The Jarvey Who Lived To Annoy Snape

Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the HP books they belong to JK Rowling, I am making no profit from this it's all in fun.

Note: I do plan on editing this slightly, so if there are some grammar mistakes, I apologize.

None of this was ever planned. This entire disastrous, utterly degrading affair should never have been allowed to thrive, let alone tolerated. Nevertheless, she found herself rumbling in pleasure beneath the spaghetti-stained fingers of a filthy, twitchy human.

No, never ever planned by a creature as noble as herself. To be roughly patted and stroked by this lonely, dirty child. When had she stooped this low?

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This Noble Creature, a name she had rightfully bestowed upon herself, supposed that all the trouble had started a few weeks ago. Being such an intelligent creature was a curse, sometimes. After being birthed in that loud, obnoxious place that stank with the waste of dozens of animals and pulsated with various hoots, meows and hisses, she had been so grateful to be carried out into a fresher air filled with new smells and sights.

The cage had slightly diminished her pleasurable sensory overload, along with the jostling of her prison every time the careless human took a step. She supposed she should feel nervous or some sort of lingering sadness at the sudden separation from the one who had given her life, but they were all detached, different. Something constantly brushed against the corners of her consciousness like a rattling exhale. A purpose, a memory that This Noble Creature could never seem to grasp, but filled her with an understanding that she was more than what she currently existed as.

All too suddenly they had seemingly come to another place, filled with loud noises and the smell of smoke and filth. She had been stuffed into the back of something- car, her mind had whispered softly, and sneezed at the scent of must and mildew lingering inside that only worsened when the doors shut.

Everything was gibberish and spoken too quickly for This Noble Creature to even begin to try to translate it into something understandable. Sweaty, eager fingers pressed at her through the travel cage, wiggling tantalizingly close to her twitching nose. She contemplated the writhing meat the human presented her with a moment before opening her small jaws and latching on.

The reaction was immediate- her nose slammed against cold steel as the fingers she was still attached to jerked back and out of the cage. Sneezing, she lifted her front paw to delicately itch at her sore nose. Shouting came from to the right of her prison, then from the front. For the rest of the car ride everything was silent except for the occasional sighs from the front of this- This Noble Creature thought for a moment before once more grasping the word- car.

Again her senses were assaulted with new information while her mind ached and exhaled words softly to supply her with names for what she was encountering. When she was brought into a house and dumped from her travel cage into a larger one she quickly tried to leap back out before the door shut in her face.

"Told you… ferrets are terrible pets…"
"should have done as your letter suggested… stuck with it now…"
"But mum-"

Excited at understanding them, she rattled her cage as the door to the boy's room once again opened and the words became clearer.

"Then you should have gotten an owl!"

"But owls are birds", the boy whined, glancing at This Noble Creature's cage before scrunching up his face in renewed despair, "it looked so cool at the pet shop! And it isn't a ferret, it's a Jarvey! The guy there said they could talk!"

Mother and son had looked at her apprehensively.

This Noble Creature grumbled lowly in its throat before hesitantly squeaking in an attempt to mimic their speech.

Several more attempts at speech had resulted in the mother paling and mumbling about "rabies" and "stupid magic" with the boy continuing to whine and eventually the young Jarvey sat , and began to understand that she had not escaped anything when taken out of the pet shop, she had merely been transported to another prison.

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As the days blended into one another, This Noble Creature began to lose hope. Once every two days that boy would quickly dump a cupful of green pellets that tasted horrendous into one of her dishes and a glass of water into her other before quickly locking the door to her cage again.

When her boy, as the Jarvey had taken to calling him, did attempt to interact with her it was more out of determination to make the best of the situation then actual affection but at least he tried at all. She drew the line though, when he began to call her Foxy.

"Your name is Foxy now. Fox-y. Can you say Foxy for me?" He questioned, poking at her depressed form through the bars.

This Noble Creature sat up quickly and pressed herself against the bars. "No!" It was garbled and sounded more than slightly demonic, but her boy seemed to understand even if he looked like he was moments away from passing out.

"What?"

She knew he understood! He only said it to his birth-giver every other sentence! "No!"

"Mum! Dad! Foxy spoke!" The human bellowed, slamming his shoulder against the doorframe in his haste to get downstairs.

"No… No Foxy," the Jarvey struggled for the words and her mind supplied the translation, "Noble One. Noble Creature!" Her voice grew hoarse and wobbled on the last word and she hurriedly slunk to her water dish, forgetting to ration it, and drank to soothe the sting in her throat- pacing agitatedly around her cage. "Stupid buggering ponce!" She growled out disjointedly, recalling words of anger that her boy had used around the visiting age mates.

Unfortunately, that was the exact moment her boy and his birth-givers arrived in the room. The woman gasped and then shrieked, her face bright red with anger and simultaneous horror. "Roger! Put that unnatural, cursed creature back in its cage and start the car!"

