Harry Potter and the Garden of Intrigue
Being an exploration of the differences in Mr. Potter's life pursuant to his understanding Victorian flower language at age 11. Single Point-of-Departure: Harry has a working lightbulb in his cupboard.
Harry Potter, all related characters, and the original Harry Potter narrative are properties of J. K. Rowling.
Chapter 9
Interesting Times
Harry didn't sleep that night. Ron had been nearly incoherent at Hagrid's, but Harry had a feeling he'd heard at least a few points that struck true.
Snape loved my mom... it seemed ridiculous, impossible - but then, so had half the shops back in Diagon Alley. Not to mention Ron's relations and their phoenix coops. Harry tumbled thoughts around in his head until the sky began to lighten.
"I need to talk to Hermione," Harry mumbled, pulling his pillow over his head. The sun was spearing through the windows, making him very uncomfortable. "Go away, sun! Need sleep!"
Neville garbled out a phrase of incomprehensible commands, and the windows snapped shut, filling the room with darkness.
"Good thing it's Saturday," observed Seamus.
Harry didn't wake up until lunchtime. He was rather surprised that he'd slept in so long. But, he surmised, this is the first time I've been able to sleep in of a morning since... Ever.
At lunch, Harry found Hermione sitting with Percy and a few other older students. She had three notebooks in front of her, mostly filled with very small handwriting; her pickled onion-and-toadstool sandwich hadn't even been touched.
"Hello Hermione," said Harry by way of greeting.
Hermione didn't even look up as she responded. "-so the interlock doesn't rely on- Hello, Harry- on the flavor of the spell at all?"
"Not even a little," confirmed a sandy-haired fourth-year. Harry sat down across the table.
"Hi, Percy."
"Hi, Harry."
Harry loaded his plate with the usual assortment of fantastic foods, wishing he hadn't slept through breakfast. Meanwhile, Hermione and her upperclassmen were still lost in conversation about Harry didn't know what.
"I've been having some trouble avoiding Code Apocalypse, Harry," confessed Percy, dropping out of the spell-babble for a moment. "I can manage Fred and George all right, but I think they've started using a go-between."
Harry glumly recalled the events of the previous day. "I don't think it really matters how hard we try to stop them, Percy, it'll only make them try harder. Mr. Stalker's already found out about the twins. Our only hope now is to convince them that the castle needs to stay intact..."
Percy crooked an eyebrow, as if to say 'good luck, you poor deluded fool,' and rejoined the impossible conversation around Hermione. Harry, reflecting on the ineffable course of destiny and its relation to the assorted cheeses on his plate, started nibbling as he waited for a chance to talk to his smartest friend.
"Hermione! Hermione!" Harry was running out of breath, trying to run and shout at the same time. Usually, back in the Muggle world, he'd kept to just running, on the grounds that nobody was going to come save him even if he shouted himself hoarse. Trying to catch a preoccupied Hermione, however, was an entirely different kettle of nargles than running from Dudley and his gang. For one thing, Harry was the one pursuing, instead of the one pursued; he'd never really appreciated the tactical insight his cousin had had to have to corner him so effectively every day for the past ten years. "Hermione! Wait!"
Hermione was still almost twelve yards ahead, her nose stuck in a book. She had her hands full with her notebooks, and she'd done something to her pencil - it kept flitting down from behind her right ear to the top notebook and scribbling something, probably notes about whatever she'd just read. Harry shouted again.
"Hermione! Please!"
Hermione finally startled out of her fugue, pausing in mid-stride as she tried to remember what it meant when somebody called your name. Fortunately, she had a magnificent memory, and Harry hadn't even reached her by the time she turned around.
"What, Harry?" She looked a bit annoyed.
Right, I interrupted her while she was studying. "Sorry, er, I've been calling at you for almost five minutes."
Hermione's brow wrinkled momentarily as she cross-indexed her subjective view of time with Harry's equally subjective external perceptions. "Really?"
"Well, nearly." Harry tilted sideways slightly, trying to catch his breath. "I've got to talk to you about Bezoars."
Hermione's expression immediately turned to sympathy. "Of course, Harry, what do you want to know?"
Harry took a deep breath. "Well, it's not just about Bezoars, I mean, Ron and I were talking about yesterday's Potions class, and we came up with some interesting ideas about flowers, and I didn't really follow everything he said so I figured I should talk to you," another deep breath, "because you're the smartest person I know, as far as I know, and I need some help figuring out what Ron was talking about and what it all means and can we go somewhere quieter?"
