Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter Eleven—Hierarchy
"You think you're that special just because you can use Parseltongue, is that it?"
Harry sighs and turns around. He hoped the challenges from within Slytherin House would end because Flint finally graduated, but it doesn't seem so. There's a large seventh-year he doesn't know in front of him, one with a broken nose and the kind of pointy face that Draco doesn't seem to have these days.
"Who are you?" Harry clenches his shoulder so that Lion will know not to crawl down it. Harry is getting better at communicating with him in things other than just Parseltongue.
"Wouldn't you like to know, Mudblood."
Harry breathes to ease the anger. "Yes, I would. That's why I asked."
The boy stares at him blankly. The Slytherins in the common room, who are mostly fifth-years, stir a little. Harry thinks that things could go either way at this point, and he honestly doesn't know who the majority of his Housemates would side with.
"His name's Justice Pucey," Blaise says from behind Harry, and for once, Harry isn't annoyed by his friends' habit of tracking him all over the place. "Related to our glorious Adrian. And named for a virtue that I don't think he has much of." He halts next to Harry, and smiles at Pucey. "Don't you think so, Justice?"
"I don't think so," Theo says, and materializes on Harry's other side. "Although I understand that you weren't asking me."
"Absolutely not," Daphne says, stretching as she wanders towards them. "No one with a sense of justice would be as perky as he is this early in the morning."
"And most people would understand what it means to call someone with Harry's powers, both magical and political, a Mudblood." That's Draco, who's standing next to Theo now and giving a smile at Pucey that actually makes him take a step back.
Pucey only looks back and forth between them. Harry waits. He has no idea why Pucey chose to approach him like this, and right now. Hatred or something his family told him, if they serve Voldemort? Or just stupidity? It could be almost anything.
"This isn't over," Pucey finally says, and then he turns and leaves through the common room door. Harry shakes his head and relaxes his shoulder under Lion so that he'll know it's okay to climb down if he wants.
"What was that all about?" Pansy is staring back and forth as though she doesn't know what to make of any of them. Behind her, Millicent is silent, a frown on her face as she strokes the cat in her arms.
"I don't know," Harry says, and then walks out of the common room door himself, after a silent count of thirty to make it less likely that he'll run into Pucey. Draco and Daphne and Theo and Blaise all come with him, which was expected, but Pansy runs out and catches up to him.
"If you're making some kind of power play in Slytherin, Potter—"
"Not consciously. I don't know what Pucey wanted. But he called me a Mudblood, so he was probably hoping I'd react."
"What would you have done if no one else had shown up to guard you?" Pansy looks at Draco as though she thinks he's under some sort of spell and will snap out of it. Draco ignores her.
"Asked some of the fifth-years to find out what his name is. Then I would have asked him what his problem is."
Pansy closes her eyes and stops walking for a second. Harry and the others keep going. Pansy catches up with them again. Millicent is behind her, still listening, her arms still around her cat. "But you can't just do it like that! You can't get an alliance with the older and more powerful Slytherins if you don't know who they are and what they mean!"
"Why would I want an alliance with someone who calls me Mudblood and would probably call me worse if I didn't have allies?"
Pansy groans to herself and sweeps past them on her way to the Great Hall. For an instant, Harry thinks Millicent is going to say something, but in the end, she shakes her head and follows Pansy.
"Pansy thinks you're a political moron," Draco informs him helpfully.
"Yes, thank you, your name should be Obvious Malfoy," Harry snaps at him. He sighs when he sees the way Draco blinks. "Sorry, I'm irritated with Snape and it's spilling over. But I still won't do what Pansy thinks I should. I made certain rules for the people who should be part of the study group. Making friends or allies with someone like Pucey who just throws blood prejudice around is stupid."
"Maybe not with him specifically," Theo murmurs. "But there are lots of people teetering on the edge of joining Voldemort who might not join him if they were offered a viable alternative."
Harry doesn't say anything. He knows that he isn't a political genius. But there are some things that he isn't going to compromise. What could he even offer people who think Voldemort is a good idea? The people in his study group don't think that way. He keeps walking, one hand rising up when Lion spreads his wings and snaps at a fly in the air.
"No one said anything about him last night, did you notice?"
Harry blinks for a second, then realizes Draco is talking about Lion and not him. "Yeah, I thought it was unusual, but I was just glad that they weren't demanding I get rid of him or something."
Draco chortles. "Get rid of him? Of course not, Harry. They're impressed by him. I think that's one reason Pucey confronted you in that clumsy way this morning. He doesn't know what you stand for. His parents have told him you're the enemy, and probably the rest of his family, but then you're a Parselmouth and you have an impressive snake on your shoulder. I think that's why he spoke about your Parseltongue specifically. He wanted to see how you would react."
