Archive of Our Own

"Potter!"

Harry startles and turns to face the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. Gawain Robards is scowling at him, an angry flush on his cheeks, and he shoves a stack of parchments against Harry’s chest.

"Listen here, you little shit," he says quietly, the threat evident in his voice, "I don’t give a fucking hippogriff’s arse if you’re the bloody Saviour, the Chosen One. If I catch one more of your botched reports, you’re gonna be out on your arse before you can say Quidditch."

Oh. Harry nods numbly, too stunned by the sudden outburst to quip a witty comeback or deny anything. His grip tightens on the parchments, crumpling them slightly.

"Yes sir."

"Good," Robards spits. He shoves Harry out of his way. "Now go fix your fucking cock-ups."

"Yes sir."

Other Aurors in the office stare at him with open curiosity and pity. Nothing new, really. Harry ducks his head and scrambles to his cubicle, face and neck hot with shame. The blissful daze from his last hit is only a memory now, leaving his veins cold and heavy. Everything always feels heavy.

He rewrites the reports. No one cares about those reports, no one looks for them unless a solicitor requests them on behalf of a client, or if the Wizengamot needs evidence for a case. But Harry is never assigned to the big cases anymore, not after the last time. Since they can’t exactly fire him, he’s assigned to clean-up jobs, or simple surveillance jobs. It’s demeaning and he hates being an Auror. But he doesn't know what else he’s meant to do, and it’s leagues better than staying alone at home for days at a time.

Anything is better than staying home alone.

It’s probably why he always signs up for overtime, even if Robards’s secretary gives him a put-upon sigh. Tonight, he’s sent on patrol duty down in Knockturn Alley. It’s been eight years since the end of the war, but criminals never rest. He doesn’t get to hunt down dark wizards or unreformed Death Eaters. He doesn’t get to solve complex cases or shoot first, ask questions later.

It’s a good thing his P.I. business is secret, then.

Before his patrol, he takes a hit, and he feels alive again.

Patrolling Knockturn Alley always gives him a good excuse to investigate whatever cases he’s taken on from civilians. It reminds Harry of all the sneaking around after curfew he used to do with Ron and Hermione when they were at Hogwarts. He even has his Invisibility Cloak stashed in his uniform pocket. His reputation isn’t stellar these days, but his old monikers — the Chosen One, the Saviour of the Wizarding World, the Boy-Who-Lived — still hold some clout. He shouldn’t be surprised; the public is utterly moronic at best, and entirely cruel at worst. So Kingsley continues to parade him around Ministry functions as though he’s a star Auror.

As though he’s still got anything to be proud of.

Harry huffs to himself and rolls his shoulders. Usually his little secret keeps his spirits bright and focused, but maybe he’ll have to adjust the dosage again. Oh, if Snape could see him now — though it’s probably best he doesn’t think about the dour bastard just now.

He walks down the infamous alley, wand held loosely in his palm. His other hand fidgets with a folded piece of parchment; his private assignment. Of course, he doesn’t conduct his Private Investigator business with his real name. That would be the height of stupidity. No — he offers his services under Evan James, and disguises himself with Polyjuice spiked with random Muggle hair. Never the same face, if he can help it. The small office he rents on Blue Kraken Lane, an offshoot street halfway down Knockturn Alley, is under his pseudonym. No one ever needs to know who he really is.

And if he does a better job as a P.I. than an Auror… well, no one but him has to know that either.

It’s just… there are fewer rules. No red tape. No reports. Sure, he keeps records, because he understands how useful those are. But they’re not the meticulous, bureaucratic hippogriff shit he has to fill in at the D.M.L.E.. And no one gives a rat’s arse if he shows up in any sort of altered state of mind.

The White Wyvern pub is quiet tonight, and the patrons are too used to seeing him there to make much of a fuss about having an Auror in their midst. He wonders when that changed; he’s quite sure that if Ron or even Malfoy stepped in wearing their red Auror kit, they wouldn’t be greeted with passive tolerance.

Harry nods to the hag behind the bar and surveys the room. It’s the usual crowd, as far as he can see. A few recognisable faces, but no one he’d feel somewhat ethically obligated to think about arresting for some nonsense or another.

The first floor is badly lit and dingy. There’s a room that smells like wet dog and piss, and he stays clear from that one; Harry doesn’t need to be messing with werewolves right now. The next room, musty and lit with only one candle on an altar, doesn’t require his attention either. Sure, demonic worshippers should concern him; but as far as Harry knows, there’s no real harm to them and their rituals. It’s just another form of Paganism, and who is he to interrupt one’s religious observations?

The room that interests him is closed, and the worn copper sign hanging off it is flipped to read BUSY. Harry sighs and leans against the wall next to it, ready to wait however long it takes. He’s here on business, after all, even if it isn’t strictly Auror business. This new, personal case he’s taken on is actually quite different from his typical cases. It came as a surprise, when he started his private office, that he was actually good at finding people. They weren’t always alive, sure, but he still found them. Over the years, he’s perfected his tracking methods, and unless someone disappears into thin air, he always closes his cases.

Unlike most cases he sees coming across the Auror desks.

Still. He specialises in finding people. Sometimes that means telling his client that their person has been sold into a trafficking ring, and that it will cost them more for him to retrieve them. Unless they’re children; when he comes across one of those kind of rings, he makes it his private affair to deal with these monsters.

And if no one hears about a few of those bastards — well, who else has to know?

Harry fidgets with the folded piece of parchment. At least tonight he doesn’t have to worry about treading in unknown waters. The wizard he’s set to meet is a good contact, and discreet. He’s never left Harry wanting for information, and never sold him any rubbish either. Half of his business likely rests on this wizard’s shoulders, and while they aren’t friends, they trust one another with their mutually beneficial deals.

Which is why, when the door finally opens and a harried witch hurries away and down the stairs, Harry smiles for the first time this week and turns on his heel to enter the room without a care in the world.

"Took your bloody time, were you sweet on her or some—"

There’s a wand at his throat instantly. It’s not his contact’s pale birch wand, and the wizard holding it with a steady, graceful hand is not—

"Where’s Colm?" he asks, unfazed by the threat of violence.

Severus Snape sneers down at him. Harry hasn’t seen him in at least a year, but he’s the same as ever. Silvery white hair at his temples, ghastly scars at his throat, crow’s feet at his eyes. The learned cruelty he’s never managed to rid himself of, even after the war, even after Harry had seen his memories. It clings to him like a second skin, and Harry knows by now that it’s an armour he’ll never divest himself from.

"And pray tell, Potter," Snape purrs dangerously, "what business you have with Colm Murphy?"

"None of your concern." Harry shoves Snape’s arm away. He’s certainly not afraid of Snape.

"On the contrary, it is entirely my concern." Snape crowds him against the wall, his voice velvet and oil and barbed wire all at once. "As you can surely deduce, despite your clearly reduced faculties, Mr Murphy has handed me his business."

