In the Headmaster's office, Professor Dumbledore and Snape were gathered.
Harry and Evelyn waited together. The former, impatient, and the latter, anxious. Sitting at the Headmaster's desk, behind which Dumbledore himself was sitting quite comfortably (but looking serious).
Snape was standing off to the side, his arms folded.
The fireplace flared with green fire, and out of the flames stepped Nagini.
"So, something happened during Potions lessons today," Nagini spoke in greeting, her eyes scanning the room - moving from person to person. She made eye contact with Snape, her expression neutral, in contrast with his rather irritated look. She moved on from him, looking to Harry. Looking him over, as always. And lastly, her eyes found Evelyn.
"I told the Headmaster all of this wasn't necessary," Snape began, derisive. "Potter and his friend acted out in my class, and I punished them as they should have been for it. It shouldn't have gone any further than that."
Nagini stepped further into the office, closer to Snape. Her brown eyes narrowed at him slightly, meeting his glistening black ones. "Well, with your track record and obvious bias when it comes to my son, I'm not willing to trust your judgement with him. I'd like to hear the facts of the situation, so that I can help the Headmaster make a proper judgement about all this." She turned away from Snape - ignoring the dark look he gave her behind her back - her gaze settling on Harry again. "Whatever 'this' is." She waved her wand, conjuring a chair and settling into it. Her hands rested on her thighs. "Why don't you start, Harry? Tell me what happened." She glanced at Dumbledore; he gave a simple nod of approval.
"Evelyn and I were working on a potion - she wasn't, err, feeling great today, so I did most of the work and just tried to get her to help me a bit when she could..." Harry began, launching himself into his explanation. "Apparently Sn- Professor Snape didn't like that. He kept glaring at us and making these little remarks at us! And then he came over and started being a huge git!" he burst out, balling his fists in his lap.
Snape scoffed loudly.
Nagini looked at him, her lips tight. Then she refocused on Harry. "All right. Harry, whether he was or not, I'd like you to try and give the facts of the situation in a more appropriate manner - details, Harry. Details and facts will help you two as much as your Professor in this matter. What did he do, or say, when he approached you both?"
Harry flushed, nodded - took a breath and let his hands uncurl in his lap. "He told her to stop wasting his time and leave. I told him she was trying as hard as she could! And then he took points from me for that and told her to leave if she couldn't- couldn't stand to be here! I told him to shut up, and he took more points. I told him to stop being a- a pathetic bully, and he told me to stop acting like my dad. Then I told him to give it a damn rest already, because my dad's dead and I'm not him, and it's been ten years and he's still hanging onto it like a pathetic loser-"
"Oh, be silent, you insolent little brat, I've had enough of you whining constantly about-"
Nagini raised her hand and jumped to her feet; a tingling feeling shot up Harry's spine, and the whole room seemed to vibrate.
Snape's mouth suddenly broke free of his face, leaving smooth skin behind, shooting across the room right into Nagini's hand.
She turned her head to look at him, closing her fist around his disembodied mouth.
Snape's eyes jittered in their sockets, but he made no other movements. His hand was frozen in his robes, plunged into the pocket.
Harry stared in awe; his mother had taken Snape's mouth and frozen him almost simultaneously!
Dumbledore didn't seem to have expected it either; his wand was drawn, but only raised two-thirds of the way to the standard ready position.
Nagini had won the draw by not having to draw her wand at all for this one. A win only possible against wand-bearers by one using wandless magic, and not usually a very useful or definitive win. Not in life or death situations. But in this instance...
"If you can't open your mouth without saying a single thing to my son that isn't petty, cruel, or pathetic," Nagini began, in a cold tone that Harry had never heard out of her before. "then you're not getting this back. Actually, it might be better for you to go without it for the duration of this meeting."
"Perhaps - but I would ask you to kindly return my Potions Master his body part," Dumbledore said calmly. "I don't want to have to force you to do so, my dear...but I'm quite prepared to. We must let cooler heads prevail, yes? That is, after all, the very point of this meeting."
"And if Professor Snape refuses to be a cool head?" Nagini asked. "There's no purpose in letting him be here if he's going to act just as much like the actual children he's supposed to be better than."