Harry just shakes his head. He doesn't think he can go on being everything to the Slytherin students, a Parselmouth and someone they need to appease and the Boy-Who-Lived from a rival House and...who knows what else. "Well, he's going to be disappointed that I'm not about to substitute for Voldemort, I suppose."
"There are people who would find what you offer more attractive," Theo says, in that neutral voice that he uses when he wants to be most annoying.
Harry closes his eyes and reminds himself that it's only seven-thirty in the morning, and if he uses up all his annoyance now, then he won't have it when he needs it. "I know. But I can't prioritize saving them. Unless they actually come to me and want to be part of my study group or something."
He can feel Theo and Blaise exchanging glances behind his back. He knows they would stop if he said something about it. He doesn't say anything about it.
"Let's go to breakfast," Harry says, and puts aside the conversation and any attempts to restart it again firmly. He concentrates on making sure that he gets enough to eat, that Lion gets enough to eat, and that Luna isn't being bulled at the Ravenclaw table. That's what he's doing for right now.
Remus crouches down and sniffs carefully at the tracks that spiral around the mouth of a large cave. It would be hard to find even normally, but someone has spelled vines and roots to grow down across the mouth. Remus wouldn't know it was here if not for his spectacular nose.
And his familiarity with Greyback's scent, by now.
He knows that Greyback spent a considerable amount of time here, and also that he hasn't been near the cave in a week. The other scents around the cave would raise all the hair on his back if he was a wolf, but he can't identify them. One is thick and heavy and resembles aconite, but isn't exactly it. And one smells a little like earth after a lightning strike, but that isn't it, either. Remus has searched carefully. He knows he would have found a place where a fire burned if there was one. There isn't.
The cave's entrance sparkles with wards just behind the plants, some of them actually attached to the delicate rootlets and tendrils. Moving them will alert Greyback, or possibly Voldemort. Remus thinks he's ready for the battle with Greyback, but not both of them.
He does have a method to move the roots so he can look into the cave even if he can't actually enter it, though.
Remus twists his wand and murmurs the charm that James came up with in sixth year and thought was hilarious for one day, until Sirius hit him over the head with the realization that if he could see through girls' clothing, he could also see through boys'. "Oculi hyali."
The air ripples in a way that Remus has learned to ignore; he never used the charm to peer through people's clothes, but he's cast it often enough to learn when an enemy was waiting out of sight or where food might be hidden. The grass softens and blurs in his sight until it looks like a cascade of rain, then vanishes. Remus studies the inside of the cave thus revealed.
A huge cauldron, perhaps the one from the dreams that Harry mentioned having where he saw Greyback casting the Confundus Charm over and over again on a cauldron. There's also a thick carpet, or at least it looks like one, made of grass woven over a cloth of some kind. There's a set of human fingerbones, and another set that probably come from thighs. There's a huge glass cup, and Remus flinches as he looks at it. It's a two-handled cup like the kind that sometimes gets handed around at weddings, and there's a muddy aura swimming around it that makes Remus want to vomit.
Remus carefully scans all of them. But none of them really tells him anything. He can't tell what kinds of liquid the cup might have held from the aura, even though it feels like he should be able to. And he's fairly sure that the grass is sewn onto a backing of human skin, but that doesn't tell him what Greyback and Voldemort intend to do with it.
A low sound comes out of the tall grass to his left. Greyback and Voldemort might have left guardians on the cave other than wards.
Remus lightly casts the net of spells that he prepared before he left Sirius's house, the end of one triggering the other, and Apparates. The first spell, to disturb the earth and erase his footprints, will catalyze the next, to erase his scent, and then comes the third, which will hide all trace of magic he performed at the site, including the Apparition.
Remus is becoming wiser in his old age. He's reminded of that again when he returns to his own bedroom and looks at the locked drawer his letter to Albus about Harry is waiting in.
He hasn't sent it, and now he never will. But he doesn't intend to rip it up, either. Keep it for now. It may be useful in the future.
"See me after class, Potter."
"Sir." Harry keeps his voice nice and polite and neutral as he turns and packs away his Potions supplies. Lion shifts on his shoulder and hisses a soft question. Harry hisses back, "It's all right," ignoring how half the Gryffindors in the class flinch.
It's still only half. Last year it would have been all of them except Ron and Hermione.
Hermione acts as if she wants to hover behind and wait for him, but Snape's face is as closed as the door he shuts in their faces. Harry nods his reassurance and turns around, arms folded. Lion curls tightly around his neck, watching, waiting.
