Summary: Alcohol + Sirius Black + full moon = [solve for X]


Warnings for language, alcohol, Spin the Bottle, and things the narrator doesn't understand but you, who have read PoA, do.

A note: I have decided that Flitwick is Jewish for the purposes of this c/h/a/p/t/e/r story. Why? Because it's as credible that he has goblin ancestry as dwarfism, and the parallels between JKR's goblins and the way Jews were treated in England for centuries is just, it's not even so subtle as to be glaring, it's so, I mean, seriously, just... if, like me, you can't stomach Merchant of Venice, go watch the BBC Ivanhoe. Go.

Plus, the full moon in April of '76 was on a school night. Therefore the plot required somebody on the staff to have a reason to know in advance they'd be taking the next day off so some students could plan to sleep in. No reason not to use an OC teacher (or a fill in the blank like Vector), but I can't be alone in feeling the sweet-humored, sometimes-bearded, deceptively BAMF head of the Geek House would be an ornament to any seder.


The eve of Flitwick's religious holiday fell on a Wednesday that spring. It moved around. Since he always took the first day of it off (there were several days, apparently), this caused a lot of complaining when it fell on a weekend, or just on a day when one's year didn't have Charms.

Spike told everyone, with an odd smile, that it was entirely appropriate for it to flee from year to year. This made Reggie's yearmate, Rebecca Goldstein, laugh, and everyone else stare blankly. He also said, more briskly, that quite a lot of people in the world used lunar calendars for religion so they ought to get used to the idea.

Regardless, that year Evan's class was going to have a free morning on the 15th. Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw weren't. He had a feeling he'd be seeing a lot of them anyway the evening before: Mulciber had had a brainwave.

They'd been in their room near the end of March, Evan and Mulciber playing go, Avery cleaning his teeth, and Severus bottling alcohol and doing accounts. He'd shaken his head at his records, diverted a few drops of vodka into his mouth, and said meditatively, "No, still disgusting."

"Whaa?" Avery called from the bathroom.

"I don't know why the vodka sells," Severus called back.

"S'strong!" Avery gurgled.

"I know, but it doesn't taste of anything. Just alcohol."

"It's easy to make it taste like other things," Mulciber had said, frowning at the board, then looked up and grinned at Spike. "We should do a contest."

Narcissa had cleared it with Slughorn the next day, because he wasn't good at telling her no and usually didn't want to anyway. Sprout had also been perfectly willing to cooperate, once assured they had their Head's permission and no one under fourteen would be allowed. She only wanted to make sure that nobody tried to harvest any of her plants themselves. Aside from concerns about the plants' welfare, she said there were some students even in the upper forms who couldn't be trusted to know what was poisonous. Or not to think Venomous Tentacula flavored vodka was a brilliant idea.

The kitchen elves, of course, could be counted on to give anyone whatever they wanted without question. Reggie had wanted to fill them in anyway, just to be polite. Narcissa had reminded him that Slughorn's permission was not Dumbledore's permission and many of the elves were chattier than Sprout. As were all of the portraits in the kitchen.

Severus had been under the impression that, since in a wine tasting you weren't supposed to swallow, he didn't have to provide Soberall or Hangunder. Fortunately, Evan had realized this early enough on and called him adorable. There had been a massive sulk, of course, but the situation had been remedied in time.

The sulk had probably been exaggerated for effect. Ev was in harmony with this scam, and quite enjoyed hauling him out of it.

These details attended to, the fourth year and up in every House had gotten two pint bottles and a rules-and-instructions sheet that Saturday. Absolutely everyone, but only after Narcissa had sent tiny birds to fly musically around Spike's head until he realized it was give up or run mad. Gryffindor had nearly been left out entirely, on the premise that Evans was going to yell at him and refuse to participate and her housemates would not play nicely.

Narcissa was adamant, and Evan agreed with her. Once Spike had given in, it had been pointed out to him that the so-called Marauders were calling themselves marauders and would surely play even less nicely if they weren't included. He had pointed out in return that explaining their reasoning to him might have gotten them what they wanted faster.

This was true, of course, but Narcissa lived in hope of training him to feel instinctively that she was always right. Evan thought she was barking up the wrong implacable waterfall. It was excellent entertainment: he wouldn't have interfered for worlds.

