Ashes of Armageddon

The following morning, Severus woke up feeling oddly comfortable and warm – a great deal more so than he should have, given the fact that he had fallen asleep on the ground, his body in an unnatural position, with his head resting on Harry\'s chest.



He shifted slightly, to discover that a thick, warm blanket was underneath him, a slightly thinner one was covering him, and a large pillow had been placed under his head – and he hadn\'t woken through any of that. Harry must have used charms to silence and mask his movements while making him comfortable, Severus realized, and felt an instant jolt of resentment at having his body manipulated without his awareness in his sleep, even if the manipulation had been benign. He was about to say something spiteful, but Harry was sitting across from him, staring at him affectionately, and Severus suppressed his irritation, not sure he could pick a fight and win it at this point.



He sat up, tossed the blanket off, reached for his shirt and put it on in absolute silence. Now that the euphoria of abrupt reconnection and acceptance had faded, he was utterly mortified at his abandonment of inhibition and self-control the night before. He really was a pitiful wretch, wasn\'t he? And then, of its own accord, a memory of Harry\'s voice, carrying Tom Riddle\'s words, echoed in his mind: You just had to wallow in sympathy and get someone to pity you and take care of you.



Severus stood up abruptly and straightened his shirt.



“What\'s wrong?” Harry asked.



“Nothing,” Severus said neutrally. “However, I\'ve spent more time here than I had originally planned. I should be getting home.”



Harry stood up as well. “Stay for breakfast?”



“I\'m not hungry.”



Harry smiled sadly. “Alright, I give up. What did I do wrong?”



“Nothing,” Severus snapped. “Set your mind at ease. Not everything in the universe revolves around you and your actions, Mr. Potter.”



“I\'m sorry if I came on too strong,” Harry said. “Look, I know I have no right to expect you to want to be near me. But by some miracle, you\'ve made it here, and I\'m not about to just let something like this slip away without a fight.”



“A fight,” Severus said sardonically, with a familiar sneer forming on his lips. “Perhaps you should attempt to confine me, then. Why don\'t we have a wizards\' duel, Mr. Potter, and see if I will blast you all the way back to King\'s Cross again?”



“That\'s not what I meant,” Harry said peacefully. “I won\'t duel you. But I warn you, I might start begging and sniveling, and that will be an extremely unattractive sight. So what do you say? Breakfast?”



“Fine,” Severus said with a small sigh. “What have you got?”



“Oatmeal and milk,” Harry said. “Do you want anything else? We could go to Brisbane, or... anywhere you like?”



“No. This will do.” He was not at all eager to be seen in public with the young man whom the wizarding world knew as his former owner. Oatmeal would do just admirably.



They walked back to Harry\'s cabin together, and Harry proceeded to cook the porridge, the old-fashioned Muggle way, half-burning it in the process.



Severus was sitting at the small kitchen table, smirking as he watched him. “Mr. Potter, I realize that you are no Potions Master, but this level of incompetency is new even for you. How on earth does one burn oatmeal?”



“I was distracted,” Harry said without a trace of apology in his voice. “Besides, I was never that good at cooking. My aunt and uncle didn\'t scream at me all those years for nothing, you know.”



Severus winced slightly at those words. “Are you blaming your deplorable upbringing on your poor cooking skills?”



Harry shrugged as he served the breakfast – the unburned portions of it. “No, my aunt and uncle were horrid in their own right. But I imagine I didn\'t make it any easier for them, either. Thinking back to it, I wasn\'t a pleasant child to raise. Just the day I got my cousin trapped in a glass case with a snake... that was spectacular. On his birthday, no less.”



“I imagine he had it coming.”



Harry smirked. “The snake certainly thought so.”



Severus looked at him thoughtfully. “Do you still speak Parseltongue, Harry?”



Harry shook his head. “Not anymore. Not since you destroyed the fragment Dust.”



They ate together in a comfortable silence. Severus lifted his eyes, to see Harry gazing at him with a sheepish smile on his face.



“I figured it out, I think,” Harry told him. “Why you were so vexed this morning. You realized I used masking and silencing charms at night. Just like I had, three and a half years ago, back at Godric\'s Hollow. You never knew when I was coming, or...”



Severus winced slightly as heat rushed to his face. “No matter,” he said quietly.



“Sorry,” Harry said. “I really didn\'t even think of that. I just wanted to make sure you were warm. And you were sound asleep, so I didn\'t want to wake you. I just did what I used to do for Ginny, or Hermione, or Ron, when we were camping out.”



“It\'s fine,” Severus said uncomfortably. “Can we change the subject, please?”



“Sorry,” Harry said again.



An awkward pause followed. Severus drank the milk, and watched Harry, while Harry was stabbing his porridge viciously with the spoon.



“Harry,” Severus said softly. “The battle is over. I think you\'ve defeated the oatmeal. You can eat now.”



“Right, then,” Harry said with a faint smile. “So... tell me about Remusin.”



“What about it?” Severus snapped, not at all pleased by the reminder of his dubious scientific triumph, that was marred by a series of setbacks in actually producing the potion.



“What does it require that\'s so difficult to obtain?”



“Cockatrice venom,” Severus muttered reluctantly. “That species is difficult to raise, impossible to make breed in captivity, and they are nearly extinct at this point.”



“The half-rooster, half-viper creatures? The ones that petrify you like the Basilisk? How could they have become extinct? What happened?”



“The war happened, Harry,” Severus said unhappily. “The cockatrice are very sensitive to magic. They will not breed and lay eggs when it is unsafe for the young. Additionally, they are very resilient. They resist being stunned, and most binding spells just roll off them.”



Harry was looking at him with absolute confusion. “How would that endanger them further?”



“Because certain elements of the Dark decided it would be just lovely to use them as guard animals,” Severus said unhappily. “If you have a secret compound or structure you need to protect, without erecting high-energy shielding that can be detected by outside forces, your best bet is to have some sort of natural barrier surrounding the area, and the guard animals posted at the entrance. And the animals that can petrify intruders simply by looking at them are very highly prized.”



Harry nodded thoughtfully. “How many of the Cockatrice are still around?”



“Well... thirty years ago, there were plenty, but at this point.. It is unknown how many are still left in the wild. Probably not that many, and they are extremely reclusive, not that I can blame them. The few animals currently in our keep have been too damaged and enraged to be able to breed. In fact, they barely respond to human contact.”



“Hmm,” Harry murmured. “What if you were to bring them to... someplace like this? I mean... the island is certainly large enough for two groups of animals. Hypothetically speaking, we could erect shielding between the habitation of the Hyppogriffs and the area we set up for the Cockatrice. And ...”



“Remember what I told you?” Severus interrupted. “They will not breed in captivity. They are sensitive to magic. They will see a magical barrier and interpret the place as a new prison.”



Harry stopped eating, and rested his chin on his hands, deep in thought.



“No barriers then,” he said finally. “Here\'s the plan. You\'ll develop a vaccine, for us and the Hyppogriffs. And then, we will bring the Cockatrice to the island, and we\'ll all just... learn to get along. It might take a few years, but eventually the Cockatrice will feel comfortable to breed.”



Severus stared at him with a mixture of pity and disdain. “I think you\'ve gone mad from loneliness. You need to get out more.”



“I\'m serious,” Harry said. “What\'s the worst that could happen?”



“They could claw your eyes out, to start,” Severus said humorlessly. “And bite off your fingers. That is, if they are only moderately upset.”



Harry shrugged, unconcerned. “They won\'t,” he said confidently. “I\'ll take good care of them, I promise. Come on, it\'s a brilliant idea! Let\'s do it.”



“Is this all a joke to you?” Severus snapped. “Or haven\'t you been listening, as usual? I\'ve told you how damaged they are. They will bite you and claw you. They will pick a fight with every single one of your Hyppogriffs, and give them a run for their money. And if you try to restrain them, or contain them, you may as well give up on the idea – it will only make them more furious.” Harry was nodding to his words, and Severus calmed down a bit and concluded with a wry smile: “What can I say, Mr. Potter. Some species do not do well in captivity. You confine them, and they do not frolic or breed. All they do is pick fights and spew venom, all day long.”



Harry smiled mischievously. “I love them already. So – how soon can you have the vaccine developed?”



Severus was just about to say that no vaccine was possible against petrification, but his mind was already working, running over the possibilities, and a few minutes he sighed resignedly. “I\'ll require powdered basilisk fang, weasel skin, toad eyes, crushed Horned Cockerel beaks, and some other ingredients that I will not mention over breakfast. I\'ll need a couple of months.”



Across the table from him, Harry smiled again. “Betcha you could do it in two weeks.”



Severus stared at him, unable to conceal his surprise.



“Harry... why do you want to do something like this?” Severus asked. “It will complicate your life needlessly.”



“I want to give you reasons to visit,” Harry said seriously. “Besides, it doesn\'t sound all that complicated. How hard could it be to get along with a brood of ferocious, venomous, clawing, biting animals?”



Severus found himself smirking slightly. “Well, you\'ve welcomed me in. I suppose a few dozen more of the same kind won\'t make that much of a difference.”



“I suppose not,” Harry agreed softly. “Please, forgive me? For...”



“Done,” Severus said curtly, and stood up. “Thank you for the breakfast. I\'ll be in touch.”



“Will you visit again soon?”



“We shall see.” Severus walked towards the fireplace, to take a handful of Floo powder. “By the way,” he said snidely, “The proper term is clutch, not brood. Clutch of Cockatrice.”



“I knew that,” Harry said defensively.



“Then I trust you will remember to use proper terminology, when you are writing your proposal to the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, requesting to relocate the beasts to your little island,” Severus said dryly.



Harry sighed. “The Ministry of Magic... They\'ll wrap me in yards of red tape, won\'t they?” he asked.



“Miles of it,” Severus said solemnly, before departing. “Good luck with that, Mr. Potter.”



... To Be Continued...