Disclaimer: Messrs. Potter, Snape and other assorted Hogwarts denizens are the property of JK Rowling and the suits at Warner.

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Chapter 25: Herbert the (Possibly) Flying Squirrel

Darkness. Darkness all around. Harry's head spun and he swallowed, hoping he wouldn't be sick as he tried to remember where he was and – more importantly – who he was meant to be. The air was slightly damp and very cold and there was the sense of great weight pressing in from all sides.

"Harry?"

"Ron?" But the voice was wrong. Slightly husky. "Severus. Are you all right?"

"For now. Harry – what did you do?"

Harry froze mid-reach. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, I'm sure it was that complete and utter insult to bipeds Black who hexed us with an occlusion spell, but it shouldn't have resulted in us being buried alive."

Oh, so that was what was odd. They were underground. "That was an occlusion spell? I've never come across one before."

"Well, you countered it magnificently. Or at least I presume so, as we're moving at normal speed and our limbs are all bending in the right places. At least, mine are. I can't vouch for yours. I didn't make out what you said when you defended us. If anything, it was a completely new spell. Do you do that often?"

"What, make up new spells?"

"Yes."

They were speaking in whispers.

"Not intentionally. Only when I'm particularly upset. I guess I was a little upset when that spell hit me."

"A little upset? My goodness. You think?"

Sarcasm back up at 100%. Snape was feeling better. "Look, I only remember having the universe ripped apart around me. It was a lot like when I came to this – ah, dimension."

"Oh. Oh. Hey – maybe we're in your dimension!"

"I don't think so. It wasn't quite the same."

"Oh."

"Sorry."

"Never mind. So. If we're not in another dimension, where the hell are we?"

"Underground."

"You're a regular genius, you are. Lumos." The tip of Severus' wand began glowing, illuminating his sour expression.

The dark had its advantages, it would seem.

"You're the one who's got the interest in DADA. You tell me what happened."

Severus gave him a level stare. "All right. Occlusion hexes have a nasty habit of twisting spells around them. They're designed to promote mental disarray, but they've also been known to trigger previous spell-shadows in a wand. I think you tried to counter something you couldn't understand because it had befuddled you so badly, and threw some sort of synergetic conglomeration from every recent spell against it to counter it."

"So I… let me get this straight… I used the spells I'd been using today all together in a sort of spell-salad to block a simple spell that shouldn't have needed such overkill."

"That's what I said. You invented a new spell on the spot."

"Oh."

"I'd congratulate you except you look like you don't have the faintest idea what you just said to get us down here and it's going to be an absolute pig getting us out again."

"Well, thanks anyway."

"You're welcome." Severus grinned ironically. "Oh well. We were looking for tunnels. And now you found us one under Squirrel Hill. I'm guessing we're still in the general vicinity of Squirrel Hill, because I only felt a pinch of that ghastly lurch you get when you Disapparate. Congratulations. Oh, and just for future reference, that disguise charm I put on you has been broken. Damn."

"I know. Da-…-amn Potter, I think. I don't know what he hit me with, but I was keeping my face covered after I felt the spell lift."

"Good. Huh. Here… let me.."

With a wave of his wand, Severus reset the glamour.

"Well." Severus looked around dubiously, rubbing his knees with one hand while holding up his lit wand to peer into the shadows stretching out to either side of them. One path sloped down while the other headed up at a gentle angle. The floor was rough, but a hint of smoothness down the centre suggested that once upon a time, before small pieces of crumbling dirt had settled from the even more irregular roof, someone had used this tunnel regularly. A few scraggly tendrils dangled from the low ceiling. Severus bushed one out of his hair and scowled as if it had just given him a personal insult. "As we're down here and I don't expect those inbred microcephalic mouth-breathers to do anything that doesn't involve the phrase 'Do you think anyone saw us?' I guess we're on our own resources to get out of this mess."

"Sounds like normal, every-day life to me. Which way?" Harry asked. "Shall we flip a coin?"