Wednesday night was the Great Tasting, and it was going, Evan thought in a slow and happy way, very well.

Potter and Evans had both stayed away, Potter stating baldly that while he understood his friends' sad susceptibility to the lure of the Demon Alcohol (nick him some, mates, would they?), someone had to stay behind to rescue everyone the snakes poisoned. Spike had very nearly cheered at this news.

Evans wasn't even boycotting to be horrible. She'd even worked with her roommates on their entry, just told Spike apologetically that she had a feeling it was going to be too rowdy for her. This obviously meant she didn't want to be anywhere near Avery or Mulciber, especially when they were drunk. Probably the preference extended to their entire House. It had been unusually tactful of her not to say so outright.

Lupin was sick (again), which Evan thought was a shame. He would have quite liked to see how a drunk Lupin acted around Spike. Sirius and Pettigrew had come, although Pettigrew's appearance had been the definition of token. He'd just tasted everything quickly, made his votes, hovered unhappily around Sirius for a few excruciatingly awkward minutes, and scampered.

Away from all the bad influences in his life, Sirius was so much more the cousin Evan remembered, less his mother's son than Potter made him. He was relaxed and joking with everyone, working the refilling charms on the samples hard. After some initial conflicted wariness, Reg had plastered himself to his side and was generally looking like three Christmases had come all at once.

Annoyed, Narcissa had suggested that Evan ought to join her in being upset that their cousin's presence had turned their friend into a wallflower at his own event. This would have been a reasonable point if any turning had been required. Or if Severus hadn't been looking on, quite relaxed, with a not unkind but definitely unholy amused look of mild blackmail in his eyes.

The original plan had been for Narcissa to announce the three winners, but they were Slytherin. Getting the most advantage and goodwill out of developing situations was what they did—well, not Spike, but he knew his shortcomings and took instruction willingly enough. Therefore, the job went to Reggie, with his brother providing commentary that wouldn't have been nearly as funny if they were all sober. Evan could tell this from Spike's slightly pained expression. Not being in the least sober himself, he took it on faith—and laughed anyway.

Severus only spoke up at the end. "The winners and runners-up will be available," he said, "and a bottle of your choice to everyone in a winning team. Even though none of you has any taste and the fireweed and elderflower was clearly superior. I detect your hand in the note of horseradish, Goldstein; a nice touch. Your lot can have a bottle each, too." Reggie, Goldstein, and Selwyn grinned at each other; their year hadn't divided by gender. Lockhart grinned, too, but it took a few fulsome bows before he remembered he'd been on a team and should acknowledge the people who had, if Evan was any judge, done all the work.

"Oi," Sirius said, trying oozily to scowl. "I thought the entries were secret unless they won!"

"No anonymity cloaks original thinking," Severus replied. Goldstein flushed in pleasure and looked like she was developing a spontaneous crush (Evan beamed gently. She was tall and statuesque for her age, and unlikely to be dismissed as 'approximately three years old' even if she was one of the youngest in Reg and Chang's year).

Sirius, on the other hand, frowned as though the comment made him uneasy. "I liked yours," Evan said, patting him comfortingly. "Knew it was yours right away."

"They were supposed to be secret!" Sirius wailed, diverted from whatever had been bothering him.

"Siri," Evan said, shaking his head slowly and patting his cousin on the back, "nobody else in the world would try to make a drink out of fizzing whizbees that makes you grow antennae and bumblebee wings."

"Good, though, wasn't it?" Sirius grinned.

"It was!" Evan agreed. Much to the disgust of many when the names were read out, it had, in fact, won second place. Severus had said for pity's sake! If you want honey-flavored try some actual mead, I've got loads. "Let's go have some."

The party shrank after that, but a lot of Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs stayed behind, playing increasingly complicated drinking games. At least, Evan thought they were increasingly complicated. "They're increasingly simple," Severus said, when Evan complained about it to him, with a soft exasperation that was just as good as curling up together. "You're increasingly drunk."

"Why aren't you drunk?" Evan asked, realizing this tragic state of affairs with sudden dismay.

"My family doesn't get drunk nicely," Severus said with a thin mouth, "I just tasted." Evan looked sadly at him, and the hard look dissolved. "You do," he added, with a touch that started on Evan's face and ended behind his head.

