It All Takes Time

*

Of all things to miss, Harry couldn't imagine it being the first start-of-term banquet in the Great Hall.

Watching how the empty and brilliantly glittering golden plates magically filled with steaming roast potatoes... lamb chops... gravy... sausages sizzingly cooked and glistening in honey... Yorkshire pudding, crispy and flaky... and those domino-coloured peppermint humbugs...

In the corner of Harry's eye, Blaise, the Head of the Slytherin House and the Potions Master, approaches.

Blaise's slender, dark brown face creases.

"Potter..."

*

Despite the sense of urgency, Harry summons something out of his quarters before going to where Albus Severus has been reported hiding. One of the other first-year Slytherins worriedly informed Blaise. Harry's wand-hand cradles against his robe's bulging pocket, feeling its weight. 

In the semidarkness of the Chamber of Reception, he discovers his youngest son knelt to himself and clutching over his head.

"Al," Harry breathes, offering a small smile when those bottle-green eyes meet his.

Lily Evans-Potter's eyes. Just like Harry.

"C'mere, love."

"Leave me alone..."

"You can't stay here all night. Molly will have my head if her favourite wee Potter catches a chill."

Usually the reminder of Albus Severus's grandmother, who noticeably dotes on an easily embarrassed Albus Severus, brings out a laugh or two. Not this time, it seems, Harry thinks heavy-heartedly as Albus Severus's shoulders lower. All of the tension draining from defeat. 

"Nan will hate me when she hears what's happened... why am I in Slytherin, Dad?"

"Don't be ridiculous. There is nothing the matter with being Sorted into the Slytherin House. We've already told you."

"Yes! There is! Everyone knows it — everyone's always known it and said it even when we were younger!" Albus Severus insists, tears forming. "Even Hagrid said! Hagrid said on the boat-ride — he said that there wasn't a witch or wizard who went bad who wasn't in Slytherin!"

Ah, yes. Harry does remember those words the same spoken to him at Albus Severus's age too.

"Hagrid knows better," he says quietly, sighing and lowering himself to a knee in front of Albus Severus. "I'll speak with him about it later. But... y'know, come to think of it, there is at least one Slytherin who had done right in my eyes. And you are named after him."

Albus Severus thins his lips, seeming still apprehensive.

"Sure... I had loads to complain about at the time Professor Snape was in Hogwarts. But it wasn't nearly all bad, I suppose. Nearly."

"It wasn't?"

Harry nods, plaintive.

Reaching into his pocket, he holds up a glowing, silvery-blue phial and cradles it.

"This is a memory," Harry explains, staring down, and the light within twirls and clouds apart, paling Albus Severus's wonderstruck expression. "Severus Snape's memory. I kept it for so long... over nineteen years... but I dunno which memory of his it is. What I do know is he wanted me to have it. He wanted me to know what he knew. And what he felt. He needed me to trust him... up at the very end."

When Harry's eyelids close, Harry sees Snape.

All over again.

Being in the Shrieking Shack, removing the Invisibility Cloak and kneeling over...

How much blood came from his neck gushing between Harry's fingers... the desperation...

"Dad?"

He opens his eyes, rueful, and Albus Severus crawls in, getting firmly embraced in one of Harry's arms. Harry quickly reassures him, pressing a kiss in Albus Severus's untidy, black hair. It's difficult. Living somewhere between the past and the present no matter how long it's been.

"Would you like to find out what my old professor left behind?" Harry asks gruffly, wiping the corner of his eye with a knuckle. "Together?"

"Together," Albus Severus repeats solemnly, climbing onto his feet when Harry does.

*

Leading up into the Gargoyle Corridor, naming the password, Harry raps his fist soundly onto the entrance-way's marble.

"Forgive the intrusion, Headmistress," Harry starts.

McGonagall arranges her long, velvety dark green sleeves to her wrists. 

She gazes between him and a bashful Albus Severus.

"The Great Hall's supper has not concluded, Mister Potter and... Mister Potter. What are either of you doing?"