"Actually, why not try a location spell? You never know – there could be the occasional golden sickle hanging around."

"So long as there isn't another one of those bloody basilisks. I've had enough of those."

"Fair enough." Severus stood up and brushed the dirt off his robes, which were looking even more worn after their fight with Sirius. Harry pointed out the scorch-mark on the right shoulder. Severus brushed at it angrily. "I guess that was where the spell hit. Black, you think? He was on that side, anyway. How the hell did he get a second wand? Honestly, those Gryffs think they can break every bloody rule…"

"Hang on." There was blood on Severus' face and Harry wanted to stop Severus before he got into full anti-Gryffindor rant and turned into Snape. "I think he got you without the wand." Harry wiped at Severus' forehead with a corner of his sleeve. The blood came off without revealing any injuries underneath. "Oh. No. You got him."

"Hooray for me. Now." Severus straightened until his head almost brushed the roof of the tunnel. He balanced his wand on his right index finger. " Let's try… Reperio falx."*

The wand trembled.

Severus changed to his left hand and said the spell again. This time the wand spun to point along the tunnel sloping down. Snape smiled.

"Basement. Ladies' robes, children's toys, horrible monsters with tentacles to rip off your face… Mind your step, please."

"Want me to go first?" Harry asked.

"I don't care either way – something can as easily sneak up behind you and bite the back of your neck out as leap out on you from a secret side tunnel in front and eviscerate you."

"I love your optimism."

"Patent pending." But he edged back a little to allow Harry to go first.

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They walked for what seemed like an hour but was probably only ten minutes when Severus spoke, breaking the silence with a whisper and making Harry jump: "If you start singing that bloody awful 'Hi-Ho, Hi-Ho' song I'll hex you now."

Harry got the giggles. "I'll never be able to get that out of my mind now. That was a cruel thing to do."

"It was, wasn't it? I think next time someone tries to annoy me I'll start whistling 'the Birdie Song'."

"What's that one – oh, no! Don't. Whatever it is it must be appalling."

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After over an hour of careful creeping along the tunnel, several verses of the 'Hi-Ho Song' where they had to make up new lyrics (Charms, Hell, Potions, DADA – Transfiguration and Detention as well as Fortescue's didn't scan) as neither of them could remember the Disney version and they eventually gave up on it as neither of them could whistle, several recastings of the location spell (which got ever more tantalising as it grew stronger – the last time Severus' wand had shot off his finger and a short distance down the tunnel), and a brief argument over the comparative value of Seekers compared to Keepers, the tunnel rose steeply.

"Are we there yet?"

Severus had said that every fifteen minutes on the dot. He was better than a clock. Harry gritted his teeth. "No. No. And no again."

The tunnel kept climbing.

"Are we –?"

"N– Ow!"

Harry's head hit something hard. The ceiling had suddenly grown much lower. Harry rubbed his head and glared up at it, then jumped when he realised the shadowy wall had a narrow opening in it. Wand ready to hex anything hiding around the corner, Harry peered around the corner. "Huh. Steps. And – hey – there's a trapdoor up there!" he added unnecessarily.

Severus was already squeezing his shoulders past Harry's to get a good look. "There. I told you you were a genius." Severus gave it a suspicious glare. Set into the side of the tunnel was an alcove. The narrow steps carved into it made a small but steep semicircle that led up to the trapdoor, the top step being level with the roof of the tunnel and a foot and a half below the edge of the door, which was in its own specially excavated chimney. Harry had banged his head on the rock lip of the chimney. "Should we be trusting trapdoors?" Severus asked, peering up at it, squinting to keep dust from falling into his eyes. We don't know if it's going to lead into certain death or Fortescue's." He scratched at the ceiling with a fingernail. It seemed to have been chiselled. By who or what was a question Harry would very much like the answer for, but one thing at a time. "We must be a fair way underground still – no plant material. You'd think we'd've seen some tree roots by now."