Harry stares and tries to make sense of that. Colm is not that old nor a wanted wizard by law, and as far as Harry knows, he’s kept his nose clean from the truly nasty affairs one might stumble across in Knockturn Alley.

It only catches up to him now that Snape knows Harry’s taken a hit. He presses his lips in a firm line and tries to shove the other wizard away. Snape doesn’t budge, only arches an eyebrow at him. Harry scowls and squares his jaw.

"Let me go. I’ve got no deal with you."

"Wrong answer, Potter." Snape gets closer still, until there’s barely an inch between their chests. Silence stretches for a whole minute, where they simply breathe each other’s air and catalogue everything about the other. "I thought you had quit this rubbish."

It’s not what Harry expects, so he lets out a surprised but humourless laugh.

"You always fancied yourself all-knowing, Snape. You don’t know shit about me."

Snape hums, and moves closer still, until their chests press together. Their faces are close enough that Harry can smell cloves off the other’s robes, a scent so familiar it makes him lightheaded. Without quite meaning to, he leans his forehead against Snape’s.

"How high are you?" Snape asks, a whisper no ghost could ever hear.

Harry shakes his head, even if he knows it’s useless to deny it. For all his posturing, Snape does know him enough for this. To know all of Harry’s ugliest weaknesses. To know where to press hard enough to hurt till he bleeds.

"Three drops two hours ago," he finally says, when Snape doesn’t move or ask anything else.

"Idiot boy." Snape sighs and tilts his head just so, his long nose pressing into Harry’s cheek. His voice is so soft, the silkiness of it like a balm right into his ears. "Mr Murphy is your supplier, then."

Harry licks his lips. "Yeah."

It’s maddening, to be so close yet to feel so unsure about what he can do. Can he reach out and touch, can he grab robes and tear them to shreds to get to the body underneath, can he run his fingers through feather-soft hair and pull hard enough to elicit a gasp?

He doesn’t know, so he doesn’t move.

Harry doesn’t know where he stands with Snape anymore, and he wasn’t prepared to see him tonight. He tightens his fist holding the piece of parchment, the crinkling noise of it enough to give him some of his wits back.

"Did you take over Colm’s business, then? Every part of it?" he asks, not daring to speak much louder than a murmur either.

Snape hums and reaches for Harry’s fist, easily getting him to loosen his grip to grab the note. "Is that why you’re here tonight?"

"Yeah."

A tension he hadn’t noticed before melts away from Snape’s shoulders, and Harry almost thinks he’ll get to steal a filthy kiss or two, but Snape pulls away swiftly. He unfolds the note and reads it silently.

"What is this?" he eventually asks, as Harry knew he would.

"A shipment tracking number." When Snape only arches that eyebrow of his at him, Harry rolls his eyes. "Apparently someone’s been tampering with the goods, and reselling them."

"Since when do you involve yourself in drug trafficking?" Snape flicks his wand to duplicate the note and pockets his own copy before handing Harry back the original.

Harry shrugs. "I don’t. I just take whatever job someone pays me to investigate."

"Indeed. If someone paid you to spread your legs, would you justify it that way too?" Snape throws, poison on that damned silver tongue of his.

"Fuck you." Harry shifts on his feet and straightens his Auror robes. "Can you help me, or not? You must know how well I pay Colm, if you’ve taken his place." He doesn’t ask what happened to Colm. He’ll find out for himself sooner or later.

At least Colm’s replacement is someone he can trust with his life.

"I have other transactions to see to tonight." Snape straightens his own black robes, making a show of adjusting every button on his sleeves and down his throat. Harry can’t help staring and following these blasted fingers everywhere they go. "Come back to the pub an hour after dawn, I’ll have my books then."

Harry tries not to sigh with too much annoyance. The best thing about Colm is that the wizard always had his accounting books with him, and always made time for Harry. But of course Snape would make Harry wait all bloody night. Nothing’s ever been easy with that bastard.

"Fine. See you then."

He leaves without a single glance back over his shoulder. According to his Tempus, sunrise is in five hours. He can kill five hours on patrol, and he’ll have time to dip back to his flat to imbibe just a bit before his mood hits the ground too roughly. It’s not like Snape expects to see him sober, does it?

The remainder of the night crawls by. Just as his shift finishes, he pops back to the Ministry to fill in the few reports of the night’s patrol — properly, this time, lest he wants Robards on his arse again — and goes home to change. Technically, Grimmauld Place is home and where his friends think he lives, but Harry can’t stand the ghosts that live in the floorboards. Every room reminds him of Sirius, or Lupin, or Tonks, or Fred. Ginny convinced him to redecorate after the war, during the year they were together, but none of it mattered in the end. Where he had managed to escape memories of the dead, it was memories of the living that haunted him.

So instead, he lives in a nondescript flat in Muggle London, where no one would think to find him. No press nor dark wizards to stalk him here.

After a quick shower and a change of clothes, Harry sits at the vanity in his bedroom. From the locked drawer hidden under the polished surface, he retrieves a crystal vial and an eyedropper. He holds the vial against the weak light coming through his bedroom window and shakes it a little, mixing the oily substance inside. It turns from a murky grey to a bright yellow after a few shakes.

The ritual is important. Harry stares at himself in the vanity mirror, observes the dark circles under his eyes that cannot be blamed on insomnia. The unhealthy, yellow undertones of his bronze skin. The chapped lips that he’s sure no one would ever want to kiss, not like this. The lightning scar that runs all the way across his eyebrow, over his eyelid, and curves just so above his cheekbone. Without a Horcrux housed inside it, it’s faded to a silvery-white. It’s better than the angry red it was when Harry was a teenager, but it’s still… gnarly.

It’s all he sees, these imperfections, this ugliness he cannot escape. The ritual helps remind him, at least partially, why he does this. Harry takes the eyedropper and sucks in the bright yellow potion. It used to be just once every few months, then once every month. Then a few times a month. Then just when he couldn’t get out of bed in the morning. Then every time he fucked the wizard he shouldn’t be fucking.

Then it was every week, before it became every day. These days, it’s nearly every twelve hours. His tolerance is out of control, if this past night is anything to go by. He can’t make it more than twice a day, it’s too risky.

Harry sticks out his tongue and squeezes out three precious drops of Herosomnium.

The effect is akin to a sunrise. It begins slowly, with the promise of warmth and beautiful colours. Harry leans back in his chair, eyes heavy-lidded, and watches as his own perception of himself changes. The green of his eyes overshadows the black circles underneath. His skin takes on a new shine, as though he’s spent the day in the park. His lips are pink and kiss-bitten, invitingly lush. Even his scar blends in a bit more, less monstrosity and more curiosity.

