Chapter 6

Snape stared at Harry as Harry put his head down and made sure Snape would not be able see into his head and waited for Snape to begin. Snape did not say a word for almost five minutes.

Harry frowned and looked up at Snape to find Snape frowning back at him. Seeing Snape's eyes staring at him, Harry quickly looked elsewhere, flushing slightly and Snape realized at last what Harry was doing. He was avoiding Snape seeing into Harry's mind. He almost smiled and cleared his throat. This summer with Harry Potter was going to be interesting.

"Your schedule is right here, Potter. The time now is five. You will start your schedule from six today. I have written everything here." Snape handed the sheet to Harry who took it with a lot of trepidation.

Daily schedule

Wake up 5.00 am

Theory 5.30 am to 7.30 am

Preparing breakfast 7.30am to 8.00 am

Theory 9.00 am to 12 noon

Preparing lunch 12 noon to 1.30 pm

Preparation 1.30 pm to 4.00 pm

Practical 4.00 pm to 7.00 pm

Preparing dinner 7.00 pm to 8.30 pm

Preparation 9.00 pm 11.00 pm

"The theory and the practical will be what I specify on that day or the day before. Do you have any doubts, if you do, ask them now." Harry shook his head as he looked at the schedule with dismay.

"Then you will prepare for a practical on Occlumency and Legilimency at six today." Snape got up and went to his bedroom.

"Sir," Harry called out to him as he opened the door and Snape turned around impatiently, "What now Potter?"

Harry swallowed his own anger at Snape's snarl, "Sir, I won't do Occlumency and Legilimency till I have prepared and built a shield in my mind."

Snape slowly walked into the room, his eyes boring into Harry's face. "Look at me." He told Harry softly.

Harry stubbornly looked down and was shocked when Snape came very close to him and put a long finger under his chin and lifted Harry's face up.

Harry locked his eyes with Snape only for a second, before, he wrenched his face away from Snape and stepped back, looking down again. "Sir, please," Harry started in a low voice, "let me study my books that I have bought from Diagon Alley and build up my shields. Then I will take Occlumency lessons with you. Please give me that much time."

Harry hated himself at that time, sheesh! He thought disgusted with himself. He was reduced to begging Snape. But he really had no choice as Snape would see everything the first time he poked into his mind and Harry shuddered at the consequences of that action. He would have to agree to anything to avoid lessons on Occlumency till he developed stronger walls.

"You will take these lessons from me Potter. Be ready at six." Snape walked swiftly and went into his room and shut the door. Harry stared at the door in anger, fear and desperation and then whirled around and went to his trunk and removed the parchment and closing the curtains around him and casting silencing spells and privacy spells, started writing to Hermione praying she would respond.

Hermione, I am in a mess. Snape has told me he will test me on Occlumency at six today. That's right six hardly half an hour away. I am so agitated I really don't know what to do. I have begged him and I have pleaded with him, saying that I need the time to study the theory and also to build up stronger shields before I can be tested on them, but Snape won't listen. I was so polite with him, Hermione. Really. I requested him and he just would not agree. Please, help.

Harry stopped there when he realized he was repeating himself and waited for an answer that would solve the mess he was in. he closed his eyes as he was waiting in an attempt to calm his mind and build up his shields and strengthen them.

A minute later he opened his eyes to see the parchment had only his note on it. He sighed and closed his eyes again, trying to meditate and get his mind that just would not listen into some semblance of order. Three minutes later he opened his eyes and saw her neat handwriting beginning to appear.

Merlin, Harry how awful. At six today means there is hardly any time to plan. Calm your mind and think of all the damage that could occur if Snape caught hold of your memories. We still are not sure of his loyalties and also if he will cover for us. Till we do it is better to be careful. Just think that whatever Snape may see, he should not witness the memories of the last three weeks.

Just keep that clear in your mind and you will be fine. Do not antagonize him Harry. He may slip veritaserum into your tea or food without your knowledge and make you spill your darkest secrets to him. Be careful and Harry, you can do it. I have faith in you. I will not write now as I want you to meditate and be ready for him. Bye Harry. Till later.

