This Fear...
Early October, 1996.
Term had finally tipped into October, some would say rather sluggishly. Everyone was getting so snowed under with midterm tests and homework, that there was scarcely any time for socializing or lounging about. Watching the Seventh-years studying for their NEWTs alone was exhausting, and as Ron had put it: ‘bloody terrifying’.
Harry actually had no clue how Hermione was managing with all of her studies when he, with Quidditch training and Moody’s weekly lessons, could barely keep up. Not to mention his latest… predicament.
And he was tired.
The same dreams and nightmares continued to persecute him, consequently scuffing his chances at sleep. These nightmares weren’t letting him live. At night, they showed up and then followed him throughout the day until a new nightmare came to haunt the following night. It was the same cycle over and over again. A vinyl stuck on loop.
And he was exhausted — mentally and physically.
No longer was sleep an opportunity to escape reality — it used to be like that when Harry had had that potion, his sweet salvation. Now, he dreaded sleep. Because he always knew beforehand the visions he’d see… Of Sirius, of Cedric, even of his parents.
That Celarium Umbras Potion Snape had given him? Gone. Harry was ashamed to admit it, but the entire flask had lasted him barely a week. And he couldn’t go and ask Snape for more — for several reasons.
Because he didn’t want to listen to the man’s spiel on how ‘foolish and irresponsible it was of him’.
Because he feared Snape would send Harry away, telling him not to waste his time and that it was his loss that he had rationed it out so poorly.
Because he didn’t want Snape to be… mad? Disappointed in him?
It was hard to pinpoint what it was exactly that was holding him back from asking Snape for more of that potion. But the bottom line was that the professor wasn’t an option.
Harry was getting desperate.
The following week showed no improvement. Ron and Hermione had actually asked him if he was alright at breakfast one day, and even Ginny and Neville had exchanged skeptical glances with one another. It had been getting even worse now that they had tipped into October and talk of Halloween had sprung up amongst the students. Harry had never celebrated Halloween, for very obvious reasons at that, and had no intention to ever. Why would he celebrate the anniversary of the day his life had changed for the worse?
The nearing occasion, as it did every year, elicited thoughts of the late Potters to surface. Harry found himself brooding over his photo album more and more often, often in a state of melancholy. His friends, particularly Ron and Hermione, had since noticed his drift in mood, but only ever exchanged concerned but knowing glances. Harry knew they knew. But they seemed reluctant to bring it up, for which Harry was eternally grateful.
It was on a Friday that Harry found himself fidgeting with his quill in Charms Class. Flitwick was going off about the disillusionment charms module they would be starting soon. The tension in the class was palpable as everyone was awaiting the last bell of the day. Everyone was spent from another week of homework and tests and just wanted to escape as quickly as possible — beside Harry, Ron had had his bag packed since ten minutes ago, the boy sitting on the edge of his seat, while Hermione, sitting at the desk in front of theirs, was furiously taking notes. Harry watched the spare quill sticking out of her hair with drooping eyes.
“...Fairly difficult to grasp material, so I’d suggest you start reading up on this branch of charms. There will be a big test on the module in January, but don’t underestimate the time you have until then—”
The bell clanged. Desks and chairs scraped as everyone shuffled off for the door. Harry regrouped with Ron and Hermione in the crowd, but he and Ron soon parted with the girl as they mselves set off for Quidditch practice.
It was some time past four when they had changed into their Quidditch uniforms and his team was assembling out on the pitch. Harry shuddered as he left the changing room. This year’s October seemed particularly chilly; it reminded Harry of the dementors’ cold auras. The air was misty, the surrounding mountains barely visible, and an unpleasant drizzle was carried by the wind. Harry was sure that everyone else present here wanted nothing more than to curl up in front of the Common Room fireplace, like him, but as Quidditch Captain and with the year’s first game quickly approaching, it wouldn’t do to let his team slack off.
“Alright, quiet, please!” Harry yelled over the chatter.
“Oi, Potter!” cried Jimmy Peakes, a Beater, “It’s monkeys out here. And wet.”
The entire team promptly chimed in protest, and Harry’s voice was lost within theirs.
“SHUT IT!” Ginny, at Harry’s side, suddenly bellowed. The crowd instantly quieted down. Harry glanced at her with an appreciative look.
“If we want to beat Slytherin, that’s no excuse for slacking off,” Harry addressed the crowd. He was trying to keep his voice encouraging. “If we fly well, we’ll end practice early, alright? Come on, then. On your brooms.”
He pointedly ignored the protests and grumbling that followed this. While everyone was mounting their brooms, Harry strode over to the chest with the Quidditch balls. He only needed to unlock it now… Drawing his wand, Harry took a deep breath and prayed to Merlin his wand would work.
“Alohomora!”
The latch budged a little but didn’t open.
