Brynn
x
Double-crossersx
I change my mind about assigning the detention. A fragile equilibrium was established between Potter and I, and I am loathe to descend back into mutual malignancy without a good reason. We both still wear the rings – while I am aware that he would not go searching for trouble, I know he will, without peradventure, get into some. Besides, I have seen for myself that Hogwarts wards no not prevent possession from outside them.
I tap the tip of my quill against the rim of the inkwell, dislodge the overflowing red drop back into the vessel and cross out an entire paragraph (if it can be called such) of the essay in front of me.
Apparently, I never shall escape singling Potter out in class. I pretend to ignore him, unless he does something stupid and endangers himself or people around him (though that has yet to occur since the beginning of the year). To Potter, that is preferential treatment.
Today's lesson, however, has started with him dropping a glass beaker. He caught it before it hit the floor, sure, but the fact that it happened in the first place was akin to an alarm. For the past hour I have been watching him closer than usually – so closely, in fact, that I have almost missed Macmillan adding whole runespoor scales instead of powdered ones. That pocket catastrophe was prevented by Granger, who had the presence of mind to not trust a Hufflepuff with volatile ingredients.
"Macmillan, ten points for idiocy. Potter, stay after class."
I rub the bridge of my nose, mentally plead for early and painless end to this lesson, and divert my attention back to the pitiful excuse for an essay.
x
We keep meeting like this.
He sits on the worktable and it scarcely even crosses my mind to berate him. He gets closer (marginally) to my line of sight like this, and I do not particularly care about school property…
"What is wrong with you, Potter?"
He stares at the backs of his hands, one adorned with a simple metallic band, and remains silent. My eyes stray to the clock on my desk, before I recall that today is Thursday, and therefore this has been the last class of the day. Potter has all the time until tomorrow morning to waste, and I… likewise.
"The sooner you tell me, the sooner you can get out of here and join your little fanclub."
He looks at me the way I imagine Dumbledore would, and on top of my headache, it makes my temper rise. He makes it clear, though, that he is not in a hurry.
"It does not concern you," Potter grumbles, looking at his pile of books to elude my eyes. He should have told Lupin that he needed a bag – it would take but a trip to Diagon Alley to get him one. Anyone from the Order could take five minutes from whatever they were doing there to make his life easier. But Potter remains silent, distrustful of adults to the point when he does not want their help, or simply considering his discomfort unworthy of such attention.
How I have misjudged him.
"It does-"
"No," he says, shaking his head resolutely. "Not unless it has influence on my work in class, and it does not."
"You dropped a glass, Potter." I glare at him. He glares back.
"And I caught it." Which is the truth and makes it all the harder to build up support from the half-baked allegations that are all I have. On the other hand, he knows perfectly well that there is a problem, and that makes him defensive.
"You should not have dropped it in the first place." He frowns, seemingly at the cover of Advanced Potion-Making, absently brushing the vivid writing with his fingers. "You have a choice. You can discuss it now with me, or later with the Headmaster. But choose quickly; I am rapidly running out of patience." Which is mostly due to the headache and my habit of intense dislike towards this boy.
I am convinced that he is going to tell me something that would warrant loss of points for strong language and high-tail out of the room, but he once again proves that it does not work that way with him. Either that, or me mentioning Dumbledore persuaded him into talking.
"I've got nightmares," he says simply. That does not tell me much – he always has nightmares. "It's visions, only these days it's through Nagini's eyes mostly… Lots of dead people, Muggles, Light families, my former classmates who were pulled out of school… the Abercrombies last night. It's just… exhausting…" He falls silent again, playing with a ripped edge of a sheet of parchment with his Potions notes. It is disconcerting to hear the lack of concern in his speech. Granted, he had no emotional attachment to these people – but I have yet to see any sign that he had had emotional attachment to Diggory, and that death struck him harder than I would have expected.
"The ring did not alert me." I am trying to make sense of this. I do not doubt his honesty in speaking of the visions, but when he had one in Grimmauld Place, the ring woke me up. I do not understand why these are different.
"Yeah… it's Voldemort casting Cruciatus that hurts… Nagini doesn't do much except bite and kill a few people here and there and keep an eye on the Death Eaters for Voldemort while they go on rampage." He finally looks up, and a smirk curls his lips. "There's not many of them left. Not more than twenty bodies."
