Help Wanted: God and Executioner

Title: Help Wanted: God and Executioner (1/6)
Pairing: Snape/Harry
Disclaimer: No money is being made from this endeavor.
Rating: R
Summary: Three years into the war, Harry is trying to hold on to his sanity and his humanity, not necessarily in that order.
Author\'s Notes: Dark fic, much darker than I usually write.
Beta: No format beta for Chapter 1, but lots of help from my flist. Waves!
Disclaimer: I am not making any money off of this story. I am only writing for pleasure, not profit.


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Harry was late, as usual; he assumed that Snape was on time, as usual.

Although accustomed to Dumbledore\'s obsessive desire to complete circles of events, Harry groaned in frustration and irritation when he discovered that the location of his meeting with Snape was the shack where Harry met Hagrid and learned that he was a wizard. He should have known something was up when Hermione whispered the coordinates into his ear and simultaneously handed him a mac.

The room hadn\'t changed one iota in ten years. Rank from salt, sea, and mold, the windows rattled non-stop from the rain and wind pounding against them. The only thing keeping it from being colder than a Siberian steppe was a fire so enormous that the fireplace could barely contain it.

Snape transfigured that lumpy, damp sofa of Harry\'s memory into what looked like a damn comfortable leather chair. Typical. Only one chair. Couldn\'t even bring himself to make it a sofa so that the two of them could have a seat in front of the fire. Bastard. What in the fuck was Dumbledore thinking, insisting on Harry being Snape\'s point man? Every time Harry would suggest that perhaps someone else might be a better choice, i.e., someone whom Snape didn\'t loath with a passion approaching an art form, Dumbledore would smile, offer him a lemon drop, and then shut him up with a few words about how this seemed to be working out just fine, that despite the animosity between the two of them, Harry\'s reports from Snape were always concise and lost nothing in the telling. Harry half-heartedly considered fucking up a report, but knew the outcome would most likely be someone would get hexed or die from his selfishness. But still, he always came away from these meetings with a fierce headache, mostly from containing himself from hexing Snape into the next century. By the end of every meeting, Snape would have thoroughly humiliated or enraged him, often simultaneously. Double your pleasure, double your fun.

\"Did you know that Tom Riddle was first in his class in Potions, Potter. A score that stood until Miss Granger graduated.\"

\"Potter, this is NOT a Quidditch match. Your performance in that last battle...words fail me. You must think offensively, not defensively. This is war. Do I need to remind you that we are fighting for our lives here?\"

Insult after insult. He was never fast enough, never ruthless enough. Harry would hex rather than curse, disarm rather than kill. The cells of Azkaban filled up with Death Eaters who\'d fallen victim to his wand, but whom he couldn\'t bring himself to curse.

They\'d fallen into a type of no-man\'s land. He was no longer a student, but he sure the hell wasn\'t an equal. Snape treated him with a mixture of the familiar scorn he\'d heaped on him in his potions class and a begrudging acknowledgment of Harry\'s considerable strength as a wizard and a soldier. Not that Snape ever complimented him outright; it was always a backhanded compliment at best.

A curtain of hair hid Snape\'s face, but he could see Snape\'s thin fingers curled around a crystal tumbler filled with something that was dead on the color of fine Scotch.

As usual, he didn\'t bother to acknowledge Harry with a glance, but greeted him in standard Snape. Verbal scorn. Speaking into the direction of the fire, he snapped, \"You are late. Again. Your inexplicable lack of manners at all times may be acceptable to everyone else, but not to me. In future, do me the courtesy of appearing on time.\"

At some point, they would tire of hurling insults back and forth at each other and get down to business. Some nights took longer than others. Perhaps this was one of them.

\"People are dying around us in droves, and you\'re lecturing me on points of etiquette.\" Harry threw his mac next to Snape and transfigured it into what he hoped was an equally comfortable chair. \"What next? When performing Unforgivable curses on your enemies, make sure that you ask for their permission before ex-sanguining and then disintegrating them so that their bodies will never be found and their loved ones cannot mourn them properly.\" Harry collapsed into the chair and closed his eyes. He was so tired even his eyelashes hurt.

\"I don\'t know why I bother, but I will say this yet again. Sometimes it is the smallest things that allow us to retain our humanity in times like these. You would do well to remember that, Potter.\"

\"I refuse to speak to you when you use my last name like that. Not only do you say it in such a way that it\'s synonymous with \'piece of shit,\' but it also makes me feel like I\'m twelve-years old and in your fucking nightmare of a potions class. A memory lane I\'d rather not stroll down. Would prefer to be pulled apart by thestrals, frankly. Severus,\" Harry added for good measure, just to stick it up Snape\'s arse. Harry never thought of him as anything but Snape, but relished the certainty that whenever Harry used his first name like that, it irritated Snape six ways to Sunday. Harry half braced himself for a silencing hex.