"NO!" Sirius shouted from behind Severus, making them both jump and Severus pull his wand. It was a jovial 'no,' though. "You don't just go at it, Sniv," Sirius told him with an air of massive benevolence. "There's got to be a bottle! Evans explained this! You twirl it. FRIENDS, SCHOOLMATES, DRUNK PEOPLE, LEND ME A BOTTLE!"

"Oh, no," Severus said, going even paler than usual. "No, no, no, no…" Evan was confused, but not so confused as to fail to recognize the Last Prayer of the Damned. He patted Spike's hand and trapped him by twining around his arm, because it seemed, somehow, for some reason, like a long-delayed justice.


Art at AO3; link in profile


"Traitor," Spike accused.

"You need to get snogged more," replied Evan, guilt-free.

"This is not what you do about that," Spike told him.

"It is today," he said blithely.

"I bet you have Lancaster blood, you hyena. Redheaded and everything. I'm going to start calling you Tudor."

"I don't know what that means, and I don't know what Siri thinks he's doing, but I have a sucksip—a suspicion amounting to certainty I get to watch you being snogged!" Ev told him happily, snuggling his arm.

"Yes you do!" Sirius agreed, beaming at Ev. "Merlin knows why you'd want to, but it is indeed something you get!"

Between the two of them and Reggie's please oh please oh please do not ruin tonight for me eyes, they made Spike cooperate for a while. Narcissa probably would have been on his side, but Narcissa had taken some of the witches and nonwinning vodka bowls away to the Prefects' Bathroom when things started to get silly. Spike kept the bottle's mouth away from himself for a while, but then Sirius caught him at it and Evan confiscated his wand (because if he hadn't, Sirius would have, and although Sirius was behaving himself for the moment, that would never ever ever be allowed).

Evan snogged quite a lot of people, and it was very nice. Sirius seemed to snog everybody, with an almost alarming enthusiasm which was not squelched by coming away from Mulciber with a bloody face. When he and Ev got matched up, though, and when Sirius got aimed at Severus, the bottle mysteriously wobbled off elsewhere, even though Evan still had Spike's birch wand tucked away safely.

Reggie, under his big brother's gimlet glare, got a lot of pecks on the cheek. He clearly felt this was massively unfair, but was putting up with it. At least Lockhart was blissfully immune to stern eyes, so Reg didn't spend the whole evening being treated like porcelain. Once he realized this, there was a great deal more cheating. He and Sirius had never been able to keep from spiting each other even when they were most desperate to be friends; it was only a question of whether any given piece of thumb-biting was hateful or habit.

Avery got banned for biting and groping people who didn't want him to, but Mulciber was fun to watch. So was Wilkes, although she, as Evan felt later he would have predicted if he hadn't been three to seven sheets to the wind, was responsible for ruining it for everyone.

Severus had been tolerantly tolerant of the whole affair, although Evan (gleefully) anticipated retribution once he got his wand back. He'd seemed less annoyed at being more or less forced to kiss people than at Sirius coming over all brotherly just for the evening. He kissed a lot of witch hands and wizard cheeks. Evan got a deeply unsatisfying peck on the forehead, although the whispered not with people watching that came with it was mollifying. He seemed to enjoy making one or two of the Ravenclaws he talked to about classes and one of the Hufflepuffs who'd honed in on his voice squeak, though, and Goldstein's refusal to take gallant for an answer was successful.

Wilkes's wasn't. To give her her due, she probably wouldn't have been so stubborn about it sober, but it ended up in Severus abruptly standing up to get her off him. With her ankles locked behind his back, it didn't even work. Then there was a shouting match about whether she, as a witch, should be held to the same standards as Avery, and whether a yes gave her more freedom to snog who she liked than Severus's mugglish prudishness admitted or just as much responsibility as any wizard to take a damn 'stop' when she got one.

It didn't end nearly as well as Severus's last shouting match with a Slytherin witch. Couldn't have with Sirius there looking on in soggy glee, probably wouldn't have anyway. By the time she stormed off to sulk on Macmillan's lap, most of the party had snagged a last drink and a vial each of Soberall and Hangunder and skulked out. Evan thought Macmillan wanted to skulk, too, but he hadn't managed to get to his feet before she sat on him. He didn't seem to be complaining, though, with a china-doll witch insisting he help her demonstrate her attractiveness to all stupid and blind fools-who-would-not-be-named.