His chest cavity is warm, honeyed and soft, like he could crawl inside himself and find himself wholly content. His shoulders loosen, and Harry wonders why he can’t feel this way all the time. Why he has to be so utterly broken that his body doesn’t know how to allow him to be happy. Maybe that’s why — he’s never learned it, so how can he be expected to feel it without a little help? No one really understands.

No one but Snape.

Harry inhales deeply and carefully returns the vial and eyedropper into its secret, locked drawer. His hands don’t shake, and he pretends he doesn’t notice the unnatural yellow rim around his pupils whenever he looks at himself again. He’ll never be vain, but it’s so much easier to look at himself when he feels like this. Hero’s Dream — like it was crafted with Harry Potter in mind.

Once dressed, he Disapparates to his office on Blue Kraken Lane. The wards are strong enough here that no one but him can Apparate inside the entire building. Logically, he knows that he doesn’t need to imbibe Polyjuice. It’s just Snape. But Harry Potter is supposed to be sleeping off his night shift at home, not sticking around the White Wyvern meeting a black market potioneer. It’s early enough that he could come across another Auror, and he doesn’t want that.

He chooses the hair of a Muggle of his build. He doesn’t normally care much if the body he borrows is male or female, but he’ll feel better in his own skin if he has all his usual bits. Getting used to a new vessel is much like flying; it only takes him a few steps to find his balance, and then he feels like he’s been doing this his whole life. Perhaps it shouldn’t be so easy; perhaps it means he’s deeply uncomfortable in his own body.

But he doesn’t want to drown in that particular line of existential introspection, so Harry shrugs on his messenger bag and heads to the White Wyvern.

Snape waits for him in the corner of the pub. He already has an ale on the table for Harry, and he nurses his own tumbler of black liquid. It smells a bit like blackcurrant and sin.

"Well?" he says as a way of greeting. Snape’s eyes had fixed on him the moment he’d entered the pub. Harry doesn’t know what gave him away, but he doesn’t particularly care. It’s just Snape — he’s fucking weird.

Snape rolls his eyes and retrieves a ledger from inside his cloak. "Muffliato. Who hired you for this job?"

Harry pauses with his free pint only an inch from his mouth. Colm never used to ask him this kind of question. "That’s for me to know, not you."

"I must insist," Snape says, that damned velvety yet barbed voice slithering under Harry’s skin. "Do you have any proof that shipments were… tampered with?"

"No, and that’s why I need to know where it went, so I can go have a look for myself." Harry shakes his head and takes a healthy drink from his pint. It’s disgusting and lukewarm, but it’s free. "Why?"

Snape shifts on his seat and opens the ledger at the right page, elegant finger pointing right at the shipment number. "It’s one of mine. I would have known—"

"Fuck, you’re a supplier for Kokozov?" Harry blurts as his eyes skim the page. "That’s—"

"Potter—" Snape hisses, but Harry ploughs over his warning.

"—fucking idiotic. Don’t you know what his lot is capable of?" Harry sets down his pint heavily and pulls the ledger towards himself. "Kokozov’s managed to remain hidden from the D.M.L.E.’s radar for years, and not because I’m helping them any. No one knows who they actually are and—"

Snape’s hand suddenly covers his mouth. Harry squawks in indignation and turns to face the other wizard, but the warning in Snape’s black eyes stops him short. Despite their position, Herosomnium keeps Harry from panicking. It also keeps the fear at bay, even if rationally Harry knows he should be a little afraid of the skeletons hiding in Snape’s closet. Could it be—?

When he protests no further, Snape drops his hand and wipes it on his trouser leg, a sneer firmly in place.

"It’s you, isn’t it?" Harry finally asks, wishing he hadn’t learnt this about his old professor. "You’re Kokozov." Does this mean the wixen employed by Kokozov are some of Snape’s old contacts from the war?

"Who gave you the job?" Snape counters instead, tugging the ledger back to his side of the table.

Harry never divulges the name of his client. Never. They don’t even know who they’re trusting with their inquiry, so he protects this last little part just so he can… feel a bit better about himself. He purses his lips and stares down at his lukewarm ale. Fuck, but he does trust Snape, so why is he hesitant to do so now? He sighs heavily and slumps in his chair. It hasn’t even been an hour since his hit, and it’s doing only half of its job.

"Narcissa Malfoy."

He chances a glance at Snape, and frowns. Snape is frozen in place, lips parted and eyes oddly emotional. Even after the war, Snape continued to cling to his Occlumency just as tightly as he did his veneer of cruelty. It’s always about control with Snape, and right now he looks like he’s completely lost control of his reaction. Harry clears his throat and knocks Snape’s knee with his own.

"Snape?"

The black eyes snap back into focus, and Snape inhales sharply. "Indeed?"

"What, why are you reacting this way?" As far as he knows, Narcissa Malfoy isn’t involved in the darker aspects of the magical community; for all he knows, Draco Malfoy is the one with the yellow rim around his pupils.

For all he knows, Snape and Mrs Malfoy haven’t been in contact much since the end of the war. Have they?

Harry has to tamper down the sudden flare of jealousy that burns a hole through his breastbone. He swallows a heavy gulp of nasty ale and shuffles on his chair.

"Use your head, Potter," Snape hisses. "Why would Narcissa want me investigated by the Boy Wonder?"

He huffs. "First, she doesn’t know it’s me, you know that. Second, she couldn’t have known it was your shipment."

"She knows."

"What? Why—" Harry sputters, then shakes his head. "You’re a bloody idiot. You told her?"

Severus’s lips pinch tightly. Harry immediately recognises the signs of Snape shutting down and closing off, but he can’t have that right now. This case has suddenly gotten very strange.

"No, no, you don’t get to—"

"Oh? Auror Potter wants to tell me what to do, now?" Snape sneers, pushing his chair away from the table. "I’m done here. You have your answer. Obviously, it wasn’t me who tampered with the shipment."

"Sure," Harry quickly agrees, standing with Snape so the wizard doesn’t slip away, "but who takes care of your delivery? What’s got you so bothered about Mrs Malfoy getting a tampered dose of—" He cuts himself off as he feels the magic of the Muffliato drop. "Snape."

He follows Snape outside the White Wyvern, somehow always three steps behind him. "Wait!"

Snape doesn’t wait, but he also doesn’t Disapparate. Which he would do if he truly wanted to get away from Harry. Instead he leads Harry all the way back to his P.I. office on Blue Kraken, and stands stiffly at the door until Harry unlocks it. Harry’s not even surprised that Snape knows where it is.

As soon as it’s closed and locked again, Harry’s wand chimes the end of his Polyjuice dose. Instead of topping up, he grimaces through the change back into his own body. The moment he places his glasses back on his nose, he’s shoved against the wall by Snape.

Their faces are close, a phantom imitation of their positions earlier in the night. Snape breathes heavily, colouring the air between them with blackcurrant and cloves. Harry could get addicted to this taste, to Snape’s mouth. Before he can think better of it, he closes the distance between them and catches Snape’s mouth in a bruising kiss.

