"The Dark Lord will press his mind all the harder into yours if ever he senses that you are blocking him," Snape had explained. True Occlumency, it seemed, involved protecting some thoughts while letting other, less harmful ones, range free. "It must seem that he has vanquished you, Harry, though you must let him see only what you wish him to see. Prepare an arsenal of memories and impressions that he can access without restriction. Cast these above your image, in layer after layer for him to sift through. Never give him cause to suspect that anything more lies beneath."
So now, in addition to working with Remus and practicing clearing his mind, Harry spent several hours each day with quill in hand, cataloguing a huge array of memories he was willing to let Voldemort lay hands on. Each evening with Snape, he practiced placing those memories above his wall of fire, casting them so thickly in his mind that the fire itself could not be perceived.
And then it was time to test his mental discipline against a true Legilimens.
Surprisingly enough, Snape came through the Floo that night carrying Dumbledore's pensieve. He set it down on the low table before the couch. Harry hung back near the entry to the parlour, nervously stroking Sals, who squeezed his wrist almost as though in understanding that he needed a little hug. The thought made Harry wonder about the little snake's intuition. It was uncanny, the way Sals could sense what he was feeling, but of course, he'd spent so many hours talking to his pet that he decided he shouldn't be surprised. Sals knew him by then, that was all.
His teacher beckoned him, one crooked finger brooking no opposition. "Have you ever used one of these?"
Harry nearly choked.
"No," Snape patiently explained, a ghost of a smile on his lips. "I didn't ask if you had looked into one. I think we both know the answer to that. Have you ever used one, yourself?"
Harry mutely shook his head.
Snape put one hand lightly on the boy's shoulder. "Would you like to, tonight? Before we begin?"
"I don't know why you're offering," Harry whispered, guilt welling up inside him. He'd grown used to the almost unthinkable fact that Severus Snape could indeed be kind --when it suited him--, but it was wrong for Snape to be so kind about this, wasn't it? After what Harry had done? "I mean, you didn't last year."
Maybe he really meant it when he said that we were even, Harry thought, his brow furrowing.
"Last year," Snape quietly explained, his fingers tensing on his shoulder, though not painfully, "I violated you repeatedly, and in a particularly heinous way. I told myself that the Dark Lord would have no pity and that it was best for you to accustom yourself to such. I believed that your horror of having me see . . . certain things, would motivate you to fight me off. But it was ill-done of me, and not the usual way to proceed with such lessons. And so, Harry, if there are things you'd prefer I not see, you may use the pensieve."
Harry gave a shaky laugh. "Um, I think you know most everything, by now. And I don't know how to make it work, and besides, my wand's pretty well useless these days."
Snape touched the tip of his own wand to Harry's temple, whispering, "Pensare non pensatum," before saying, "Now, think."
Harry closed his eyes and thought of the first time he'd realised what a birthday was, and had understood why he'd never got any presents. As Snape drew his wand slowly away, Harry felt a sensation of something moving in his head, something being drawn out through his skull. He didn't watch as Snape deposited the silvery white strand into the pensieve.
"Again?" Snape asked.
Harry swallowed. "I don't see the point. I mean, it doesn't matter what you see. Not now."
"Of course it matters, you foolish child. Everyone has things they would prefer to hide." Snape touched his temple once more. "Pensare non pensatum."
Harry thought then of something he'd prefer to hide, after alclass="underline" how much he was beginning to trust Snape, and how much the thought of it sometimes worried him.
"Again?"
"No, I'm through." Feeling a bit better, Harry gave a cocky little smile. "I didn't need that, anyway. You're not breaking through. I know how to hold it together, now. Must have had a good teacher, this year."
"Confidence will help," Snape agreed, ignoring the praise. "Arrogance, you will find, can be counterproductive." He moved the pensieve out to the kitchen, then returned, brandishing his wand. "Shall we begin? Legilimens!"
As Harry tensed, Sals scurried down his leg and disappeared between a crack in the floorboards. Startled, Harry almost lost his grip on his image. He felt Snape pressing inward, broaching his defences, but at the same time, he felt himself filling with fire and blocking all thought.
They battled for what seemed an eternity.
Then Snape broke it off, conjured him something cold to drink, and demanded they begin all over again.
Snape didn't hold back; didn't coddle him. But Harry had been right; he was ready. He could hold his concentration steady against the strongest of Snape's attacks. He practiced letting harmless memories drift free, practiced keeping them layered atop his fire, even against the sensation of Snape's questing mind. He never once found himself collapsed on the floor, helpless and practically retching, as had happened so often the year before.
"Your magic must be at play in this as well," Snape finally said one evening several nights later, as they were resting after a session. That time, Harry had kept up his defences for a solid hour.
"You said even Muggles could learn mental discipline," Harry reminded him, wiping at his brow with a damp cloth. Sighing, he laid his head on the kitchen table, letting the tension drain from his frame. He felt Sals returning, crawling up his back, then diving down his shirt to curl up against him.
"Muggles can't acquire the skill as well or as fast as you have," Snape assured him. "The way your Occlumency is coming on, I'm tempted to wonder if it's a birth power for you, as well."
"You can't think that, not after I was so bad at it before."
"Before," Snape stressed, "you did not want to learn it. That much was painfully evident."
Harry gave a harsh laugh. "True enough. I didn't want my dreams blocked. I thought Voldemort was trying to get a weapon from the Department of Mysteries. I was trying to find out what he wanted." He paused, and drank his cooling tea, then continued in a calmer tone. "I also didn't want to learn it from you. I mean, why would I have? You obviously hated me, and half the time I did think you were . . . messing me up on purpose."
"Perhaps you didn't hear me when I told you to put the past in the past, Harry."
When Sals slithered out his collar and whispered something in his ear, Harry replied in a rush of Parseltongue, the sounds more clipped than slurred, his hands curling into fists on the table.
"What is your snake saying?"
Harry rolled his eyes a bit, and tried for a semblance of calm. "Now Sals wants to know if you're my father. Honestly, are snakes all so obsessed with family?"
"I wouldn't know. What did you reply?"
A bit strange, that question. What would he have replied? Feeling a bit on edge, even more so than when Sals had asked the question, Harry admitted, "I said I didn't have one and never would and not to ask again, though I don't know as Enough, already really goes over so well in Parseltongue."
"I think you offended her." Snape pointed at Sals, who was winding her way down a table leg before slithering off across the floor.