"Potter."
Snape nodded Harry through the door of his office. It was exactly how Harry remembered it from their Occlumency lessons, betraying no trace of the festive season. Alicia had demanded that Harry keep an eye on Snape all the time, and McGonagall, after hearing about their plans to analyse Smith's blood, insisted on his presence as well. She was much more polite and apologetic about it, reasoning that Harry witnessing the procedure would lend it more credibility with authorities. Still, Snape had been visibly hurt, giving her a mocking bow before leaving for the dungeons with Harry in tow.
Harry walked along the shelves rising from the floor and up to the arched ceiling. He now recognised most of the things that used to freak him out as a teenager: plimpy eyes, blinking at him from behind the glass, a hand with grey, peeling skin and webbed fingers that looked like it could have but not quite belonged to a Grindylow—it send him a rude gesture when he lightly tapped on the jar—and a brain in formaldehyde that Harry could see now to be a training dummy. He had one like that lying around Grimmauld. Snape's brain—ha!—was clearly well-used, and Harry wondered what potions or spells he tried on it.
The veritable centrepiece was a bottle with a skull on the label and big black granules inside. Despite being relatively tame compared to the other things on the shelves, rumours about it permeated Hogwarts. It was said to be a poison Snape invented, one granule enough to kill a unicorn in a millisecond; tasteless, odourless, completely undetectable. This simple bottle filled students with dread more than slimy things in the jar ever could.
Looking at the dramatic skull now, Harry felt embarrassed and faintly nostalgic at how silly they had been to believe this, wondering if the current Hogwarts generation did as well. While there was no doubt Snape kept plenty of deadly poisons in his private stores, he wouldn't display them here for any student to grab. Harry squinted at the granules, trying to work out what they actually were.
"What are those?" he asked.
"This is not what killed Smith, I assure you," Snape, said and pushed a section of the bookshelf next to the desk, revealing an entrance to another room. Obeying the careless gesture of his hand, the lights went on, illuminating what had to be his personal lab.
"It doesn't look like any poison I know."
"Some say one granule can slay a hippogriff before I can say 'ten points from Gryffindor.'"
"And by some, you mean terrified students?"
Snape gave him an uncommitted shrug with one shoulder for a reply. The corner of his mouth raised into a smirk.
"In my days, it was a unicorn," said Harry.
"I'm sure it would work just as well on a unicorn as it would on a hippogriff."
"Who is its latest victim, according to the students?"
"The last I've heard, it was a baby dragon."
"Now that's too much. You have to stay believable." Harry snorted. He would not have believed this even at eleven. Probably. "But really, what is it? Some rare ingredient?"
Snape looked him a long moment, his expression inscrutable. Finally, he said, deadpan, "Bathing salt."
Harry stared at him, gauging if he was serious.
"Wait a minute!" he said as he followed Snape into a spotless lab with two cauldrons already simmering on low fire. In contrast to the dim and gloomy office, it was brightly lit by the sconces on the walls. "When you say 'ten points from Gryffindor,' are they actually detracted?"
"When I say 'ten points from Gryffindor?'"
"Yes. When you say—that."
"Potter. What is the main prerequisite for a spell to work?"
"Intent." Harry grinned, on sure ground again. Were he his eleven- or even seventeen-year-old self, he would be searching for a catch somewhere in the question. But years of Healer training and practice had given him confidence in his understanding of the basic principles of magic.
"Congratulations, Potter, at least something from seve—six years of your magical education managed to sink in."
"So you're saying you have to mean it when you take points off or give them, and they are not automatically deducted when teachers say the words themselves." He felt he needed to clarify this for all the future generations of Gryffindors who would still be taught by this acerbic man.
"Precisely. I have to actively wish to take points from Gryffindor when I say 'ten points from Gryffindor.'"
"You don't have to repeat it," Harry said uncomfortably, imagining the rubies in the hourglass running out at this very moment. He narrowed his eyes. "Have you wished for it just now?"
"When I—"
"Yes!"
"When have you ever known me not to wish it?"