"But among them are Rodolphus Lestrange and Fenrir Greyback," I state, and Potter's smirk fails. His expression disappears again, leaving the blankness behind. He nods, as if I needed his agreement. I suppose that he does have a lot to say about and to those two people.
"Macnair, Pucey and-"
"You know who they are?"
Potter laughs weakly.
"Those I've met before. But I can describe them; I know what they are like, I know how they think…" I realise I am gaping at him, when he looks away again and shrugs. "I tried to get people to listen to me."
x
My talk with Potter in the end generates little new information, but helps clarify which of the Death Eaters survived the battle at the orphanage. The Order managed to count the dead werewolves – there was twelve of them, the only one to escape was Greyback – but they ran from the premises when the fire started.
By the time the Muggle fire brigade arrived, the evidence was lost.
Thanks to Potter's conscious' nightly excursions, we can be certain that the surviving group consists of Fenrir Greyback, Rodolphus Lestrange, Walden Macnair, Augustus Rookwood, Alecto Carrows, Mercury Gibbon, Peter Pettigrew, Antigona Yaxley, Marcus Flint, Claudius Warrington and Adrian Pucey. There are others whom Potter could not name, although the description of one of them matches Stamford Jorkins suspiciously well. Potter has a clear picture of four I cannot identify, and a shadowy one of two to five more.
Either way, despite the small numbers, it is an intimidating group.
Potter and I have relocated to my office for the discussion – a place that holds many negative common memories – and endured the gloomy atmosphere with unexpected decorum. He started out seated on the chair opposite me, but, after nearly avoiding falling off it, he relocated to the floor. He sits crouched at the foot of the wall on his bunched outer robe, isolating himself from the chill of the stone as best as he can. His eyes are narrowed; his head lolls to the side.
"Do not fall asleep here, Potter. I would not bother carrying you into bed, even if Pomfrey killed me for letting you die from pneumonia."
He has the guts to smile at that and close his eyes completely.
"Potter!" I bark at him. He sighs, straightens and rubs his eyes.
"S'ry…" he mumbles. "I'm dead on my feet… well, dead anyway." He rolls his shoulders, eliciting a series of pops, and moans with discontent. I glance at the clock; it is well past dinner. He should not be here.
"Go to bed, Potter. If you find out or remember more, we can resume this on another day."
He mumbles something and looks quizzically up at me. The weariness is easily readable in his body language and mimic, but there is also expectation. He must think that whatever sound he just issued was comprehensible.
"Was I supposed to understand that?"
He is lucky that my headache has long since receded, otherwise I would subtract points for antagonising me.
"Teach me," he says quietly, but distinctly enough.
"What?" Years of pretending to be a Death Eater pretending not to be a Death Eater supposedly taught me to hide surprise, therefore he mistakes my exclamation for a question with an actual point.
"Occlumency. Anything useful." He leans back against the wall, just like he was after Dumbledore's interrogation in the Headquarters – weak and very, very tired, but determined. I dreaded this day, even though I thought it would be long in coming. Potter asks me for guidance, which I cannot exactly refuse him… but I shall not surrender without a fight. My assistance is not easy to get.
"What are you blathering on about, Potter?" My scowl does not work on him anymore. He looks back evenly, completely ignoring the verbal attack.
"Teach me. Please. I went to Dumbledore, and he flat out refused. Sometimes I get the feeling that he doesn't want me to survive this war." I cannot believe that of the Headmaster. His past decisions involving the Boy Who Lived have often been questionable, but Potter is crucial for the outcome of the war, and Dumbledore wants to win it. There must be a different explanation for the lack of training our saviour receives.
I strongly suspect it to be the same stupidity that made the Order disregard Potter's contributions to the warfare and tried to force him to stay out of 'danger'. That, or general senility.
"He might be trying to push the two of us into a working relationship," I tell him in the end, waking him from another almost-slumber he fell in during the long while of silence. I do not believe it, but Potter in his current state might.
"But… we already have a working relationship. Don't we?" Of course we have, what kind of question is that? He is smart, he cannot misunderstand that, not even fatigued as he is. I have just spent hours with him alone in my office and neither of us came to any harm. I even tolerated minor disrespect and did not berate him for lack of manners, accommodating his physical and mental state. If this is not a 'working relationship', then I do not know what constitutes one.