"True. Maybe there's a house up there. Huh." Harry squeezed past Severus and peered into the stretching darkness of the remaining tunnel. "Well, the tunnel keeps going a little way – maybe a long way. Back down. Do you want to keep on with that?"

Severus groaned. "I've had far too much of this tunnel. Let's see if there's anything better through the door."

"Okay," said Harry, ducking under Severus' arm to give the trapdoor an assessing stare. It looked heavy, but not so heavy he couldn't lift it providing there was nothing sitting on it. Like, for instance, a three-headed dog. "I'd like the chance to get back outside. We can always come back if we have to. And then trudge along this tunnel for the rest of eternity." Harry put a foot on the bottom step. "Well?"

Despite the threat of wandering along tunnels for eternity, Severus didn't seem entirely convinced about the exit. "Hmm – wait a minute." He checked his wand again. This time when he cast the sickle locating charm the wand leaped up and bounced off the wooden planks overhead, hitting Harry in the face as it came down."

"Ow again!"

"Sorry."

Harry poked at his cheek where it felt like the wand had dented it. "It's all fun and games until someone loses an eye."

"Depends how good your eyeball collection is, I suppose."

"Oh, that's just wrong," Harry said, laughing. He sobered. "You don't have an eyeball collection, do you?"

Severus gave him a look of exasperation. "Maybe I'll start one just to prove people right about me."

"I see you as more of a butterfly type."

"Butterflies?"

"Pretty creatures pinned down and poisoned. You could do an evil laugh. Mwa-ha-ha-haa. Something like that."

A sniff. "I could grow a moustache and twirl the ends while I'm at it. What?"

Harry, who had been grinning, decided not to mention the black cloak billowing out as Snape stalked dark corridors: he was pretty sure Severus would figure out that one without any help. "Just thinking of you with a moustache. It could work."

"In your universe, maybe. I bet it's hell when you're trying to eat corn on the cob." Severus shook his head. He flicked a greasy lock of hair out of his eyes as he peered up at the trapdoor. When he stretched up, standing on his toes, he could just touch the hinges, which were set into solid stone. "What sort of wards will be on it, do you think?"

"I don't know. You can tell a lot about a witch or wizard by the type of wards they use. Skuggin's Modifier? Lockable Ablelock? Portal of Doom?"

"Portal of Doom – the scariest thing about that is the name. I hope it's not a Triggerward, though – I don't want to end up bottled somewhere gathering dust for the next millennium."

"Understandable. Hmm." Harry drew his wand across the trapdoor as if he were sketching out the pattern for a game of noughts-and-crosses. "That's weird."

"What?"

"I don't feel anything."

"Nothing?"

"Absolutely nothing."

"Let me."

Harry stepped back as Severus climbed up the first two steps and tried a few charms to work out the nature of the lock. Eventually he lowered his wand and scowled up at the trapdoor as if it had personally offended him. Perhaps it had.

Harry took a deep breath. "Let me try something."

A little awkward in the close space, Severus moved off the steps, stepping back to allow Harry to climb up them to the trapdoor.

Harry pushed.

"Hey, you'll…" Severus broke off and frowned. "… Open the trapdoor because it wasn't locked in the first place. Oh. Well done. Any monsters?"

"Give them a minute." Harry pushed the trapdoor harder. The hinges groaned and threatened to seize, but when Harry climbed up onto the top step and put his shoulder to the boards they grudgingly gave way. Dust sifted down through the cracks, shimming in brief motes as they fell through the soft illumination of Severus' wand.

With a final creaking groan and a small shower of dirt, the door opened. Harry waited until the fine dust had finished falling before peering through.

"There's some light through here," he whispered. I can make things out. They look like trees. But there's something odd about them…"

"Have they tried to eat you yet?"

"They don't seem too hungry. Not at the moment."

"Give them time."

There was a scuffle and Harry squeezed sideways to let Severus have a look. "What do you think?"

"I think we're inside something very big."

Harry frowned. "Why?"

