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Allergic to Potions
A Harry Potter Fanfiction by Cordria
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In the early hours of the morning, Harry stuttered awake, sitting up in his cot and staring around the den in panic. Something had woken him up. A sound. A movement.
He reached for his wand when something disconnected from the shadows and stepped up to his bed. Half-forgotten memories of the dream he'd been having flooded through his mind - dusty images of the Dark Lord, stuttering professors, and cold fingers on his forehead. Harry stared at the shadowy figure in panic, knowing that this wasn't a dream.
"The Dark Lord is far away. Go to sleep."
At the cold sound of Snape's voice, Harry's panic subsided, the last visages of the dream faded away. His heartbeat slowed and he relaxed back down against the pillows. "Sorry if I woke you," he muttered.
Snape let out an irritated noise. "Go to sleep, Potter."
The door opened and closed, leaving Harry alone in the room. He lay there, staring up at the ceiling, counting the passing minutes until he was sick of it. Then he sat up, pushed his glasses on his nose, and lit the end of his wand. He pulled the Darke Creatures book into his lap and opened up to a random page. Mountain spirits.
Little curls of darkness crept onto the page. Harry brushed them away irritably. "Go away."
The door clicked open again and Harry looked up. Snape was standing in the doorway, peering down at him. "I expressly told you to go to sleep."
"I can't sleep," Harry murmured, shutting the book with a sigh. "What's with this book, anyway?"
Snape arched an eyebrow. "Now, in English?"
Harry rolled his eyes. "There's dark magic in this book. And I know it makes me read it."
"Anyone with basic magical control could fight a mild compulsion charm," Snape said blandly.
"Compulsion charm?" Harry picked up the book, flipping it over and over in his hands. "That's it? How come that's dark magic?"
Snape scowled. "Do you truly not pay attention in class or was Quirrell simply that bad of a teacher?" He narrowed his eyes. "Any spell that takes away free will is considered dark magic."
"Oh, I thought…" Harry trailed off, shrugging. "Isn't dark magic illegal?"
"Compulsion charms and Veratiserum are far from the darkest magic out there. And the Ministry finds them useful." Snape let out a breath. "It is four in the morning, Potter. You should get some sleep. The mind healer will be here tomorrow."
Harry gazed down at the dark magic curling around the book. "Why now?" he asked.
Snape frowned. "Madam Pomfrey scheduled the healer a week ago, Potter. This is not a surprise-"
"No," he said, "I mean the dark magic thing. How come now I can see it? And not before?"
Snape's lips thinned. "There are many possibilities. Perhaps you simply became old enough. Perhaps it was enough near brushes with death. Perhaps it was your proximity to the Dark Lord. Perhaps it was none of those things and you are just decisively unlucky. Whatever it is, it is better pondered after a night's rest." Snape stalked into the room and held out a tiny vial. It glittered in Harry's wand light. "Sleep. Now."
Harry took the potion quietly, running his fingers over the cold glass.
"And do be careful around the rest of my books," Snape said as he stalked out of the room. "Not all books with dark magic have simple compulsion charms."
Harry set the book on the small side table, unstoppering the potion and draining it. He shuddered at the taste. Setting the vial and his glasses on the table, Harry sank down into his pillows and stared up at the ceiling.
It didn't take long for Snape's potion to start working. His eyes drifted closed and sleep pulled him into the darkness.
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Severus Snape walked back to his bedroom, casting a disillusionment charm on himself. He silently pushed open then door and gazed inside. A slightly glowing, short creature was floating above his bed, cackling to itself. It held a silver and gold vial in its hands.
No emotion drifted across the man's face as he watched the poltergeist toss the vial up and down a few times, muttering about payment. Although Snape's wand was in his hand, he just stood there. Waiting.
Then Peeves took off through the walls. Snape arched an eyebrow and headed quietly down the hallway. He stopped to glance into the den, noted that Potter was finally asleep, and then continued his way out the apartment and through the silent hallways. He whispered a spell and a slightly glowing blue light forming in front of him. It wavered left and right, before settling in front of him in an arrow shape.