He turns to me, with pleading eyes like two green ignes fatui. So that is it – he has seen or heard something and needs reassurance. Why is it me again put in this position? Have I not given him enough in the flea-infested old house of his? I should not be asked for comfort… But I grant it, for the humanity of that need in turn reassures me.
"Yes, we do. But he does not know that behind closed doors we are civil – he only sees that among other people we are not."
x
I doubt that Potter retains much of the conversation, nevertheless, I concede that it will be for the best for everyone if I stand to my word and schedule two or three hours a week to spend teaching him how to kill faster and better.
If he emerges from the Gryffindor Tower at all on Friday, I do not know about it. I am accosted by an irate Zanthia Baddock on the way from the classroom to my private quarters.
"Professor! Professor Snape!"
I pause and turn to face the girl. I am not an approachable person, and even my Slytherins often hesitate before they bring up a problem with me, but this particular girl never seemed to accept the fact. She has too much of a Gryffindor in her, but ranks among the best in her year in Potions, so I tolerate it.
"Miss Baddock." I do my best to convey my displeasure about being detained on my way to two days of relative freedom on Friday afternoon. She looks apologetic, but insists nevertheless.
"I'm sorry, sir, but all the other houses have already booked the Quidditch Pitch, and Draco Malfoy does nothing! When we asked him about it he said he didn't want to be the Captain! Could you please talk to him, sir…" She steps from one foot to the other and back, nervously twiddling with the end of her pony-tail. "If he still doesn't want to, could you please assign someone else? Draco's the best Quidditch player we have, but if he really doesn't want to…" she shrugs. "There's no sense in forcing him…"
Draco seems to have taken up Potter's annoying habit of surprising me. His appointment as the Slytherin Quidditch Captain has somehow been passed without my contribution, even though I would have agreed with it if asked. That he does not want to take the position… I know for a fact that he yearned for it in the past. It used to be one of his more realistic dreams. That he would refuse it now worries me.
"Do you know where he is now, Miss Baddock?"
The girl nods.
"In the common room, sir."
"Very well. I shall speak to him. You may go." I continue toward my quarters to put away the stack of essays I shall have the joy of marking tonight.
"Thank you, sir!"
x
The Slytherin common room is quieter than I am used to it being, although it might be because I rarely come here while classes are still in session. Draco, it seems, has Friday afternoons free, and I do not teach the last two periods before dinner (which I intended to spend in blithe solitude, or, if the fancy strikes me, perhaps in the company of a glass of Alsikescotch). I do not dislike this place, but the memories tied to it cause me to avoid it as much as possible.
Draco occupies 'his' armchair. He has commandeered it as soon as he returned for this school-year, in stead on the couch that used to 'belong' to him and his two thugs in the years past. When I enter, he is sitting (quite against etiquette) on his folded legs, leaning sideways against the backrest, engrossed in a (newspaper-packed) book. How quickly and efficiently Potter managed to counter his pureblood upbringing.
"Mr Malfoy."
He looks up. There is no sign of surprise visible on him as he gestures me to the nearest couch without saying a word. I ignore the, likely unintentional, slight and remain standing.
"This is about Quidditch, is it not?" I raise an eyebrow at him, but it does not work. Instead of Potter picking up some manners from him, Draco seems to have adopted the Golden Boy's impudence.
"That would be correct. I was under the impression that you coveted the Captaincy."
He checks the number of the page he is reading, shuts the book and puts it down on the armchair's seat next to his leg.
"I used to. I changed my mind. Besides, no one bothered to ask me whether I wanted it."
"Do you wish to withdraw from the team?" It would be a loss for Slytherin, especially since the pool of potential players has been drastically reduced, but forcing a skilled flyer to play would have a less positive effect than letting someone enthusiastic, even if less accomplished, to take the position.
"There's no real competition…" he concludes melancholically. He misses the past years, the trivial problems and confrontations with other students that resulted in quick jaunt to hospital wing rather than a memorial service. "The Ministry didn't revoke Harry's life ban, so he can't play even if he wanted to. But he doesn't… not really. The Gryffindors have been biting his head off about it, as if there was something he could do…"
I have not been aware of that development, but Potter has enough to struggle with, even without the blasted sport. He is falling asleep in classes – on a broom he would likely kill himself. Draco obviously worries about him, but I doubt he truly understands the detachment from everyday school life that Potter feels.
