Ashes of Armageddon

Empty Spaces



The game went on for a long time, with both of them completely absorbed by it, until Harry finally almost managed to bring it to a draw. When Severus checkmated him at the last moment, Harry swore under his breath.



“You are getting better,” Severus said soothingly.



“Don\'t patronize me,” Harry muttered. “This just makes the defeat more sour.”



“If you don\'t want to be patronized, perhaps you should stop doing the same,” Severus said evenly. “You enjoy losing to me too much to make your displeasure believable.”



Harry smiled sheepishly. “Is it this obvious?”



“Actually, yes.”



“I suppose that\'s true,” Harry said softly. “I like to be reminded...”



Severus arched an eyebrow and stared at him.



“... that I am with someone who can win against me,” Harry said very quietly. “I could never be with anyone else. I hope you know that.”



Severus smiled sadly. “I suppose I should apologize, Harry,” he said reluctantly. “For leaving like that, without speaking to you.”



“You don\'t need to apologize to me,” Harry protested. “We are together now. That\'s all that counts.”



“No,” Severus shook his head. “What I did was wrong. Unfair to you, unfair to both of us.” He shuddered inwardly as the delayed dread at nearly losing his lover gripped him. “I know that you love me, and I should have had more faith in you. I am sorry.”



Harry smiled slightly. “Do you know why you did it?” he asked quietly.



“No,” Severus admitted with embarrassment. “It made sense when I did it, but truthfully, at the end of the day, I don\'t know.”



Harry nodded. “You\'ll figure it out,” he said.

---

That evening, Hermione dropped by, bringing Hugo and Al along. Severus made a hasty retreat into his lab, leaving Harry to entertain the guests. A few minutes later Hermione\'s brisk knock was heard on the door. “Will you open the door, or should I get Hugo to cast Alohomora for me?” she demanded



Severus snorted. “The door is not locked. Enter.”



She did, and surveyed his lab with a wry grin. “I see you are packing up,” she mused when her eyes stopped on the box filled with carefully wrapped potions ingredients. “You\'ve decided then...”



“Yes. Al can stay here, when he is ready,” Severus confirmed. “I\'ve wanted to get rid of the lab for a while, anyway. I don\'t like bringing work home.”



She grinned and sat down on one of the packing crates. “You might come to miss it,” she pointed out. “Harry doesn\'t really understand it, but I know what it\'s like to wake up in the middle of the night with an idea that just needs to be tested out immediately...”



Severus found his lips twitching into a wry smirk. “Is this how the Renalert potion was born?”



“As a matter of fact, yes,” she said.



“Remusin, too,” Severus mused. “Three years ago, I have been trying to wean myself off the dreamless sleep. I dreamed of full moon... and a creature stalking in the dark. I tried to see what it was, but it kept shifting out of sight. I woke up right away and thought, Demiguise saliva! The idea was preposterous, but ...”



“Best ideas usually are,” Hermione agreed with a mischievous twinkle in her eye. “The worst ideas, too,” she added giving him a single stern look.



“I really don\'t care about the lab at this point,” he protested.



“And I\'m not talking about the lab.”



“Hm. I thought so,” he muttered grudgingly, and paused uncomfortably under her intense gaze. “I really don\'t have much to say,” Severus admitted. “And the simple, stupid truth of the matter is that I don\'t know why... I have no idea why I just left. I honestly don\'t know what has gotten into m...e why I would be so quick to give up on everything that ever went right with my life, and throw it all away.”



“It\'s not that complicated,” Hermione murmured with unusual sadness.



“I have a feeling you are about to enlighten me,” Severus said dryly.



“It\'s easy to give up on life, when you don\'t grieve what you\'ve lost,” Hermione said quietly. “That\'s one thing I\'ve noticed about you over the last four and a half years. You don\'t grieve.”



“Hmm,” Severus repeated absently, struggling to grasp the meaning of Hermione\'s words. “I am afraid I don\'t follow you.”



“You grieve for others, I know that,” Hermione said. “Those who had died in the war; but I don\'t think you\'ve ever grieved for yourself.”



“I have wallowed in misery for almost four years, on and off,” Severus pointed out. “I think that\'s more than enough, don\'t you?”