Sirius was not a skulker, and was probably not physically capable of skulking. He was in no hurry to leave, either; was trying to play checkers with Reggie on a go board. Evan sat with a sketchbook propped on Avery's back, because he thought his Uncle Orion would like a picture of his boys getting along. It probably wasn't going to be the best picture of his life, even the best inked one of this week, but he could get the heart of the scene and do it over when the room was spinning less.

He could hear but not really understand Spike and Chang, talking above his comprehension level. His current one, anyway. All he really understood was that Spike thought her 'sunshine' entry had been clever and that Dumbledore would like it. They were pouring endless bottles of vodka out of the refilling sample bowls, making a stockpile for gifts and sales. She was getting to keep a few for helping out, and helping Severus pick out one to give to her grandmother when they met.

Eventually, it got to be that hour when the light from the lake started turning a darker green and the torches flickered on. Evan heard Spike sigh, and understood that Slughorn's charms on the sample bowls had faded. "Limited editions," he was saying to himself consolingly.

Evan smiled to himself and planned his next letter to Malfoy, who would be pleased to know that some of his 'financial genius' was sinking in. Provided he remembered. Avery was snoring, and he felt close to it himself.

There was another sigh, and then Spike (reluctantly, Ev thought), went over to the Blacks. In what was, for Spike talking to Sirius ( 'just tasting' might not have meant just tasting), quite a gentle tone, he reminded them that there was still such a thing as after-hours, and that Reg had class in the morning. Evan felt that the resulting bedraggled duet of nooooooo was heartwrenching, really, and he saw that Spike was not-smiling as a success rather than from a lack of effort.

"Come on," he chivvied them, "we promised Slughorn we'd have everyone out of here by sundown."

"I'm not everyone, I'm family!" Sirius announced, aggrieved.

"Kin but not kith, Black; you don't live here," Severus said patiently. "If you don't get back to your own common room soon, your prefects will come after you." Sirius shook his head with a slow, sly shrewdness, and Severus said, "Oh, yes. Your lovely, charming prefect is the most inflexible goody-two-shoes that ever donned a robe, and if you want to get nagged and scolded all week for irresponsibility, I don't."

"Never happen," Sirius said confidently. "Not tonight my prefect." He beckoned Spike down to whisper something in his ear.

"That's in Hogsmeade, Black," Severus said, still patiently. "It's Wednesday." In case Sirius was too drunk to understand, he elaborated, "Not a Hogsmeade weekend." As a further condescension, "There are no students in Hogsmeade tonight. Can't get there."

"No, no," Sirius assured him earnestly, "you can, because what you do is…" And then there was a slurry explanation Evan wasn't listening to, because Chang was kissing him goodnight and swaying dreamily out. It seemed to involve a lot of hand gestures, but Chang ambling off was worth watching.

You could think about what you'd put her in to paint her. She was too short for a cheongsam to show her at her best, but maybe a kimono or stola. Or about what if she were really someone else, polyjuiced, and what they'd be like with her lush curves, if it would soften them. Probably not. Or if knowing they were beautiful would change the color of their confidence, the flash of black eyes.

But then Spike was straightening up, very pale. "You're not ser—you can't mean that!" he demanded, backing away from Sirius. "Nobody knows what makes those—it could be poltergeists or banshees or…" he glanced out the window, through the lake water, up at the sky, and went even whiter. "Rosier!" he snapped, formal in mixed company even in his distraction. "I need my wand back. And your cufflinks!"

Evan tossed him his wand, but asked in bewilderment, "My why?"

"Accio Rosier's formal cufflinks!" Severus snarled without answering him, and barely stayed in place long enough for them to zoom down to him from upstairs. "Swanning about down here, letting everyone get pissed, and all the time, she—bastard," he spat at Sirius, fumbling them into his sleeves. By the time he'd hurtled out the door, they'd stretched themselves into shining silver bracers down his forearms.

Ev and his cousins blinked at each other. "Er?" Reggie asked articulately.

"Mental," his brother said with wise grandiloquence. "Always said so. Completely mental, Sniv."