Snape slipped through the halls, silent as a wraith. When he found himself at the front doors of the school, he pushed one open slightly and headed out into the darkness. The moon was just slightly past full. The stars glittered overhead. Peeves, glowing in the moonlight, was visible near the docks.
Snape's movement slowed. When he came closed enough to the ghost to hear its cackling, he stopped. Disillusioned and silent, Snape was unnoticeable.
Peeves was still playing with the vial. Up and down. Up and down. Then the ghost suddenly grabbed the potion and stuffed it into the crook of a lightning-scarred tree. "Done it," the poltergeist snorted, crossing its arms. It waited a moment, then vanished back towards the castle.
Snape continued to stand there, gazing blankly at the tree. His wand came up and there was a quick murmur of sound. Little swirls of blue illuminated around the tree. His wand came back down, tapping softly against his leg.
Then he turned and walked back to the castle, leaving the potion outside. The door closed with a solid clunk behind him. Snape was all the way back to his apartment before he stopped. Still under the effects of the disillusionment, Snape dropped into a chair and buried his face in his hands.
When the morning sunlight glinted through the windows, Snape finally waved away the disillusionment. He stood and walked over to the window, his face perfectly empty. He gazed out at the trees, watching them sway slightly in the wind, before closing his eyes and letting out a deep breath.
Outside, in a swirl of blue light, the potion vanished.
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The healer's name was Alice Albright. She had the sort of smile that ringed bright white teeth with red lipstick. Perched right at the edge of the hospital chair, she wove her fingers together on top of a clipboard and smiled at him again. "Mister… Potter." She drawled his name out slowly.
Harry glanced towards Madam Pomfrey. The mediwitch was pretending to be busy sorting potions onto a shelf.
"Can you explain to me why I'm here?"
Harry's gaze jumped back over to the healer. "Uh… Madam Pomfrey wanted you to talk to me?"
One of the healer's eyebrows arched. "About what?"
With a shrug, Harry shot a look back over at the mediwitch. "Stuff, I guess."
"Very specific." There was a bit of sarcasm in her voice. "Can you think of anything specific?"
There was silence as Harry found himself staring down at his fingertips. The last he'd heard, the Voldemort-Quirrell thing was supposed to be a secret. Almost everyone in the school knew, of course, but he wasn't sure he was supposed to mention it. Or what had happened over the summer.
"Mister Potter. May I call you Harry?"
Harry nodded, picking at a loose bit of skin near the nail of his middle finger.
"Harry, then. I assure you," Healer Albright said as she reached out a hand a patted his knee, "that anything you say is in strict confidence. I can not and will not repeat it to anyone without your express permission."
Harry looked up, peering at her over the tops of his glasses. "Okay…"
She set a clipboard down in her lap and smiled at him. "Now. Can you think of anything that Madam Pomfrey might want you to talk about?"
"I guess," Harry started, his eyes drifting back down to his hands. His right hand was still red and itchy. He scratched at it distractedly, then wondered how many times his mother had to deal with itchy hands.
"And?"
With a start, Harry realized he hadn't actually thought of anything to say to the healer. He looked up. "Um… I guess there's the thing with the Dark Lord."
She nodded, looking horribly sympathetic. "When your parents died?"
"No." Harry shook his head. "I mean, a few months ago, when he tried to take over the body of my Defense professor and kill me, and then a month ago when he tried again..."
The healer's blue eyes blinked a few times. Her mouth opened, then closed. "You-know-who?" she finally managed to get out, sounding a bit dazed. With Harry's nod, she looked to her left.
Harry followed her gaze, his eyes settling on the slumped form of his potions professor. Snape eyed the mind healer, then nodded. "It was at the beginning of May."
"And this wasn't in the papers?" Her voice was a bit faint.
Snape's eyes narrowed and his arms crossed over his chest. "Of course not. The Dark Lord has not yet returned, he is merely an annoying spirit. Why incite a panic?"
"But-"
"You are here to talk to the boy," Snape said with a nasty turn to his voice. "I suggest you do so."