“Not like that,” Hermione denied. “You\'ve tried to protect yourself, to minimize the emotional impact of what had happened, and you\'ve agonized over and over again whether you were going to be good enough for Harry. But I don\'t think you\'ve ever fully acknowledged in your own mind the full horror of what had happened to you, of what was done to you, and taken the time to grieve it.”



“I still don\'t understand,” Severus said, feeling like he somehow had lost track of the odd conversation even further. “I haven\'t died. What\'s there to grieve?”



“Plenty,” Hermione whispered, without looking up at him. “Doing a thankless job, year after year, without anyone knowing. Losing five years of your life after the war. Loving unrequitedly. Giving something, day after day, and getting nothing back except for violence and rejection. Being asked to cast the Killing Curse on someone, to save his soul at the cost of your own.” Her eyes finally rose to meet his gaze, and she shook her head. “Those aren\'t just obstacles, or challenges of life. They are losses. Losses to be mourned, not just endured.”



“Hmm.” Severus shut his eyes, and for what seemed like an eternity, sat in absolute silence, listening to the sounds of voices downstairs, Harry\'s, Hugo\'s and Al\'s.



“You know I am right,” Hermione said with her usual quiet insistence.



“I don\'t know that at all,” Severus denied with all the spite he could muster . “It sounds like nothing but the usual Gryffindor self-indulgence.”



Hermione\'s smile was very faint and rueful. “I knew you were going to say that.”

---

It was late in the evening, and Hermione stopped by the lab to say goodbyes for the night. The lab was fully packed, the shelves and desks looking bare and stark, for the first time in over a decade.



She grinned. “Must be unusual to see so many clear surfaces and empty spaces.”



He offered a genuine smile this time. “Unusual, but not unwelcome.”



He hadn\'t realized how much stark, yet welcoming beauty clear surfaces could hold. They spoke of infinite possibilities, as empty space opened up a way for something new. He smirked under his breath, scolding himself for the sentimentality, even if it remained unvoiced.



“You shouldn\'t give up on your lab altogether,” Hermione said matter-of-factly. “In fact, I think you should move it to Harry\'s island.”



“It makes sense,” he agreed. “I don\'t really need a lab here, but when I am back there, far away from St. Mungo\'s... yes, I believe I will do just that.”



“That\'s good,” she said.



“Well, good night,” he said. “I\'ll send Harry over first thing tomorrow morning...”



She took his hand in hers, and he half-resisted, half-welcomed her touch, as was always his habit, even four and a half years into their friendship. He wondered briefly if that would always be the case, even decades from now, if he would always mistrust and attempt to refuse that initial moment of affection and kindness.



“What are you afraid of?” she asked.



Feeling too tired for the games of evasion, he didn\'t ask what she meant by that. “What you said. Grief,” he said wearily. “It sounds too dangerous. There is too much rage, too much anger, too much mindless fury buried underneath. I suppose,” Severus admitted absently, “I am afraid, that if I were to start, I wouldn\'t know how to stop.”



“You don\'t need to know how to stop,” Hermione said softly. “Grief and anger will run their course, and exhaust themselves.”



“And you know this how?” Severus demanded bitterly.



“I know this, because we\'ve watched Harry,” Hermione explained, as a brief shadow of guilt crossed her face. “If he hadn\'t found a way to grieve and mourn the lost years of his life, and what he\'d been forced to become, he\'d still be cutting himself up, or embarking on suicide missions for the greater good, or finding other spectacular ways to throw away his life.”



Severus nodded mutely, and then she was gone.

---

“You need to leave. Now.”



It was late already and Harry was half-asleep on the couch, hugging the volume of Les Miserables to his chest. His eyes opened wide when Severus spoke to him, and for a few minutes, Harry just stared at him blankly.



“Why?” Harry demanded, studying his face intently.



“I need space.”



“I won\'t crowd you,” Harry protested. “I\'ll sleep on the couch.”



“I need time.”



“Time for what?”



“None of your business.”



Harry shook his head. “You keep sweet-talking me like that, we\'ll be married before the new year comes.”



Severus sighed deeply, realizing he was beginning to lose the verbal battle. “I\'m not in a good frame of mind for company right now,” he said, managing to force his voice into a somewhat neutral tone.