"Granddad gave me those," Evan said sadly. He sighed. Spike's transfigurations never held for longer than a few hours. Ev should get them back all right as long as they didn't get lost or fall in a meat-grinder. "He's right though, you know, Siri; Evans won't think twice about barging in here and dragging you back by the ears. Not that I object if you want to lose points," he added with a smirk.

"Ohh," Sirius said, slow enlightenment dawning. "Evans. I thought he meant Moony. Moony's my lovely charming prefect. She's Jamie's. Except, not charming. Yeah, probably," he admitted, and wavered to his feet.

"Better take some Soberall before you see her," Reggie said, looking worriedly up at him. "You might run into the Tartan."

"Aw, I can have Professor Pussycat eating out of my hand," Sirius boasted.

"Evans, too?"

He paused, nearly overbalancing, and admitted, "Evans is on the screechy side." He meandered over to the table by the door, paused, and went back to nick a couple of the bottles Spike and Chang had filled. Then he did go take a swallow of Soberall.

Ev and Reg watched with interest, because sometimes the side effects were entertaining. Spike could brew the potion so no one got them, but didn't always bother. Evan wasn't sure whether this reflected his opinion of drunkenness or just his streak of schadenfreude.

For a minute they thought Sirius was having one of the turning-green-and-bubbles-out-the-orifices reactions, but there were no bubbles. He just turned slowly green, and not the approved nearly-teal shade: a milky, sickly, horrified green. And instead of any bubbles, he breathed, "Oh, fuck," and was gone so fast he left a smear of rubber on the floor. And two smashed bottles, the careless git. They could be repaired, but people had been walking on that floor. In shoes and boots.

Evan blinked at him, then looked at Reggie, tilted a thumb after Sirius, and cocked an eyebrow. Reggie seemed just as baffled, though, so Ev shrugged. "Come help me get this lot stored away," he suggested. "There'll be hell to pay if it's all stolen when Spike gets back. Nobody's even picked their prizes yet."

"We'll break things," Reg said doubtfully, looking cross-eyed a few feet in front of him.

"We'll just have a little Soberall first," Evan decided, because it was a good kind of swimmy. "And a lot of Hangunder." He was looking forward to a nice, long, warm evening of not in front of people when Spike got back from whatever he thought was so important. Maybe a nice, long, warm morning, too; not having Charms after breakfast had been a vital point in the planning process.

Spike didn't come back all evening.

Evan waited for over an hour, and then went out looking for him. There was no risk of getting into trouble. As a prefect, it was his job to go combing the school for students out of bed. It felt odd to be out at night without Spike or Narcissa, though. Cold, and the back of his neck kept prickling.

The portraits were singularly unhelpful. It was without precedent in his experience, and it wasn't a no-help-to-give kind of unhelpful, either. The portraits of past Slytherins tended to tell him they couldn't say: a red flag so obvious they might as well have just said, "Sorry, under orders." Other portraits shrugged helplessly, lied badly, or found urgent business elsewhere.

He did, at least, believe the elves in the kitchen when they told him they hadn't seen anyone he was interested in. They seemed to have been occupied by the slew of disgruntled younger students who'd decided it was only fair to stuff themselves with sweets if the upper forms were having a party.

He was just thanking them dispiritedly when a youngish elf with cornflower eyes and elephant ears popped in. Without much hope, he asked, "Nandy, have you seen Snape?"

"Oh, yes, Evander Rosier!" she squeaked. "Nandy is just bringing Severus Snape tea in the Infirmary."

He'd been trying not to think of that. Spike ended up in the infirmary a lot, of course, but Madam Pomfrey could heal most things in seconds. Assuming, that is, she didn't decide whatever had happened to you was your own fault and you ought to suffer. But Spike had long since had her reasonably convinced that he didn't go seeking trouble out. She knew he helped Slughorn keep her stores well-stocked, too, which might have kept him on her good side anyway. If he'd gone to see her, he should have been back in short order.

"Thanks, Nandy," he said with a tight throat, and left—without running, but at a good clip. You never ran, except in play. A fast stride only said you were busy, but a run told watchers that there was failure or weakness somewhere.

Sirius, it occurred to him in a slow way, like a bubble struggling its way up from a tar pit, had very nearly flown. He walked faster.

