He found an old wand, probably one Sirius had outgrown, and tried a few failed spells with it.
Last, at the very bottom of a box, he found a small mirror, the companion to his own. Harry clutched it, moaning, experiencing again the awful feelings he'd suffered when he'd found his mirror after Sirius' death. It wasn't just grief that he'd never be able to talk to his godfather in the mirror, it was a horrible, gut-wrenching sense of guilt. Damn it, he'd had a way to contact Sirius, a way Kreacher's machinations wouldn't have been able to confound. He'd had a way all along, and he hadn't known. If only he had opened the package Sirius had given him! If he had, Sirius would be alive today. Harry would have known not to go on that wild-goose chase to the Department of Mysteries, if only he'd known at the time about the mirror.
Stupid, stupid! Irredeemably, unforgivably stupid!
Harry sat down hard on the ground, bent low over the mirror, and sobbed.
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Harry didn't know how much time had passed, but eventually, his tears trickled to a halt. He sat cross-legged, staring at the walls, which were lit only by a dim glow spelled to go on whenever anyone was present in the cellar. The mirror still lay cradled on his lap, unresponsive and dead. Like Sirius.
Pain gripped his heart anew, but he had no more tears to shed. Somewhere deep inside of him, he felt cold. Freezing, to the very core, the bite of frost so fierce it felt like it was cleaving him.
A slight noise caught at the edge of his consciousness. Mired in grief, Harry didn't register it until it repeated itself at irregular intervals. Then he looked up, and saw a tiny snake slithering forward by slight degrees. Pure maroon, yet with a golden iridescence shimmering as it moved, the snake drew closer, and raised its head, flickering its tongue at him.
Harry blinked, remembering the python at the zoo. This snake, though no longer than his own arm, regarded him with the same curious, somewhat somber expression. It certainly didn't call to mind the more frightening snakes he'd encountered, such as Nagini and the Basilisk.
"Well, hallo there, little fellow," he said by way of greeting, wiping slightly at his eyes.
He didn't know he'd spoken in Parseltongue, which sounded just like English to his own ears, until the snake replied in a hiss which Harry understood completely. How could he not? It sounded like English to him.
"You have been here a long time, man-boy."
Harry sat up a little straighter, and set the mirror aside. "Yes. And you? Do you live down here?"
"There are mice here," the snake replied, slithering forward again, stopping just shy of Harry's knee.
Harry patted his leg, inviting the snake to climb, but it continued to just regard him thoughtfully. "My name is Harry, not man-boy," he offered. "Do you have a name?"
The snake shook its head back and forth in confusion.
Well, that could wait a bit, Harry thought. "Do you like it here?"
"Cold. But there are mice here. I eat, then I climb."
Harry glanced toward the cellar stairs, and understood. "Have you eaten enough for now? I will climb, now, and take you up to warmth, if you like."
At that, the snake nodded, winding itself around the wrist Harry held out.
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Upstairs, Harry lit a fire in the parlour, and throwing some cushions down in front of it, relaxed on the floor. The snake slithered down his arm to the floor, and settled itself in coils on the rug, its head propped up on itself.
"Why do your eyesss drop rain?" it asked, and Harry supposed that as snakes couldn't cry, Parseltongue probably didn't have a word for tears.
"I was upssset," Harry answered in tones that would sound like hissing noises to anyone save himself.
The snake nodded slightly. "Are you ssstill?"
"Yeah, think ssso."
They sat in silence for a few moments, the quiet punctuated only the crackling of fire in the grate. "So warm," the snake finally said. "But it is not the sssame for you, man-boy? You feel warm, but you are still up-sset?"
"Call me Harry," Harry explained again. "But yeah, being warm doesn't really change anything for me."
The snake crawled onto his lap and settled on his thigh. "Becaussse Harry is warm at all timesss."
"Yeah, maybe ssso."
His thigh itched a bit as the snake wriggled a bit. "Then what up-ssets Harry?"
Harry couldn't help but smile a bit. Was he really going to sit here and pour out his troubles to a snake? Well, why not? Better that than let Remus find him brooding. Remus, who would conclude something daft about depression blocking all access to his magic.
Well, it wasn't all blocked, was it? He had more than dreams to base that on, now, he had the Parseltongue itself.
Feeling more like a wizard than he had in a while, Harry finally answered the snake's question. He explained about the Dursleys, about things he'd almost forgotten, they were so long ago. He spoke of his parents, of Sirius trapped in Azkaban when it was Pettigrew all along who had belonged there. Of saving Sirius, and letting Pettigrew go, only to have his kindness repaid in the foulest way after the Tri-Wizard Tournament. He talked of being the Boy Who Lived, and how he'd never wanted the acclaim and expectations that went along with it. He didn't even want to be The Boy. Just . . . a boy. A man-boy now, as the snake had said.
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"Who's Lucinda?" Harry asked after dinner, absently wondering what Remus would say if he poured himself some whiskey; Snape had left the bottle behind.
Remus gave him a hard look. "Where did you hear that name?"
"Today in a dream," Harry tossed out. "I told you, Snape said parts of my dreams were divining things."
"Professor Snape, Harry."
"Yeah, whatever. So anyway, I saw you both in the headmaster's office, and I guess he had asked about this Lucinda, because you were answering that she was well. Who is she?"
Remus hesitated. "A friend."
Well, Harry thought, never let it be said that he couldn't take a hint. "Okay," he answered easily. "Here, have you met Sals?"
He watched Remus' brows arch in surprise as he began speaking to the snake that had been resting comfortably inside the sleeve of his jumper. No doubt Remus was hearing the slurred, hissing noise that was Parseltongue, at least as Hermione had described it.
And then Sals poked his head out Harry's cuff, tongue flickering. Harry brought his other hand around to catch her, and drew her out. "Beautiful, don't you think?"
That one must have been in English, for Remus answered, "Yes . . ." in a hesitant, wavering voice.
"What, you aren't afraid of snakes, are you?" Harry thought to ask.
"No, I just didn't expect one to come crawling out your sleeve. Was it in there all during dinner?"
"Yeah. Asleep, I think. Sals does a lot of that."
"Sals," Remus repeated dubiously.
Harry smiled. "Well, it was going to be Sally, but then I realised I didn't know if Sals here was a girl snake. And I guess I could have asked, but it . . . felt wrong. Hard to explain. I mean, I think I could have got the question across in Parseltongue, but it would have been awkward. So I just decided that Sals would be better. You know, it kind of covers either possibility."
"Why didn't you ask the snake its own name?"
"I tried," Harry acknowledged. "I don't know, maybe they don't have names unless a wizard dubs them. Sals didn't seem to understand at first, but now I think it's clear." He switched to Parseltongue. "This is Remus, Sals."
The snake hissed something at Remus. Harry frowned, and shook his head.