Harry stared at the note in dismay even as he knew what Hermione was saying was the truth. Veritaserum, Merlin that would be horrifying, Harry thought with a shudder as he imagined the questions Snape would ask him with a sneer on his greasy face.

Harry carefully put the parchment away and sat down on his bed and started meditating. He closed his eyes and started placing memories of the basilisk, the graveyard, the Department of Mysteries and other memories of his School years and his home life or rather the lack of it at the front. While these memories were horrible and distressing for Harry they were nowhere near the level of fear he was feeling in the pounding of his heart if the other memories came up to the fore.

Sharp at six Snape called him sharply.

"Potter! Come on now. It is time." Harry sighed angrily and then immediately regretted it and tried to calm himself as he knew being angry before or during Occlumency would only make it easier for Snape to penetrate into his mind.

He got up and flicked his wand to open the curtains and walked towards Snape. Snape was standing, his wand in his hand and ready to cast the Legilimens spell on Harry.

Harry stood across him nervously prepared to fight his way if Snape would even touch the edge of his memories that he did not want Snape or indeed anyone to see.

"Sit down." Snape told him sourly and he stood as Harry sat down gingerly, his wand in his hand prepared to cast anything short of the unforgivables at Snape.

"To close your mind Potter you must clear it first," Harry looked at him in bewilderment as he realized that Snape was talking and not attacking, Snape glared at him, "Are you paying attention, Potter for I dislike to repeat myself unless you are an ignorant and a fool who cannot understand?" he sneered his eyebrows raised questioningly at Harry.

Harry flushed angrily as so many retorts came to his mind. Only the threat and fear of veritaserum held it off and he swallowed heavily and nodded his head. "Yes."

"Yes what?" Snape asked him his expression dark and forbidding as he looked at Harry with anger.

Harry was puzzled at the question until he remembered the Occlumency lessons of fifth year and he flushed again. "Yes Sir." He said in a low voice.

Snape began to pace the room as he talked softly "Well, Occlumency is the art that teaches you to completely close your mind against outside influences. People who know the art of Legilimency can look into another's mind and see and remove thoughts. If the Legilimens is exceptional wizard or witch, then they can peer into another's mind without the knowledge of the other and they can plant false memories like the Dark Lord did."

Harry gasped as he looked at him panic shining in his eyes, "Can anyone look into my mind without my knowledge?" Merlin how awful was Snape trying to say he and Dumbledore could actually read his mind without his knowledge?

Snape snorted and sneered. "Why? What are you hiding Potter?" he asked Harry as he watched Harry very closely and saw him almost shake in fear and blush madly.

"I, Sir, I just, no Sir I am hiding nothing. I just don't like anyone and everyone to peep into my mind without my knowledge." Harry was stuttering as he answered Snape and looked at him for a second before looking down.

This was already getting tiresome and he had been here for only an hour or two. Harry felt his sprits sink lower than the floor as he thought about the next two months. The week with the Dursleys had been fantastic by comparison. At least at the Dursleys there was no constant fear of anyone peeping into his mind.

"Not all wizards can do this Potter," Snape began impatiently as he started walking again, "only those who are powerful to begin with or those who have cultivated that power over the years. Today only a handful of wizards can do this; the Dark Lord is among them and that is why you will learn this branch of magic that will stop him from using your mind for accomplishing his work."

Harry nodded his head listening and concentrating as Snape continued.

"How to close your mind is something I cannot tell you as you must decide for yourself how best to lay protections around your mind so that no one can go past it and see your memories. The best way to do that is to arrange a lot of your memories, true ones with may be spell walls or other kinds of protection as you see it fit and then constantly check them and strengthen them, by the simple process to not giving in to your mind's whims and fancies. In short Occlumency is to have control of your mind and its actions and NEVER to allow the mind to have control over you and your actions."

