A/N: Not mine, the Harry Potter Universe as always belongs to J.K. Rowling and all the other affiliates.

Chapter Thirty-Seven – Coup D'état

Harry, with Hermione's hand clasped tightly in his, hesitated before knocking on Severus' door. The two waited patiently as there was quick movement from the other side and then the door was yanked open.

"Where have you been?" Severus demanded as soon as his eyes fell on him. Harry shrank back a little and looked at Hermione, who squeezed his hand reassuringly.

"Around," Harry said quietly, not looking up at Severus. "Can we come in?"

Severus looked from Hermione to Harry and back and then stood aside. But he placed a hand on Hermione's shoulder, stopping her. "I'm sure Harry is grateful for your support Miss Granger, but we need to talk to him alone," Severus said sternly.

Hermione looked into the sitting room and saw Sirius sitting there. She squeezed Harry's hand again and then let go. He turned back with a panicked look in his eyes after seeing Sirius as well. He didn't want to do this anymore and wished they had just gone to Madam Pomfrey.

"It's going to be all right, Harry. I'll be in the common room when you get back," she said lightly and Harry nodded. She leaned up and kissed him on the cheek. "Don't worry, they'll understand," she whispered and then left the three.

"Harry," Sirius started as he stood while Severus closed the door. "We've been looking for you for the last few hours; you haven't been on the map, where have you been?"

"You found the map?" Harry asked, but when he didn't receive an explanation he turned away. "I told you, around."

"That is not an answer, Harry," Severus stated.

"Well what do you want me to tell you?" Harry suddenly snapped as anger built up inside him. "What do you want me to say? That I rescued Remus? Well I didn't and he's probably dead because of my stupid actions!"

"Harry, he's –"

"No! I don't want to hear it!" Harry started towards the door, but Severus grabbed his arm. "Aah!" Harry tore his arm from Severus' grasp and held it against his side as it throbbed in pain.

"Harry, what's wrong?" Severus asked with concern in his voice.

Harry shook his head and took in a deep breath and then uncovered his arm. The bandage was soaked through, but it was only lightly damp, the bleeding having stopped a while ago. Sirius was by his side in moments.

"What happened?" he asked, gently taking Harry's arm in his hands.

"I hurt Voldemort," Harry said tightly.

Sirius and Severus looked at each other with alarm in their eyes and then Severus unwrapped Harry's arm. He paused when he saw the slash marks and the confusion was evident in his eyes for a moment. "He didn't do this to you." It wasn't a question.

Harry shook his head. "He's human," Harry whispered. "He's human and I hurt him." Harry swallowed thickly. "I wanted to hurt him. I-I enjoyed it."

"Harry."

Harry shook his head and pulled his arm away, wrapping the bloodied bandage back around his wrist. "I'm sorry I couldn't save him," Harry whispered after a minute while the two stared at him.

"He's in the Hospital Wing," Sirius said.

"What?"

"Remus, he escaped. Whatever you did, it saved his life. It took him a while to get out, but he managed it," Sirius said gently.

Harry shook his head. "No, after what I did to Voldemort surely they would have…"

"Had they caught him, I'm sure they would have killed him," Severus said seriously.

"Are you sure it's really him?" Harry asked with suspicion in his voice.

"It's how we got the map back; he found it while he was hiding. It is Remus, Harry," Sirius reassured.

Harry stared at the two. "Good," he finally whispered and sat down on the couch.

"Harry," Severus whispered kneeling down in front of him. "Are you all right?"

"I just thought…" Harry shook his head and then gave them a small smile. "I'm fine."

Severus and Sirius shared a hard glance and then they looked back at Harry.

"It's after curfew, I should go back to the dorm," Harry said as he stood.

"Harry, you aren't going anywhere until I heal your arm, and I think we should talk about this," Severus said pulling Harry back down.

"Right, sure, let's talk," Harry whispered, not really wanting to talk at all.

--

Harry sat in Ancient Runes three weeks later. It was his last class before lunch. They were learning how to lay quick wards without needing a runic base. These wards were temporary, but more powerful than their charm counterparts. They were working on a privacy ward that acted much like the silencing charm, but it was much harder to break. Harry already knew how to cast this ward; he'd laid a permanent one over Myrtle's bathroom by adding a base rune to it. So he was sitting on the side after showing he could do it, working on a project of his own.

This was something he'd thought about trying to create for a while now, but didn't have the knowledge or time needed to work on it. Now, he had both the time and because of Ancient Runes and Arithmancy he had the knowledge. He didn't know if it was possible, but he thought he'd give it a go anyways.

Harry was so engrossed in his work that he was startled when the end of class was announced and Katie Bell shook his shoulder to get his attention. Harry hurried to packed up his parchment and books and leave the room with his other classmates.

"I wouldn't get so engrossed in whatever you were working on, in Defense this afternoon. Alicia said Snape's on a warpath or something," Katie said as they made their way to lunch.

"Really?" asked Harry, looking over at his Quidditch teammate.