There’s nothing loving or tender about it. There never was, between them, and Harry sees no reason to change that. They’re both made of ugly things and scars and pleasure always feels better when it’s paid with pain. It’s easier to accept the tenderness of kisses when there are teeth behind each of them. Harry bites Snape’s lip hard enough to break the skin, and Snape growls deep in his throat. It raises the hairs on Harry’s neck, and he shivers.

"Fuck," he groans, then shoves Snape back against his desk. The movement sends inkwells and manila folders to the ground, but he doesn’t care. "Fuck. You bloody bastard." His words are punctuated with the rapid shuffling of Snape’s cloak, trousers, and pants. Even from this angle, Harry can see how hard Snape is. "Tell me to stop."

Snape snarls and points his wand at his own arse, even if they both know the spells aren’t enough to stretch him properly. Neither of them care. Still, Harry pushes two fingers inside Snape’s hole, scissoring them rapidly — he’s no monster — before replacing them with his own hard cock. The slide inside isn’t swift. Every inch of Snape’s arse is tight, even when he bears down.

"Good Godric," Harry groans, sweat building on his brow already, "you’re so bloody tight."

"Some of us don’t spread our legs for a hit," Snape says mockingly, cruelly, his hips doing absolutely sinful things that make Harry’s knees feel like jelly.

"I’m not a whore, fuck you." Harry grabs Snape’s hips to still them, digging his nails into the sallow flesh until Snape lets out an impatient whine. "Yes, fine, I know."

And oh, how he knows. He knows how Snape likes to be fucked. The older wizard is the easiest yet best shag Harry always has. There’s something about splitting his pale, round arse on his prick that obliterates everything else in his mind. Herosomnium isn’t his only addiction. Severus Snape is as potent a drug.

Harry shifts his weight on his feet and pushes his cock further inside the hot, tight hole. When he bottoms out, he lets out a deep sigh. Gods, but Snape’s arse will be the end of him. He huffs when Snape makes another impatient noise, and pulls out slowly. It feels divine, the slow, underprepared stretch.

"Potter, if you don’t—Fuck!"

His hips snap back against Snape’s arse. The pull is slow still, but every thrust back inside is hard and fast. He sets the pace as such, eyes glued to the spot where they’re joined. No matter how many times they shag, Harry can rarely look away from the act itself. It’s almost primal, this urge to see him claim Snape’s body for himself. It feels a little like victory, and a little like he’s fallen right into Snape’s trap. They’re both predators, a snake and spider dancing around one another with fangs filled with venom, tangled in a web of silk. They bruise and ache and take one another harder than they would anyone else.

He could do this for hours. They’ve done it, in the past. Once or twice. Shagged themselves silly, until Harry’s office smelled like spunk, sweat, and cloves. He doesn’t know, exactly, why they always keep circling back to each other like this. He doesn’t even remember how or why it began. All that matters is that Snape is his, right now, and Harry will make him paint the underside of his desk with his spend. Join the rest of the stains under there.

They aren’t together — not in the traditional sense. But Harry knows Snape doesn’t take other lovers. Just as Harry doesn’t, either. How could they, when every other person would have to compare to this?

Harry snakes his arm around Snape’s waist and grabs his weeping prick. His thumb presses into the wet slit, spreading precome over the tip and then shaft. It eases the way, and soon Snape fucks both back onto Harry’s cock, and forward into his fist. It makes an obscene wet squelching sound, and drives Harry’s hip faster and harder. He presses his forehead down between Snape’s shoulder blades, panting with the exertion, but he doesn’t slow down.

The telltale shiver runs through Snape’s body, and his arse squeezes tightly around Harry’s cock. Harry moans and shifts his angle just so — hitting Snape’s sweet spot with renewed vigour. It doesn’t take long, just half a dozen thrusts, and Snape comes all over Harry’s fist and on the underside of his desk. The tight heat of Snape’s arse, his convulsing orgasm, and the wetness on Harry’s fingers is enough to send him over the edge as well. He groans and grinds his hips hard enough to bruise, hard enough for Snape to hiss in a mix of discomfort and pleasure.

They stay like this for another minute, each catching their breath. Boneless and decidedly less on edge, Harry wandlessly gets rid of the mess on his hand and pulls out of Snape’s arse. He tucks himself back in while Snape pulls his pants and trousers up.

Harry collapses into his chair and leans his head back, eyes closed. "Who takes care of your deliveries?" he asks, as though nothing had interrupted their earlier conversation. He cracks an eye open, training it on the other wizard.

Snape gingerly sits on Harry’s desk, a lit fag between his lips already. The strange, dark green smoke fills his office with the scent of cloves.

"Dan Horowitz." He blows out a small cloud and watches it dissipate instead of watching Harry. "An alias, before you ask."

Harry rolls his eyes despite having closed both of them again. "Obviously," he drawls, a juvenile imitation of Snape’s classroom voice. Harry grabs his messenger bag and pulls out a thin manila folder. As he leafs through it, he confirms his suspicion that Horowitz is part of Kokovoz’s crew. "Where did that shipment go, once Horowitz had it?"

Snape pinches his lips before sighing in irritation, nostrils flaring as more dark green smoke blows out. Harry can tell he doesn’t want to divulge this information, but there’s a reason suppliers aren’t normally the front faces of businesses like this one. Rolling his eyes again, Harry summons one of the discarded folders that has KOKOVOZ scribbled on it. Snape huffs, almost in amusement, and watches Harry leaf through that folder instead of answering him. Annoying bastard.

While his reports to Robards are written with minimum effort, his own, personal reports and database are kept up to date and filled with all sorts of information. Sure, it might not matter how this or that smuggler takes their afternoon tea — but Harry’s found himself in enough tight situations to know that any piece of information might come in useful one day.

"Huh," he eventually says, once he finds the names he was looking for. "Kokovoz’s operation always runs smoothly, I’ve found. No cracks in the walls, no weak link. I always suspected your lot to be guarded with mercenaries, perhaps retired Hit Wizards." Harry taps his file and looks up at Snape. "They’re all trained by the same person, aren’t they?"

Snape shrugs, a little too nonchalant to be genuine. "Perhaps." Another cloud of dark green smoke fills the space between them.

"Tom Horowitz is your distributor, once Dan Horowitz delivers it to him. High-quality product like yours doesn’t go anywhere but those blasted high society parties, does it?" Harry pushes, and from the minute twitch of Snape’s brow, he knows he’s on the right track. "I know Kokovoz supplies rich bastards like Malfoy and Nott."

"Do you?" Despite their very recent shag, Snape’s silky and oily and barbed-wire voice sends a powerful shiver down Harry’s spine.

"Yeah," he says, more confident in his theory now. "Yours was the first I tasted. Nott held a party at the turn of the millennium. I’d just broken up with Ginny, and I remember you were there."

He’d been twenty, then, depressed out of his mind and seeing too many ghosts for it to be healthy. Malfoy was his assigned partner at the time, and they’d gotten along well enough after their third fist fight. Malfoy was a dangerous acquaintance to have; he knew everyone’s dirty little secrets, somehow, and he’d divined that Herosomnium was exactly what Harry had been looking for. That Severus Snape was exactly what Harry needed.

Licking his lips and tasting the remnants of blackcurrant liqueur, Harry runs a hand through his hair and sighs heavily. Logically, this case doesn’t make sense. Why would Narcissa Malfoy send him to investigate Kokovoz, whom she must know is actually Snape, and whose entire operation has run smoothly for almost a decade? Not to mention, Harry has no proof that the product has actually been tampered with, no leads, and Mrs Malfoy doesn’t actually know that Harry is Evan James, Private Investigator.

He frowns and rubs his chin pensively. The sun is making headway outside his window, which means he’s been up for nearly 24 hours by now. Harry glances up at Snape and catches him watching, eyes heavy-lidded and thin lips still dark from their fervent snog. Harry licks his lips again and clears his throat.

"I’ll investigate the validity of the claim tomorrow," he finally says. "See what the product looks like, if it’s actually been tampered with. Might lead me to finding out who’s reselling it, too."

Snape only inclines his head in acknowledgement. With a quick swish of his wand, Harry sets his office back to its previous orderly chaos and shoulders his messenger bag. He usually has the day off after a night shift of patrolling, but he often drops by the office by midday to grab another shift to distract himself. Today, though…

Throat tight and eyes wary, he extends an arm towards Snape. "Well?"

The other wizard studies him for nearly a minute, then takes his arm. Harry refuses to consider the reasons behind it, or the reasons why it sets his heart racing in his chest. They Disapparate with a quiet pop and reappear in Harry’s flat.

Harry’s flat, where he’s never brought anyone else.

Snape looks around, but thankfully doesn’t comment on how this is not Grimmauld Place. Instead, once his eyes settle back on Harry, all thoughts seem to flee both their heads. There’s an untamable sort of heat in these black, depthless eyes. A lust so wild that it nearly triggers Harry’s fight-or-flight response, makes him want to duel Snape until they’re both breathing heavily, panting, hard bodies pressed together—

And why can’t he? Harry grabs the back of Snape’s neck and pulls him forward until their lips meet. It’s just as urgent, just as violent as their kisses always are. Tenderness has a price attached to it, and Harry can’t control this irrational desire to claim everything Snape has to offer. Teeth pull his lip and fingers tug his hair, and before he knows it they’re both pressed against a wall again. The fire in his veins makes Harry feel so alive, more than Herosomnium has ever managed.

They manage to make it to Harry’s bed, and Harry spares a single thought about how they haven’t fucked in a bed in years. It’s always quick, with them, always a mind-numbing sort of emergency that means they usually just make do with any surface that can support them. But now, with Snape caging him against the unmade bed, their shirts lost somewhere and their trousers wide open, Harry wonders if there was ever another reason they never made it to a bed before. All thoughts about the case slide away into a corner of his mind, as he busies himself with mapping every inch of Snape’s back and sides with his hands.

Snape drops his forehead against Harry’s as his fingers squirm under Harry’s balls to pet his hole. "You will be the death of me, Potter," Snape mutters with too much feeling, too much pain. "What you do to me…"

Harry whines, knowing full well what Snape means. Because Snape does the same to him; he has, since that blasted party he’d let Malfoy convince him to attend. This is why neither of them take other lovers. How could anything or anyone compare to this? They destroy each other exquisitely, over and over. Harry wants to sob when Snape pushes a slick finger inside him.

"Fuck," Snape breathes out, their breaths mingling with the scent of sex and cloves. "You take me so well."

"More," Harry says, impatient and needy, "give me more."

Snape huffs, all too fond, and pushes a second finger in. It’s nothing like how they fucked just a few hours ago, in Harry’s office. There’s a bed, and Harry is realising there’s no pain, and the imbalance of their scales puts him on edge. Yet when Snape scissors him, fills the air with the obscene wet sound of his fingers thrusting in Harry’s arse, it’s easy to give himself to the pleasure.

He trusts Snape with his life; what is his life, if not this?

It doesn’t take long after that for Snape to slide inside him. When he’s fully sheathed inside Harry, they breathe together, trembling and kissing clumsily. Have they ever kissed like this while fucking, before? Harry feels like he should think a bit more about this, a bit more about why this is happening the way it is. Snape’s eyes are still black coals of lust, and they sear all of Harry’s thoughts away.

It’s so easy to give in.

Snape fucks him long and slow. Every brush of his prick against Harry’s prostate has them both gasping. Harry won’t last long, but he does his best to hold onto this unfamiliar feeling blooming in his chest. It grows and grows, rampant vines covered in thorns that prick his heart and his ribs. Every breath has them tighten around his lungs, until he’s moaning and crying out as he comes untouched. Snape growls and fucks into him harder, faster, until his hips stutter with his own climax.

The vines covered with thorns don’t recede, don’t let go of this unseemly world inside his chest. Perhaps this is the price of pain, then, to have his entire heart and soul captured so thoroughly by Severus Snape.

Harry closes his eyes and falls asleep with his face in Snape’s neck.

Snape is gone when Harry wakes, but it’s late in the afternoon, so he doesn’t question it.

He showers, dresses, and makes himself some late lunch. Normally, he tries to keep his P.I. case files at his office, but sometimes he needs a change of scenery to help him think outside the box. Not to mention modern lighting makes this much easier than the magical lamps he has to use over there. While the dishes wash themselves, Harry spreads his current case on the kitchen table.

Narcissa Malfoy came to him almost a week ago. She doesn’t know — shouldn’t know, he clarifies to himself — that Private Investigator Evan James is in fact Harry Potter. But now that he’s looking at everything laid out like this, he has to wonder. Kokovoz’s organisation is a well-oiled machine; they’ve managed to stay clear from law enforcement. Every Auror knows of it, of course, but every time they’ve apprehended someone named Horowitz, they’ve succeeded in slipping away. None of them have broken or given up information, and so none of them have been arrested.

So why now? How could it be that they suddenly get targeted for their shipment of what Harry is sure contained Herosomnium? It doesn’t make sense. He would have heard of it at the office, surely, even if he wasn’t dispatched to deal with it. A lot of Aurors think he’s dimwitted, a bit dumb in the head, after getting hit by Voldemort’s second Killing Curse. It’s easier, sometimes, to pretend that he is. He’s had to learn the value in being underestimated rather than feared for his powers.

Harry looks over his notes. Tom Horowitz, he knows, is the wix who distributes at parties held by the rich pure-blood families. Weddings, charity balls, naming ceremonies, private Pagan festivities. A rival, then, perhaps? Someone who knows how much gold Tom Horowitz could make at one of those, and they planned to get to the lion's share for themselves.