"There is still Chang." At least I think so. I am not sure – many Ravenclaws bent to the lure of power and knowledge the Dark Lord promised. I have lost conception of which students still attend and which of those that do not do not because they are dead.
"She's been pathetic last year. Summerby is better, but still not worth getting on a broom."
I suppress a sigh.
"Draco, you know very well that I cannot force you to play. However, you still do not know whether there will be a challenge or not – the teams are not even complete yet. Incidentally, who is Gryffindor Captain?" It would have been Bell, but who was put in her place?
"Ron," Draco says. I need a moment of thought before I realise that he is talking about the second youngest Weasley. It sounds strange from his mouth, but I will have to get used to it – Draco has adopted Potter's fanclub as his own friends, and I do not intend to alienate the boy by disparaging his companions.
"Incidentally," Draco says with a hint of a sneer, "he is likely to be a far better Captain than I could ever amount to be. Objectively, Slytherin has no chance on the Quidditch Cup this year. It's simply not worth the bother…"
"And yet you do not wish to withdraw from the team." If he did, he would have told me so. This stalling means that he does not know what he wants, or that he is not sure whether his decision is right.
"I do enjoy flying…"
It is against the nature of Slytherins to search for compromises, but I do so in order so save at least a part of my Friday evening to myself.
"Then I shall appoint a different Captain. However, I expect you to try out for the team and do your best if you are drafted." I phrase it as an order, although I technically cannot command him to compete. Apparently, my solution is acceptable to him.
It only leaves me with the conundrum of who to select as a Quidditch Captain, when there is no one with any experience on team left in Slytherin.
x
The issue solves itself by the end of the evening.
Draco sends me a letter with one of the school owls, since I am not approachable personally by any way except the Floo network, which the students do not have access to.
Apparently, word of Draco's rebellion reached Potter, who explained to him exactly why he wanted to retain the captaincy.
I roll the glass in my fingers and watch the liquid in it swirl around as I think about the child. Potter. An apparition with the dead eyes of his dead mother, his father's penchant for trouble, yet lacking the supposed maliciousness I resented him for… and a mind all on its own. So fragile and at the same time so… so alarmingly powerful… Dozens of respectable wizards, many of them trained and hardened Aurors, fell to Bellatrix Lestrange only. And yet the boy constructed a personal ward, took a blade, and sliced through the Dark Lord's Inner Circle with ease that makes my throat go dry just by recalling it.
I take a gulp of the liquid and relish in the slight burning that it generates. It is apparent that there is little that can stand against Potter and survive – not Death Eaters, not dementors, not werewolves… the ordinary and exceptional horrors of the wizarding world will one day near in coming (if they do not already) quake at the mere mention of the Boy Who Lived.
How many are there left who can say no to him?
I think I'm drunk now. I should go to sleep.
x
He does not seem so powerful now, does he?
I watch Potter as he packs up his supplies and puts his book into an old, overused bag. Someone must have stepped in, unable to look at that pathetic insect-like creature as it carried its belongings around the school in brittle emaciated hands. Would he even be able to lift the sword he killed Bellatrix with?
Where is the power? Alcohol must have more influence over me than I ever realised. Is this what 'temporary insanity' is like? I certainly hope so. It would not do to underestimate Potter, but for a man I my shoes – soon to be Potter's instructor in dabbling in the nastiest things wizards can hurl at each other – the consequences of overestimating him would be far worse and further reaching.
"Will you be missed if you do not attend dinner?" I ask him. He shrugs.
"I might. But it's not likely – I don't attend dinners often lately."
Yes, I can clearly see that. If there ever was an ounce of flesh on his bones it is not there now. He should have a real baby-sitter to make sure that he eats at least three times a day. I suppose that I am not exactly guiltless of self-starvation either, but I have yet to take it to such lengths as I see it in front of me.
"You will eat today."
For a moment he cannot suppress incredulity, but then his expression settles on something I have not seen before and cannot gauge the meaning of.
"I am not hungry."
I believe that. I hold the door open for him, not out of misplaced courtesy or something equally laughable, but to prod him to finally leave the classroom. I feel the wards fall in place as the lock clicks behind us, and lead him through the hallways to my office. My quarters are infinitely more appetising, but I will let Potter learn Cruciatus on myself before I allow him into a place so private for me. Even if I have to suffer the sight of pickled intestines as I eat.