The Jarvey smirked, revealing a mouth positively gleaming with sharp little teeth. "Creature!" She repeated with glee.

The husband paled, looking after his wife as she shuddered and left the room, then at his son where he stood looking torn.

"Dad, do we really- ?"

"You heard what your mum said, Danny-boy. Let's get her put in the travel cage."

For a moment her boy looked at her forlornly, he had just gotten her to talk, after all. In the end though, what little attachment he had to his Jarvey vanished in the face of re-entering the pet store where he had purchased her only two weeks ago and perhaps getting another chance at a newer, better pet.

This Noble Creature watched as her boy unlocked the cage and approached her slowly with his hand along with an understandable degree of wariness. Unexpectedly he shot forward the last few inches and grabbed the red wine colored fur on her scruff and dropped her into the smaller cage.

Yes! The Jarvey thought, dancing in small circles inside her carrier, we go exploring! No cage! "Good Danny!" She chattered in excitement, wrapped her clawed paws around the bars of her carrier to see where they were going before dancing in circles of joy again. Smart boy! Fun to play outside of the cage!

Her cage jolted violently at her last words before they were out the door and back into the car. The tense atmosphere in the car convinced This Noble Creature to quiet herself less the humans once again remembered that they feared her and put her back in the cage, though the fur on her body remained puffed out in excitement at the perceived adventure.

So caught up was the Jarvey in her joy that she almost didn't notice when the car finally stopped and they were practically gliding through the loud human streets, then a pause, then suddenly everything seemed to become muted. Gone were the sounds of engines and busy streets. There was talking, yes, but everything was so much more pleasant to her senses… and the magic. This Noble Creature shuddered pleasantly at the scent of it, the soothing trickle of it reaching down her throat and stroking her insides.

"We'd better get a refund. This is simply unacceptable!" The woman huffed, the glint in her eyes fearsome.

What? This Noble Creature tensed, suddenly very wary. The door they had just walked through had a distinct jingle. The smells and sounds- dozens of creatures all desperate to be free. "No!" The Jarvey squeaked, pacing anxiously with wide eyes as they entered the pets hop and her cage was set upon the counter. "No!"

"What's this then?" The man behind the counter questioned, sounding uneasy.

Her boy's birth giver drew herself up, glaring fiercely at the employee. "I demand a refund! The animal you sold my son is deficient!"

The man paled, eyes lowering briefly to the irate Jarvey inside the carrier and back to her face. "Ma'am, I'm truly sorry but… We no longer sell Jarveys nor is any shop in London able to deal with the selling or trading of these animals."

"Just what are you trying to say?" her boy's father asked.

"We weren't… technically allowed to sell them in the first place, but no one had ever made a fuss about it before. There was an…" he paused with a helpless shrug, "unfortunate incident between one of the Jarveys and a potential customer and the Ministry had made it clear that any shop caught dealing with Jarveys could be fined or potentially shut down. So last week we released the whole stock back out into the wild. We can't give you a refund or even take the animal back, but if you're sure you absolutely have to get rid of it- " The man paused again, eyeing Danny's mother.

"We're sure." Her tone was glacial.

The employee sighed and sent a brief sympathetic look at the animal pacing in the cage, "the only solution I can think of would be to release it into the wild. Not in any muggle woods, mind you. Has to be somewhere in the wizarding world."

The woman's husband hesitantly cleared his throat, "we, ah, we're not exactly familiar with the wizarding world. Our son just got his letter this summer and before that we didn't even know such a thing a magic existed. We would have no idea where to release this… creature."

This Noble Creature perked up at the name, paused in her pacing to try to make sense of what was happening.

"Muggles, eh?" the man behind the counter huffed, "It might be a good idea to just hold onto her until your son goes to Hogwarts. They've got the Forbidden Forest there and I imagine that would be as good a place as any to let her go."

"Unacceptable!" "But I want an owl now mum!"

The kafuffle continued, but a sense of dread had rooted itself inside This Noble Creature's chest and she began panting, understanding that they didn't want her, were trying to throw her away. "No!" She hissed quietly to herself, reaching out with her dexterous paws and toying with the latch to the carrier. After a few moments it opened and she squeezed out and growled menacingly at the boy she had called her own, tail raised along her spine threateningly. "Buggering PONCE!" She enunciated clearly, baring her fangs and dodging the hands of the pet shop employee before launching her lean body from the counter to the floor.

Her claws scrabbled noisily against the tile floor before she dug in and loped steadily to the door, squeezing through the tiny opening at the base where the barrier didn't shut fully. Outside was even more chaotic. Giants- humans she reminded herself in an attempt to keep calm as she dodged startled shoppers and menacing shoes that could potentially crush her spine. The cobblestones were a considerably less slippery surface than the tiles and she was able to keep her footing and use her natural agility to quickly slip into an alley and up a stone wall before leaping to the other side.

