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So Harry did, pulling awful faces all the while.

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"Oh, ick," was about all he could say when he first finished reading. "That was completely gross from start to finish. And they use needles. Just what I need."

"You can see why I have reservations."

"Yeah," Harry admitted. He did wish he could run away home to Hogwarts, but he knew the wish was selfish, on several fronts. "Um, but it doesn't really matter, you know? I mean, I'd have to do it even if I wasn't angling for the wards. She is my aunt."

"You do know how irrational that sounds?" Snape returned, shaking his head. "She may share your blood, but she's been your aunt in name only, Harry. You do not owe her a thing."

"I owe my mum," Harry clarified. "She wouldn't want me to let Petunia die, not when I might be able to forestall it."

"You might be surprised," Snape tightly informed him, eyes fierce. "I knew Lily Evans. I heard her talk about her magic-hating Muggle sister. That alone should have told me that my assumptions about your first eleven years were erroneous. At any rate, I have no doubt that your mother would not want you to undergo a painful, highly dangerous and dubious procedure in hopes of saving someone who has treated you so shamefully."

Harry didn't know what to say to that, since the Potions Master did have a point.

"Furthermore," his teacher went on, "your mother gave her own life to save yours! Do you think she would want you throwing that away for the likes of Petunia Dursley?"

"A little dramatic, as scenarios go," Harry shot back. "Get a grip, would you? I'm not going to die!"

"How do you know that? Have your Divination skills improved?" Snape sneered, waving his hands in a random manner Harry'd never seen from him before. "I did see your O.W.L. results, Mr Potter!"

"Look, if I can survive Cruciatus, I can put up with a needle shoved through to bone."

"Cruciatus," Snape gasped, his hands falling gracelessly to the table, so hard it would leave bruises. "What do you mean, Cruciatus?"

"Aren't as well-informed as you think, are you?" Harry sneered. "Yeah, you heard me. Voldemort cast it on me after he snatched me from the Tri-Wizard Tournament. Imperio, too, and I still made it out of there alive. I'm pretty adaptable; if I wasn't, the Basilisk would have got me! So just stuff your worries in a sock or something--"

Harry abruptly shut up, his mind clanging on a single thought. Oh, shite. That's it, that's why he's looking so shattered, why he can't meet my eyes. He's worried about me. Not the prophecy, not the future . . . me.

"It'll be all right, you'll see," Harry resumed in a lighter tone. "Trelawney would no doubt predict my demise, but she's been wrong every time yet, so you don't have to . . . er, be concerned."

"Cruciatus at fourteen. Dear Merlin." Snape's fingers curled into claws. "Haven't you endured enough? Why must you do this, too? Don't excuse it on account of your mother. I guarantee she would not want this."

"Well," Harry murmured thoughtfully, glancing sideways at Snape, "Hermione would say it's because I have a saving-people thing."

"That is singularly not funny, Mr Potter."

"Better switch back to Harry; I want to go out."

"Out?" Snape looked like he was still contemplating the curses Harry had endured.

"Yeah, can we? You don't sense any dark magic outside, do you? We should head to the hospital, I guess, but I really don't want to Disapparate if it can be avoided."

Snape nodded, pointing his wand, revolving it in a slow sphere, even pointing it towards the floor and ceiling at times, as he incanted Finite Incantatem. Then he swept the wand in a wide arc, his eyes blazing with concentration. When he finished, he shook his head in dismay.

"I think perhaps you'd better come here, Harry."

Understanding what the professor hadn't said, Harry stepped close. Remembering the last time, he closed his eyes and stayed still, only flinching slightly when Snape laid an arm across his shoulders. Then the world was melting around them and through them, but at least when Harry realised he was in the hallway just outside Ward 328, he was still on his feet.

Swaying, almost incoherent, his stomach somewhere near his knees, but he was on his feet.

He took a moment to breathe deeply, some vague part of him glad to still have that arm around his shoulders. Even better, when he went to shake it off, it moved away at once.

"All right?" Snape asked, but not in a pitying way. Just matter-of-fact. Harry liked that.

"Yeah, fine. Winded, but fine. Er, thanks."

Snape gave a slight gesture as though to brush that aside. "Are you sure you want to do this?"

Harry grimaced, but nodded. How bad could it be? Not worse than that dunce Lockhart removing his bones and Madam Pomfrey having to regrow them, surely. Certainly, it couldn't be any worse than Cruciatus, even if he didn't respond to the procedure the way a Muggle would.

An audible breath escaping his lips, Snape remarked, "I must admit, I find myself hoping that you won't be considered compatible, Harry."

"Ha. With my luck?"

"Perhaps your family will refuse, on account of . . ."

"My abnormality," Harry finished. "Well, there is that. I may just have to insist."

Snape placed a hand on his shoulder when Harry tried to go in. "Miss Granger may be right, you know."

"About my saving-people thing?" Harry sighed. "Well, let me just get to it, then."

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Coming Soon in A Year Like None Other:

Chapter Ten: Tests

~

Comments very welcome,

Aspen in the Sunlight

Chapter 10: Tests

http://archive.skyehawke.com/story.php?no=5036&chapter=10

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A Year Like None Other

by Aspen in the Sunlight

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Chapter Ten:  Tests

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It was good to be back at school, Harry thought, even if he knew he was going to find the waiting rather difficult. He wanted to be doing something about Aunt Petunia's problem, which was after all, his problem as well, but that wasn't how the Muggle world worked.

He'd gone into Ward 328, Snape in Remus guise at his side, and between the two of them, they'd somehow managed to get it through Uncle Vernon's thick skull that magic just wasn't going to be an option. The spell didn't exist, they said, and it couldn't be developed. Magic didn't work that way; it wasn't for Muggles. Of course that was an oversimplification, to say the least, but Snape had insisted that Vernon was best equipped to deal with nothing more complex than simple axioms, Harry. Your uncle's not exactly Ravenclaw material, now is he? 

All in all, the news hadn't gone over too well. Vernon had yelled and blustered and pretty much disowned Harry and threatened to kill him, but he took most of it back when Snape calmly laid out the alternative. Harry's willing to donate bone marrow to your wife, the Potions Master had explained. I really do think you ought to thank him.