\"Language, Potter. Act as an adult and you will be treated as one.\"

With the tacit understanding that his reply would be an exhausted, \"fuck-off,\" Harry didn\'t even bother to say it. Several minutes passed before Harry muttered over the hiss and crackle of the fire, \"Why do we do this? Argue. Goad each other.\"

\"Sometimes it is the smallest things that allow us to retain our humanity in times like these.\"

Harry smiled. He didn\'t need to open his eyes to know Snape wasn\'t smiling, but cutting irony was a close to a smile as Snape got these days.

Suddenly, the sharp, beveled edges of a cut glass tumbler nipped at his hand. His seeker reflexes quickly grasped the circumference of the glass while he inhaled that lovely smoky aroma of fine Scotch. The muscles in his neck relaxed just a fraction in anticipation of the pleasant drunk that was sure to follow.

\"Tell me, do you know why we\'re meeting here in this hellhole? I doubt this place has seen sunshine for millions of years.\" Harry took a sip. Christ, where did Snape get this stuff? His estimation of Snape\'s taste in liquor went up exponentially.

\"I imagine it might have something to do with you, Hagrid, and the date. To Hagrid,\" Snape murmured with far more respect in his voice than he\'d ever given Hagrid when he was alive

The muscles in his neck coiled tight again. Fuck. How could he have forgotten? Certainly explains why everyone was tiptoeing around him today. Asking him if he\'d eaten, if he\'d slept last night. Seemed like routine overbearing smothering. He should have known something was up when Molly made all his favorite foods for breakfast. He downed the entire glass and held it out for a refill. The whoosh of a wand slicing through the air and the glass was once again heavy in his hand.

\"That\'s your allotment for the night. Savor it,\" Snape ordered.

Harry\'s eyes open for the first time since he\'d flopped down in the chair. \"I miss him,\" Harry whispered, not sure he wanted Snape to hear him or not.

Snape raised his glass again, took a healthy swig, and swung around to face Harry.

\"Shall we go over the list of the dead, first?\"

\"I said,\" Harry found himself gripping his glass so tightly that the sharp edges of the bevel bit into his hand. \"I miss him.\"

\"Yes,\" Snape murmured. \"I heard you. We\'ve much ground to cover. First, the dead, then there are new strategies for the North Fens that will take some time to explain, not withstanding your preternatural ability to understand anything even remotely resembling a game. Your affinity for Quidditch, I expect. Now...\"

\"Yes, I heard you,\" Harry mimicked. \"We\'ve mourned Hagrid for the requisite three seconds and now let\'s \'cover\' that ground you\'re chomping at the bit about,\" hissed Harry, who stood up and began pacing back and forth in front of the fireplace; the Scotch slipped over the glass and wetted his hand. \"Let\'s rub our hands together in glee while we plot to wipe out as many Death Eaters as possible in the next two weeks.\"

\"The appropriate way to mourn his death is to do our damnedest to ensure that others do not join him,\" Snape hissed back.

Harry stopped pacing and brought the glass up to his cheek. Rolling the curve of the glass against his cheek, he looked at Snape. \"I\'m so tired.\"

Snape nodded. \"We\'re all tired, Potter. I believe that Granger\'s spectacular wand work brought down three minor Bulstrodes, Weasley\'s adept use of a freezing hex captured Sybil Parkinson, and you stupefied McNair and Lestrange, but Lestrange got away due to some rather fancy wand action by his wife. Am I correct?\"

\"Yes, McNair is in a lovely dank cell in Azkaban right next to Crabbe, Senior. I think I winged Bellatrix.\"

\"Hmmmm,\" Snape agreed. \"She\'s hurt but not down. She was able to apparate before you did her any lasting damage.\"

\"On your side, Crabbe killed Dean Thomas, Malfoy Senior hexed Remus so badly that he\'ll be out of commission for weeks, and Hermione in her effort to bring down all three Bulstrodes ended up getting a nasty acid burn on her arms and three broken ribs. She\'ll be out for a couple of weeks...\"

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\"You missed our last meeting.\"

If being late elicited a ten-minute dressing down, what did completely turfing Snape at their meeting two weeks ago merit? Braced for a firestorm of vitriol, fury, and scorn, the typical battery of verbal weapons at Snape\'s disposal, he was completely undone by Snape handing him a glass of Scotch, followed by a banal, \"Sit.\"

They hadn\'t bothered to un-transfigure the chairs. There was only one season on this rock. The cold and rainy season.

\"I\'m sorry I didn\'t send word. After that last battle...I couldn\'t come.\" He left it at that. It was true. He\'d been throwing up non-stop for five days and could barely crawl to the toilet. Forget apparating to some god-forsaken rock in the middle of the North Sea.

They sat there drinking in silence. Snape filled his glass from time to time, the shush of the fire and the rain beating against the windows the only sounds in the room for a couple of hours.

All of a sudden, Harry downed his drink with a shudder and a shiver. First the chill and then the delicious warmth of the booze licked his bones. He realized with a clarity he didn\'t often have these days that he could very easily become a drinker. The kind of drinker that needs it first thing in the morning. It wouldn\'t take much.

