actually been friends, but over that last few months they’d come to an understanding. Truth for Approval. It wasn’t ideal but it worked.

Tears slowly slipped down Harry’s cheeks, the rest of the moving pictures becoming a blur as he silently replayed that final night over and over again in his mind. It was only when a hand came to rest on his shoulder that Harry realized the picture show had ended and now everyone was silently staring at him as he cried.

“Oh Harry, it’s okay.” Hermione wrapped her arms around her best friend as Ron gently squeezed his shoulder comfortingly.

“I think you need another fire whisky buddy.” Ron was quick to get up and fetch the glass of amber liquid from the bar where Albus had filled it up. Ron returned a moment later and allowed Harry to swill the drink down quickly as the boy crudely wiped the tears away from his cheeks.

“They’ve all gone.” Harry whispered finally having found his voice that had been choked up in his throat.

”Not everyone’s gone love, we’re still all here.” Mrs. Weasley bent down over the back of the bench seat and hugged Harry from behind, having pressed a gentle kiss to his forehead.

“And Seamus Finnegan is technically still here, he’s currently haunting the six year Gryfindor boy’s dormitory.” Harry smiled across at Ginny who winked at him cheekily.

“And Arthur’s always with us.” Mrs. Weasley added quietly as she stroked her fingers soothingly through Harry’s fringe.

“It just doesn’t seem fair.” Harry whispered again his mind now more focused on Severus than anyone else.

“Nothing in war is fair Harry, it is the way things are and we must accept that.” Albus had moved from out of the bar and had come to sit down on the bench opposite Harry, the bar towel draped over his shoulder and his funny pointy hat glistening in the still dimmed candle light.

“You can’t change what happened Harry, just be thankful for those who did survive.” Sirius smiled over at his godson where he was sitting in the v of Remus’ legs the werewolf dead to the world being still affected by the latest full moon. Harry nodded and stared at Dumbledore, the gray wizard eyes having lost none of their mischievous, knowing sparkle even in old age. The rest of the group had gone back to their own respective conversations, the photo’s having inspired more stories of the past. Dumbledore however remained sitting opposite Harry and his two friends, who were still comforting him.

“I want to see him again. Do you know where he is?” Dumbledore knew immediately whom Harry was talking about, having known eventually the boy would want to find the only wizard who could fill in the blanks for Harry about that fateful night.

“I’m sorry Harry I don’t know.” Albus looked apologetically at Harry who sighed heavily. “But you could ask Minerva, she might have heard something.” Harry smiled at Albus and nodded. Excusing himself past Ron, Harry went over to the table where Mrs. Weasley, Headmistress McGonagall and Arabella Fig were still gossiping. Harry cleared his throat as he came to a polite stand still beside the lady’s table.

“Ah Harry, Harry Birthday.” Minerva reached up and hugged Harry. His old head of house had fitted in quite nicely into the role of Headmistress of Hogwart’s and Harry could see already the similarities between her and Albus.

“Thank-you. Do you mind if I have a word please?” Harry smiled apologetically at Mrs. Weasley and Mrs. Fig, both of whom nodded understandingly and stood up from the table.

“Have a seat Harry, we’ll be back in a minute with your cake.” The two women disappeared behind the bar at Albus’ bidding and Harry sat down opposite Professor Minerva McGonagall.

“Well Potter? What word would this be?” Harry smiled at the professor whose eyes sparkled much the same as Albus’ did behind her half moon glasses.

“Dumbledore said you might know where Severus Snape is.” Harry looked hopefully at the witch but sadly she shook her head.

“No, I’m sorry Harry the very last we heard from Snape was an extremely poorly written letter of resignation about a week after the last battle. It seemed odd. Severus was always so particular about his writing, yet the letter was barely legible and lacked almost all of his ‘Snapish’ flare.” Harry remembered all to well how neat and precise Snape’s writing had always been. There had always been looping tails and sweeping crosses, and not once did he spell anything wrong, and the lines of text were always perfectly horizontal on the page. While the information wasn’t what Harry had wanted to hear, it did prove one thing. That the man was still alive, or at least he’d survived the last battle if he’d managed to write a letter of resignation, even if it was a poor one.

“Have you got any ideas where he might be?” Harry inquired again.

“Not really. There was no return address on the letter. It was delivered by a strange speckled owl, which has never returned to Hogwarts since. Most of what’s left of Snape’s family estate is still under Ministry control, so it’s very unlikely he’ll be there. The only thing I can tell you that might be of help is a rumor that was circulated around the older Slytherin’s a few years back about Draco Malfoy.” Harry’s interest picked up immediately. The blonde Slytherin had quite turned the tables during the war, he’d turned on his parents and on Voldemort but yet he still hadn’t changed sides. Not much was known about where Draco was during the last battle but it was well known he’d survived, the last of the Malfoy family. All the Malfoy’s estate had become his when the Ministry had concluded the boy had had absolutely nothing to do with Voldemort. Rumor around ‘Knockturn Alley’ was that he was a recluse, not willing to show his face because of the reputation the ‘Malfoy’ name now had.

“Draco?” Harry inquired quite stunned that he had something to do with Severus.

“Yes, I over heard the boys talking about it after a prefect meeting purely by chance of course.” Minerva’s eyes sparkled mischievously as she smiled sideways at Harry. Harry nodded and allowed the professor to go on. “Anyway they were talking about a summer camp of some sort, a place where they were going to spend their holidays. It wouldn’t have meant much but I heard one mention ‘Applegate’ estate.”

“Huh?” Harry was confused and shook his head in puzzlement at the witch.

“Applegate was a beautiful old wizarding estate owned by the ‘Snape’s’ a very long time ago before the war and before Riddle. Apparently the Snape’s gave it to the Malfoy’s as a wedding gift. I don’t really know the specifics of the arrangement but I know the place meant a lot to Severus. I believe he spent some time there as a child. As far as I know the place is still in disrepair but it might be worth checking, you might find Malfoy. If there’s one person who might possibly know where Severus Snape is, it’ll be Draco Malfoy.” Harry nodded pensively, now completely lost in thought. “Oooh cake.” Harry snapped out of his thoughts as he heard McGonagall speak. Harry turned around and watched as Mrs. Weasley pushed out a trolley with a large four-tiered cake on top of it. The cake looked beautiful.

“Alright come on Harry.” Harry didn’t have chance to stand up on his own as the Weasley Twin’s grabbed hold of Harry’s arms and dragged him up to the cake. Slowly the group began to sing ‘Happy Birthday’ all the while making Harry blush as he looked around at his gathered group of family and friends. Finally as the song came to an end Harry took a deep breath and blew out his candles, all the while making his wish. When the candles were out there was a cheer and Harry gratefully accepted the piece of cake Mrs. Weasley cut for him. However before Harry could put the cake in his mouth the twins who were still either side of him, pushed the entire cream covered cake into his face smearing it in and making everyone laugh out loud. Harry scraped the cream from his face and licked his hand before turning to glare at the twins who were happily giggling away. It was hard to see the twin’s as being mature married men, but they were. Having been on a business trip to America the twins had met another set of twins and it had apparently been love at first sight. It stood to reason that Amy and Amanda were wizarding chemists and had quite an input into the brother’s wizarding joke shop creations.

For the rest of the evening Harry sat with Sirius, Hermione and Ron listening to everyone’s attempts at the really bad muggle Karaoke that Dumbledore had hired for the evening. Harry felt better and he hoped that if he drank enough it would perhaps just for one night, stop the nightmares…

TBC>>>>>>>