"See the constellations? They shouldn't have those angles between them. It's as if the sky is rippling."

"Oh. Oh… You're right." Harry hadn't paid over-much attention in Astronomy (or no more than it took to stop Sinistra taking points) but even he could see that the stars, which twinkled normally, were not within their normal degrees of each other.

"Those trees… they're not quite right."

"I know, but I don't know why."

"Hm." After carefully checking the immediate surroundings, Severus squeezed through the trapdoor and held it for Harry as Harry climbed up.

Severus let the door drop as quietly as the hinges would allow, then poked a dry forked stick into the ground next to it. He tied a handkerchief to the stick. "There. Just in case we need to find it in a hurry."

"Good idea. Now let's go and have a look."

"Let's carefully go and have a look."

"That's what I said."

"You know, some days I could swear you were a Gryffindor."

Harry decided not to answer that. He was too interested in looking at their surroundings, anyway. When he walked sideways the stars should have followed him. Instead they danced and reformed in new patterns. "It's like being inside a kaleidoscope," he whispered.

Severus nodded. "It is, isn't it? I wonder what's turning the eyepiece. Or who. No – don't answer that. I want to see one of those trees. Come on."

Harry followed and watched as Severus poked and prodded at the nearest tree. It was an odd thing: the bark was leathery and relatively smooth by tree standards and covered trunks and limbs which flowed and bulged as if they had been extruded while liquid and set a short time afterwards. The many leaves littering the floor through which the hems of their robes shushed were as large as dinner plates, reminding Harry that he'd missed dinner. He heard a small growl and smiled.

"Were you just thinking these leaves were the size of dinner plates too?"

Severus, whose stomach was the one which had growled, ignored the question. "It seems to be some sort of fig. They aren't usually magical, although they crop up – excuse the unintentional pun – in literature and myth fairly regularly. Probably because they're so productive under such destitute conditions."

"Good for them," Harry said with feeling, thinking of the Dursleys. Severus gave him an odd look.

"I wonder what the fruit is like?" Severus mused, tapping his mouth with his wand.

"I wonder what the things that eat the fruit are like."

"I wonder what the things that eat the things that eat the fruit are like. Let's not expand on that. I'm not brave enough to face some of the things I can imagine."

"Fair enough. Shall we – hey… are you sure climbing them's a good idea? Severus?"

"No. But I'm curious."

"You're telling me." But Severus was already up to the second branch, climbing up the tree swifter than Harry would ever have considered possible for someone destined to turn into Snape, and luckily didn't hear Harry's remark.

After a minute or two of soft rustlings, occasional swear-words spoken just as softly, and a few falling leaves (but fortunately no falling Slytherins), Harry heard his name being called.

"Harry? Are you feeling all right?"

"Fine. Why? What's wrong?" Harry looked up, squinting through the twining darkness of the thick, sinuous, interlocking branches. He caught a glimpse of a pale face far above and then made out the form of the other boy, almost invisible in black robes and gloom, standing on a branch fifty feet up with all the confidence of Harry, who was standing on the ground. Like the trees, there was something fundamentally wrong about the way Severus was standing.

"Because one of us is upside-down, and it doesn't feel like me," came the reply, floating down with another leaf.

"What?" And then Harry saw it. And he saw what was wrong with the trees. "Severus, you're upside-down. I haven't moved. And the leaves on the branches up there are pointing the wrong way. The trees are growing upside-down."

"I'm coming back down."

Harry waited, gripping his wand at the sound of each rustle. But the only moving creatures in this world seemed to be himself and Severus, who leaped from branch to branch like he'd discovered a new and much more exciting version of Quidditch before shinnying down the trunk of a different tree to the one he'd climbed up.

He was grinning as he jumped down the last meter and landed softly beside Harry, arms outspread and feet together like an Olympic gymnast expecting only tens from the judges. "That," he panted, pulling a few leaves out of his hair, "was utterly brilliant." His eyes gleamed.