\"Why him?\"

Snape ignored the question. He stood up, stretched, and transfigured his cape into a heavy blanket and his chair into bed. Despite the fact the bed was narrow, the room was so small and pokey that the bed half filled the room. Snape secreted his wand up his sleeve and turned back to face Harry. In the last year, Snape had gone completely gray. The infamous greasy, black hanks of hair that had been the butt of many a joke were no more.

\"Your hair. It\'s gone completely gray,\" Harry said with wonder.

His shoulders slumped, the stiff, unyielding posture somewhat turned in on itself for once, Snape looked every second of his forty-five years.

\"Your powers of observation render me speechless, Potter. Any other earth-shattering comments you care to make regarding my person before I turn out the lights?\"

Harry rolled his eyes. \"I just wondered why. Seemed to have happened overnight.\" He put a hand up to his own hair in a self-conscious gesture.

\"Your fixation on your own, granted, hellish reality has blinded you to the unique horrors that each of us face as this war grinds on in its seemingly incessant slaughter. In my case, imagine being forced to choose between killing or being killed by your former students. I was their Head of House. Four years ago my duty was to guide them, keep them safe. Now I spend every waking second of my life engineering schemes that will ensure that they will either die or be captured so that they may spend the rest of their sorry lives rotting in a five-by-six cell in Azkaban.\"

Snape shook out the blanket so that it covered the bed, crawled under it to the far side of the mattress, and turned over, away from Harry. An exhausted voice, a voice that sounded like saying every single syllable physically hurt, said, \"I couldn\'t save both. I had to choose between Longbottom or Weasley.\"

Sweet, nice Neville. The last Longbottom, if you don\'t count those parents of his and who could.

Snape took his silence as an indictment. \"That\'s what we are, Harry: God and executioner. I\'m too exhausted to argue. I\'m going to bed. Considering the amount of Scotch I\'ve consumed this evening, any attempt to apparate would result in splinching myself over Manchester. Moody\'s insane paranoia forbids us from using the floo network, so I suggest you spend the night here as well, as you matched me drink for drink. We can discuss our business in the morning.\"

\"I need to get home.\" Harry realized he sounded petulant, but for all his bravado he didn\'t move. A part of him wanted to hurt Snape, draw blood, scar him even, while at the same time get down on his knees and thank him. For killing Neville to save Ron.

Three years into the war and the weaker wizards and witches had been killed off. Now it was down to the people who mattered. If he\'d been more honest with Snape, he\'d have confessed to the horrible bargains he made with himself every night before he went to sleep. At the next battle I promise to hex six Death Eaters. If I fail, you can have Seamus but not Hermione or Ron. If I only get five Death Eaters, then Ginny will be hurt, maybe blinded, but not killed, and Seamus still dies. He never knew who the \"you\" was. The one thing he did know was this was nonsense, even bordering on insanity, but he continued to make nonsensical bargains, more than willing to sacrifice a Neville for a Ron without batting an eyelid. Because the one thing he had learned over the past three years was that some casualties had become acceptable. Trust Snape to actually verbalize what Harry would only allow himself to think in the dead of night.

In his more bitter moments, he wondered if they could just stop all this fighting and uncertainty and lay it out in the open. War as poker. I bet you a Neville Longbottom. I\'ll see that bet and raise you a Draco Malfoy. I\'ll see your Draco Malfoy and raise you a Ron Weasley. Call.

\"Potter,\" Snape warned him, \"I am turning out the light. You may spend the night in your chair or you may share this bed. The only thing you may not do is make a single sound.\"

A Nox from Snape and the room went dark except for the light from the fire. Harry could see the faint rise and fall of the blankets as Snape breathed in and out. Harry looked at the chair. Looked at Snape. There\'d probably be enough room. These days no one cared where they slept. And to be honest, it was nice to hear someone, anyone, breathing next to you. A reminder that you weren\'t alone. He couldn\'t suppress a slight grin. The Harry Potter of three years ago would have sooner snogged Crabbe than share a bed with Snape.

Harry crawled under the blanket and lay on his side spooning Snape, positioning himself as close as possible without touching Snape in the hope that the soft in and out of Snape\'s breathing would lull him to sleep.

\"Snore and I will kill you,\" Snape murmured.

Harry doubted Snape was kidding. \"Um, about Ron. Thank you.\"

He didn\'t expect a reply back and was startled to hear a sleepy, \"God and executioner, Potter, God and executioner.\"

Harry woke the next morning in the same position he fell asleep, except that during the night he\'d moved right up against Snape\'s back, tight. Back to front, arse to groin. Not only that but his arm was coiled around Snape\'s waist, his hand threaded through Snape\'s, and, Merlin\'s balls, he had a full-blown erection throbbing against the crack of Snape\'s arse. Immediately, he scooted out of bed, hoping against hope Snape was still asleep. Snatching his robes from his chair, with the full intention of apparating home right then and there, the creak of bedsprings put an end to that desperate thought.

He looked up from under his blush.

Snape was lying on his back, eyes closed, fingers resting on his chest together as if in prayer.

\"Be grateful you still get them, Mr. Potter. In two weeks and don\'t be late.\"

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TBC

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TBC