"But how Sir, aren't me and my mind the same, I mean," as Snape scowled at Harry for interrupting him and asking silly and foolish questions, Harry continued hurriedly, he had been genuinely listening and had wanted to know honestly, "all of do what our mind dictates in any situation don't we?"

Snape stared at Harry and Harry immediately blinked his eyes and looked elsewhere, amusing Snape a lot and making him think seriously about just what Harry had in his mind that made him so desperate to protect it.

"Well your mind and you are two separate entities Potter and if you want to master even a little bit of Occlumency you must be prepared to accept this and work on it." Snape told him softly.

Harry frowned as he struggled to think of his mind that was just telling him to curse the git in front of him to oblivion, just so that he could look anywhere he pleased without the fear of Legilimency cast on him and himself, who was saying exactly the same thing. He heaved a huge sigh as he told himself that though both were saying just the same thing they were very different and felt like banging his head on the table in front of him, felt by both him and his mind, he told himself darkly.

"Potter please, I know it is very difficult but do try not to be foolish." Snape told him angrily as he glared at Harry as if he had heard aloud what Harry had thought.

Harry looked blankly at him as Snape came around and sat in front of him. He made himself comfortable and looked once again at Harry. "Now you had Umbridge last year." Harry shuddered as he remembered Umbridge and her blood quills and the cruciatus she had almost cast.

"Now when she spoke about the Dark Lord and told all of you his return was a figment of your imagination, you might have wanted to immediately jump up and say she was wrong and the Dark Lord had indeed returned. That was your instinct which is generally correct mind you, and powered by your mind that generally tends to give in to impulses of contrary emotions that you must have felt at the time.

"You must have kept silent though, as it was not prudent to talk to a Ministry official in a way that would bring down nasty consequences on you. The emotions were right, mind you but the power that acted opposite to your emotions that were equally correct, so you had to choose, you chose an action that was prudent at that point and so you exercised caution. You who are powered by your emotions and intelligence chose one. The other you quelled to either put it away for good as it would have never been a wise option or to act upon it in the future, when there might be a more favorable atmosphere. Do you understand now?"

Harry blushed in shame as he thought of how he had jumped and listened to his mind rather than his intelligence.

Snape smirked. "Of course I know you did no such thing and you spent a lot of time in detention with her but, I am merely explaining to you the difference between what you did and what you should have done."

Harry did not know it was possible to go redder as he blushed furiously and glared at Snape for a second.

"What you did was to give in to your impulses. What you should have done was to exercise caution and kept quiet. You must listen to yourself and start discriminating so that every action is a well thought out process from a mind that listens to both the instinct and the intelligence inside you and makes the correct choice.

"Now I want you to try this after dinner. You may go and start preparing it now. I wish dinner to be ready by eight." Snape got up and went into his room and shut the door, leaving a thoughtful and a resentful Harry. Thoughtful as he pondered all the things Snape had told him and resentful he was being treated like a house elf.

He got up and started working, chopping the vegetables and thinking furiously about what Snape had said. It made a weird kind of sense and Harry was amazed Snape was this polite to him. Harry had expected him to straight away start off with the Legilimens and had been shaking with terror, but Snape had been more than decent, more decent than Ron and the others and definitely more than Dumbledore.

Harry drew a deep breath as he tried to stop the thoughts of that one and only Order meeting he had attended. He decided it had put him off the Order for ever as one meeting and the after effects had made him feel Snape was better than all the people he thought were his friends. He brought back his thoughts to Occlumency once again and was soon trying out different shields in his mind he felt might just work.

Sharp at eight Snape came striding to the small table and sat down. Harry set the table and placed the dishes in the middle and Snape silently helped himself and then he noticed Harry standing and he still silently signaled to Harry to sit and begin.

Harry sat down with some relief as he was very hungry. He had only a cup of tea after lunch that he had had at the Dursleys and the tension and stress of Occlumency and the subsequent relief made his stomach ache with hunger. He immediately loaded his plate and then paused giving a brief glance at Snape waiting for a minute to see if Snape would object to the amount of food he had place on his plate.

