A Friend in Need

Just a short message this chapter!

Hey well here’s another chapter I hope you guys are enjoying this as much as I am!

Thanks to Slytherdor for beta-ing my works!!


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Harry walked down the Corridor with…Bikit? And saw many portraits and artefacts on the walls and every time a window passed he would fight the urge to just stare at the beautiful scenery outside.

“Bikit, where is this place?”

“Castle Krum is in the Rhodope mountains, just past the muggle resort of Chepelare sir.” The house elf turned down another corridor and as Harry followed he could here voices. Then the house elf turned into a room that had the doors already opened and stopped just past the door.

“My Lord, Lady and Masters. Mr Harry Potter is being here.” The house elf said and then gestured to Harry that he should walk forward.

Harry looked at the table and saw a large muscular man with black hair sat at the head of the table in white shirt and dark, red open robes. There was a beautiful woman with brown hair tightly curled up into a bun sat on his right who was wearing an off the shoulder red dress that seemed to match, presumably, her husbands attire. Opposite her sat Victor, so the other two must be his parents. Victor had said he only had one older brother, but around the rest of the table were four other men who all looked to be Victor’s age. He bit his lip trying to work out what he was supposed to do now as everyone was looking at him expectantly.

Victor, on seeing his distress, stood and held a hand out to the empty chair next to him. Harry smiled and followed to the table. He gave a small thanks to Victor as he sat down and gingerly put his arms crossed on the table.

“You seem a little out of your depth little one. Perhaps we should introduce our selves, at least then you will know who you are dining with.” The woman smiled kindly at him and he found himself blushing and smiling back, giving a small nod.

“I am Lady Milena, Victor's mother and this is Lord Demitri, Victor's Father.” The man nodded as he was introduced.

“You already know me but these are my close friends, they helped me get you out of your relative’s house.” Victor put his arm over Harry’s chair; he could tell it made his Little Light feel safer as he saw the tension in his shoulders leave.

“I’m Derrick Portlan, I go to Durmstrang with Victor. We all do.” The guy sat next to Lady Milena with sandy blonde hair and a grey jumper stated.

Then the one next to him with black slicked back hair and black shirt smiled and nodded towards Harry. “Antonio Lugano.”

The next guy was sat at the end of the table, he had a blue t-shirt on and had neon green hair, he smiled and gave him a small salute.

“Chad Forester.” Harry laughed as the guy next to him looked exactly the same but he had bright orange hair. They reminded him of the twin Weasley

“My names Zack Forester. We’re usually twins.” He said while pointing to the green haired guy.

“They’re metamorphmagi…And are constantly being told no changing or wild colours at the dinner table.” Victor added pointedly.

“Wow…It’s er, a pleasure to meet you all.” Harry wasn’t stupid; he remembered how many people hand been at his house last night and given that he remembered someone calling him Little Light he knew it was Victor that had carried him out. It was a little embarrassing but at least he was safe now.

“Breakfast is ready to be served, Lady Milena.” This house elf was a light green colour and was wearing the same as what Bikit had on.

“What is for breakfast today, Fipel?” The Lady of the house asked.

“Today, Goren has made bowls of chopped fresh fruit, toast with assortment of jams, there is sausages, bacon, tomatoes, mushrooms all fried and breads and butter. There is coffees, teas and fresh juices also.” The house elf bowed and disappeared. Then a second later the tables was filled with everything the elf had said as well as empty plates and glasses, napkins and cutlery. As everyone decided what they wanted and started light conversations Harry turned to Victor, the man smiled at him and went back to filling his glass.

“Thank you Vic; for getting me out. It means a lot to me that you don’t believe the papers and rubbish.” Victor clapped him on the shoulder.

“Friends help each other out and don’t believe gossipy women from newspapers. Me and these four, we’ll always have your back. United we stand.” He said as he raised his fist into the air.

“Divided we fall!” The other four replied, all doing the same as Victor had.

“Boys! Not at the table.” Lady Milena said reproachfully.

Breakfast was a quiet affair after that, with the boy’s all shooting smirks and funny faces at each other while trying to not get caught by Lady Milena. Although Lord Demitri had seen them and tried not to laugh when he saw the look on Chad’s face.

^^********************************************************************^^

He had been out in the gardens with Victor and his friends. They were all showing off their close-combat fighting skills and trying to show Harry how it was done when Tessy had come out and told Harry that Mr. Snape was here to see him and in the Study.

With an encouraging look from Victor, Harry had waved to the others and let with the house elf. Now he was sat with Snape.

Harry tried not to fidget in the armchair he was sat in; Snape sat in the chair opposite him and was…looking at him. It wasn’t quite staring, it definitely wasn’t eyeing up and there didn’t seem to be any critical glances. He was just looking.


“Dumbledore had said that you sent him a letter a few weeks ago. That was before you sent me a letter. Why didn’t you tell him the extent of the damage being done? If you wanted him to take you away from them, why did you choose to leave out the violent attacks made towards you?” Snape asked in an even voice.

Harry didn’t answer straight away. He knew that if he wanted the man’s help he needed to be truthful. But it sounded so melodramatic to say you think you deserved it but…He was the Boy-Who-Lived! Every time it came down to Voldemort he was basically excused from breaking any rule along the way.

Even when he came back from supposedly just finishing the third task with a dead body and the cup in hand he was just sent off to the Dursleys as though there wasn’t an enquiry going on or most people concluding he must have done it. Surely he would have been put in Azkaban or something but no.

So when Vernon was hitting him and shouting at him he felt better sort of; because it kept the part of him that kept saying ‘I actually got away with murder…what else can I do’ from growing into a full conscious thought.

“Mr Potter, you can not seriously think you deserved to be beaten half to death.” Harry frowned and looked at the man.

“Don’t you think ‘beaten half to death’ is a bit much? And how did you know that that was what I thought?” Snape let a ghost of a smile pass his lips before he turned his head to look out the window.

“Because it was the same look I had when I had to tell Dumbledore why I did a certain thing in my youth. You do it thinking it’s better that way but when it comes to telling someone out loud why you do it, it sounds…overdramatic to say the least.”

“What did you used to do?” Harry asked and chuckled at Snape’s pointed look, “Ok, ok I get it; enough sharing. I have a few questions about the night I was taken though…would you be able to answer them?”

“I shall tell you everything from when I got your letter to when you arrived here. If you still have question I will see if they are worth answering.” At Harry’s nod he continued.

“A day after I got your letter Demitri gave me a fire call. He tells me that you sent him one and asks what I’m going to do. Since I knew if he were really going to ignore the letter he wouldn’t have bothered calling me I knew I had to help him lest you be truly missing from our world. Victor wanted to be there to get you out and already had half a plan formed with him getting four of his trusted friends involved. I told them how to open the concealing coded spell that would reveal the netting of wards on you house. After that it was up to them, although I am told that none of your belongings were brought with you save for a photo album found under an open floorboard and a tin box you were clutching. I couldn’t be there with them because Dumbledore would have picked up on me not being in the castle. I’m here today and tomorrow because the headmaster believes I’m chasing leads of where you could be since I’m the spy. So any other questions?”

Harry processed all that information. So Dumbledore thinks he was probably taken by death eater. Snape did help him, a little at least. He didn’t have any of his things save for the his photo album Hagrid had given him, the key to his vault (always kept inside a secret pocket of the photo album) and his tin box.

“Did my clothes get left behind? Because these aren’t mine but the house elf said I had to put them on because proper people don’t go down to breakfast in their night clothes.” Snape thought on it for a moment before shaking his head and smiling slightly.

“Lady Milena was told of your home life and wanted you here even more the Victor did. When her son told her that you usually wore your cousin’s hand-me-downs she visited her friend Gustav, he’s a fashion designer and you can only buy his clothes directly from him if he deems you worthy of wearing them and got you a new wardrobe full of clothes.”

“Wait how many people know about my ‘situation’? I mean come on don’t I get any privacy?”

“Harry, we need these people to know what’s going on so they can help us help you.” Severus frowned at Harry who was smirking at him.

“You just called me Harry. I knew you could say it. That didn’t hurt did it?” The only sign that Severus was in the least bit flustered was the way he moved up to straighten his posture in the chair.

“Potter. I said Potter. Any way that is of no importance! What is, is what do you wish me to tell Dumbledore? I will need to tell him weather I know where you are or not. Do you want him to know?”

“No,” Was Harry’s immediate response, “I don’t care if this was all for my own good and better in the long run. There were plenty of options he could have used and he didn’t. I didn’t mind at first; thinking that if I truly needed him he would be there. But he never was. As much as I hate to admit it you’ve been there for me for the more dangerous stuff.”

“I assure you that, although I am a Slytherin I don’t plan on ‘being there for you, you just seem to bloody fall into danger around me.”

“Hey, you’re the one who came after me in third year!”

“I wanted the pleasure of hexing that mongrel before he was found to not be a threat!”

“What about when the troll was in the bathrooms? You didn’t have to be there, you could have just stayed with the group of teachers getting the kids to their dorms?!”

“I’m one of the only bloody Professors there that is competent in battle!”

“What about on the Quidditch pitch?! You were the one doing the counter curse to Quirrell's…what ever he was trying to do!”

“I didn’t bloody want my house getting the blame for his stupidity. Look why do you want me to admit to helping you anyway?!” Harry blushed slightly and feigned relaxing in the chair he was in.

“I-I don’t. It would actually be disturbing if you wanted to help me so much yet torture me so much in class.” Snape smirked at having stopped Harry’s assessment of his behaviour.

“Look…Yes I did help you and…look out for you.” Snape tried not to sneer at the implied niceness of him. “But only because of you mother. She was a nice upstanding student and she would not want her only son gallivanting round the school in such dangerous times.” He added quickly.

Harry watched the potions professor out of the corner of his eye and saw Snape doing the same thing

“So…Are we good? You know, truces?” Snape rose a fine brow.

“I suppose we should be. You mother would hit me rather hard if I didn’t at least try to get along with you.” Harry smiled and chuckled at him.

“But no hugging and tell secrets crap. I just don’t think I’m cut out for that.” Harry laugh out right at the thought of him and Snape having a girlie night in braiding each others hair and swapping secret.

They got up and walked out to meet the others out by the fountain in the west gardens, Snape clipping Harry round the head with a smile as the boy still giggled when they got to the large doors.

They parted ways as Snape went to join the Lord and Lady on the veranda that looked down onto the gardens where the boys were still, this time the dogs had joined them.

As Harry got closer to the group the dogs started to notice and began charging at him. He let out a cry as he was tackled to the floor and slobbered on from at least four dogs.

“Cara! Blake! Feya! Adele! Get off him, you big donkeys!” Victor ordered as he ran over to help Harry up, trying not to laugh.

As Victor grabbed his hand to pull him up, Harry instantly noticed that the hand was warm on his. That the hold was strong put gentle. He felt a spark run through him that died out just before it reached his brain and looked into Victor’s eyes to see if he had recognised it. But the man was just smiling warmly at him.

Harry looked around when the dogs began to bark for attention and that was when he realised he was still holding Victors hand. He blushed slightly and was about to remove his hand when Victor was tackled by Chad and Zack, soon a dog pile had evolved that actually included the dogs. Harry started to laugh as he heard Victor complaining that they were all getting too fat, that he needed this new thing called air to breath and decided he was better of just were he was and didn’t join the pile up.

When the others noticed he was laughing at them they all gave out a battle cry and raced after him as he took off down the hill.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Well that’s another chapter! Don’t forget to tell me what you think, I do so love reviews!!