Harry sputtered as Snape busied himself with vials and jars. He was raking his brain for a witty comeback when he realised they were exchanging banter instead of trading insults, and this thought stopped him short. The insults were sure to return any moment now, but Harry found he rather liked this Snape. When he had gone to visit Snape in the Hospital Wing in hopes of building bridges all those years ago, he had imagined them solemnly discussing weighty topics, with Snape being all stoic and grim. Maybe it was a good thing Snape had thrown that glass at him.
Surreptitiously studying the defined arch of Snape's brow and rise of his cheekbones, Harry was suddenly struck by how—not handsome, no—magnetic his features were. Not from a cover of a magazine, but a classical statue. He hastily dropped his gaze lest Snape caught him staring. Hermione had been right. Harry must have been single for too long if he was starting to look at Snape this way.
Snape drew Smith's blood from the vial with a dropper and added it to half a dozen glass rectangles, moving with the easy grace of someone who had done this a thousand times before. A pair of candles flew up to him without prompting, casting their light on the samples. He took some vials from the shelves behind him—much less impressive without any moving hands or big skulls on the labels but meticulously organised—and added their content to each rectangle. With five, nothing happened, but the blood on the last one darkened even more until it turned black. Snape frowned slightly and took out a small cauldron.
"Can I help you with anything?" Harry asked.
Snape thrust a cutting board and a jar of horned slugs at him, making Harry regret the offer.
The potion was done in fifteen minutes of increasingly strung silence and did not require even one slug from the pound Harry had chopped. Right after taking the cauldron off the fire, Snape added precisely one drop of blood and waved his wand over it, muttering some incantation. The potion bubbled and foamed, threatening to overflow, but Snape was quick to vanish it with a practised swipe of his hand just in time. He stared at it for a full minute, his face ashen.
"The main active component is white snakeroot," he finally said through his teeth, his voice devoid of the levity from before.
"Just white snakeroot?"
"Yes, Potter. This is an ingredient you would have learned about if you have ever opened One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi."
That did not sound right.
"But doesn't it only appear in slow-acting poisons? If it was only white snakeroot, his hair and teeth would be falling out for a week before, and he would not be able to drink that wine, because his liver would have already failed."
Snape looked at him in momentary disbelief before the scowl returned to his face. Apparently, the fact that Harry did know his potions these days refused to sink in. To be fair, Harry was not much better at actual brewing now than he was at Hogwarts, but he could quote One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi if woken up in the middle of the night. At least the information relevant to his job.
"This is a white snakeroot-based potion, and yes, some of them are capable of acting fast. You can relay that to your friend Spinnet. I've done my part here." He sent the cauldron to the sink where it landed with an unnecessary clank and turned his back on Harry, returning the vials to the shelf.
Harry felt irritation bubble. "You don't have to tell me what got you in a snit, but you better be sure the Aurors wouldn't find out either."
This was a shot in the dark, but he seemed to hit the bullseye with it, for Snape whirled to face him, eyes flashing with fury. "Of course. It took no time at all for you to show your true colours, Potter."
"I still don't believe you killed Smith and want to help you!"
"Lord over me just like your father, more likely!"
"I'm on your side here, you stubborn sod!"
For a moment, Harry was sure Snape was going to hex him. His hand dove to his pocket to furtively grasp his wand under the table. As his fingers wrapped around the handle, Harry realised they still were covered with slime from chopping the slugs.
"Fuck."
Snape glanced at his arm. "Good luck getting the stains out." He smirked with malicious amusement, but Harry's display of stupidity seemed to relax him somewhat.
"So, are you going to tell me anything?" Harry asked cautiously, going to the sink to wash his hands.
"I don't owe an explanation to an ungrateful ignoramus like you," Snape said, but from his tone, Harry knew he had won.
There was another bout of tense silence that Harry didn't break.
"There is one snakeroot-based poison that acts instantly. Gertrude's Kiss."
"Never heard of it."
"At the last stage of the brewing, a potioneer uses a spell to imbue the poison with their own magic, which enhances its deadly nature and makes the death instantaneous."