The Dursleys would have and in fact would have ordered him to remove half from his plate. Snape did no such thing as he went on with his meal. Harry started his own, still keeping an eye on Snape and soon he finished and looked up to find Snape staring at him intently.

Harry blushed, "I am sorry Sir, and did you want anything?" Snape frowned at Harry as if trying to find out why Harry was being polite as he answered him.

"No. have you finished?" at Harry's nod Snape got up and Harry got up as well and started piling the dishes in the sink to wash. There were not many and with magic Harry had completed cleaning everything in no time.

"You may concentrate on the different shields you would like to protect your mind with and tomorrow we will continue." Snape once again turned to go into his room for the night.

"Sir, may I use the bathroom now?" Harry asked him hating the flush that stained his cheeks. "Make it quick Potter." And Snape banged the bedroom door close.

Harry washed and went to his bed and drew the curtains and cast a silencing charm on them and went to sit at the table and chair Snape had conjured for him. He removed the parchment and started writing to Hermione about his first lesson and soon was engaged in a very pleasant chatting session with her for the next half hour.

Then he went to work and taking out the runes book he spent about three hours studying hard and memorizing the various rune combinations. After that Harry once again cleared his mind and checking his shields went to sleep.

------------------

Snape in the meantime was thinking had had a very interesting day with Harry Potter. Potter was not like his father or even like his Godfather Black, who so adored him. Snape's lips curled as he thought of Sirius Black and James Potter. With all his faults Black had truly loved Potter. Had he been present at the Order meeting that other day he knew Black would have stopped speaking to the werewolf and cut off his friendship with him. His one regret had been Potter could not be with him at Grimmauld Place so that they could bond closer with each other.

He frowned as he thought deeply. So many things did not make sense now that he was beginning to look deeply into the actions of the Headmaster after his talk with Minerva. While Evans may have sacrificed her life for her son, there was no blood magic as far as he knew that would keep Potter safe in an abusive household like the Dursleys. For the blood magic to work, Evan's sister had to accept the magic voluntarily. From Potter's memories, he knew that was not the case. So why did Dumbledore keep Potter there all these years?

Minerva would have made a wonderful guardian. Why was Minerva not allowed to parent Potter when she had volunteered for the job? The blood magic could have been altered he knew with a simple ritual that could have blood bonded Potter and Minerva, thereby transferring the protection if any from Petunia Dursley to Minerva.

More confusing was the imprisonment of Black. He had been a death eater and was in fact responsible for the deaths of Potter's parents' by handing over half the Prophecy to Voldemort and even though at that time Evans had probably not conceived, still that was a thin line. Albus had gone to great lengths to save him so that he could spy for Albus and he knew had had deeply repented and regretted each and every action as a death eater.

Albus had not done a thing to demand a trial for Black. That was astounding by itself as Black had been a brother to Potter something everyone knew. Sure Black had cried insanely that he had killed the Potters but why had no one verified it under veritaserum? Black could have been under the imperious curse that had made him betray the Potters.

If he had really been responsible for their deaths then why had no one demanded he be kissed? Albus could have demanded a trial and the moment veritaserum was given, he would have known Black was not the culprit and it was the rat who had betrayed him.

The rat was another confusing thing. In Potter's third year, when the dementors were guarding Hogwarts Albus had secured the wards very tightly so that he would know each and every member in the castle so that if Black or indeed anyone who were not part of the staff, elves and students entered he would know immediately. Why did he not realize that the rat was human? Snape sighed as he had too many questions and almost no answers at all.

Potter would have been fine with Black, Snape thought reluctantly to himself as he threw a bit of the floo powder in the fire in his room. There was another floo exit in the drawing room, but he had secured both so that no one other than him could floo in and out unless he allowed them to.

"Minerva?' he called softly wondering if she would be there in her private quarters. There was no one there and he left a parchment for her eyes only telling her to call him, whatever the time and the password for the floo and waited. He heard Harry finish with the bathroom and went to have a bath and came back all refreshed.