"Yeah, she said she hasn't seen him this mean in class since before your second year. He's being worse than Professor Mordant, she says, and he even took points off Cedric and he's one of his best students next to you. But maybe he'll be better in our class, because you're there an' all," Katie reassured when Harry's eyes widened.

"Yeah, maybe," Harry muttered, trying to figure out what could be up with Severus. He hadn't seen him outside class in the last few days because he'd said he had business and he wasn't going to be around for their extra lessons.

Harry had used the extra time to teach some things to The Club, especially some Potions tricks to help out in Potions as they all needed it with the taskmistress Professor Mordant was. At least she was somewhat fair in her dislike of the students. But she was very close to how Severus used to be and not even Harry could get along with the woman.

The Club, so far had been going extremely well, but there was one thing Harry hadn't expected and he'd nearly cracked up one afternoon in the Great Hall when he'd noticed. Normally students brought some of their homework, or books with them to meals, especially breakfast and lunch, but since The Club had really started getting popular, people weren't staying as long in the Hall. They came, they ate, and then they left to disappear into the Room of Requirement.

It had been even more amusing, because McGonagall had pointed this out to Dumbledore and the two had the most perplexed look on their faces afterwards. Harry had quickly left the hall himself after that as to not start snickering in front of them. He had however, noticed that the staff were all watching the student population more closely since then. He thought he'd use the mirror in Salazar's Chamber to spy on a staff meeting at some point in the near future and see if this was brought up at all. After all he needed to know if they were catching on yet. The longer they kept The Club a secret, the more amusing it would be when the teachers found out. That and the longer they could go unsupervised and not have the adults telling them that they couldn't learn something just because they were children.

"Harry," Katie said from a little ways down the table as she sat next to Alicia and Angelina. Harry looked up as he sat. "Professor Snape wanted us to work on casting silently for today, but I'm still not getting it. Do you think you could help me work on it some before class?" she asked.

"Sure, why don't we just grab a sandwich and head up to The Club, we've got about an hour before class."

Katie nodded and started pulling together a sandwich. "Thanks, Harry, I think it's a good idea to be on Snape's better side today, just in case."

Harry nodded. "Probably is," Harry said and pulled his own sandwich together.

Hermione sat down and looked at him oddly as he stood up with his food. "Where are you going?" she asked.

"To help Katie with some Defense work, did you still need help with your Arithmancy tonight?" he asked as Katie waited for him.

"Yes, thank you, Harry, the numbers still don't seem to be adding up right and I really want to get this spell correct before class tomorrow," Hermione admitted.

"After Quidditch, I'll meet you at The Club," he said with a smile and then left with Katie, both hiding their food on their way out.

--

"Harry, I don't think I could have gotten this on my own. It seemed so difficult before but you made it so easy," Katie said and then leaned up and kissed him lightly on the cheek. "Thank you for your help."

Harry blushed slightly. "You're welcome, Katie, anytime."

Katie smiled and then looked at her watch. "Oh no, we're going to be late, come on!" she exclaimed and then pulled him down the hall at a run, proving she didn't need a broom to fly.

They skidded into the hall where the Defense classroom was, a few minutes later, just as Severus was closing the door. "You are late," Snape said with a frown on his face.

"Sorry, we lost track of time," Harry said sheepishly, breathing heavily and giving Katie a half smile as he moved to step into the classroom. Severus stepped in his way.

"Be that as it may, you are still late. Did I or did I not state the very first class that if you were going to be late, to not bother coming at all?" Snape said coolly.

Harry looked at Katie and she nodded. "Yes, I suppose, but we're only a couple seconds late," Harry argued.

"And still late, perhaps next time you will consider being here on time like the rest of your classmates. I will see the two of you in detention tonight after dinner for skipping my class," Severus said curtly and then moved to close the door.

Harry put his foot in the door. "You can't be serious? We weren't even that late and we ran to get here!"

"Potter, I am deadly serious, now removed your foot so I can get back to teaching the students who deserve to be taught!"

Harry stumbled back and Severus closed the door firmly in his face. He looked at Katie who was staring at the closed door as stunned as Harry was. "Did I do something wrong?" he asked no one in particular.

"Alicia did say he was in a bad mood," Katie said, bighting her lip. "Come on, we might as well go back to The Club."

Harry nodded and followed in a numb sort of shock. He couldn't think of anything that would set Severus off like that. He'd been much later to class before and it had been shrugged off, even joked about, why would it upset him now?

They entered into the Room of Requirement together, but Harry didn't really realize they were there until Angelina spoke up. "What's wrong with Harry?" she asked, putting her book aside.

"Snape wouldn't let us into class," Katie said and several heads shot up.

"What?!" was the collective response from many of them, including Ron and Hermione, a few couches away.

Hermione got up and rushed over to Harry. "What happened?"

Harry shook his head, anger starting to come to his eyes. "I don't know. We were maybe a half a minute late. He was closing the door when we got there, but he wouldn't let us in."

