"Yeah," said Harry again, but deep inside, he wasn't so sure.
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Coming Soon in A Year Like None Other:
Chapter Fifteen: Expecto Patronum
~
Comments very welcome,
Aspen in the Sunlight
Chapter 15: Expecto Patronum
http://archive.skyehawke.com/story.php?no=5036&chapter=15
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A Year Like None Other
by Aspen in the Sunlight
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Chapter Fifteen: Expecto Patronum
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Kneeling just before the hearth in the downstairs parlour, Harry pointed his wand at the scattered ashes within, and bellowed with all his might, "Incendio!"
A single tendril of ash fluttered slightly upwards, then cascaded back to join its fellows in the grate.
"See, that was better," Remus said, all encouragement. "That time something happened."
"Remus, I blew on it, is all!"
Harry flopped onto the floor and stretched out full-length, almost wishing a doxy or a grindylow would come flying out of the shadows. At least then, he'd get to watch Remus do some magic. His own, he was sad to admit, wasn't working at all.
Well, at least Remus didn't have Snape's awful habit of snapping that he wasn't trying, even when he was. He had been trying, with all his might. To visualize the flash of fire from his wand, to feel the sizzle deep inside him rising to the surface of his skin and then beyond, to make the spell come out.
But it was just no use.
"Come now, back to work," Remus quietly insisted, pulling Harry up by one hand. "We can't let a few setbacks get us down, Harry. Perhaps Incendio wasn't the best place to start. We need something simpler, Wingardium Leviosa, perhaps."
Harry shook his head. Spells didn't get any easier than Incendio, and Remus knew it. Who did he think he was kidding? You only needed one split-second of power to light a fire; raising something aloft and holding it there required you to sustain the magic.
But still, Remus wanted him to, so Harry tried. "Wingardium Leviosa," he incanted at a bit of fluff that had torn loose from inside a cushion on the sofa. He stared at it hard, willing it to rise, but the fluff just stared back. Smirking at him, Harry thought with disgust. He turned to Remus as if to say, Now what?
"Harry, anyone who could produce a Patronus at the tender age you did could not have lost his magic over a mere fever." Rocking on his heels slightly, Remus lost himself in thought. "Ah, perhaps that's what the matter is."
"What?"
Sitting down on the mouldering sofa, Remus patted the spot beside him until Harry sat down, too. "These last few days have concentrated your attention on rather dark thoughts, haven't they?"
"Um . . . well, not really. I mean, I felt a lot worse at the end of last year," Harry admitted, wondering what his former defence teacher was getting at.
"But being thrown into the thick of things with Severus, Harry--"
"Hey, Snape and I are getting along all right, didn't you notice?"
"Professor Snape, Harry, and it was good to see. But still, it can't have been comfortable for you at first. Add to that your worry over the wards, your aunt dying and your uncle attacking you, which I gather has not been an uncommon occurrence, not to mention the terror you felt when you had to subject yourself to general anesthesia, and--"
"Snape's got a big fat mouth," Harry grumbled.
"The point," Remus quietly continued, "is that all these things have weighed on your mind, one after another. I think you're in a dark place, emotionally--"
"Oh great, another load of psychological crap. Are you going to cast me as a masochist again, or just a run-of-the-mill coward this time?"
"Where did you learn a word like masochist?" Remus gasped, taken out of stride.
"Remus, I'm sixteen, not twelve," Harry retorted. "And I read it in a Divination text."
Remus tried to get his thoughts back on track. "You're in a dark place," he repeated, his voice going about as stern as Harry had ever heard it. Which wasn't very stern, all things considered, but it still reminded Harry to stop interrupting. To show a tad more respect, as Snape had said. "Believe me, Harry, it's not nonsense. It's well-established that mental attitude affects healing. You have injuries that need to heal, both physical and magical. Your depression might well be keeping that from happening.
"Therefore, I suggest we work first on the Patronus Charm, which as you know, requires overwhelmingly joyful memories to propel it. By forcing your mind to dwell on those, we will convince your injuries to begin healing."
That was about the daftest thing Harry had ever heard from Remus, primarily because he knew he wasn't depressed. Sure, his life had been dark lately, but when hadn't it been? From cupboards to Voldemort to friends petrified to friends actually dying to his disaster with Sirius, life just hadn't been a bed of roses. But he'd never been depressed, not like Remus meant. He'd just learned to ignore the awful bits, push them aside, and keep going.
Though it had hurt to push Sirius aside, it really had.
Maybe, Harry thought, he was a little bit depressed, after all. He frowned, not liking that idea. Did he seem depressed to Snape, too?
"It's perfectly normal to be feeling blue, after all you've endured," Remus soothed, his glance on him sad and understanding all at once.
Seeing that glance, Harry felt like a hippogriff whose feathers had been ruffled the wrong way. Or maybe more like a hippogriff that had just been insulted. He didn't need coddling, and what was more, he didn't need Remus thinking that he did.
On the other hand, he did understand that Remus was just trying to help. For the sake of their friendship, not to mention his magic, Harry decided, he'd concentrate on mastering his lessons, not on pointless arguments about his feelings.
"All right, Patronus Charm," Harry murmured, standing up and assuming the familiar stance. Now for the memory. Something suffused with positive glee, with giddiness unchecked. That magical, perfect moment when he'd believed he'd get to live with Sirius . . .
Harry flung his arm out, wand held out at an upward angle. "Expecto Patronum!"
Nothing. Absolutely nothing.
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By afternoon, Harry had felt happy thoughts until he was quite literally blue in the face. Hours worth of screaming Expecto Patronum, every minute of them riddled with frustration, hadn't exactly improved his mood.
And for all that effort, he'd not got so much as a silvery hiss from his damned wand.
Well, Harry thought, if he hadn't been depressed before, he certainly was now. He went upstairs to get some sleep, mainly because he didn't want to be nodding off during Occlumency, later. Snape was going to see, this time, that he was taking the skill seriously.
Instead of returning to Sirius' bedroom, he headed into the one he'd shared before with Ron. The beds in there were stripped, but Harry didn't care. He lay down on his uninjured side, and eyes shut, started counting backwards from one thousand. Sometimes that helped him sleep, sometimes not. This time, it did.