Half an hour later the floo glowed green as Minerva's head came into view.

"Hello Severus. How are you and Harry?" she asked him her face very anxious.

"Fine your precious Gryffindor is fine and I am sure he is plotting ways to kill me right now." he told her sneering at her.

She smiled, "Oh good. Harry's fine and you look fine as well. Why did you call me? I was so worried." Snape scowled at her happy sarcasm and then frowned.

"Have you got a minute Minerva? Can you come over? There are so many things that have begun to make me ponder and I wonder at the many things that have happened in Potter's life so far that I needed to talk to someone about it."

"Give me a minute, Severus I will come in as soon as I ward the place." Five minutes later Minerva was in Snape's room sipping a cup of tea.

"I am sorry I cannot take you to the drawing room as Potter is there." Snape told her about the layout of the cottage.

"That is fine Severus. I really don't mind. What did you want to ask me about Harry?" she asked him in concern.

Snape had called McGonagall mainly to seek information about everything that was bugging him and also find out where she was in the scheme of things that surrounded Potter and with that in mind he started.

He told her all his doubts, "I was the one who ran away with half the Prophecy Minerva and everyone knew Black would have died for Potter, James Potter as well as Harry Potter. Albus swore on his magic for me. Why didn't he demand a trial by veritaserum or at least ask Black for an oath on his magic about his loyalties. He ran away from his home Minerva to avoid being marked by the Dark Lord and Albus just sent him to Azkaban without a trial and Potter was left to rot with the Dursleys.

"Another thing that got to me was the protection magic. Potter I am sure is being protected by other magic not the blood magic based on the sacrifice of his mother which means he could stay just about anywhere."

"What!!" Minerva was shocked and stunned by what Severus was telling her. "What are you saying Severus?"

Snape nodded his head sharply. "The truth Minerva, only the truth. If Potter could get by with the protection that his mother's sacrifice gave him by staying with the muggles for only two months in a year after his eleventh birthday, why wasn't that rule enforced before? Second, this year Potter stayed there for only one week, to strengthen the protections Albus told us at the Order meeting.

"Two months after starting Hogwarts and one week when you want Potter to learn Occlumency, three weeks after third year when you allowed Potter to go to the Quidditch World Cup, four weeks after the Triwizard Tournament when you brought Potter to Grimmauld Place, Minerva blood wards don't work like that. You know that as well."

Minerva stared at him in horror as she tried to come up something that would justify Albus and failing stared at him again.

"Yet another thing that confuses me is his aura." Snape was silent for a second and then he continued quietly, "I am saying this in confidence hoping that you will not betray me Minerva. No one not even Albus knows that I can see auras."

Snape was silent for a second and said softly, "My aura color is green with silver lines and golden sparks." McGonagall gasped. Hers was green with silver dots and she could not see auras unfortunately for her and Snape was talking about an aura that was more powerful than Albus, who had a pure green with silver lines.

"But Albus can see auras too, Severus and he told me your aura was pure green, when we were discussing power among the wizards." she gasped.

"I know and if you change your aura to a power level below yours yes he would have been suspicious. All I did was to subdue the silver and golden in my aura so that I had power but not more than Albus or the Dark Lord, remember he could see auras too."

"When did you do this? You-Know-Who must have spotted it at the very beginning."

"In School during my fifth year," Snape shrugged as McGonagall gasped once again. "What Minerva, I could see auras and when I find I have a more powerful one than most of my professors naturally I change it a little, not too much, but a little, yes."

"Well! Severus I really don't know what to say; you, you Slytherin you." She accused him with a twinkle in her eye.

"Of course, my self preservation is priority." He smirked back at her.

They were silent in a companionable silence as each pondered heavily on everything they had been discussing. "What about auras Severus? You were saying something when we got side tracked."