Harry sat up abruptly, and stared at him. “You are angry,” he muttered. “About something recent, or...”



“Or,” Severus snapped, as if it were a complete answer. “Get out.”



Harry swallowed hard, staring back at him grimly. “Are you angry with me? Do you want to hurt me? Punish me?”



“No,” Severus said quietly. “I don\'t. But given my state of mind right now, I might hurt you regardless.”



Harry sat up abruptly and stretched his hand out. “Then hurt me,” he said. “I don\'t mind.”



“I mind,” Severus snapped, ignoring Harry\'s hand.



“Don\'t,” Harry said softly. “Let it be. Let\'s be together. I won\'t disappear on you if you hurt me or scare me. In time, it will pass.”



“There is no reason for you to remain with me,” Severus said insistently. “You can\'t make it better for me.”



“No,” Harry agreed. “I know that I can\'t. All I can do is be here.”



“Arrogant child,” Severus spat, slamming the door as he went upstairs.

---

Over the next few days, Severus lost track of how many fights he had picked with Harry, how many times he threatened to eject him from Spinner\'s End, and how many shouting matches they had engaged in. In spite of his many threats, Severus never raised his wand against Harry in order to remove him from his home. He tried not to dwell to much on why – unwilling to admit that in spite of all of his denials, he really wanted Harry to stay.



Still it was not the most auspicious way to herald in the New Year. They may have spent the eve of it screaming at each other, and sleeping apart, both exhausted and drained, but Severus was no longer certain. Still, in spite of the rage and the fury that were gripping him, there was a kind of strange satisfaction to see Harry there, day after day, slightly more worn out and tired each day, but without any willingness to concede defeat and leave.



For the life of him, Severus could not even tell what he was angry about, exactly. It wasn\'t any specific thing, any particular event that evoked anger. More like a lifetime of events, a string of things that had gone wrong, without a hope in hell of fixing them, of turning back the clock.



Harry appeared to have become a permanent fixture in Severus\' household, unobtrusive but ever-present. He refused to go out at all, perhaps correctly suspecting that, had he left even briefly, he might find the doors warded and the Floo blocked when he was ready to return. Harry firecalled Hermione\'s place several times a day to speak to Al, and Severus made certain he stayed out of Al\'s sight.



When left to himself, Harry continued to sit in absolute silence. He made no attempts to talk Severus out of his distress. He made no promises, offered no reassurances. Harry just... waited, remaining nearby, appearing to be fully intent on simply riding out the storm, instead of fighting it. Sometimes, late at night, worn out by lack of sleep, Severus wondered if his mind was playing tricks on him, and if Harry was simply a figment of his own imagination.

---

“Hi,” Harry whispered from the couch when Severus entered the sitting room.



Severus nodded to him, and sat on the opposing end of the couch, avoiding contact.



“How are you doing?” Harry asked.



“I don\'t know anymore,” Severus said tiredly, as exhaustion began to claim him. “It\'s pointless, you know. All of it. Me raging. You being here.”



“No,” Harry said with his usual infuriating Gryffindor confidence. “It\'s not pointless. It will pass.”



“You don\'t understand,” Severus said bitterly. “You mean well, but you do not understand. You never have, and you never will. It will not pass.” He glared at Harry with absolute fury. “You really think that anything that happened to me at Godric\'s Hollow matters? It doesn\'t. What matters is that I am not my own man, and I will never be. No matter what, I will always remain...” He bit his tongue to suppress the spiteful word that nearly fell off his lips of its own accord, but Harry heard what was unsaid, and supplied the unspoken word on his own,



“Mine. You will remain mine.”



“Yes. Yours,” Severus confirmed with loathing. “But not by choice. By accident of fate. Through a foolish mistake I made years ago, out of guilt, out of misguided fear. I should have never sold my soul to Albus in exchange for his dubious protection. I should have continued to muddle along on my own. I would have made it,” Severus said angrily. “I would have made it. Now... I can never be free of it.”



“Don\'t you see?” Harry said softly. “You\'ve made a mistake, yes, but when you are with me, the mistakes of the past don\'t matter. You will always be free with me.”