Not unexpectedly, the infirmary was dotted with groaning short people who had been condemned to suffer. There was a curtain up in the back, and Evan's throat closed all the way for a minute. He couldn't let the kids see it, though, even if they were preoccupied. Some of them might remember, later.

"Has anyone taken points from you lot yet?" he asked in a long-suffering tone, leaning against the doorframe and tapping his wand against his shoulder.

"Yes?"

He frowned. "Three points per year from each of you for not knowing your limits or taking precautions," he told them. "And another eight from Slytherin, Blakeney, for lying to your elders and doing it badly."

Another groan went up, rather louder and of quite a different shade. He shrugged, and suggested, "Next time you decide to make piglets of yourselves, take a digestive potion first and don't waste the mediwitch's time."

The mediwitch herself came out from behind the curtain, regarding Evan with disfavor. Her long chestnut hair was unpinned, in a thick braid over her shoulder. She was quite pretty, out of those formless robes. "You don't look hurt," she said crossly.

"I came looking for my little lost lambs," Evan explained, not entirely truthfully, tapping his prefect's badge with a grimace as he ambled over to her. And, not coincidentally, the curtain.

"Take them if you want them," she offered generously, her attitude transforming as she learned he didn't represent More Work.

"I have mercy in my heart for their more temperate roommates," he apologized. "But one of the elves told me Snape's here, too?"

She hesitated, and they looked at each other for a long moment, she uncertain and Evan implacable. "He should stay the night," she said finally.

Evan considered several answers, but they would all have given too much of himself away. In the end, he just walked past her and through the curtain.

He found Severus curled like a boulder on top of a cot, eyes buried between his knees. The tea was on the table next to him, steaming and untouched. He was very muddy, scraped up generally, and bleeding through a bandage on his back, but he seemed more or less intact. Evan touched his arm carefully. He was icy to the touch, shot through with fine tremors. That explained the puddle of blanket around him; it must have been shivered off.

"Spike?" Evan asked, very softly, closing his hand on the cold arm.

Severus turned his head enough to look at Evan. His exposed eye was red and puffy, and Evan knew just from the shape and dead gloss to it what the rest of his face would look like. It was his raged and screamed and battered himself against an uncaring world until there was nothing left look. Evan hadn't seen it in years, had only seen it once since it had become something he cared about. Severus had been less fraught about being a scapegoat outside the dungeons once being friends with Ev and Narcissa and Reggie had made Slytherin safe for him. Had been better able to take things in stride and give as good as he got without (usually) hysteria.

He sat down next to him, pressed a kiss to that bared inch of skin, tasted salt. "I will take you home," he vowed quietly, and Severus jerked back into his knees as if he just couldn't bear it. His hand closed tightly on Evan's wrist, shuddering his bones.

They were just sitting like that when Madam Pomfrey came back. "He's been here all night?" he asked her, keeping his voice low. Surely not, with all that dirt, all those little scratches. Surely she wouldn't have let those stand.

"One of the teachers wanted to speak to him after I'd fixed his back," she said, choosing her words carefully. Evan could see she wasn't going to tell him much, and that was so strange, because she was always happy to rant about Spike's battles with the Gryffs, at length. They weren't just incessant, they were creative, and that kept her on her toes. He suspected her of enjoying the challenge as much as she found it infuriating. "He's only just come back. He ought to stay," she repeated. "He's in shock, and that… that cut wants watching."

"Why is it bandaged?" he asked, barely keeping the sharpness out of his voice. "Why didn't you just heal it?"

"It was a dirty wound," she said with her eyes on their hands. She just told him, instead of telling him not to tell her how to do her job, which was terrifying. And she was, he could see, nearly-lying, which was worse. "The bandage is drawing impurities away. It's better if they bleed out, we don't want them trapped inside." Severus made an unvoiced choked noise. "He should be all right," she said in a very firm convincing-everybody voice. "But it should be watched."

"We'll do what needs doing," Evan said. "Just tell me." When he had his instructions and had led a numbly unresisting Severus to the prefects' bathroom for a very hot soak with soft mermaid music, he remembered to ask, "Is Evans all right?"

There was a long silence, and then a rasping, bitter, swallowed noise that made his every hair stand on end even before he realized Severus was laughing.


Yes, the kid is one of those Blakeneys.