Snape frowned, "Potter's aura is all wrong. Remember the first year when you were so worried that Potter's magic was probably weakened by the Dark Lord's assault and Potter's subconscious fight by his magic had made a mediocre wizard out of him?" she nodded her head remembering what she had discussed with Snape.

"Yes, he could not get anything before trying for at least a minimum of six to eight times and a maximum of I don't know how many." She told him. She had been saddened that Harry's core had weakened by fighting the Dark Lord.

"Then how did Potter destroy Quirrell? The way he had burnt to ashes suggested a huge magic backlash. Potter was in the infirmary recovering from magical exhaustion not anything else, I know as I supplied the potions. The way he held of a hundred dementors. Remember the way Black had been so proud that Potter saved his life?" she nodded again as she listened to the facts that implied so much and none of it good.

"The way he fought the Dark Lord and came out of the graveyard was nothing short of stunning. I saw that in a pensieve memory that Lucius showed me and my first reaction was awe, Minerva. Really, I know you will not believe me but I felt awed that a fourteen year old boy had held a very powerful wizard at wand point that joined with each other and still escaped. How did he defeat a sixty foot basilisk at twelve?"

McGonagall was very thoughtful as the implications of what Snape was trying to tell her washed over her. She looked at him in sudden comprehension. He nodded his head.

"Potter's aura has been changed. He has a blue aura and there is a jagged line surrounding it and you know what it means. If we are dependant on this boy to win the war and if all of us are to put our lives on the line for him, why is he not a warrior already? How can you expect him to defeat the Dark Lord, Bellatrix and the other death eaters with the spells he knows at present, nothing adds up Minerva and I am so confused.

"I would have left it there and not interfered as until now I sincerely believed Albus always thought the world of this boy and had only his best interests at heart; but this summer Albus gave this boy to me to break him and make him more resentful and lonely, not to teach him anything, I know that much. If he truly wanted Potter to learn, there is you, Bill Weasley, Moody, Shaklebolt so many others." Snape shrugged and stopped.

The truth was that Snape was so impressed that Potter had stood up to Black, he knew how much that must have cost Potter who thought Black was the father he did not have. When Minerva told him he had sat long into the night and thought about so many things and put them all in their proper places.

Molly's comment was very true. Apart from him no one really said Potter was unruly, idiotic or rule breaking. All the so called rule breaking had been emergencies that any child who had a little sense of right and wrong would do.

The moment he had seen Potter in a different light so many inconsistencies had sprung up that had made his head spin. The fact Albus had a hand in all this worried and intrigued him.

While he had hated Potter he also had been sure that Albus wished nothing but the best for Potter and even the aura was Albus's way of protecting him from unnecessary speculations. After his conversation with Minerva, he found evidence totally to the contrary and that worried him. If Albus was intentionally doing all this then he felt it was his duty as a spy who was risking his neck every time he went to Voldemort, to find out why. He would try his best.

Potter was the center around which the Wizarding World was placed. His actions would ultimately make or mar his world as he knew Prophecies had a way of coming true and history had a way of repeating itself. Well, Snape would try his best to make sure history would not be repeated in the second war with Voldemort as the first war had almost destroyed the Wizarding World till the Potters died and Harry Potter saved them all.

This time Snape and he knew Minerva was on his side would do his best to ensure the Wizarding World's peace did not depend once again on the death of a Potter. That family had paid more than it's due to the world that they had been a prestigious part of.

The only problem was gaining the trust of the damn boy and he knew Potter would face Voldemort rather than confide in him. Still he had to try.

"What do we do now Severus? All this is so frightening and I really do not know what to do and whom to trust?"

"Trust no one Minerva, no one till they prove themselves. What we have discussed today is so important please assure me you will never speak of it till I agree and I will do the same, never speak till you are there with me." Snape was alarmed as he considered the implications of all this falling into wrong hands.

Minerva nodded her head, "Of course Severus. I will never speak without your consent. Now you try and bond some way with Harry and see if you can get through to him."

He doubtfully agreed to try and added a warning that it would be very difficult though and both the colleagues went to have a well deserved rest.