“Lies,” Severus hissed. “Empty promises. I cannot tell you how tired I\'ve become of them over the years.”



“I keep my promises,” Harry shot back at him furiously.



Severus shrugged. “I suppose you do. And, I admit that I have no right to be disappointed that you had broken one Covenant promise, after I have broken every single one of mine.”



Harry looked at him with a strange smile. “What do you mean?”



“You\'ve tracked me down,” Severus spat, lifting a finger to his own forehead. “You used the tracking spells embedded in my slave-brand to find me. Words of freedom mean little, when there\'s a magical connection in place, available for your use at any time. In time, you will do something like that again, when you decide the end justifies the means.”



“I won\'t,” Harry insisted. “I will never use those tracking spells, unless you allow it. I won\'t. I haven\'t.”



Severus stared at him blankly. “You haven\'t?” he asked.



Harry shook his head. “No. I promised I wouldn\'t, didn\'t I? If I had used those tracking spells, I would have gotten to you much sooner.”



“I had wondered about that,” Severus confessed. “I assumed you were simply agonizing over whether or not to keep your promise, or do the logical thing.”



“I wasn\'t agonizing,” Harry said spitefully. “Hermione and Ron both wanted me to use the tracking spells, but I said no. So... we found another way. It took the two of them over an hour to reconfigure your port-key, reversing the direction to take us back to the compound.”



“Oh,” Severus muttered, taken aback by Harry\'s explanation. “You ...”



“Hermione and Ron nearly killed me, by the way,” Harry said. “I have never been screamed at quite so much.” Harry\'s eyes flashed dark green fire in Severus\' direction. “We could have been too late, you know. You could have died because I kept my promise to you.”



Severus stared at him speechlessly. Harry\'s face was frozen into a fierce, furious mask.



“You would have let me die, rather than lay a claim on a part of my slave-bond,” Severus murmured.



“Yes,” Harry confirmed.



“Why?”



“Because there are worse things than being dead,” Harry said in a barely audible voice. “Like having parts of you claimed and used by others, for whatever reasons. Seeing yourself disappear, and not being able to stop it. Seeing more and more of your life slip through your fingers, as someone else makes choices for you and pulls your strings. I wouldn\'t do that to you,” Harry said softly, “because I know what it\'s like.”



“You do, don\'t you,” Severus murmured, and shifted closer to him.



Harry stretched his hand out, and Severus did the same. Their fingers touched, and having rediscovered each other, locked together in a furious, desperate grip. Something changed forever with that contact, as if the last and final invisible wall separating the two of them finally shattered and vanished.



A moment later, he knew beyond a shadow of doubt that the man he was holding in his arms was more than a kind, well-meaning lover, more than a loyal friend, more than flesh and blood. The man was like him, the man knew him, and understood him, the way only someone who had nearly lost his own soul could.



“I am sorry,” Severus whispered in his ear. “I have put you through hell, haven\'t I?”



“Nah,” Harry denied with a brief, nervous laugh. “It\'s fine, really.”



Severus snorted. “You never know, you might have even missed me if I had died.”



“Not for long,” Harry said softly. “If you had gone back to King\'s Cross, I wouldn\'t have been too far behind.”



“That\'s foolish talk,” Severus admonished him, unnerved by Harry\'s calm tone of voice. .



“Not really,” Harry said, and his green eyes twinkled remorselessly. “Remember my own Unbreakable Vow? It binds me to protect your life. If I had failed to do all I could, and if you had died, we would have gone into the afterlife together.”



Severus shuddered. “I really hadn\'t thought this one through,” he admitted reluctantly.



Harry chuckled wearily. “Well, you must be really tired to actually admit to it.” He yawned and stretched. “I am tired, too. It\'s three in the morning. I want to get some sleep, and visit Al tomorrow. What do you want?”



“The same.”



Harry shifted slightly to stretch himself on the couch. “I imagine you still need space,” he muttered.



“Yes,” Severus agreed, and reached for Harry\'s arm, to prompt him to get off the couch and follow him to the bedroom. “Space. With you in it.”



To Be Concluded...

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Almost finished, yes we are! Only the epilogue left.

So let me know what you think.

Thank you all who\'ve read and reviewed.