“Alohomora!”
Again, nothing. A wave of nervous sweat washed over Harry. He was no longer cold. The weight of his team’s eyes was on his back.
“Alohomora! Alohomora— Bloody thing!”
“What’s wrong?”
It was Ginny. Harry straightened up at once, thinking fast and shrugging nonchalantly.
“The thing won’t budge. Dunno, maybe it’s broken.”
Ginny drew her own wand and approached the trunk with a frown. Harry heard her mutter the spell, and in the next moment there was an audible click, and the hood swung open, the bludgers struggling and snarling against the chains holding them down.
“Seems fine to me,” she said. Then she looked at Harry, and he could have sworn he saw concern in her eyes. “Are you okay? Like really okay?”
“Why is everyone suddenly asking me the same bloody thing? Yes, I’m fine, Ginny.”
“No need to use that tone with me,” said Ginny right back. “We’re just worried—”
“Thanks. But I’m fine. Really,” replied Harry with a bit less bite. He released the latch holding the bludgers and quaffle, and snatched up the Snitch within a deft move.
“Hey, what’s taking so long!?” cried a voice overhead. Harry threw a leg over his broom, kicked off from the ground, and released the Snitch, signaling with his hand the start of the game.
The mock game went on for a good twenty minutes. He watched closely as his players skillfully ducked and avoided the savage bludgers and scored hits on the quaffle. Ron had come a long way since the tryouts a few weeks ago, but Harry noted that confidence was not his strong suit — it was clear in the way the redhead kept awkwardly trying to apologize whenever he’d miss a hit on the quaffle or accidentally hit someone with his club. He wasn’t a bad player; Harry knew it was only the peer pressure.
Though he worried how Ron would play in front of the entire school.
It was almost completely dark now and still drizzling, but the field was lit up by several bright Lumos Maxima spells. Harry could feel his eyes drooping despite the constant moving of his broom. He just couldn’t seem to locate that elusive golden Snitch, so he’d kind of given up on it and was simply spectating the players from above.
Some minutes later, Harry called the end of practice. No one needed a special invitation; everyone shot for the changing rooms.
Harry and Ron stayed behind to store the balls away. It took him and his friend another good ten minutes to finally catch that Snitch (they laughed about their victory), and then locked it up with the rest of the balls.
By the time both of them were heading back up to Gryffindor Tower, Harry felt like he could hibernate until next Friday, or even the first game of the year. His eyes stung, and he was practically dragging his feet behind himself.
He was, again, craving sleep. Rest. But then the thought of those nightmares reappeared, and he suddenly felt sick in the stomach.
Ron had just reached the landing in front of the portrait of the Fat Lady when he turned around to find his mate painstakingly making his way up the staircase, using the railing. Maybe it was the torchlight, but the bags under his eyes unnerved Ron. His face also seemed to have attained an unhealthy pallor.
“Mate—”
“ —I’m fine,” Harry ground out irritably. He straightened up, strode past Ron, and gave the Fat Lady the password.
“Abstinence.”
She swung aside without complaint. But before he could walk through, a hand caught his wrist.
“Yeah, right,” said Ron. “You look like you’re about to fall over. My Great Aunt Tesssie’s nearing a hundred, and she doesn’t look nearly as if death’s warmed over as you—”
“I just need some sleep, Ron. It’s been a long week. Let me go.”
“That’s rubbish, Harry. I know you don’t sleep.”
Harry stilled and turned around. Ron loosened his grip.
“Yeah, that’s right. I know you’re using silencing spells on yourself.”
Harry swallowed, his mouth suddenly feeling dry and his face going red. “How— How did you find out?”
“Dunno. Just woke up for no reason one night. Saw you thrashing like mad,” Ron answered.
“But… why didn’t you say anything?”
The redhead rubbed the back of his head uncomfortably. “I just guessed you wouldn’t want me to bring it up. I also thought it was a one-time thing… I haven’t told anyone, but…” Ron sighed. “Harry, I think you should tell McGonagall.”
Harry immediately shook his head. “No. It was a one-time thing, Ron,” he lied. But when Ron didn’t look convinced, an absurd but plausible idea sprang to Harry’s mind. “Listen. If it keeps happening, I'll go to Madam Pomfrey. Alright?”
Ron was still looking rather skeptically at him, but eventually nodded his head slowly. Together, they finally walked through the passage and into the welcoming warmth of the red-gold Common Room.
Later that same night, Harry lay in bed, staring dead up at the ceiling of his four-poster bed with his hands under his head. His ears occasionally picked up Neville’s and Ron’s light snoring; other than those sounds, everything was quiet.
Except for the warring thoughts running through Harry’s head.
Should he really do it?
What if he got caught? What if… what if it was Snape’s shift tonight?