"This won't be long. May we borrow your office?" Harry then draws out sheepishly, "And... the Pensieve once owned by Dumbledore as well?"

A deep but silent curiosity twinkles in McGonagall's eye.

"Make haste," she murmurs.

Before Albus Severus gets very far stepping inside, McGonagall presents out a bare, elegantly aged hand.

"Well... how are you enjoying your very first evening here with us at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Young Mister Potter?"

Harry glances over to his son looking down at his feet, Albus Severus's expression tightening.

"Erm, it's... it's..."

"Yes, I am afraid I found myself missing this year's Sorting Ceremony," McGonagall announces, going stern-lipped. "However, I have heard you have joined the ranks of Slytherin." McGonagall's mouth quirks. "Very good. They would do well to appreciate any promising young mind."

Albus Severus goes wide-eyed. He peers to Harry clearing his throat to prevent a laugh and to McGonagall's faintly amused look.

"Oh? Did you assume since I was once the Head of Gryffindor House that I would not see so plainly?" she declares.

Harry rubs his lips and chin, beaming.

"I expect Albus Severus is learning more already before classes officially have started..."

If this was at home, Albus Severus would have complained loudly about getting teased — and Harry feels proud of Albus Severus with his light brown cheeks reddening, and instead bowing his head a little to McGonagall. "Th-thank you, Headmistress, for letting us stay."

"Yes, thank you," Harry adds a bit more earnestly, nodding when McGonagall nods and steps away.

"Excuse me..."

When she's gone, Albus Severus mutters and leans away from Harry's fingers gently ruffling into his hair.

There's the complaining.

*

Eventually, they march towards a cabinet Harry unlatches, lifting a familiar-looking stone basin and placing it onto a desk instead of heaving it. No need. Oddly enough... the Pensieve isn't as heavy in Harry's hands as it was years ago. And the tables and desks of the Headmistress's office, cleared of parchments, lack the spindly, self-moving tools and enchanted items Dumbledore kept around before his death. 

Albus Severus's forefinger traces over a stone basin-marking. "What are these?" he breathes, observing the runes.

"Dunno. I wasn't told whenever I visited."

Harry gestures for him to back up, uncorking the phial's top and draining the contents in.

The surface of the Pensieve brightens into a silvery sheen.

"Right," Harry says murmurous, gesturing for Albus Severus to come forward again, touching onto his shoulder. "Go on. Can you find it?"

Albus Severus's luminously green eyes dart, looking for something not quite visible.

Eventually, his words slow, sleeplike.

"There is it..."

With his forefinger out, he points to where Harry leans in and examines the glowing white swirl forming and massing.

It solidifies.

A thin-looking face.

Sweat visibly drips down a large and handsomely hooked nose. 

Professor Snape's lips open, but no voice emerges

"Brilliant," Harry says encouragingly, regrasping Albus Severus's shoulder and nudging him. "I knew you could find Severus Snape's memory."

Albus Severus blinks himself into attention.

"What now, Dad?" he asks.

"Now... we go inside."

Harry explains to his youngest son about how to bend over the Pensieve and prepare to fall through the nothingness... to land on his feet... and to remember that they are only observers while within... no one in a memory can hear you, Al... because that's all it is... a memory...

Dad...

*

Dad, is that... you?

*

It sounds faraway. Albus Severus...

Harry listens again for Albus Severus speaking beside him, hush-toned, and grounds himself.

They stand in the low lights of an office far, far underneath Hogwarts castle. Professor Snape's office, Harry thinks after a long moment. He recognises the dead frog, suspended in a thick and violet-coloured liquid, in its jar. The shelves stacked not-so-precariously.

Albus Severus gawks as a fifteen-year-old Harry Potter lets out a strained shout, writhing in place, fighting off an unknown incantation.

"Concentrate... you're not concentrating... Legilimens!"

Harry shuts his eyes like it is muscle-memory and takes a breath, his younger self doing the same, and reopens his eyes as Albus Severus gasps. Yes... yes, Harry remembers it. Every night of his Occlumency lessons. How everything around Harry vanished, replaced by the terrible visions of Harry's life... blinding him... flickering like film... this has to be the third month in, where it all got more intense...