The healer pulled herself even straighter in the chair – Harry hadn't thought that possible – and turned her eyes back to Harry. He could almost see her pull a cloak of duty around her. "Yes, yes. Of course. Harry, and what happened exactly?"
Harry shrugged and fiddled with the bottom of his shirt. "He was trying to get the Sorcerer's Stone. You know, to live forever? And I ended up with it. I didn't mean to, but I thought that S…" He trailed off, and flushed as he tried not to look at Snape. "Someone was trying to get the Stone, so I went after it to find it first, and the Dark Lord was just there. Only he can't touch me, because my mother did something to prevent him from touching me…"
"Blood protection," Snape cut in when Harry's voice trailed off. "Specific to the Dark Lord."
Healer Albright shot him a glance. "How is that possible? Wouldn't that have required some of You-Know-Who's blood?"
Snape's mouth tightened into a frown. "We are not sure. Traditionally – yes, you would be correct."
The woman turned back to Harry slowly. Her head was tipped slightly to the side, a lock of brown hair dangling in her eyes. "And you said You-Know-Who was here again, a month ago?"
"Yeah." Harry's fingers were so tightly twined into the bottom of his shirt that his fingers were starting to hurt. He paused to yank them free. "He really wanted the Stone, I guess."
"I suppose." Harry heard the woman take a slow breath and let it out. "Must have been scary. I'd be having nightmares." She snorted softly. "I'm going to have nightmares just hearing you talk about it."
Harry glanced up at her as she pushed the lock of brown hair over her ear. There had been a real shudder in the healer's voice as she'd said that. "A few," Harry admitted, looking away again. The sun shone through the high, skinny windows of the hospital wing. Little white clouds scuttled across the sky.
"You want to tell me about them?"
Harry thought about that. How he dreamed about Voldemort attacking the castle, surrounded by all sorts of dark creatures large and small. How he'd imagined professors dying around him. Students dying. His friends lying cold on the ground at a crazy man's feet. How in so many of the nightmares, Voldemort turned into Snape. How, lately, that was the part that scared him the most – Snape vanishing. He opened his mouth to talk about one of the stories when he stopped.
A bird flew past the window. It was a dark shape with long, twisted tail feathers.
His eyes flickered over to his snarky potion professor. The man was sneering at something in the distance, his sharp eyes narrowed in a dangerous sort of way. Harry's brain wandered to the potion they had brewed the week before. A dangerous, expensive potion that Snape didn't even believe would work. So why did they make it?
Dumbledore had asked him to.
Snape had drunk from the goblet to destroy the Stone, knowing he'd have to give something huge up in exchange. Snape had allowed a child he hated to live in his apartment for two months. Snape had protected and chased down Harry when Voldemort had attacked the castle, putting himself in extreme danger in the process. And why?
Dumbledore had asked him to.
Harry's mouth clicked shut as he tore his eyes away from the potions professor and down to his fingers. There was one very real truth Harry had learned this summer: Snape trusted Dumbledore's plans.
'There are things in this world more important than the health of one person.'
Green eyes slid up to look at the mediwitch, still busy pretending to be sorting her new stock of potions. She must have noticed the attention, because she paused and glanced at him. There was a pleased look on her face.
'If all goes well… back to the Dursleys.'
"Harry?"
His gaze snapped back to Healer Albright. "Um…" The words bubbled up in his chest. It was all he ever wanted. Here was his chance. Just tell the healer and he'd get to stay at Hogwarts the rest of the summer…
'You must go back to the Dursley's, my boy. They're your family. Surely you miss them.'
Mouth dry, Harry blinked and glanced once more towards Snape. His hated, snarky, cruel, cold potions professor. The man's dark eyes were focused on him, but they were blank. Unhelpful.
But there. And Harry had the oddly pleasant realization that they always would be there. Sharp and vindictive and bitter, but there and focused on him.
"I…"
Dumbledore had… asked.