But what other choice did Harry have? He would never get more than one small vial of Dreamless Sleep from Madame Pomfrey, and going to Snape was, again, absurdly out of the question.
No… No, it was ridiculous. Harry wasn’t a thief.
He turned over onto his side, the sheets rustling softly.
But he couldn’t sleep. Was every night to be like this? His friends had already since started asking him if he was alright, and Ron had even seen him once… For how much longer could this go on?
Mind suddenly made up, Harry carefully swung his feet over his bed and gathered his glasses and wand. It took him a moment to locate his Cloak and the Marauder’s Map in his trunk, and then he was padding down the staircase down to the Common Room. There, the hearth was just barely still lit, nearly dead but bright enough for Harry to unfurl the map and make out that the coast outside the Tower was clear. And yes, there was Snape, down in the dungeons, but he wasn’t patrolling the halls. Harry could only see McGonagall, but she was near the Great Hall.
As quietly as he could, Harry climbed out through the portrait hall and swung his trusty Cloak over his shoulders in one swift, practiced move. He didn’t light his wand with a feeble Lumos and set off for the Infirmary.
The trek down to the Fourth Floor was much shorter than Harry remembered it to be. It seemed no time had passed before he was standing in front of the big doors leading inside. He knew the place was never locked at night, for which he was eternally grateful. Ever so slowly, he opened the door wider and wider, until he eventually slipped in. No one seemed there; all was quiet, and the beds empty. Harry made a beeline straight for the cabinet he knew stored all kinds of potions.
Guilt was stabbing painfully at his conscience, but he swallowed it down. Now it was too late to turn back. He upended the cabinet doors and scanned the bottles and flasks for that one potion…
At last, he found what he was looking for. Dreamless sleep. There were about seven big flasks full of the potion, but they weren’t perfectly lined up, so it gave off a bit of a disorganized look. This was perfect, as it lowered the chances of Madame Pomfrey noticing…
With a shaky breath, Harry snuck one flask out, closed the cabinet softly, and fled the scene.
~***~
Mid-October, 1996.
A shuddering gasp rattled his lungs. Severus shot upright in his bed, leaning back on his elbows and gazing into the darkness that surrounded him. It took him a moment to establish where he was; his eyes soon adjusted to the bare amount of light coming in from the artificial window. With every exertion, his chest rose and fell with gusto, but it soon began evening out.
Severus sighed and ran a hand over his face, covering it for several long moments. But it seemed no matter how hard he tried to fight it, those images kept coming back, shifting and warping in vile and crippling ways that were then projected in his sleep. The same images of the same faces, of those many days and nights that he was so ashamed of that he kept them hidden in the very recesses of his mind with Occlumency, and yet they were still there.
No, it seemed there was no sleep for him.
Tonight had been, by far, the worst in several weeks. He’d dreamt of that night in Godric’s Hollow — that night of genocide executed by the Dark Lord and his Death Eaters. Only this time, it hadn't’ been Severus feeding those victims the Strangulatus Potion — it had been the other way around.
Another involuntary shudder rocked his body, this one at the thought of the voice of the woman who had been standing over him — the very same one he’d subjected to the potion’s torture in real life. Her voice, her loathsome expression, her words…
That night, along with countless others, was still engraved in Severus’ head. They warped and morphed into such projections that Severus dreaded sleep these nights. Not even Occlumency seemed to be working as much as it used to, and that Celarium Umbras potion was nowhere in sight, unbrewed.
Because maybe Severus didn’t deserve relief from these thoughts that continued to plague him. Maybe this was the kind of punishment he deserved for his past, for his crimes, for his sins… It all felt suffocating, like a windowless shed with no escape.
It mattered not that it was his duty as spy — to kill, to torture, to lie —, because the fact of the deed remained, and it stained. His hands felt stained with this filth, this blood, covering them that he could not wash off. It was like his Dark Mark, only invisible yet palpable to him.
Deciding any attempts at sleep would be in vain, Severus threw back the tangled covers, reached for his wand tucked under his pillow, donned his night robe, and staggered out of his bedroom. He had no clue what this ungodly hour was, but neither was he interested to find out.
The torches lining the walls flared at a simple, vague flick of his wrist. The Slytherin, despite having lived down here for nearly fifteen years, was still not used to the cold of the dungeons. He pulled his robe tighter around himself with a contained shudder.
Entering his private potion lab, the torches flared here as well. Severus ghosted his eyes and hand over his research journals and parchments, all covered in either scribbled-out or crammed spidery writing.
Another few weeks had passed…
Another fortnight bearing no results.
Severus lowered himself onto a stool and picked up one of the test tubes he’d been studying — containing the boy’s blood. He’d segregated the initial sample to ration it. For this one, he’d infused it with essence of pitleaf oil and left it to commingle, but the substance had turned out a dull purple instead of the expected deep magenta. So this was a failed trial.