The memory of Harry Potter, drenched in sweat, collapses upright. Harry only remembers this. He remembers the chair creaking beneath him.

Everything went black then...

"Potter," Professor Snape croaks out, hurrying in and dropping his wand. Harry Potter goes fully unconscious in the chair, still remaining upright, but his head hangs backwards. Thin, pale fingers clutch the back of Harry Potter's head. "Potter, say something... Potter!"

When there's no response, Professor Snape — younger than Harry at the age Harry is, by several years, Harry realises — decides to press his other hand against Harry Potter's neck, carefully checking him. The worry furrowing Professor Snape's brow obvious. Harry's never seen it. He's never seen Professor Snape like this before. And certainly never about Harry himself. Never on a six o'clock on a Monday evening.

Harry eyes him uneasily, noticing the healing flesh-wound on Professor Snape's arm and a Stinging Jinx's mark to the left cheek.

Harry Potter... he did that.

Producing wandless magic so young, in a controlled environment, took everything out of him.

And apparently so, it did Professor Snape.

That exhaustion creeps in. Professor Snape nearly collapses himself, moving away from a younger Harry Potter resting in the office's chair. Erratically shallow breathes leave Harry Potter's lips parted open. Professor Snape combs back his oily-dark locks gleaming with his own sweat.

"Severus."

At the same time, Harry and Albus Severus glance warily to the roaring fireplace.

"Were you aware of this?" Professor Snape mumbles, not looking round as the others. He harshly pinches the bridge of his nose. "The boy... the boy has been through worse than you can imagine, Albus. Much more. I have seen it... I pray somehow I can undo it. And I cannot."

Harry's throat bobs, struggling against a gulp, as Albus Severus slowly reaches for his dad's hand...

Brightly illuminated in the flames, Dumbledore's expression hardens.

"It hardly matters now, Severus. This is how you must serve Lily's memory and protect her son. This is how you make wrongs right... the Dark Lord cannot have a way into Harry Potter's mind. You must convince him to work harder. To practise. We need an act of success against evil."

One of Harry Potter's breathes comes to a stutter while he's unconscious, unable to release it.

Professor Snape rigidly lurches, whispering, "no, no, no..." and going for a smaller cupboard of hand-crafted potions in bottles. Little bottles and big bottles. He clatters several before discovering the one, seeming to contain an iridescently yellow powder, needed.

It dumps and flecks onto Professor Snape's palm.

He returns, clasping the back of Harry Potter's head and pulling it forward. Professor Snape frowningly blows the powder against the nostrils. When it enters Harry Potter's system, the following breathes deepen. His colour improves. Relief trembles Professor Snape's hand.

"As I said, Severus... the focus against the Dark Lord must be success."

"Y... yes, of course."

*

Dad?

*

The basin's contents dull their silvery-white glow.

"Dad?"

Once pulled from Severus Snape's memory, Harry stares up to the sleeping witches and wizards. Magically imbued portraits of Heads. Dumbledore's portrait eerily emptied of his likeness existing. Which suits Harry fine — Harry doesn't trust himself to face any of Dumbledore right now.

Albus Severus's little fingers tighten to Harry's hand.

"He was... a good Slytherin, Dad?"

"A good man who happened to be in Slytherin," Harry manages to get out, the corners of his eyes stinging hot. He inhales, collecting himself before kneeling to Albus Severus's level. "Your House can never decide who you are going to be. You have to do that... understand?"

"I understand," Albus Severus repeats with as much sincerity as he can muster, their hands separating.

Behind his spectacles, Harry's eyes grinningly bunch up.

"Thanks, Dad. I love you."

"I love you too, Al," he murmurs. "I'm starting to feel peckish... how about it? Dobby may have some plates of roast chicken from the banquet."

Watching his youngest son's enthusiasm heightened, finally settling into Hogwarts, Harry makes some peace with it all.

Past or present... they're here.

*