"I… don't really remember them very well," he said, stumbling slightly over the words. He couldn't look at the healer. "I just kind of wake up feeling a little scared. But it goes right away. And I haven't had a nightmare in a couple days, now."
Snape – who Harry was quite sure knew the real severity of Harry's nightmares – didn't say a word. He just sat there with his arms crossed, glowering at the world.
"Hmmm." The healer leaned forwards, resting a gentle hand on his knee again. "Harry."
"I'm fine," Harry insisted, this time forcing his gaze up to meet Healer Albright's blue eyes. He put a smile on his face. "Really."
There was an arched eyebrow. The healer didn't look at all convinced. "Harry…"
Harry swallowed, licked his lips, and went for it. In for a penny, in for a pound. "I just want to go home. See my aunt and uncle." He couldn't even begin to force any sort of happy emotion into his voice while talking about his relatives, but he was hoping the healer wouldn't care. "Sleep in my own bed." He leaned forwards. The woman's red lips were hard to not stare at. "Please?"
Her lips pursed. She looked over his shoulder at Madam Pomfrey.
"Professor Snape," the healer said, suddenly turning to the sour man, "have you seen any evidence that Mister Potter needs assistance from a healer over the next few months?"
"Potter needs all sorts of help," Snape said darkly. "But not in the way you're asking. He'll do fine at his relatives for the remainder of the summer."
"No nightmares?" she pressed.
Snape glared her down. "Potter is annoyingly arrogant and self-centered. Were he having nightmares, I assure you he'd be telling all about them simply to get the attention."
The healer was silent. "Is there anything you need to talk me about?" she asked, looking at Harry with wide eyes.
Harry shook his head.
"Very well," the woman said, her gaze flitting from Harry to Snape. "I'm going to give you my card, Harry. Just in case you think of anything once you're at your relatives."
"Thanks." Harry took the card, staring down at the ink that shifted slowly from dark red to dark blue and back. "Can I go now?"
There was a quiet pause, then a small sigh. "Yes, Harry. You can go."
When Harry got to his feet and scuttled for the door, the Healer just stayed seated. Harry paused at the door, glancing back. Madam Pomfrey had a dark frown on her face, her eyes focused on Professor Snape. The man was stalking towards the door Harry was holding open, a bland look on his face. Snape paused just after he left the hospital wing, staring down the hallway with that empty expression.
Letting go of the door, Harry let it swing shut behind him. He bit his lip as he imagined the conversation that was about to take place in the hospital wing. "Madam Pomfrey doesn't look happy," Harry commented into the silence.
Snape's eyes shifted towards him. "I thought you professed a desire to not return to your relatives."
Harry shrugged and stuffed his hands into his pockets. "It's just one month."
There was a dark sound that came from Snape's throat. He studied Harry through the darkness, his head tipped slightly to the side. Then he turned on his heel and strode down the hallway, his robes billowing behind him. When Harry had to practically run to keep up, he could have sworn that Snape slowed his pace, just a bit.
Or maybe Harry's legs had just finally decided to start growing. It'd be about time.
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Silver and gold shimmered in the darkness. A man wearing a dark hood held it up to the light.
"Is it real?" The whispery voice seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once.
Long, slender fingers tilted the vial slightly, allowing a few drops of the precious potion to settle onto a piece of paper. The paper hissed and fizzled before turning to lead. The hand holding the paper let go and the sheet of lead dropped to the ground with a heavy clang. "It is, Master." The voice of the hooded man was a soft, gentle baritone.
"And it is active?"
"Yes, Master."
The bodiless laughter that curled through the air made the man in the hood shudder. "Good. Then we have a new plan."
"My Lord?" The man standing in the gloom pushed back his hood, revealing long, blond hair and aristocratic features.
"Knowledge is power," came the whispered response. "Prophecy…" There was silence. "You still have my book?"
The man nodded. "Of course, my Lord. The aurors have been getting close. I will have to move it to a new location soon."
"Perfect," the shadows whispered, curling around the silver and gold potion before the man secreted it into the depths of his robes. "To Hogwarts. Get my book to Hogwarts…"
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To be concluded...