Hermione's expression had slumped from sympathetic to confused during Harry's spiel, but quickly rebounded to earnestly helpful. Or is it helpfully earnest? Harry couldn't really tell, and it really didn't matter.
"Certainly, Harry," agreed Hermione. "I'd be happy to help you figure it out. Let's walk to the library."
Harry agreed.
I have no idea what she's talking about, though Harry, not for the first time. He'd been trying to pay attention to Hermione's friendly ramblings, but honestly he had no idea what she meant by 'indexing temperaments' or 'spell-flavor matrices,' not to mention 'intergraph reticulation.' At least she's not asking me to remember any of this.
"Oh, look, the library!" Harry rushed forward to the door, holding it open for Hermione and her armloads of books.
"Thank you, Harry. Do you think we should start in the Herbology section, or the Potion-making section?"
Harry had to think for a moment before he realized she was referring to his earlier explanation. "The Potions section, I think." Harry patted his bag. "I've brought a book of my own for the flowers."
Harry was a bit unnerved when Hermione led him to a small table in the middle of the Potions section.
"Er, Hermione? Weren't we looking for a quiet place to talk?"
Hermione waved a hand in dismissal of his concerns. "This is a library, Harry. It's quiet everywhere. Besides which, this table has a built-in privacy charm. It's for students that need to talk while they study, it should be perfect for a private conversation."
Harry had to agree, since Madam Pince hadn't borne down on them for opening their mouths yet. The thought of the cantankerous Hogwarts Librarian reminded him of his old acquaintance, Madame Pinch; on contemplation, Harry was rather surprised at the similarities in character between his friendly spider and the overprotective librarian. He had decided never to tell Hermione about it, though, especially after her initial confusion over their names.
"Alright, Harry," interjected Hermione, having settled her books before her. Harry noticed a few additions from the nearby shelves. "What could Ron have possibly said that would need me to translate it for you?"
Harry explained.
"Wait, Professor Snape was sending you secret messages about your mother by asking you difficult questions?"
Harry nodded.
"And Ron thinks," Hermione snorted a bit at this statement, "that Professor Snape is secretly on your side." She'd filled almost twelve pages with notes while Harry related the tale of Tea at Hagrid's.
Harry nodded again.
"And you believe this because you've got a book on Victorian Flower Language, which, Harry," she fixed him with a concerned gaze, "has never been a very complete language, you understand."
Harry had actually cross-referenced a few of the elements in Snape's message, if message it was, with a book from the Hogwarts Library, just to be sure the flowers didn't have a special dialect for Wizards. They didn't. Harry nodded again.
Hermione checked her notes. "So you wanted me to make sure Ron wasn't going completely insane when he made those assumptions." The pages of her notebook flipped back and forth as she compared information. "And to find out if Bezoars had any tricky meanings."
Harry felt that nodding was getting a bit old, so he shrugged instead.
The notebook flipped again, and two of the books on potions joined it.
"Well?"
"Bezoars are aggregations of matter mixed with stomach acids, usually stonelike in appearance; they come in a wide variety of materials and sizes. There's also something called a Trichinobezoar..." Hermione made a retching sound, "which I'm pretty sure isn't what he was referring to."
"And they cure poisons?"
Hermione nodded, which made Harry feel a bit better about his own recent behaviour. "Only certain types of Bezoar, and muggles don't usually have enough latent magic to activate the Bezoar's curative and purgative effects, but..." Harry was staring at her with a mildly glazed expression. "Nevermind. Yes, they cure poisons, but only for wizards."
Harry pondered this information for a minute. "Is there anything else about Bezoars that might mean something to Snape?"
"Nothing I can see. I doubt Professor Snape is old enough to have met Ibn Zuhr, and there's really nothing else in their history that looks interesting."
"Oh."
Hermione tried to console him by patting his arm. It wasn't very effective. "Well, Harry, if Professor Snape really was trying to tell you something, maybe the bezoar was just a bit of good advice?"
Harry nodded, still feeling a little glum. "That's what Ron was saying." Not noticing that Hermione's expression suddenly became quite fixed, he continued. "I guess he really knows what he's talking about, then." Harry started putting his books away. "Thanks, Hermione, you've been really helpful."
Hermione was still sitting very still, her arm still stiffly reaching across the table. "Er, Hermione? You all right?"
"Yes! Perfectly!" Hermione jerked her arm back to her side. "Anything else I can help you with, Harry?"
"Er," said Harry. "I'd like to figure out how to tell Snape I got his message, but I'm not sure where to start. Should I use flower language? Should I just tell him 'I got your message'?"