"Strange as it may sound, Potter, I do believe you." I miss his reaction, since he is walking behind me. "However, at some point you reach a state when you do not feel hunger anymore. I think you are past that point."
Once again, I hold the door open. He walks past me, staring blankly ahead, which more or less confirms that my accusation was accurate. He takes a place on the chair he started on in our last meeting, sets his bag on the floor next to his feet and gazes at the ink- and tea-stained surface of the desk.
I shut the door and fire-call the kitchen for two servings of the main course of whatever is going to be eaten in the Great Hall in two hours. It takes the house elves nary a moment to deliver the food, which turns out to be beef, rice and sauerkraut. Potter eyes it with distaste, but obediently picks up a fork and prods the vegetable. He at least tries to stomach something, although it is very obvious that the activity causes him no pleasure.
We eat – and by that I mean that I eat while Potter rearranges the food around the plate with the objective of making it seem less – in silence that, behold, is not as tense as it could be. I actually manage to consume most of it, which is somewhat of a rare occurrence, despite the ominous presence of the stomach-unfriendly jars.
My final examination of Potter's plate, as they are being taken away, uncovers that he has, in fact, managed to dispose of the rice. I explain any feelings I might have about it away as satisfaction that my plan worked. With sufficient manipulation (since Potter simply disregards direct orders) he might grow strong enough to carry that sword of his again.
"The Dark Arts," I say when we are alone and isolated from the outside world by a Silencing Bubble, "are many, varied, ever-changing, and eternal. Fighting them is like fighting a many-headed monster, which, each time a neck is severed, sprouts a head even fiercer and cleverer than before. You are fighting that which is unfixed, mutating, indestructible. Your defences," without any conscious decision, my voice becomes just a little louder, "must be as flexible and inventive as the arts you seek to undo."
Potter does not seem to be taken in at all. He stares at me appraisingly, then shakes his head, sighs and looks away.
"I know you love them," he says with a hint of exasperation. "You don't have to tell me that."
Can he not keep his mouth shut? He wanted me to teach him – why must he aggravate me so?
"Potter-"
"I am not a sixth-year Hogwarts student starting N.E.W.T. level Defence course, Snape. I have asked you to teach me outside your official occupation. And I don't intend to stand against that many-headed monster of yours with just my wand. I need my own monster to pitch against it." He is a monster already. Why must it be required of me to make him yet more frightening? He already cannot be controlled; it will become worse. He will become worse. I do not want to be the one to have created the new Dark Lord.
When he looks at me, though… he is so small. So pathetically underdeveloped and thin and naïve-looking but hurt and jaded underneath… is it those eyes?
"That's why I asked you," he tells me, as if he could not see how it vexes me. He exercises no caution in dealing with me.
"You want to learn Dark Arts?"
"I need to learn Dark Arts."
I frown. It was not a trick question – it was a straight, clear one, and I expect an answer just as clear. Nevertheless, I understand the make-believe – even though I have never fallen prey to it myself.
"Ah, that is a very convenient excuse. I believe you did not answer my question Potter." I am the master of evasion – he has no hope to placate me with shrewdly put-together words.
"Is it wrong to want to?" he asks a moment later. There is trepidation in his voice; even though he is consciously aware that to a point he can trust me, he has learnt not to trust anyone and must now battle those reflexes. The secret he lets out to me could be very damaging to him if made public… were I so inclined.
"That depends on the point of view. Your protégé was said to have enjoyed learning them, as were several of his former classmates."
"That is not an attractive prospect – the only one of that group that survives has been forced into custody of a Gryffindor his junior."
"Amazingly perceptive," I deadpan.
"I wouldn't say so," he brushes off the not quite compliment. He is the one that made it happen, though, and I – however grudgingly – do respect that. "I am well aware that Ministry frowns upon the knowledge of Dark Arts. I think everyone is aware of that," the amusement I hear in his words is in direct conflict with his rather irritated expression. There is no friendship for the Ministry lost between the two of us.
"And yet you seek that knowledge…" Even though not phrased so, it is a question.
"I seek survival," he replies simply
There is no arguing with that statement. Seeing Potter in Slytherin colours is becoming familiar to me and, much as I dislike having him around me so often, if it is my influence, I shall continue my quest of converting him to a frame of mind that allows him to live up to the infamous title that was bestowed upon him.