He’s still a bit bothered by Snape’s reaction to it. And why Snape even replaced Colm Murphy. It’s nasty business ethics, he knows, for the head of an organisation to take over primary contact like this. He bites his lip and runs a hand through his hair. Could it be a ploy to get Snape into trouble? No, impossible. Mrs Malfoy and Snape are close friends, she wouldn’t do that to the man who kept her son safe during the height of the war.

Harry sighs and gathers everything. It’s no use thinking too hard about it now. He needs to visit a few people. His next shift at the office is tomorrow morning, so he had the rest of the afternoon and the evening to deal with this. Plenty of time to cross a few names on his list.

He finishes his tea, gets dressed, and Apparates to his Blue Kraken Lane office. A dose of Polyjuice later, and he Disapparates to the coordinates he has for this Tom Horowitz wix. He has no idea where he’s going, or if this will be a false lead, but it’s all he has for now.

When he knocks on the flat’s door, in a nondescript Muggle area in Sussex, he doesn’t expect much. But then the door opens, and Harry stares with his mouth open because what the fuck.

"Can I help you?" Cho Chang hasn’t changed much since Harry last saw her a few years ago at a Ministry gala. She works in the Department of Magical Games and Sports, so their paths don’t often cross. She’s also a retired Hit Wizard.

What the bloody hell is she doing getting mixed up with Kokozov’s organisation?

Harry blinks a few times and laughs nervously, trying to play off his surprise.

"Sorry to bother you, I was expecting someone else."

Cho frowns and looks behind Harry, suspicious all at once. "Oh?"

"Yeah," he says with feigned nonchalance, stuffing his hands in his jean pockets, "someone by the name of Tom."

Her eyes immediately narrow and her posture straightens. "No Tom here, I’m afraid." But she doesn’t close the door.

Harry has to wonder — is there a secret code he’s missing? A line, perhaps, that would clue her in that he’s on her side? Surely, Snape would have mentioned it if there was? Instead, he tries his best smile, though he has no idea how it looks on this Muggle’s face.

"You sure? No Tom Horowitz?"

It’s a gamble. For a moment, Cho hesitates, and glances behind and around Harry again. Before he can try another track, she grabs his arm and pulls him inside her flat. As soon as the door is closed, she shoves him against it and points her wand at his throat. His pulse jumps and he idly wonders if it was the potential for danger in Cho Chang that attracted him to her in school.

"Who are you?" she hisses, wand tip digging into his throat. "Who sent you?"

Harry swallows and tries to push her hand away, but it only causes Cho to push her wand harder against his skin. He sighs, slightly annoyed now.

"No one sent me, Tom Horowitz." From the twitch of her eye, Harry hit the nail on the head. "No. I’m here because I’ve been asked to investigate a certain shipment. One you were supposed to distribute a few weeks ago."

That throws her off. She takes a step back, wand still trained on him.

"Kokovoz sent you," she breathes, eyes wide. "It wasn’t me. I never got the bloody shipment. It never got delivered."

Harry is inclined to believe her. Cho has never been very good at hiding her emotions, just like him. He straightens his jacket and pulls on his sleeves before looking back up at her.

"Who were you supposed to distribute it to?" he asks, as matter of fact as he can.

She hesitates again, torn between lying and telling him the truth just so he’ll leave her. Clearly, Kokovoz has instilled a healthy amount of fear in his subordinates. It’s just like Snape, really, and Harry isn’t surprised by that at all.

"It was for the Malfoy’s Ostara party," she grits out. "I couldn’t just… go there empty-handed."

No, he imagines not. A bunch of junky pure-blood wixen would not have been pleased to have their party ruined by a lack of drugs. He arches an eyebrow, inviting her to continue.

Her lips twist, and there is true anger in her voice when she speaks next. "But someone provided the entertainment anyway. Someone got the gold that was supposed to be mine. And because they all thought it was coming from me, when they realised it was a shit quality because it had been diluted, they blamed me."

"Hmm." Harry nods once. "Who was it?"

Her cheeks flush and her wand hand wavers slightly. "Someone ‘juiced up as me."

Well. This isn’t what he expected. A shiver runs down his spine as he considers his options. The Malfoy Pagan parties are popular and renowned; they’re lavish, beautiful, and invitations are highly sought after. No one, even a recognisable face, would have been able to get in without an invitation. So either someone stole Cho Chang’s invitation, or they were already part of the crowd.

"Do you still have your invitation?"

"Yes. Do… do you need it as proof?" She almost sounds hopeful, as though Harry can absolve her of these false accusations.

Unfortunately, he doesn’t care enough to do that. She decided to get involved with Kokovoz’s organisation, and she was sloppy enough for someone to get a hair or nail clipping to impersonate her.

"Sure," he says instead, "it can’t hurt."

Cho eyes him once more and nods stiffly before hurrying into the adjacent room. Harry doesn’t have to wait long for her to return with a pale yellow envelope made of expensive parchment. It hasn’t even been opened.

"Will you—" Cho cuts herself off, darting her eyes away from Harry.

Harry shrugs, turning around to open the door. "I’m not Kokovoz’s man, Tom Horowitz. You’ll have to deal with him yourself."

Before Cho can get over her shock, Harry steps outside and Disapparates on the spot. Sure, there were enchantments there to prevent it, but he’s long learned how to slip between those restrictions.

Back at his office, he slumps in his chair. The air smells a bit stale, of sex and cloves, but he doesn’t care. He tops up on his Polyjuice when his wand chimes, and ponders sending a letter to Mrs Malfoy about this new discovery. Someone must have used their personal invitation while posing as Cho, but it will be gruelling work to get it all sorted. He sighs, thinking about all the work he’s got to do, and doesn’t quite notice until he’s returned from Malfoy Manor with the old invitations from the Ostara party that he hadn’t used any Herosomnium before he left his flat.

Huh.

It’s almost a week later, between night shifts and extra patrol shifts from the Auror office, that Harry finally finds what he’s been looking for.

One of the invitations has residual magic on it, unlike the others. It shouldn’t be the case — once the seal is broken, the invitation is plain, with the attendee’s name, and the magic allowing them access to the party dissipates. Harry almost wishes he hadn’t found it at all though, when he clears away the residual magic and dispels the glamour charm.

Colm Murphy.

That’s…

He wants to say it’s bloody impossible. Sure, Colm Murphy is a pure-blood Irish wizard, but he doesn’t have any connection to the Sacred Twenty-Eight. Besides, he’s a recognisable face in certain crowds, and would never be found dead at the Malfoy’s private parties. How the bloody hell had he secured an invitation?

Why had he gone there as Cho Chang? No one but Kokovoz would have known of "Tom Horowitz"’s true identity. Perhaps Dan Horowitz, the other piece in this puzzle, but why shoot their own organisation in the back? It makes no bloody sense.

And Harry likes to think he knows Colm. They’ve worked together since the beginning of Harry’s side-career as a P.I., and he’s convinced Colm would never undercut Kokovoz like this. His own client!

It’s late by now, and Harry knows he should go home for the night. He has a shift later tonight at midnight, and he’s running low on his own supply of Herosomnium. He hasn’t seen Snape all week, and — with this whole mess — he’s not entirely sure he could even get his next supply.

He bites his nail and makes a snap decision. He’ll never be able to focus on anything else, and he knows himself. He’s like a dog with a bone, a bloodhound on the hunt. It’s part of what makes him such a good investigator — his instincts never lie to him. And this time, his instincts are screaming at him that he needs to resolve this case as soon as possible.

At his flat, he changes into his Auror kit and goes through his little ritual in front of his vanity mirror. He watches his own eyes for a long minute, basking in the warmth inside his body. It’s almost — almost — as good as when Snape fucked him in his bed. Harry doesn’t think he really knows how to love anyone properly, but if he did — well.

Maybe this different sort of pain is reparation enough for the way Snape looked at him at that moment.

There’s still two hours before his shift, which gives him enough time to do what he needs. Years ago, when Harry was in a tough spot and toying with the wrong sort of potions, Colm had given him access to his home for emergencies. He’s only had to use that privilege once, but he’s positive the wards will still let him in.

And he’s proven right when he Apparates right in front of Colm’s front door. Or so he thinks, until he takes a step past the ward line and a sense of dread immediately fills him. Run! his instincts cry.

But Harry never runs away, even when he should.

Without thinking, he blasts the door open with a spell and rushes inside. It’s quiet and dark, and the air is stale like the house hasn’t been aired out in weeks. The dread only grows at the thought, and Harry hurries through every room.

"Colm?" he calls, heart racing, "Colm, are you here?"

Every room on the ground floor is dark and empty, so Harry runs up the stairs to the first floor. He finds Colm in his bedroom, sitting on the bed with his mousy brown hair obscuring his face.

"Colm?" Harry rushes to his side.

When Colm finally looks up at Harry, it stops him dead in his tracks.

He recognises it immediately. The glassy, empty stare. The unnatural calmness. The lack of Colm’s typical twitchiness.

Wand in hand, with a stunning spell on the tip of his tongue, Harry misses the knife in Colm’s hand until it was too late. In a movement that is too fast for it to be Colm’s normal self, he plunges the knife straight into his own chest.

Again, and again, and again. And Harry can only stare in horror, can only try to stop Colm’s hand.

"No!" Harry cries, dropping his wand and moving to wrestle the knife out of Colm’s hands.

But Colm’s hands are covered with blood, and the knife keeps slipping between both their fingers. Colm fights like a man possessed, like a man so deep underneath the willpower of another wix that he’s lost his last traces of humanity. Somehow, the knife ends up in Harry’s hand, his wrist held tightly in Colm’s own blood-slick hand, and Harry can only watch in abject horror as, together, they slit Colm’s throat.

The only sounds in the room are the clang of the knife as it falls on the floor, Harry’s laboured breath, and the awful gurgling as Colm dies. There’s blood everywhere, and Harry’s hands are soaked with it. He stares, knowing distantly that the only thing preventing him from panicking is the Herosomnium in his blood. Harry feels cold, but his veins are hot with a horrible sort of euphoria.

He’s been staring for so long, lost in his own mind, that he doesn’t notice the other Aurors in the room until someone grabs him roughly. He blinks rapidly, realises how much he’s trembling but unable to do anything about that, and takes in his surroundings.

His heart sinks.

Ron looks down at him, in all his Head Auror glory, his lips twisted in a desperate sort of resignation. Behind him, Malfoy — Ron’s partner, because even Draco Malfoy is a better Auror than Harry — tightens his grip on Harry’s arms. They both radiate anger and disappointment, and that combined with the scene before him, is what breaks Harry.

He hangs his head, and doesn’t speak a single word even as Ron tries to coax him into giving his side of the story. Malfoy is silent and stiff. They’ve bound his wrists, pocketed his wand, and placed a light magic-dampening cuff on his wrist because Ron knows how good Harry is with wandless magic.

Betrayal, deep and sharp, poisons the jagged edges of his heart.

They stick him in a Ministry cell.

His robes are stiff with dried blood, his hands are stained red, and the last bliss of Herosomnium fades from his system in the hours he remains here. At dawn, they drag him into an interrogation room. It’s too bright and he never feels quite right after the downer of the end of a hit, so he can’t help flinching and drawing in on himself.

Snape is already in the room. His back is ramrod straight and he refuses to catch Harry’s eye. They were never open to others about their… liaison. Even Ron and Hermione don’t know that Harry hasn’t shagged anyone but their old Potions professor in years.

They sit him in front of Snape and someone unceremoniously presses their fingers on the hinges of his jaw, forcing Harry to open his mouth. He knows how this goes; one of their own, found at the scene of a murder with the murder weapon.

It’s easy for the entire D.M.L.E. to look the other way when they’re cleaning up their own messes.

Harry swallows the drops of Veritaserum and feels its effects immediately. He thought maybe Snape was here to verify the quality of the truth potion, but he’s not so sure now. He blinks slowly and waits for someone to ask him a question.

"What is your full name?" Ron asks, shoulders stiff as an iron bar.

"Harry James Potter."

"What is your date of birth?"

"July 31, 1980."

Snape inclines his head and finally looks straight into Harry’s eyes. He leans so close, their noses are just a few inches apart. It’s a terrible facsimile to their more intimate moments, but just as the thought appears in Harry’s mind, it’s gone. Snape leans back and looks directly at Ron, ignoring Harry again.

"He’s sober, no longer under the influence of Herosomnium."

The moment Ron acknowledges it and writes it down, Snape takes his leave without a glance over his shoulder. So, that’s why they called him in. They sure as fuck don’t know Snape is Kokovoz, but they know he’s one of the finest Potions Masters of Britain. It makes sense that they would consult him on this.

Even with the effects of the Veritaserum, the back of Harry’s neck heats with shame. It’s not like it’s truly a secret; Ron knows Harry’s partaken in such potions in the past, and Malfoy’s the one who introduced him to it. He supposes they never thought he’d develop a deeper need for the Hero’s Dream than for anything else.

"Why were you at Colm Murphy’s house in the middle of the night?" Ron asks once the silence has stretched for an uncomfortable minute.

Harry doesn’t want to answer, but his mouth opens and words spill out before he can stop them. "He wasn’t there for our last meeting, and I needed to see him after I found out he’d been at the Malfoy’s Ostara party."

Behind Ron, Malfoy frowns and tilts his head. Of course, neither of them know about Harry’s P.I. job. They don’t know that Narcissa Malfoy set him up, somehow, to be there when Colm killed himself. They don’t know that Harry has connections with the black market, with Kokovoz, with so many more wixen than should be normal for an upstanding Auror.