The floor was so strange. It was green and spiky and uncomfortable on her soft paw pads. Walking was awkward for the first few moments, and the Jarvey had no time to spend getting accustomed to her new environment. It seemed none of the humans had pursued her, though she shouldn't be surprised since they had been so eager to rid themselves of her anyways. Tilting her head that way and that, she squinted against the vibrant colors and the sudden heat and brightness of the sun.

Her ears continued to swivel as she awkwardly waddled across the lawn to a white fence, wincing hesitantly each time her paws came into contact with the green spongy surface. Something fluttered in the edge of her vision and she turned, bristling in surprise when her eyes zeroed in on the insect. "Butterfly" She supplied as soon as her brain whispered the word.

The next instant it turned as if to fly away and This Noble Creature leapt, obeying her instincts as her teeth caught the delicate corner of the insect's wings. She finished by wrapping her front paws around her prey and briefly opening her jaws only to stuff the rest of the butterfly into her maw and crunch again, shaking her head to rid herself of the strange taste before running her tongue over her mouth.

Continuing on, This Noble Creature slunk through a group of bushes cut in strange shapes and underneath the fence to gaze cautiously at the sea of feet and swirling robes beyond. She sneezed dismissively and turned to explore the grass more thoroughly but froze at the sound of gentle snoring.

Furiously swiveling her ears and glancing around, she finally determined that it was coming from the bench sitting against the bushes. The Jarvey stood on her hind legs a few feet from the bench, stretching her neck and spine to eye the oblivious human.

He looked quite different than the human she had spent the last two weeks of her life with. He had a considerably large nose framed by a thin, pale face with stringy black hair and his mouth was open in his sleep, emitting soft snores.

Her golden eyes widened. He smelled of blood. Delicious, nourishing blood. Forgetting herself, This Noble Creature leapt onto the bench and snuffled along the black sleeve of the boy's shirt, pushing past the opening around his wrist before pulling out to sneeze. She continued up his arm and sat on his slowly rising and falling chest, rising up on her haunches and swaying with his breaths as she spotted the cut on one of his dark eyebrows, the eye beneath slightly discolored and swollen.

The injury must have happened recently, because the wound was still oozing. Being careful to balance her weight, the Jarvey placed her front paws on her cheek and leaned forward to lap at the red liquid, tail swishing eagerly.

She had never noticed the slight hitch in breath or the nearly undetectable shift in the boy's features as his eyes opened slightly. "ARGH!" Certainly, however, was noticed.

Feeling as if about ten years had been taken off of her life, This Noble Creature started violently, fur standing on end as she turned to flee and ran headfirst into the back of the bench. Scratching violently at her smarting nose with one paw, she started to lope off on three legs but was stopped by a hand harshly gripping her scruff.

As violently intelligent and gorgeous, not to mention noble, a creature as she is, This Noble Creature was only at this point two months old and still incredibly susceptible to going limp at the familiar feeling of something grabbing her scruff.

Annoyed and slightly fearful, This Noble Creature hissed in an attempt at bravery and then cowed under the boy's fierce frown.

"A ferret?" He mused, and the Jarvey, even in her current predicament and even realizing that this boy was probably the age of her previous owner, decided that his voice was nice.

"Noble Creaturrre." This Noble Creature purred, not wanting to anger him further but getting annoyed over being called something she clearly wasn't.

The boy's eyebrows shot up and he winced slightly as the cut on his eyebrow split again and blood began to flow anew. "Damn."

The Jarvey he held captive, however, was currently riveted on the blood, a little drop of drool slipping from the fur at the corner of her mouth to land on his fingers.

"Ugh. Disgusting animal."

She bristled in indignation, growling lowly.

"Don't you take that tone with me, you ball of fluff. Hmm, not a ferret. Jarvey? What are you doing in the middle of Diagon Alley?" The boy question, turning her this way and that and even having the nerve to tug lightly on her tail with his free hand. "This is ironic, considering I just read about you in one of my school books-"

"Severus Snape!" A woman's harsh voice broke through the boy's examination.

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Author's Note: So yeah… I just decided that I should actually write something down and I've really wanted to do a story with Snape having a pet for a long time but by no means is this going to be some cheery happy story. I plan on making this continue all the way into Snape's adulthood and eventually include the actually HP books and other characters.

It was a weird idea I just got… and then I discovered the Jarvey (You should google it) which is a magical creature in the Harry Potter series that can speak to people along with other features. If you've read this chapter, please review. Suggestions are very welcome.

And I am truly sorry, all the he's and she's and… gah. And her name is not going to remain This Noble Creature throughout the story, she will eventually get a name that is easier to type out and not quite so long :3