"I believe you misunderstood my intent when I sent those letters to your friends," Snape says. His voice is still closed, along with his face. He watches Harry as if he thinks he'll bolt in some random direction and Snape will have to stop him.
Harry gives him as small and neutral a smile as he can, and asks, "What was your intent, sir?"
"To make sure that they knew I would not tolerate investigations into the dangers like the ones they initiated in past years."
"That makes it sound like I was their helpless pawn. I never was, sir. I participated in those 'investigations' just as much as anyone else did. I went down to the Chamber of Secrets and I went to help retrieve the Stone. I confronted Sirius on my own last year, and that's not something Ron or Hermione wanted me to do. And I notice that you didn't send any letters to my Slytherin friends."
Snape struggles in silence for a moment, while Harry watches him and doesn't sympathize. Then he says, "They did not get you into danger in the same way."
"Then you're only looking at House prejudice, and nothing else," Harry says, and sighs. It was nice to believe that he and Snape had got past that during the summer, but maybe Snape can only get past it until the moment when he saw Gryffindors other than Harry walking around in red and gold. "Can I go now, sir?"
"I want to be sure that you will be safe."
The desperate tone in Snape's voice makes Harry pause for a moment. But then he shakes his head. "I really, really don't go looking for trouble, sir. I only jump in when I can see that no one else is going to do it and someone needs to be protected. I can't let someone die because I wanted to stay safe."
"None of your peers thought they needed to go to the Chamber of Secrets!"
"Ron did."
"That does not count. His little sister was trapped there. But you had no reason to be there."
Harry really wants to bang his head against something, but there's nothing in a convenient distance. He speaks slowly. "If it's all right for Ron to go because Ginny is his sister, then it's all right for me to go because they're my friends. It's all right for children to go or it's not. Make up your bloody mind."
Snape narrows his eyes, and Harry flinches. But he stands tall. If Snape wants to put him in detention for the language or take points, he can do that. But Harry remembers what Healer Lyndell said.
Snape can never be a good guardian if Harry is afraid of him.
"Let me say, then," Snape mutters, his voice caught on the edge of what sounds like a snarl, "that I do not care as much if other children go. I care that you don't."
Harry closes his eyes.
So he knew this, but it does sound differently when it's put into words.
"I understand that, sir," Harry manages to say. There's too much all mixed up in his mind, understanding and anger and the desire to protect his friends from Snape and the desire to argue and Healer Lyndell's words and the lessons from the Speakers and how Snape protected him from Dumbledore this summer. It's all mixed up. "But I care about my friends. So don't send threats to them unless you want me to get upset. It's something that's pretty simple to understand when you think about it."
"I only want some assurance that you will also place your own safety first."
It cost Snape a lot to say that. Harry nods to acknowledge it. "I'll try to take care of myself better. But I can't place my own safety first before everyone else's."
"Why not?"
"It's not who I am."
Snape sounds as if he said "Dursleys," but Harry ignores that. He can't talk about that in a rational way, either, which he knows means he shouldn't try. He opens his eyes and looks at Snape. Snape has his arms folded and a fierce frown on his face. He looks as if he doesn't know whether to snap at Harry or not.
"So this is where we stand?" Snape asks, when a few moments have passed in silence and Harry has begun to wonder how late he's going to be to Transfiguration. "With you making promises that you may not keep?"
"I'll try my best to keep them, sir."
"But you can't promise absolutely?"
Harry shakes his head. "I think it's best that you know that, sir. That's not the person I am. I can't stand aside when I see someone in danger. I can ask you for help or warn people if I have time, but I—if it was a choice between going down into the Chamber of Secrets alone or leaving someone to die, I'd go every time."
"I suppose it would not matter to tell you that I would much prefer that you stayed up here?"
"I'll always remember it," Harry says. He's thinking about this summer again, and how he doesn't like Snape sending threats to his friends, but Snape not understanding this might be a bigger problem. "I would do all I could to find another solution. But I would still do it. If I could ignore someone in danger, I'd be a different person."
Snape sighs, from the heart. Then he says, "Very well. I cannot—stand in the way of that. But I do insist that you continue your appointments with Healer Lyndell, even now that we have returned to Hogwarts."
"Yes, sir," Harry says quietly. He can respect what it took for Snape to say that. He'll also respect his own convictions.
Snape hesitates before he casts the spell that will open the door. And then he bends down and hugs Harry, quickly, before he steps aside and lets Harry go.
Harry turns around and leaves with a smile that will grow wider during the rest of the day. He and Snape might not be all right immediately.
But they will be all right.