Much the same had happened with the other five tests. The only one still undergoing testing was the Blood Knife blood one. Severus had split the amount into two tests — one to show what Potter’s blood had looked like before he’d been hit with the Killing Curse, and one after. So far, there was no difference, so that was as good as a dead end.
Said test tubes were sitting on the counter on the other side of the lab. Severus watched them. His gaze was unfocused. The tapping of his finger against the workbench was unregistered with him. His thoughts slowly strayed to these last few weeks.
Nothing noteworthy had happened, for which Severus was thankful. There had only been that one meeting the Dark Lord had called some time ago. Draco had been mentioned; the Dark Lord was expecting him to fail — that was obvious, but it was the torture he was most interrested in: watching the boy suffer for his father’s mistakes.
Draco had been completely avoiding Severus as of late, and there was nothing he could do about this. This matter was beyond mere class attendance. Severus knew it would only be counterproductive to assign the boy detentions for not attending his classes or pointedly ignoring him. No, Severus simply chose to overlook this because he was no blind imbecile.
And, admittedly, he was at sea as to what he should do about this predicament. He knew the boy was struggling as well as planning something. Severus had tried offering his assistance to him, yet to no avail. He had been shrugged off every time.
And then there was Severus’ other predicament: Potter.
Severus’ strange habit of observing the boy had only grown. He found the Gryffindor’s behavior rather strange as of late. During meals, he appeared to lack appetite, due to which he looked quite emaciated. His face was also gaunter, more drawn, and he always seemed jumpy and distracted. These symptoms set off bells in Severus’ mind, but their cause seemed very unlikely. He doubted the boy had access to Dreamless Sleep, as Poppy Pomfrey never condoned its prolonged use, let alone that he was overdosing on it.
So then, what was the matter with the boy?
This line of thought brought him back to their last conversation. Even now, weeks since, he was still unable to shake it out of his head.
The boy was looking to confide in him. Or rather, he was looking for a confidant.
He was looking for understanding from Severus.
“... do you do it, sir? Block him out, I mean, when he looks into your mind…”
“...I hope you understand I am the right person for you to consult about this, Potter…”
“...I wasn’t… I just thought… that you’d…”
Potter had thought Severus understood. It was plain as day that now, with his mutt of a godfather dead, he had scarcely anyone to confide in. Severus inwardly cursed Black’s stupidity in having gone to that Merlin-forsaken Ministry and died, leaving his godson practically an emotional wreck. Talk of responsibility! And if that wasn’t bad enough, the werewolf was away on that mission for Dumbledore and the Weasleys’ sentimentalities would offer little to nothing to the boy.
And with the truth pertaining to the Prophecy and Dumbledore having come to light, the boy no longer held the old man in his good graces any more, as far as Severus assumed.
Thus, it left Potter with few options. The boy was growing desperate.
But what could Severus offer him? Of all people in this castle, he was the least qualified for such a position. In light of what he’d done, the damage he’d caused, the years of prejudice and torment he’d shown towards the boy, and what with his less-than-commendable life decisions… No, Severus could not see himself offering Potter more than his help in extricating that soul fragment and perhaps some guidance, protection granted.
Even though he longed to somehow help him in more ways than just this. He knew what it was like to feel the Dark Lord invade his mind, what it was like to feel him ruthlessly riffle through his thoughts and memories — Severus knew this feeling of disgust, of contamination. He’d lived it so many times before, and it never got easier.
But again, who was he to play the boy’s confidant? The thought of it was quite laughable. He had a role to play in this war, and he had to do it professionally. Growing close — growing to care — had been an unanticipated turn of events — it was already bad enough.
Care… The word still sounded so strange to Severus. Such words had seldom crossed his mind. He could practically hear his drunkard father’s manic laughter if he knew… Severus Snape? Care? And for the Potter spawn, of all people?
And yet, he did. He would be a fool to try to deny it. And now, he was terrified of the boy’s fate should he fail to extract the Dark Lord’s soul fragment in him before it was too late.
But would this fear be enough? After all, he’d been terrified for Lily’s life; that fear had been his drive to try to do whatever it took to preserve her life, and yet it hadn’t been enough. Lily had died. Severus hadn’t done enough. His fear-driven efforts hadn’t been enough.
And that was what terrified him even more now. He feared history repeating itself, as it was so notoriously known for.
A strangled, bitter laugh erupted from Severus as he tiredly rubbed the corners of his eyes. Even still, these thoughts running through his head made him sound delirious, for never in a million years would he have thought that he would ever be terrified of losing the boy.
The boy isn’t even mine…
He didn’t know why, but that thought drove a knife through his heart. Perhaps from the regret, from the thought of what might have been...
It did not do to dwell on dreams.