Chapters 151-160

Tests and Tribulations

‘Very well,’ Snape said. He stared at Harry, his expression caught between a smirk and a painful grimace. ‘You’ll have to take my hand.’

Harry realised that he still couldn’t think of him as ‘Severus’. Just as the pause before Snape would speak his name betrayed the professor’s discomfort at this new stage of their…well, it wasn’t really ‘friendship’ yet. Even though they appeared to have passed the bitter enmity of his school years.

‘Okay,’ he said at last and tentatively reached for the other man’s hand.

Snape’s hand was warm, the skin dry. His long fingers were strangely slender and fragile under Harry’s touch. For a moment they stared at each other, supremely discomfited at their close proximity.

‘Merlin and Circe!’ Dubois exclaimed. ‘No one expects you to kiss and make out! Monsieur Potter, Professor Snape needs to hold your hand so you can enter the Realm of Death together.’

‘Wait a second,’ Harry protested. ‘We’re supposed to run around like Hansel and Gretel while we’re there?’

Snape smirked. ‘Bingo.’

Harry shook his head. ‘We might as well start snogging.’

‘Sorry, Potter, but I’m afraid my wife doesn’t share—now hand me that sword.’

oooOooo

Death was different this time.

There was no train station. There was no Dumbledore waiting for him. Cold, clammy mists that drifted over the banks of a dark river surrounded him. In the distance Harry thought he could see the silhouettes of trees, but he couldn’t be sure. The fog limited his vision to a few feet of frozen ground and murky waters. He felt as if he’d woken in an old black-and-white movie.

The Gate that he’d heard so much about was nowhere to be seen.

His breath froze in prickling crystals around his mouth. The cold seeped into his bones. When he shifted his weight on his feet, ice cracked on his robes. The only warmth radiated from his right hand—the hand that was clutching Snape’s as if he was his last anchor in the darkness.

Harry turned his face towards his former teacher. A figure made of black and white, Severus Snape did not look all that different in the gloaming of Death.

Only his eyes were burning. Still black, but hot as coals, full of bright, dark life.

‘It’s so dark here.’ Harry shivered, vaguely ashamed at his lack of courage.

‘It won’t be like this when…when it’s your time, in case you’re worried,’ Snape said gruffly. ‘This is what scholars call the “objective dimension” of Death. It’s black and white for everyone. The “subjective dimension” is supposed to be different. Experts say that it will show you what you truly believe. I suspect for Gryffindors it will be all reds and golds.’

Harry swallowed hard. It cost him a conscious effort not to cling to Snape with his other hand as well. He shuddered. When he replied at last, his voice was husky, ‘Th—there were no c–colours for me before. Only greys.’

Snape looked at Harry for a long moment, but before he could say anything, the mists near the river shifted, and Madame Dubois stepped out of them. Hoarfrost covered her hair and her lashes were thick with rime. ‘Well,’ the blond witch beamed, seemingly unaffected by her surroundings. ‘We’re here, all of us. C’est magnifique, n’est-ce pas?’

Harry blinked at her smile in disbelief. Then he remembered to breathe. ‘Yeah, I guess.’

oooOooo

‘Vim magicam per vitam ad mortem revelio,’ Dubois chanted, executing a strange swirl with her wand, pointing it at Harry’s arm. To Harry it looked as if she was executing wand movements he should know, only they were all wrong. Of course! Suddenly he felt extremely stupid. The portrait mistress moved her wand the other way! In Death the directions of the wand movements were all reversed.

His left arm tingled, then burned.

One thing was sure, Death didn’t agree with his reflexes. He felt as if he were immersed in heavy, icy water. At last he was looking at his left arm and the forked tattoo of the rune Elhaz.

A strange green light issued from the tattoo, a thin thread of luminosity that snaked away from him into the mist hovering above the river. The haze glowed with an eerie emerald glow that only faded far away from the water’s edge.

Straining his eyes, Harry thought he could make out the distant outline of a wall, or maybe a gate…

‘Damn,’ he whispered.

The tall dark man at his side followed his gaze. ‘For once I couldn’t agree more.’

oooOooo

‘Are you going to sleep tonight at all?’

‘Hmm?’

‘Hermione.’

‘Oh.—Oh, sorry, Severus. I didn’t realise. I—just another chapter. I’ve been reading about the Peverell brothers and the Deathly Hallows all day, and it’s been such a waste of time. Well, I guess philosophically or psychologically those legends may have their merits. Did the brothers build a metaphorical bridge across the River of Death, the way versions A, B1 and B2 tell us? Or did they devise a way to draw back the Veil of Death, the way version C and D1 tell us? Or did they make it all up? That would be D2 and, of course, AD.

‘This,’ she thumped the book she was immersed in, ‘is at least something practical. Something useful.’

‘What are you reading?’ Severus asked, realising belatedly that Hermione was indeed still wide awake, reading and studying at 3:00 a.m.

‘I’m cross-referencing “Wand & Rod—The Tools of Masters” by Dick Hertz and Stuart Pot against the Pomet manuscript.’

Severus squinted at her. ‘Why would you do that? No—forget that question. Why would anybody do that, especially at 3:00 bloody a.m. in the morning?’

‘Well, I am doing it because you told me I have to know Charmed potions for the second half of my apprenticeship, and because I suck at working with two wands.’ She sobered and added, ‘And because I’m getting nowhere researching the damn Deathly Hallows.’