Chapter 4
Hope Over Experience

"For myself, I am an optimist – it does not seem to be much use being anything else."
(Winston Churchill)

I stood in front of the mirror in my office, checking to see if I had pinned my cloak straight. I was not normally so vain as to care, but today was the first day of the new school year, and a class of first years awaited me in the room beyond. I aimed to make an impression on the new students. Teaching – my method of teaching, anyway – was as much to do with the style of delivery as the information that was delivered. I liked my students to respect me, listen to me, even fear me a little.

I never wore black. It would have been too painful. Snape had worn nothing but black, all his life, and I did not want to remind myself or anyone else of him. I did not want to look into the mirror and see a shadow of that traitor. He had been largely responsible for one of the most harrowing experiences of my life, and I had no wish to remember him any more often than I already did. I might look a little similar to him, but I was nothing like him, nothing at all, and I would not have anyone think that of me. I might have the black eyes, but I did not have the black heart.

Today's robes were slate grey and of a light, swirling material. They flowed about my body, disguising the fact that I was too thin for my height and lending me a dignified appearance. Looking in the mirror, even I had to admit that I looked rather striking, especially given my age. Only my eyes gave any indication of what had happened to me, of the terrible things that lay in my past. And even those windows to my soul could not reflect the extent of the horrors I had seen or the scars I had been left with.

I heard noises from the adjacent room. The first years were there, eagerly awaiting their first Defence lesson. I felt, as always, a little sad that they should have to be taught how to defend themselves against dark magic; I had always looked upon the Dark Arts themselves as an interesting academic study, nothing more. To think that there were those who would use them, and use them on children, never failed to make me feel slightly sick.

Exactly on time, I swept through the connecting door and down into the classroom. A sudden hush swept over the room as the students stared up at me. I wondered, idly, if I was really that frightening. I continued until I stood just in front of my desk, where all of the children could see and hear me perfectly. I was ready to give my course introduction talk. I sometimes thought that it might be a little too dramatic, but it was meant to be powerful. This was something I wanted them to remember.

'Welcome to your first Defence Against the Dark Arts class,' I declared, my voice carrying over the entire room despite its low volume. 'In this room you will learn the most important magic there is; how to defend yourself against attack, whether your assailant be beast or human. This magic has the potential to save your life; I say this with complete confidence, since the techniques I will teach you have saved mine many times over.' There was a hushed murmur spreading through the room, and I dispelled it with a wave of my hand.

'I, like so many people my age, fought in a war before you were born. I learnt the hard way how to survive, sometimes at the expense of other people's lives. I hope none of you ever has to kill another to stay alive, but it is a possibility that cannot – and should not – be ignored. These studies are crucial. There is a chance that the world may become unstable again. There has never been a greater need for attention in this class, so I will not tolerate inattention. Not for my sake, but for yours.' They stared at me, eyes round like saucers. Probably they did not understand much of it, but so long as they understood not to fool around in my class, I would be satisfied.

I turned to them again and said, 'What do you think that Defence Against the Dark Arts really means?'

A lone hand was raised. I nodded, and a small boy said, 'It's about using good magic to fight evil.' I was about to say something, correct him, when he continued, 'It's about never giving up, even if everything looks hopeless. It means never sinking to the level of your enemy.' I stared. Never before had an eleven-year-old spoken so. He had summarised quite succinctly the Order's attitude during the war.

'Not exactly,' I said, still amazed. 'Harry Potter would have answered similarly, however, so you are in good company with your beliefs.' The boy looked completely awestruck by my comparison. I smiled to myself. That name still had power, though its bearer was dead. 'No, I will tell you what defence means. Defence means getting out alive. Just that and nothing more.

'Defence is not a well-defined form of magic. In some cases, offence is the best defence, since some curses cannot be shielded. If you ever find yourself in any situation such as the ones I will describe to you in this class, you should do anything you can to get out of that situation alive. Possibly the most important thing I will ever teach you is this: keep your wits about you. If you think the enemy is near, never let down your guard.' I did not use the old phrase constant vigilance. It was too painful, too inextricably linked in my mind to the war.

I could see that I had the full attention of the class. It was a strangely warming feeling. I had lost so much that there was no way the respect of a handful of eleven-year-olds could ever repay me, and yet somehow I felt, looking at the expressions of awe, as if my sacrifices had not been for nothing. If learning from my experiences saved even one of these young, innocent lives, then I would not have risked life, limb and sanity in vain.

In the first lesson of the first year, I never taught anything, at least, not directly. I devoted that time to sharing my experience of the Dark Arts with the children. It normally went down well. After my speech, any of the basic practical work would have seemed like a terrible anticlimax. Far better to keep them interested by discussing cursed Egyptian tombs, haunted Arabian oil mines and the horrors of my father's library than to bore them with the basics of wielding a wand. I did not tell them much about the war. Children enjoy violent stories, but some things are just too awful to face at so tender an age.

The long day's work was done. I was tired, but I could not sleep. This would happen to me occasionally; the spectres in my mind would take, for a moment, more solid shape in nightmarish visions that kept me awake. I was well used to it by now. I would usually go down to Draco and ask for a sleeping draught, but I had been up late reading and it was now nearly midnight. I could not disturb my friend's sleep for such a trifle.

Nor, tonight, did I want to. It was perfectly quiet, clear and still; a stargazer's night. It would do me no harm to go for a walk now; perhaps it would help me to sleep naturally. So I wrapped a thick winter cloak over my pyjamas and grabbed my sturdy boots, and set off slowly out through my office and into the third floor corridor. I had barely gone ten paces before I collided with someone in the hall. I looked at the offender and saw, to my considerable surprise, that it was Dorado Malfoy.

'What are you doing out of bed at night?' I exclaimed.

He had the good grace to look embarrassed. 'Nothing.' He was lying through his teeth, but that was nothing new in one breaking rules.

'Dorado,' I said, seriously. 'I know you well enough to know that you do not do anything without a good reason. Hence you must have a good reason to be here now instead of in your dormitory. Would you care to explain what that is?'

He fixed me with a piercing green glare. I wondered if the boy were channelling the spirit of Harry Potter. 'I was supposed to be meeting someone,' he said, defiantly.

'I thought as much,' I said. 'But I didn't think that you normally broke rules.' Unlike his father, who had believed that the school rules were for other, lesser people.

'I don't,' said Dorado, simply. 'But this time it was different. I made a promise, you see, and I have to keep it.'

'And I'm a teacher, and I have to make sure that people who turn up where they shouldn't be get punished,' I said, seriously. He looked a little upset. But then, I couldn't really let him off; that would have been unduly favouring my best friend's son. 'Five points from Ravenclaw, I think, since it is a first offence, and detention tomorrow night in my office.' His expression brightened; perhaps he had expected worse. 'Now, take yourself back to your tower.'

'You're not going to walk me back?' asked Dorado, and I could see the idea that was in his mind. Maybe he had inherited deviousness from his father after all.

'No,' I said. 'You aren't a first year any more. I trust you.' If truth be told, I did not care if he ran off to keep his rendezvous. He had paid for it, after all, and far be it from me to keep a young man from keeping his promises. A promise made to a girl, in all likelihood, I supposed. Only that could explain why the usually obedient Dorado had taken to wandering the school at night. I thought that any girl who had managed to get him to lighten up so far as to break rules would be good for him, and left it at that.

I met no one else on my way down to the Entrance Hall, much to my relief. I did not want to waste time punishing errant students. I wanted, more than anything, to sleep, but if that option was not available to me, at least to enjoy the peace and quiet of the night alone. The necessity of punishing any student found out of bed really spoilt the magic of wandering the school's corridors by night.

I reached the front doors of the castle and slipped outside. I had been right to put the cloak on; it might only be September but it was bitterly cold after dark. The sky was perfectly clear and, because this was deserted North Scotland, the stars could be very clearly seen. I had never been interested in stargazing as a student; it would have been too much like Astronomy homework. Now, though, I knew the constellations sufficiently well to be able to say where in the world I was simply from the arrangements of the stars.

I sat down on the lawn, and almost immediately stood back up again; the grass was damp. Lying on wet ground was all very well for younger people, but I chose to take better care of myself than that. I walked out through the grounds under the bright light of the moon until I came to the old ramshackle hut that in my schooldays had housed the half-giant gamekeeper, Hagrid. No one lived there now. The hut was half-destroyed; there were holes in the roof, perfect for looking through to observe the night sky.

The door hung from its solitary hinge and creaked threateningly as I opened it. The inside of the hut was swathed in dust and grime. On the far side of the room lurked the large shadowed shape of what had once been a bed but now was nothing more than a great ruin complete with tattered gargantuan mattress. I did not go near this – who knew what creatures could have taken up residence in such a promising home? – but rather plumped for lying down, flat on my back, on the rather threadbare but bone dry rug decorating the floor directly under the largest ceiling hole.

Now installed in my own makeshift observatory, I looked out through the gap in the roof. The stars shone as points of white in the deep blackness. I stared, immediately identifying the more major constellations with a dismissive air and moving on to the more obscure patterns. The dog days were no longer with us, but I could still see Sirius, the brightest star in the sky. Further examination revealed the obscure cluster of insignificant stars that had given Draco his name. That was a Black tradition, naming children from the night sky.

Draco had kept to that old tradition in naming his son – Dorado was also a constellation, although not one I had ever seen. I wondered then: if I had a son, what would I call him? I did not believe that I would ever have children. It was not that women did not attract me; merely that one woman had captured my heart long ago and I could never think of being married to another. If I could not have her – and I knew I could not – then I would not have any wife. It was simple as that.

I hadn't realised that I had fallen asleep until I woke up, freezing and uncomfortable, hours later. I knew that some while had passed, because the eastern edge of the inky sky was beginning to turn pale. I cursed myself for being so foolish. It was not the best idea to go out and sleep in dilapidated huts under the stars, especially not at my age and in this time of instability. I stretched out, trying to remove the stiffness from my slightly twisted, aching limbs.

How long had I lain so, I wondered? Well, there was a way to find out. 'Tempus,' I murmured into the stillness of the early morning. It was ten past five. I had slept for perhaps four and a half hours in the cold open air. I cursed myself for a fool and was about to get to my feet and head back to the castle to my bed and comfort when I heard the noise. Somewhere out in the not-quite-darkness, someone was moving. By the sound of it they were not too far from me. I tried to quiet my racing heart, telling myself that whoever it was could not know I was there, but logic was no match for adrenaline.

I got up as quietly as possible, my cold, rigid body protesting at this treatment, and crept over towards the door of the hut. Peering out into the grounds, at first I did not see anyone. Then I did not believe my eyes. All I saw was a flash of dark robes and a head full of long, dark blonde hair, but I knew as if instinctively exactly who it was out there. And I wondered why. Granted, I had no good reason to give for my presence in the grounds, but there is a difference between stargazing at midnight and wandering at five a.m. It seemed like suspicious behaviour. I made a note of it. Then, like the sensible person that, after all, I am underneath, I put the thought to the back of my mind and made my painful way back to the castle, coffee and a warm office.