Fic: Bound and Chained (To You) - for vividzephyr

[snarryhols]

Title: Bound and Chained (To You)
Author: Perhaps a Veela?
Giftee: vividzephyr
Word Count: 2,900
Rating: PG
Pairing: Harry/Snape
Warnings: None.
Disclaimer: All Harry Potter characters herein are the property of J.K. Rowling and Bloomsbury/Scholastic. No copyright infringement is intended.
Summary: Harry and Snape awake to find themselves in a cave. Both don’t know what to do until Harry summons an unbelievable ally.
Author's Notes: A great thanks to my beta, K! Happy Holidays, vividzephyr!

Bound and Chained (To You)

.::.

Blackness overwhelmed him. Heaviness glued his eyelids shut, and Harry gasped in terror as consciousness cleared his handicapped mind. His damp breath warmed his face with harsh, staccato exhales. He was face down on rocky ground, bits of sharp grit cutting into his forearms and palms. The jab of his broken spectacles against his cheek told him that he had landed on his face while unconscious. In thought, he licked at his top lip and found smeared blood on the tip of his tongue.

Groaning with a quiet exhalation of air, Harry pushed himself up into a kneeling position, his knees cracking in discomfort. Panicked, he reached blindly for his wand, sighing in relief when his fingers wrapped around the cold wood. He pulled it from his back pocket as he settled onto his bum.

His eyes watered as he looked around, vision blurred. He paused for a moment to fix his glasses, but his efforts were fruitless when the blackness thickened around him. Squinting, he raised himself to his feet with trembling limbs. He was in an area that appeared to be a cave, the air musky and wet. The dampness clung to the inside of his lungs with each breath, and he was surprised that no water came up when he sneezed.

The back of his neck itched, forcing him to swing around to look behind himself. As his eyes grew comfortable in the darkness, he began to make out a faint light. He stared without blinking and realised after a moment that the light was growing stronger, as if someone had turned on a Muggle lamp.

The harsh contrast between brightness and darkness distorted the scenery around him, and he walked forward cautiously, his feet slowly shuffling over the varied rocks on the ground. His hearing seemed to intensify in his paranoid state. Harry paused more than once in his journey after something like a low groan met his ears. More than once the vocalisation of pain made his heart thump quicker within his chest, the muscles within his stomach clenching in fear.

Hope numbed his anxieties when he spotted the glint of water. His feet tripped over his dragging trousers in his rush to view the water more clearly. As he drew closer, he realised with punching confusion that the liquid was not water. It was too thick and the colour of mercury. Harry knew from his experience in another cave that he must not get too close.

“Potter.”

Harry pivoted on his feet with a jolt, his wand raised to aim. He knew that voice.

“Snape? Are you there?” Harry noted how his voice cracked in fear.

There was a loud, disgruntled huff. “I am right in front of you. How can you not see me?”

“I dunno,” Harry said as he thought suddenly, Oh my god, have I gone blind?

“How do you not know?” Snape snapped, his voice rising in anger. “Can you see me or not?”

Harry ignored him as he focused on his eyesight. Straining, he was able to see shadows reflecting against the alien liquid and concluded that the source of the light was blocked by something. Stepping to the side, Harry saw enough evidence to support his conclusion that he ventured to his right in a circular motion as if he was stepping around tangible darkness.

“Snape?” he called out again.

“What?” His voice was becoming louder and distinct, the familiarity causing Harry’s body to relax slightly.

“Snape?” Harry repeated, hoping to follow the voice.

“Potter, you dolt!” Snape was now cursing vehemently, his breathing cut with harsh gasps. “Open your eyes and look!”

Harry frowned deeply. From the sound of Snape’s voice it seemed that he was in front of him, but Harry could make out nothing but growing light and shimmering mercury. “Are you hurt?” he asked, his heartbeat almost choking him with its acceleration.

“You could say that,” Snape replied, breathless. It sounded as if he was struggling to breathe.

“What is your situation?” Harry asked, his lips moving over the words effortlessly. He had practiced the Auror protocol phrase numerous times during his training. Now, it made him feel out of place and useless.

Snape snorted loudly. “Let’s just say that I’m compromised.”

“Being cryptic doesn’t help me find you,” Harry said through gritted teeth, exasperated.

“Potter, you don’t need to find me. I see you perfectly. You are just an idiot, and therefore cannot see what is right in front of you!”

“Right,” Harry said, swiping his sweaty palms against his thighs. Gulping air, he bit at his bottom lip in thought, bringing his wand up to trail in the air. He felt dumb waving his wand against nothing, but nonetheless thought of all the revealing charms he had learned during his training.

He reached a hand out and felt an unyielding, cold surface. Pocketing his wand, he placed both hands against the invisible barrier and pushed with all his might, his trainers slipping against the ground. Pain shot through his arms from the exertion and his teeth sliced across his tongue in concentration, but he felt the barrier give way.

Falling forward suddenly, his straightened arms landed on the ground first, followed by his face. He heard Snape laugh at him and frowned, sitting up as he looked around. What he saw made his heart jump to his throat.

Snape was bound with heavy chains to a jagged rock, which jutted from the pool of mercury-like liquid. Mind spinning, Harry found it hard to focus his eyes as his heartbeat seemed to control the blurriness of his vision. A cracking erupted from the rock, and Snape slid closer to the surface of the silvery substance. After a moment Harry realised that the pool gave off a rancid odour.

It was obvious that something more horrific than drowning would happen to Snape if Harry was unable to free him in time.

“Well, are you just going to stand there and stare at me as I die, or are you going to do something about it?” Snape asked, a certain anxiety surfacing within his voice. “Because, as we both know, you are very, very good at watching me die.”

“Shut up,” Harry snapped, his wand once again in his hand. “Do you know how you got like that?”

“Yes,” Snape bit out, his face consumed by angry lines, “I allowed myself to be chained to this rock, in the middle of this foul pool, because I thought I’d have a bit of fun. Life is so dull sometimes, you know.”

“Your sarcasm is stupid,” Harry said, rolling his eyes. “I can’t remember how I got here, either. Not if I was attacked . . . where I was last . . . nothing.”

Snape smiled sickly at him. “We finally have something in common.”

“Don’t speak,” Harry said, his fingers tightening around his wand in concentration. He tried summoning, disabling, and revealing charms, but failed as he miserably watched Snape descend more rapidly into the pool.

Stepping closer to the edge, he plugged his nose as he crouched and dipped his wand into the shimmering fluid. The substance was beautiful in a strange way, even with the incredible stench that flooded his nostrils despite his attempts to block it.

The scent of something glorious streamed from the tip of his wand, mixed with purple smoke that made Harry’s cheeks flush. It masked the horrible stench around him briefly. He felt warmth and hopefulness squeeze at his insides, and was distracted when his wand began to vibrate in his hand. Unprepared, Harry was unable to control it when light shot from the tip, blinding him until it disappeared a moment later.

Only twin breaths and the creaking of rock broke the eerie silence. Ghosts of the light flashed within Harry’s vision, and he blinked as his eyes began to water again. Wiping his eyes with dirty fingers, he fixed his spectacles as he glanced at Snape. The man had an odd expression on his face, his eyelids drooping. His cheeks were horribly flushed, and the irregular pace of his breathing was unsettling.

“Snape?”

“No, not even close. My name is Sherlock Holmes.”

Screaming, Harry flung around to look in the direction of the voice. Eyes widening, he froze mid-movement, his wand lifeless within his hold. The apparition of a man stood mere seconds away from him, a disturbing greenish glow radiating from his body. The glow illuminated what appeared to be the apparition’s background, a cluttered study with a large fireplace.

“Are you a ghost?” Harry managed, his voice trembling within its quietness.

“Absolutely not,” Holmes said, his hands clasped behind his back as he took a step toward Harry. “Are you?”

“No,” Harry responded slowly. “At least I don’t think so.”

“How do you not know if you are among the living?” Holmes asked, his stare intensifying as his dark eyes lingered on Harry. It reminded him uncannily of Snape’s menacing glare.

Taking a deep breath, Harry allowed the needed oxygen to wash through him before answering. “I’m not sure about anything at the moment. How did you end up here?”

“It appears that you think I travelled somewhere.”

“Well, yeah,” Harry said, feeling foolish. He thought for a moment. “Unless Snape and I travelled somewhere.”

“Snape?”

Harry turned around and motioned to Snape, who was now slack-jawed. His eyes were unmoving as they stared upward.

Holmes’ eyes widened slightly as he took in the scene of Snape on the sinking rock. “My God, how did that man end up there?”

“Dunno,” Harry responded, disbelief pulling at his insides. It all must’ve been a dream. How could he be speaking to Sherlock Holmes, with Snape chained to a rock, in a damp cave? Truly, truly insane. “But if we don’t do something soon, he’ll die.”

“By drowning?” Holmes asked nonchalantly.

“Yes,” Harry responded, and then added after a moment’s thought, “or by something worse.”

Holmes walked to the edge of the pool, his steps nearly gliding across the uneven ground. “What are your relations to this man?”

“Er,” Harry said, stepping side to side in his anxiety, “I guess we are friends. Sort of. He used to be my professor in school.”

“I see,” Holmes said, his eyes shifting from Snape to Harry. He appeared to be thoughtful for a long moment, his thin finger tapping against his chin. “It appears that the solution to this dilemma can only be found within the victim.” He pointed to Snape.

“What do you mean ‘within the victim’?” Harry asked, astonished that he was asking the ghost of Sherlock Holmes a question.

Shrugging with an elegant shift of his shoulder, Holmes said, “You are the one who must decide on the action. It seems as if I am just a phantom in this situation.”

“Ugh!” Harry said, tugging at his hair in thought. “How can I find something within Snape . . . .” Suddenly it occurred to him. “Legilimency.”

“What did you say?” Holmes asked.

Waving his question off, Harry had no time to explain to Holmes about Legilimency. He pointed his wand at Snape and closed his eyes in concentration before saying, “Legilimens.” There was a barrier between his mind and Snape’s, and he bit his bottom lip as he tried harder to break through the mental blackness.

After a few moments an image flashed within his mind, and he knew he had broken through Snape’s blockade. There was a small girl standing under a large tree, her dark red hair blowing around her face with a light breeze. Her eyes were closed, but her mouth was parted as she sang unevenly. The words were nonsense, a tune that children create from the well of their mind.

Harry’s throat constricted as he realised he was staring at his mother. Taking a deep breath, he tried to calm himself as he delved deeper into Snape’s mind. He saw himself in Snape’s thoughts, sitting on that stool in the pub, his head turned downward as he stared at his pint of beer. That had been the first time he sought out Snape with questions about his mother. After the incident in the Shrieking Shack and his probing into Snape’s thoughts when he had assumed the man was dead, he felt the need to know more about his mother and Snape’s relationship with her.

In his surprise, Snape had agreed to meet with him numerous times to talk about his mother. After a few times he sat next to Snape in that pub, he knew the meetings were less about his need to know more about his mother and more about Snape just needing someone to talk to about his past.

Everything had been going all right until he awoke in this cave. Now he may have to witness Snape’s death, for real this time.

“Well, go on,” Holmes said, ushering Harry forward with a moment of his hand. “A man’s life is hanging in the balance. You can’t dawdle.”

“I’m not dawdling,” Harry snapped, and then closed his eyes. He joined Holmes at the edge of the pool and concentrated with all his might on Snape. Repeating the incantation, he willed himself to do something, anything to help Snape.

A horrible cracking rumbled through the shadows and Harry’s eyes shot open to see the tip of Snape’s boots and robes sinking into the mercury liquid, the pool hissing and humming as it gulped down the rock.

“Snape!” Harry yelled, forgetting about all the dangers as he jumped into the pool. He expected to be burned by the liquid, but tingling electricity ran up his spine. The feeling wasn’t painful, just peculiar. He paddled over to Snape and grabbed onto him, their bodies weighed down by their wet robes.

He looked down into Snape’s face and was shocked to see a younger man. Astonished, he glanced at his hands and found that they were smaller, almost child-like.

“It appears that Snape and you are de-aging,” Holmes said, his voice curious.

“Shuddup!” Harry screamed, hysterical. He pointed his wand and tried every spell that came to mind to get them out of the pool. Nothing worked and he clung to Snape more closely, wishing for the man to focus his eyes and tell him what to do. “Do something!” Harry turned to look at Holmes, but the apparition was gone.

“Snape! Snape!” Harry shook the man as he kicked in the water, trying to find a foothold. He pulled on the chains that bound Snape to the rock, his fists sliding over the cold metal. As the silver liquid rose to his neck, he watched as Snape transformed into a teenager right before his eyes. He couldn’t imagine what he himself looked like.

Without thinking, he kissed Snape desperately, because it was the only thing he could think of doing. For some reason he thought his kiss would be the magical solution to end their misery. Once again, nothing happened. Harry decided to hold onto Snape and drown with the man.

The liquid was cold against his face. Harry gasped, and then spurted. Everything went black a moment later.

.::.

“I’m sorry.”

Harry opened his eyes to see a wooden ceiling. He blinked in his disorientation, unable to catch his bearings. Then he remembered.

“Snape!” he yelled, bolting up. Cold liquid ran down his forehead, gathering at the base of his neck.

“Potter,” Snape said, leaning closer to stare at him. “Are you all right?”

Looking around, Harry realised they were in a small study. “How are you – did you –” He gulped down air and said more slowly, “Did that actually happen?”

“I don’t know,” Snape said, pensive. “I was trying to apologise when you rudely interrupted me.”

“I had been unconscious!” Harry said, irritated. “What were you apologising for? I’m the one who allowed you to drown.”

“Nothing that happened in that place was your fault,” Snape said, his voice low. “I think – well, it’s idiotic, but I think we had to pass a test.”

“What?” Harry said, his head pounding. “What sort of test?”

Red patches ballooned across Snape’s cheeks. He seemed unsure of himself when he said, “A test of – feelings, I suppose.”

Harry’s eyes widened comically. “Feelings? Does that mean . . .”

Snape glared at him. “You kissed me.”

“I didn’t know what else to do! You were dying!” Harry felt lightheaded, his heart pounding hurriedly within his chest.

“Doesn’t matter.” Snape sighed deeply and his glare lightened a bit. “You still did it.”

“I – I guess I wanted to,” Harry said. He paused before saying, “Can I kiss you again?”

Snape’s face whitened, but he nodded nonetheless. The kiss began chaste and shy, though both seemed unable to hold back. Distracted, Snape and Harry were unable to see the green glow that appeared in the study, a shadow of a man smoking a pipe falling across the wall. The shadow paused to inspect the scene before him, and then gave a curt nod, the movement of his head indicating finality.

A moment later the shadow was gone.

****