But Harry has never been an upstanding Auror, and he thinks that perhaps both of his interrogators know that.

Malfoy, though, knows more than Ron the kind of questions that could get a lot of people in trouble.

"How do you know Colm Murphy?" Ron asks. Behind him, Malfoy stiffens and presses his lips tightly together.

Well, fuck. Thank all the gods that Harry’s had this sort of training while he was a Junior Auror.

"He was an acquaintance." He wants to stop there, but his mouth won’t let him. "I met him five years ago, at the White Wyvern."

Sweat pearls his hairline and he prays Ron doesn’t notice.

"What were you meeting him for?"

Harry licks his lips and responds in that same monotonous voice. He hates how out of control this potion makes him. "Information. I was meeting him for information."

Ron raises an eyebrow and glances over his shoulder at Malfoy, who is now watching Harry with a pensive look on his face.

"Information on what?"

"A case."

Ron is getting annoyed with him, he can tell, but Harry isn’t about — he will not spill these secrets out, not even to his oldest friend. Somewhere, along the way, they found themselves behind different lines, different sides. Nothing as stark as Good and Evil, but certainly in the lighter and darker shades of grey.

Thank Godric for small mercies; Ron scribbles something down on his parchment and speaks in a tone that indicates he’s addressing Malfoy. "We’ll have to check his past cases. Get Ferdinand on that."

Malfoy hums and twirls his wand between his fingers. "Potter." When Harry focuses his dazed eyes on Malfoy, he understands. He’s fucked. "Did you slit Colm Murphy’s throat with this knife?" he asks, voice oily and needling, just like when they were at school.

Ron doesn’t seem to notice, because his eyes are now focused intensely on Harry.

Harry wants to scream, say No, of course not! But the truth of the matter is that — Colm had grabbed Harry’s wrist. Had placed the knife in Harry’s blood-slicked palm. Had made Harry commit the act of slitting his throat.

In a very technical sense, Harry had slit Colm Murphy’s throat. Veritaserum cares very little for nuance and technicalities. So, of course, as Malfoy appears to know, the only thing that comes out of his mouth is:

"Yes."

Harry is led back to his cell. His entire body is numb, both from the lingering effects from the truth serum and from the inevitable truth of his situation.

There’s no doubt about it: he is complicit in the murder of Colm Murphy. He doesn’t know how he ended up here, or why Malfoy, who’s oddly always been a very upstanding and law-abiding Auror, partook in this farce. He knows now, from the moment Malfoy asked if Harry had slit Colm’s throat, that Malfoy was in on the plot.

His only salvation is that they don’t know about his P.I. office on Blue Kraken Lane. No one does, except Snape. And Snape…

Is Snape in on it, too? Is that why he took over Colm’s entire business? Surely, as the head of the whole Kokovoz organisation, Snape doesn’t have the time to brew, be a mob boss, and be an informant for the likes of Harry. He doesn’t understand, and the headache creeping up behind his eyes isn’t helping any. He’s exhausted, and it’s been more than twelve hours since his last hit.

His veins are heavy and cold. Everything is cold, stiff, and smells like pennies.

Someone brings him a tray of food some time later, and he picks at the food as best he can. Will he be sent to Azkaban until they can hold his trial? Will he be put under house arrest, at Grimmauld Place? No one but Snape knows of his Muggle flat, and he certainly isn’t keen on divulging that information. He feels so alone, so cold. He’ll never say it out loud, but he’s truly terrified of being sent to Azkaban. He’d rather die than be forced to stay there, without his own Patronus to ward off the Dementors.

He shivers and pulls his knees up against his chest, wrapping his arms around them. What a fucking mess. He should never have accepted Narcissa Malfoy’s case. He specialises in disappearances, not drug deals gone awry. Not missing shipments.

Some hours must pass, and Harry feels the heaviness inside every inch of his body more keenly the longer he goes without Herosomnium. He’s sweating too much, his heart rate is too high, and his mind teeters between worrying about his fate at the hands of the D.M.L.E. and obsessing over when he’ll be able to have his next hit. He knows what this is; he’s experienced it enough times before.

When someone opens the door of his holding cell, he doesn’t look up. It’ll be Ron, or another Auror on duty. Maybe it’ll be Malfoy, come to gloat about how Harry is stupid and how he’ll never let Harry get his mother in trouble. The sweats, the pounding headache, and the despair swirling in his heart is a terrible concoction and it makes it difficult to care about what happens to him in the next moment.

The other person sighs, bone-deep and soul-weary.

"Potter."

Slowly, Harry looks up from his knees. "Snape?"

Snape stands in front of the open cell door, dressed in black trousers and coat, not his typical swirling black robes. He blinks a few times and focuses back on Snape’s face.

"You have three choices," Snape murmurs, showing Harry three fingers. "I can leave you here after wiping everything you know about my operation." He cocks his head, a mean sneer on his face. "I believe you know exactly how pleasant memory-altering magic that leaves no trace is." He lowers a finger. "I can give you Hemlock’s Hug, which would kill you before the change of guards in three hours." One finger remains and something softens in Snape’s eyes. The same heat Harry’s only seen directed his way fills those coal eyes. "You come with me and disappear."

"Disappear?" Harry croaks.

Snape hums. "Permanent human transfiguration, not so different from Muggle cosmetic surgery. New name. New wand." He shrugs. "Disappear."

Harry licks his dry lips and tightens his hold on his knees. "Where would I go?"

Instead of answering, Snape shrugs again and gestures to the general world around them.

It’s an enticing, dangerous thought. They’ll never stop looking for him, he knows. There’s also the small matter that he was set up, and perhaps so was Snape. He refuses to believe Snape had anything to do with this plot, and his instincts agree with him.

"Do you need another Horowitz?" he asks after a few minutes of silent consideration.

When Snape sighs, it’s almost fond. Harry knows it doesn’t change anything between them, not really. Their personalities will always be at odds. Snape will always wear his armour of cruelty, and Harry will always bite back at the hand that feeds. It’s in their nature, he supposes, and no manner of circumstances is likely to change that. It doesn’t need to be love, Harry thinks. Neither of them is very suited to fits of romanticism.

But, well.

A small smile crosses his face. Between death, Azkaban, and Snape — the choice isn’t difficult at all.

"We’ve no time to waste," Snape finally says. "There is no going back from this, Potter."

"I know." Harry stands on unsteady legs and grimaces at the state of his appearance. He shucks off his bloody Auror kit, mildly relieved to see that his shirt and trousers have just a bit of blood on them.

As he follows Snape out of his cell, out of the D.M.L.E., out of the Ministry — he wonders if that feeling, the one that made him forget to take another hit of Herosomnium, will be enough to carry him through his new life. After all, he will no longer be anyone’s blasted hero, and he’s damn well glad for it.

When they Disapparate, it feels a little bit like slipping away at long last.