Hermione's rigid smile shattered into a genuinely friendly grin. "I'll put together a few ideas from the research we've done, and we'll go over them tomorrow, alright?"
Harry nodded. "See you later, Hermajesty," he intoned, bowing deeply and gathering his things.
The next morning, Harry discovered Ron feverishly assembling some kind of chaotic jumble across the back wall of the Thunder Room.
"Ron? What's that?"
Ron turned from his incomprehensible diagrams. "Oh, morning Harry," he slurred. "I've been working out everything I can from what Snape told you, look." Ron gestured vaguely at the web of twine that he'd constructed, and Harry noticed scribbled notes near almost every juncture of threads.
"So... what is it?"
Ron huffed a bit. "It's a conspiracy board, right? Got the idea from Dad, he's got one of these in the back of his workshop tracking muggle conspiracies about him."
Harry's eyebrows raised an inch.
"Got it from a muggle, if you believe it. Anyway I thought I should try to put my thoughts in order, since this whole Secret Message thing is obviously important somehow."
"Did you sleep last night?" Harry was still yawning himself.
Ron shrugged. "Nah. Too much to do."
Harry looked at the conspiracy board again. "Er, Ron, is it supposed to rearrange itself?"
Ron whirled on the board, whose threads were twisting into new and ever more maddening configurations. "PEEVES!"
"Hahahha, playing with string, ickle Griffindors? Maybe you're just kittens, not lions at all!" Peeves whooshed out of the conspiracy board, bobbing through the floor between Ron and Harry.
"Aargh!" Ron clenched his fists in the air in a futile gesture of frustration. "That crazy- - -waste of time!"
"-Breakfast?"
"What?" Harry was a bit confused.
Seamus Finnigan waved at them from his bunk. "I said, shouldn't we all head down to breakfast?"
Ron punched the twisted ruins of his conspiracy theories. "Yeah, good idea, Seamus."
Most of Sunday was uneventful after that, although Harry was a bit surprised when he discovered that Hogwarts didn't have a chapel.
"It's not that strange, Harry," explained Percy. "Witches and Wizards were persecuted by most of the big religions in the days of the Founders, and there's still a lot of mistrust floating around out there. Godric Gryffindor couldn't really invite a priest to Hogwarts when all the priests were trying to burn our magic to the ground, see?"
Harry saw.
In the evening, Harry met up with Hermione and Ron to discuss his plans - and Hermione's plans - for returning Snape's message.
Hermione's idea to use Chestnuts - meaning 'do me justice' - was shut down by Ron, who pointed out that they also mean Luxury. Harry, meanwhile, thought Ron's idea to earn detention by blowing up Harry's cauldron with an Exploding Snap set was excitingly horrible.
"I mean, he might just kill me for being an idiot, and who knows what would happen to the potion?" reasoned Harry.
"I could probably work out a formula for next week's Lightening Liquid that makes an inert substance from the explosion," offered Hermione.
"Right on!"
Harry sighed. "No, just... no. Snape still hates me, even if he liked my mom, and I'd rather not give him a real reason to punish me - you've seen how he is when I'm trying to behave!"
Hermione nodded glumly, and Ron grudgingly agreed.
"That's the best plan I could think of, though," admitted Ron.
"Don't worry, Hermione's got loads." Hermione nodded again, this time quite happily.
In the end, they settled on having Harry put a cherry blossom on his workspace - signifying that he had a 'good education' - and if that didn't work, he'd just have to fall back on Ron's Exploding Snap idea.
"It's a decent plan, Harry, I don't think Professor Snape can have you expelled for blowing up your cauldron."
"And if he gives you detention, it'll be all the more chance to find out what he's really up to."
"Yeah," grumbled Harry, "unless what he's really up to is trying to make me look bad and then punishing me whether I do or not. Those questions might have been coincidences, you know."
Ron and Hermione shared a glance. "We've been over this, mate. The odds that Snape would single you out - something he hasn't done to any other Gryffindor - and then ask questions that are so specific to you and to him?"
"Not likely, I know." Harry shot a look out the window. "D'you think Neville might be able to help with the plan? He's got a better head for flowers than any of us."
Hermione started to agree, but Ron interjected with "too many already, Harry. The more know a plan, the less likely it is to stay secret - and Snape definitely wanted that to stay secret."
"Which is why he told me in front of the entire class?"
"In a secret code!" objected Ron. "Which only you know!"
"Not that Professor Snape had any way of knowing that, of course."
"Of course."
"So we tell Neville?"
Ron shrugged. "Sure, why not?"