Harry shivered. There was something wrong with the trees twisting around gravity like this. And something about Severus had changed between climbing up and climbing down. But, like first seeing the trees, Harry couldn't quite put his finger on what that difference was. It probably had something to do with that back somersault Severus had done at one point mid-air. "How do you feel?"

"Feel? Great. It's like suddenly learning to breathe. Maybe these trees make special air or something – can't you feel it?" He sniffed at his fingers, which had some sticky sap on them. Harry was twice as disturbed when Severus licked them.

"Stop it. No – get your fingers out of your mouth. Do you have another handkerchief?" Harry wished he had one – it was something he always meant to have and never got around to. Severus, looking confused and dazzled, held one out. "Thank you. Now, I can't believe I'm saying this, but… spit."

Severus, cross-eyed as he tried to focus on Harry's hand, spat onto the handkerchief.

"Very good. Now hold out your hands. That's right." Harry did his best to wipe the sap off. "Feel better?"

Severus was looking a little dazed still. He looked around as if suddenly remembering where they were, then sat down as if his knees had lost all tension and put his head in his hands. Harry sat down next to him. "How do you feel?"

"A bit queasy. Don't touch the sap. It's magical – I mean, almost purely magical. The resin is normal except that somehow it's got raw magic stored in it like some sort of Muggle battery. It's… Wow. Beyond wow. Don't touch it."

"I'll try not to. Did it hit you fast or slow?"

"Slow. Then all at once. It might take some time to filter through your skin. I don't know. But it felt…" He leaned his head back against the trunk of the tree and groaned.

"That bad?"

Severus opened his eyes. They were like dark tunnels, or maybe it was just the angle Harry was looking at them. "No," he breathed. "Oh, no. And yes. It was glorious. Too much so. I never want to lose that, yet it's something I should never have. No-one should have anything that mindlessly great. Not while they want to stay alive, anyway. But…" The bleak hunger in his face etched shadows between his eyes and in the corners of his mouth.

Harry shivered. He felt like he'd just walked over someone's grave. He strongly suspected it was Severus Snape's. He had the sudden urge to talk to Ron and Hermione and felt something twist in his gut as he remembered they hadn't been born yet. "Should we leave?"

Severus snapped back to reality and turned to glare at Harry. "What? When we've come so far? No." He sat forward and wrapped his arms around his knees. "I had this moment up there – just as I was coming down the tree here, actually – and I could see everything in the glasshouse."

"It's a glasshouse?"

"Almost. Glass isn't quite right: it's a shield a little like the ceiling in the Great Hall – I heard Helga Hufflepuff made that, and I'm damned sure she made this. And maybe she had something to do with the trees – tree. It's all one tree. It's set itself into little treelets or whatever you want to call them all through this place. It's all one tree and it's all bound around a centre," he finished, pointing with his chin up and over his shoulder towards where the tangle seemed to solidify into shadows. Harry frowned at it, not liking it at all.

"That acts as a centre of gravity?"

"I think so. Things started getting a little hazy around that point." He scratched his chin. "I think for a moment there I thought I was a squirrel called Herbert – and if this ever becomes common knowledge I'll know who to blame. But luckily that wore off before I decided to find out if Herbert was a flying squirrel." He paused again, looking up and around at the trees which thrummed with stillness and a coiled magic which, now Severus had pointed it out, Harry could hear like the memory of surf inside a seashell. He curled his lip slightly as he pondered – it was the first time Harry had seen a pensive sneer. "It's so strange: this place is here, but only from the inside. If we went looking from the outside we'd never have found it. Lucky you thought of searching the tunnels for that room of Hufflepuff's – because I think this is the secret room of hers we were looking for. Remind me to thank Black when we get back." He smiled a crooked smile and his eyes gleamed with equally sardonic humour. "Congratulations, Harry – not only have you found the Secret Chamber of Salazar Slytherin, you found the Secret Glasshouse of Helga Hufflepuff."

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*More proof the author doesn't speak Latin.

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