"I remember reading about this technique for our History of Poisons and Cures class," Harry said, trying to remember the details. "It leaves a magical signature, right?"
"Magical signature. Yes. A simplistic way of putting it, but essentially correct. This is the reason why it mostly went out of fashion in the last century; nobody wants to leave their calling card on a dead body." Snape let out a bitter little laugh. He was glaring down at the remaining blood in the vial, face obscured by his hair.
"So we can know who made this potion? But that's—that's great, right?"
"Simply stupendous."
Something in Harry's mind clicked. "You're the one who made it, right?"
"You can spare me the speech on how you should've never trusted me after all."
"I wasn't going to make it." Harry struggled for words. "So… Have you had any potions stolen recently?"
"Don't be ridiculous. I got rid of all stocks like that after the war. Unless—" Snape's wand froze midway to the vial. In the next moment, he leapt to his feet and strode from the lab with a single-minded determination on his face, Harry on his heels.
In the office, Snape marched to his desk and completed a series of complicated movements with his wand, making another drawer appear between the two existing ones. He murmured something that sounded like 'Lady Stardust', which was Harry found a rather odd password choice for a man like Snape. But it was the point, he supposed.
Snape jerked the drawer open, revealing some envelopes, photographs, muggle and wizarding, paper clippings, and a tiny round vial of viscous liquid, safely sealed with wax. He exhaled in relief.
In contrast, relief was the last thing on Harry's mind. He found the fact that Snape was keeping this in his desk rather disturbing, especially after he noticed one of the envelopes bearing his name.
"Why have it here at all?" he asked cautiously.
Snape slid the drawer back into place with a rattle and made it disappear again. "Insurance during the war," he explained curtly.
"Insurance?"
"I knew a lot, and my position was precarious. Should I have been exposed in an inopportune moment, this would ensure I wouldn't betray any of the Order's secrets," Snape said matter-of-factly, sinking down into his leather chair. I seemed like he was explaining a homework assignment and not his plans for his death during the war. "This poison is one of the rare ones that don't have an antidote. Technically, it could be developed, but one would simply have no time to administer it."
Harry shivered. "Why have you kept it all this time?" he asked, taking the opposite chair.
"I haven't opened it since the war," Snape said with an irritated expression that told Harry to tread carefully. Harry suspected the answer to be a lie, but it was not his place to press the issue.
"So someone stole the poison from you during the war?" he asked instead.
"Nobody would have stolen something like that from me, Potter! I didn't store it with the Gillyweed and Boomslang skin."
"I didn't steal either of those, you know."
Snape raised a sceptical eyebrow at him.
"Really, I didn't. But if nobody—"
"I only brewed those potions, Potter," Snape said, sounding tired. "I wasn't a part of their... end use."
"So they are from the potions you made for Voldemort?"
"This is one option."
"One option?" Harry looked at him in confusion. "You don't mean Dumbledore asked you to brew poisons as well?" He meant it as a joke, but the grimness of Snape's face made him waver. "What, really? Why?"
"For much the same reason I was keeping my own potion on me all the time. Certain Order members were sent on increasingly dangerous missions, especially towards the end of the war."
"Remus?" Harry found himself asking.
"The wolf, among others." Snape nodded. "This potion is one of the few equally effective on his kind."
"But if anyone were to use it, wouldn't you be to blame?"
Snape's face was now an expressionless mask. "We all had to bear our risks at that time."
"It's wasn't fair from the Headmaster to ask that of you."
"It's a moot point now." He watched Harry oddly, as if he had expected a different reaction to that piece of information. But Harry was well aware of Dumbledore's ruthless and utilitarian side, even if he did not like to think about it often.
"Well, it's really not, if the potion has resurfaced now. Or do you think it's from the ones you brew for Voldemort?"
"Could be either," Snape said reluctantly. "Odds are it's the one intended for the Order, because of those of I brewed for the Dark Lord, only one or two are unaccounted for."
"The others were... used?" