Ghosts Revived (Harry Potter, Snape/Harry)

The cold from the stone floor seeped into Harry through his knees. He could feel it deep in his bones, tracing like poison through his veins to chill his naked skin. There was a fire smoldering in the fireplace scant feet in front of him but it did little to warm him. He kept his head down, breathing slowly and evenly through his nose. His jaw ached from the gag that filled his mouth, pressing against his tongue and forcing his mouth open wide, but the pain was offset by the feel of the leather bindings tracing across his cheek like a constant caress. A leather collar circled his neck, thick enough that the top of it pressed against the base of his chin as he kept his head lowered. Matching cuffs bound his wrists and ankles together, a strap running between them to hold him in position.

He wasn’t sure how long he’d been kneeling on the cold stones. It felt like hours, though he knew it couldn’t have been all that long. Less than four, likely more than two. He was going to have bruises on his knees tomorrow. Thankfully he didn’t have to teach for the next two days. He hoped to acquire a few more bruises before the night was through.

The room was quiet, leaving Harry little to concentrate on besides his thoughts, the occasional crackle of the wood on the fire, and the wisp of page against page as Snape read from his chair by the fire. He could see Snape out of the corner of his eye. Harry’s placement had been deliberate, allowing him to see his master while Snape watched him, though so far Snape had appeared, at least outwardly, entirely uninterested in Harry’s existence. It was entirely possible that Snape was ignoring him. He’d done so before, but the extended length of time between the turn of each page made Harry wonder. He thought Snape was reading slower than normal, but that could just be an illusion, a trick of the senses as time stretched out with nothing else for him to focus on.

His muscles ached. It felt wonderful. Not nearly as wonderful as fresh lash marks or the imprint of a hand on flesh, but enough to ground him. He was alive. Sometimes, often, he needed a reminder of that, a reminder that, despite everything Voldemort had thrown at him, despite the fact that he had actually died, if only briefly, he had survived all of it. Many others hadn’t, and this was his self-imposed penance, his atonement for the lives the war had taken, for the many he couldn’t save.