"He gave us detention tonight for skipping his class," Katie added. "So much for Quidditch practice and studying," she said flopping down on the couch beside Angelina with her arms crossed over her chest.

"I'm not going," Harry stated.

"What?" Hermione asked.

"I'm not going to the detention," Harry said firmly.

"But, Harry…"

"No! It's a completely undeserved detention. He could have let us in and taken a couple points away. We ran to get there on time. It was quite obvious that we wanted to be there. So I'm not going to his detention!" Harry said with finality.

"I don't know if that's such a wise idea, Harry," Hermione said fretfully.

"You have Defense next right?" Hermione nodded. "Let me know how he is in class. If he's gotten over himself by dinner, I'll think about going. Right now I'm too angry to be in the same room as him," Harry hissed and then walked across the room to one of the dueling dummies.

The others watched as he started casting spells at the dummy. "If Harry's not going, I'm not going either," Katie said and the others looked at her in shock. "Harry's right, it was completely undeserved. We practiced most of lunch to get our spell work correct for Snape. And what he said to us…" she shook her head angrily.

"What do you mean?" Hermione asked. "What did he say?"

"Said we didn't deserve to be taught, and just because we were late," she spit and then got up and joined Harry with taking her frustrations out on the practice dummies, but with considerably less damaging spells.

"At least we know what's set Harry off," Ron said softly.

--

Harry paced outside of the defense classroom waiting for Hermione. Normally he would be using this time for homework or helping students in The Club, but he was too agitated to do anything constructive. The door opened and Hermione was the first to storm out, followed quickly by Ron, Seamus, Neville and then Dean. Harry ran to catch up with them as the others spilled out of the class, most looking as equally outraged.

"He took away fifty points for answering a bloody question wrong!" Ron ranted, completely forgetting that he wasn't talking to Harry.

"It's like he expects us to be perfect!" Hermione nearly growled. "He gave me a week's detention for pointing out that half Ron's question was correct!"

"That is it!" Harry shouted and turned to go confront Severus about his outrageously bad behavior, but Dean, Neville, and Seamus stopped him and pulled him with them along to dinner.

"Don't bother, Harry, we're not going to detention anyway," Neville said. "And who really cares about the points anyways."

"Wait, you all have detention?" Harry asked, shocked to hear this.

Dean nodded. "All of the Gryffindors do. He thinks we've been somehow cheating because we've been doing so well on our pop quizzes."

"He said he expected good work from the Ravenclaws but the fact we all got perfect scores had to be us cheating," Seamus put in.

Harry frowned at that. "That's bloody bollocks, what is this, guilt before innocents? I'm going to talk to him." Harry was again pulled back.

"No, wait until tomorrow," Hermione said. "Maybe he's just having a bad day and this will all blow over."

Harry relented and followed his friends into the Great Hall, but his resolve not to talk to Severus until the next day wavered considerably when they got there. Harry was receiving glares from many of The Club members. Harry sat down with his friends and wasn't surprised when the first students started to come up to Harry for an explanation.

Cedric sat down next to him, followed by Cho and surprisingly Draco. "Okay, so tell us, what the bloody hell is up with Snape?" Draco asked first.

"So it really isn't just the Gryffindors," Harry said and then shook his head. "I have no idea; he wouldn't let me and Katie into class today and gave us detention for skipping," Harry answered quietly.

"I'm in my right mind to go to Dumbledore," Cedric said seriously. He was Head Boy this year and Harry knew he would as it was part of his duties to look out for the students. "He's taken away so many points today; I'm surprised all of the houses have any left."

"Not to mention completely unfair detentions," Cho added.

"I'm not one to usually complain about the staff, because it's their prerogative how they want to treat us, but he kicked three of us out of class today and gave us all detention on top of that," Draco growled. "And it was completely superfluous; all we were doing was talking, about class work!"

Harry put his head in his heads for a moment and then looked to the staff table. Severus was absent. "I assume he's assigned detention for tonight?" Harry asked.

"Yes, after dinner," Cho said.

"None of these detentions as far I can tell are fair." Harry said serious. "Tell everyone not to go to detention tonight."

"Not that I fear Severus Snape, Potter, but I'm not too keen on finding out what he'd do us if we skived off detention," Draco sneered.

"He can't have all of us in detention at once; his classroom's not nearly big enough," Hermione put in.

"Say we all skip detention, he's just going to come looking for us in our common rooms anyways," said Cho.

"If we're not there, he can't find us," Ron said quietly.

Harry smiled slightly. "Tell everyone to go to The Club. Gryffindor has Quidditch, but we'll be up directly after. Let's show Severus that we're not going to just take his new found animosity against the students, and tomorrow I'll talk to him," Harry said reasonably. "And hope he doesn't kill me," Harry chuckled, to show he was only being half-serious.

The others nodded and moved back to their own tables to spread the word quietly. Harry couldn't believe he was forming a coup against Severus Snape, and here he thought they'd all be rebelling against their new Potions professor first.

--

A/N: Cheers to the rebellion!"