"And are you not also reacting in anger and defense of young Harry? Stealing a man's mouth over words?" Dumbledore said quietly. "I imagine this is quite a charged situation for all of us - even you. Understandably; he is your son, and any mother would jump to their child's defense. However..."
"Yes, I'll steal his mouth if he's going to harass my child right in front of me with it," Nagini said fiercely. "The standards I'd hope to hold the man to are higher than what I hold Harry to - a child. If an adult can't behave like one, then we have a problem."
"A problem we're all here to try and resolve," Dumbledore nodded. "But how can we, if one of us can't speak at all?"
Nagini flashed out her arm, hurling Snape's mouth away from her. It soared back to its owner, smacking onto his face properly again. All at once, Snape's body was let free of her stasis spell.
Dumbledore raised a hand and stepped forward immediately. "She does make a solid point: Severus, if you can't behave civilly, I will be forced to remove you from this meeting."
Snape stared at Dumbledore, whose blue eyes were sharp and piercing...warning and hard as steel. Snape nodded. "Of course, Headmaster," he said, in a tight voice.
"Now then, I believe young Harry was just beginning to tell us the most important part of the events that transpired in the classroom," Dumbledore went on. "If you would resume your tale for us, please?"
"Right, well..." Harry struggled to pick up where he'd left off. He drew another breath. This time, to clear away the feelings of admiration and love for his mother - and the vindictive satisfaction at her actions toward Snape! "Professor Snape just insulted Evelyn over how she can't walk, I told him to shut up, he took points. I said he was being a cruel bully toward her, and he said I was acting like my dad. I told him to shut it about my dad and get over it, it'd been ten years already. I told him it was just sad - and it is!" He cried. His mother gave him a look; he took another breath, trying to really draw on his sessions with her in Occlumency. "Anyway, he took more points and told me to sit down, and I said no. He told me to leave, and I actually agreed with that one. So we left. But he had to get one last insult in, and asked if I was 'running home to mummy so somebody could listen to your whining.' So I told him at least I had someone who loved me in my life, and it was because he's too pathetic and cruel that nobody in his life loves him."
Harry glanced at his mother, who was looking...as supremely neutral as she could. But he knew her enough to know she was...fairly conflicted. Not at all emotionless. He flushed a little and glanced down, mumbling out, "So yeah, then we left - Evelyn and I - and we came here. That's what happened."
"I'd like to see what happened for myself," Nagini spoke. She looked to Dumbledore, and nodded to a strange basin in an open cupboard. Dumbledore gave her a nod in turn.
"An excellent idea," Dumbledore said simply. "I trust you can walk the children through how the process...?"
"I can." Nagini strode up to Harry and Evelyn, crouching down in front of them. She drew her wand, holding it between gentle fingers. "I would like to view your memories of the events in that classroom. See that over there? It's a Pensieve - a rare magical artifact that allows you to store memories in it and review them. But it isn't just memories: the magic of the world, of space-time itself, fully recreates a section of space and a segment of time based off the memory, inside a unique pocket dimension. You enter this place and view the events of your memory. It's like going back in time, but it's non-interactable and limited to a certain radius. And of course, it's limited to the segment of time between when the memory begins and ends. It's unbiased and the objective truth to be seen. Because the magic of space-time recreates that place and time, it can also be used to see or hear details around you that you yourself were never aware of."
"If these exist, why doesn't everyone just use them?!" Harry exclaimed. "Why didn't Sirius just use one, why didn't-" He glanced at Evelyn, falling silent.
"We would all love to," Nagini replied, with a slight smile. "But Pensieves are extremely rare, owing mostly to their difficulty to create. When you're using magic to access space-time, a million things can end up going wrong. Black holes and time loops, eternally trapped or suffering. One of the very first pioneers of the artifact, a witch named Lucinda Varson, ended up enveloping an entire town in a time vortex, endlessly repeating the same three days. But it was corrupted, things were amiss - people would wake without body parts, walls would be where they shouldn't, the air would become toxic. Whole areas were just black voids of 3D space. And if you stepped into those - well, no one knows what happens. At any rate, it took hundreds of mages working tirelessly for years from the outside to tear it down, and once they did..." She shook her head, her expression very grim. "Well, none of this is the point."
"What's the point, then?" Harry asked.
"The point...is that sufficiently skilled, powerful adults can charm or alter the Pensieve, or even their own memories before placing them inside it," Nagini answered patiently. "If everyone used Pensieves, everyone who wanted to would just find ways to fool them or avoid them. So they're generally only useful in special cases - or cases like yours, where it's generally assumed that the ones donating the memories don't have nearly the level of skill or knowledge to alter them. Or to try to affect the Pensieve itself, which - Lucinda Varson - I wouldn't recommend."
"Okay..." Harry said slowly. "How do we do this, then? Give you memories?"
"Just focus on that class, focus on that time, the emotions, the words," Nagini replied. "And I'll handle the extraction - it won't hurt at all."
"Evelyn, can you do this with me?" Harry asked.
"Sure," she nodded, sighing. "I'll think about what we need to."
Harry nodded back, and cast his mind back through his own memories.
His mother raised her wand, touching it to the side of his head.
Harry stayed focused, and relaxed; he trusted her more than anyone in the world. Trusted her now, truly, to never hurt him. Not on purpose, anyway (dueling accidents still happened, and normal clumsy human ones).
His mother drew her wand away from him, and a long trail of silver thread manifested on end of her wand. Pulled out of Harry's own head.
But he felt nothing from it.
Nagini conjured a small vial and placed the strand of silver inside it. Then, she looked to Evelyn. "Ready?"
"Yes..."
"All right."
Nagini repeated this process for Evelyn, storing it in a second vial.
Then she stood, holding them both tight in hand. "I'll go first," she told Dumbledore. "After I've finished, you can take your turn."
"Of course," Dumbledore said lightly.
Nagini took the vials to the Pensieve and turned them over, dropping the strands inside a smooth liquid surface. She raised a hand and dipped it into the liquid, and then she was being sucked right into the Pensieve as the symbols around it glowed blue.
Harry startled, leaping to his feet.
Dumbledore raised a hand. "It's perfectly safe, Harry."
After she just got done telling me all about the unsafe stuff that's happened to people who tried to make these things...
Harry tried to breathe, and resumed his seat. He locked his gaze to the Pensieve, staring until his eyes watered and he had to blink again.
Waiting.
After nearly five minutes, Nagini returned at last.
She straightened and turned, her eyes going right to Snape. That cold, hard look of hers was back with a vengeance. But she drew breath and said nothing, simply walking to stand next to Harry.
"Why don't we go together, Severus," Dumbledore spoke, moving to the Pensieve and gesturing toward the man.
Snape nodded tightly, and followed.
The pair touched the surface of the water, and disappeared together.
Silence, and discomfort reigned.
Nagini lowered herself down next to Harry, grasping the arm of his chair. She looked at his face, and leaned in to whisper, "I'm proud of you for standing up to that man for her. Now, I'm not exactly thrilled with how you handled it overall - you need to work on that temper, Harry, and you did not need to throw out half as many cutting remarks as you did - but you did do the right thing, and your intentions were good. And I expect far less from you than I do from him; we can work on your execution later, and we will have a lengthy discussion this weekend about it." She paused. "Although, you forgot to mention that you taunted him that you weren't going to do any of his detentions."
"I thought that was assumed," Harry said thoughtlessly. "Sorry!" he said quickly, flushing.
Nagini sighed. "That's something we'll have to discuss with the Headmaster. You are right: you shouldn't respect people who don't earn it - especially not adults who abuse power over students and abuse students. And I wouldn't want to send you to a detention with that same man. But you did say quite a lot of things I wasn't a fan of...and you should probably be punished for that in some way - not to punish you for who you said it to, or why you said it, but because you said them. To hopefully teach you to better restrain your anger; that would be the focus, the reason, Harry. I'll have to think of something." She stood, giving his shoulder a squeeze and a stroke.
"I'm not sorry I said it. Somebody had to after all this time!" Harry burst out.
"I know; I understand. Regardless, I can never make you feel anything you don't want to," Nagini added quietly. "I won't try. Your feelings are yours, and in this instance I think they're largely valid. I'd never have asked you to just sit and endure what that man was doing to you - and to Evelyn. It's better that you said anything at all, than if you'd said nothing, in the end. And for that, I am proud of you, Harry. Just...we need to fine-tune the details," she gave a little laugh, shaking her head.
Nagini gazed at Evelyn, who had her head down, as ever. "Evelyn...? I'm sorry he said that to you. It was incredibly inappropriate, and disgusting, and wrong, and you never deserved that. Not from anyone, but especially not from any adult - and especially not from a teacher. I'm going to make sure he can't do that again."
Evelyn looked up, her eyes going wide, her lips parting. "Really?"
"Yes," Nagini said firmly. "I promise - alright?"
Evelyn nodded, cheeks flushing, and quickly ducked her head again to hide in her hair.
A few minutes later, and the Headmaster and a surprisingly subdued Professor Snape returned from out of the Pensieve.
"Let us sit," Dumbledore said quietly.
Snape obeyed, while Dumbledore resumed his seat behind his desk and folded his hands.
"Before you begin, Albus," Nagini spoke, calm and level. "I want you to know that I will either accept this man's resignation from his position, or I'll withdraw Harry from this school until he is - doing what I can to make sure that happens from the outside."
"What? Wait-" Harry began.
"How fitting: an entitled parent of an entitled child," Snape snapped out at her. "You'd see me fired for a single incident?"
"There have been two incidents that I know of, involving my son," Nagini replied firmly. "I'm sure there are dozens of others involving other children. And while it has been a few years since the last one, it still speaks of a pattern. And that pattern isn't one any child should have to be subjected to. You're remarkably unfit to run a classroom, a man of gross abuse of his own students, of his own authority and power. You are cruel, and you're petty, and I will see you either removed from the place where you can keep doing harm to students, or I'll remove you myself. It's entirely unacceptable, even once. And you've shown no indication of changing, or stopping. So you're going to be stopped."
"For the good of the children, of course," Snape sneered. "How compassionate."
"Case in point - thank you," Nagini responded. "How you even still hold this job is beyond me. But it ends today. Doesn't it, Albus?"
"I agree that his conduct has been highly inappropriate, and grossly wrong toward our students," Dumbledore said thoughtfully. "But how would you suggest I solve the problem? There are not many accomplished Potions Masters in the country, and even less who would be willing to take the job here. Not to mention, to oust Severus from his position would mean leaving no one to teach his classes for an unknown period of time. This is the OWL year for many students, and even the final year for others."
"You'll have to settle for less, then," Nagini said evenly. "Anyone less would still be better than this man, I imagine."
Snape growled, and Dumbledore raised a warning hand.
"You would be surprised," Dumbledore replied sincerely. "Or, perhaps not. We both know just how many people out there are far worse than Severus here. Especially toward children."
"Then hire someone you trust, someone you know already, with the capabilities to teach at least adequately. It will have to be enough for the time being. This man needs to go."
"Perhaps we could come up with a system to ensure our students still get their quality of education, yet ensures no more inappropriate behavior?" Dumbledore suggested. "A secondary Potions teacher - a partner, perhaps? Someone to step in and correct and report any more behavior like that? Someone to watch out for the students' wellbeing, who would be teaching in the classroom alongside the current one? Someone to be there at all times to help...manage things in the chaos of a potions lab?"
"That is...an option," Nagini said slowly, nodding in deep concentration. "But speaking as a parent, it's one I'd still have reservations about. I'd imagine many other parents would as well."
"Understandable. Well then..." Dumbledore gazed at her, a small smile coming to his face beneath his long white beard. A twinkle to his eyes. "Would it ease your worries if you were to be the one in those lessons with our students?"
Nagini looked at him without surprise. "I knew you were going to suggest that."
"Well?" Dumbledore persisted, raising an eyebrow. "If I recall, you're not a terrible potioneer yourself - while you didn't attend Hogwarts, you once told me you left your village's local mage school with some of the highest marks of anyone. And, forgive me, but considering your unruliness during childhood, that's saying something."
"I did manage to turn myself around near the end, yes," Nagini said absently, her cheeks slightly flushing. "But that wasn't an elite school, not like Hogwarts - far from it. The entire school barely had twenty average mages! And my marks, if compared to a student here, wouldn't be nearly so impressive."
"But you have gained further experience during the war," Dumbledore insisted. "It was practical - a necessity for many of us. And it was one you took to quite well, if I remember."
"When the occasion arose..." Nagini agreed hesitantly.
"It would appear an occasion has risen," Dumbledore answered. "If you would be willing to rise to it as well. It would only be temporary, as you said, until we can find a suitable, long-term replacement for Severus." He paused, peering at her. "This is the compromise I'm hoping we can make here, old friend."
Nagini sighed. "All right. But if I'm going to be acting as a secondary teacher, I'm going to be the one with authority over discipline, not Snape - as he's shown he can't be trusted with it any longer. And I'd like to be paid as one. Beast-hunting work pays highly but sporadically, and in all honesty, it would be nice to have a steadier, regular form of income for my family." She paused, glancing at Harry with a slight smile as she added, "Not to mention, teaching should be a lot safer than wrestling with monsters all the time."
Harry felt a warmth in his chest, and he beamed at her.
"Done," Dumbledore said cheerfully. "You will have the authority over student disciplinary incidents in and out of the classroom - while Severus will not - and you may be hired on at a standard rate of two hundred and twenty-five galleons a week, for every week you stay here."
"Done," Nagini agreed, looking considerably more cheered herself.
Dumbledore leaned across his desk to shake her hand. "Welcome to the staff, Ms. Siahaan," he said jovially.
"I'm glad to be here, Headmaster," she replied, with a small smile.
"Headmaster," Snape started quietly. "I'd highly protest this arrangement. If I'm to be stripped of my ability to manage my own classroom, the students will all take advantage of it. They'll go wild, and I'll have to stand there and take it all."
Nagini gave him a look. "Unlike you, I'm a fair enough person; if any students want to act out unjustly against you, I'll discipline them for it - even for you - when deemed appropriate, and in an appropriate manner."
Snape snorted, as if he didn't believe her. He rounded on Dumbledore. "Again, I don't see how this is even-"
"Sadly, I'm getting rather old, and any protests you make would, unfortunately, fly in one ear and out the other," Dumbledore said cheerfully. He met Snape's gaze, and grew serious. "It is either this, or I will be forced to fire you tonight, Severus. At least you will be given a couple of weeks to get your affairs in order - more than generous, I believe. I won't have swarms of owls from outraged parents accusing me of not caring for the wellbeing of my students. I care a great deal, Severus. As you should have - rather than making their lives worse. You have failed quite horridly at meeting the standards we expect of Hogwarts professors, especially since young Harry came into our halls. I admit, my great mistake was excusing you for being so young when you were first hired on - thinking that you might learn - but you're not so young anymore, and so I realize my other great mistake was in expecting never to be so disappointed with you as I am today."
Snape actually gulped. "V-very well...Understood, Headmaster...I'll take my leave, then, if there's nothing more to discuss?"
"Nothing that comes to my mind," Dumbledore responded casually. "Go on, my boy. And be prepared to work smoothly with your co-teacher tomorrow; you'll get her up to speed this evening - I'd like both of you to return to my office at 7 PM, if that works for you two - and I'll hear of no more incidents like today's."
Snape gave a single nod. He crossed the room and left the office down the spiral staircase, his cloak flowing behind him.
"We should have made him apologize to these two first," Nagini muttered, sighing.
"Perhaps it's best if we extract such an apology later this evening," Dumbledore replied. "When we will all have had a bit of time and distance put between us and the events of this morning."
"Perhaps," Nagini agreed. "If I'm to be teaching here, I'll need quarters. Are my old ones still unused?"
"They are, yes," Dumbledore nodded.
"Then I'll move back into them," she said.
"I see no issue with that - though, you may need to do a bit of cleaning."
"That's not a problem." Nagini gave Harry's head a pat, his hair a little ruffle as she looked down on him fondly. "We should get the two of you to your next lessons. I'll need to return home to pack some things - I'll see you again tonight."
"Okay." Harry stood and quickly hugged her. "Thanks for coming, and for- I love you. And you're right, I- I shouldn't have gotten that angry, I just..."
"It's all right. We'll talk about it later. I love you, too, Harry." His mother let him go, stepping back with a sigh. "Get yourself to class now."
"Yeah, okay. See you tonight." Harry glanced at Evelyn, who quickly ducked her head. He thought he saw a flash of something on her face, but then it was hidden away. "Come on. I think we have History of Magic next, according to our new schedules; it's changed around from last year - oh, you weren't here, though. Anyway..."
Harry watched his mother disappear in green flames, and then he and his friend left the Headmaster's office down the spiral staircase.
He felt...a great deal more relieved and happy than he had been feeling all through the morning so far.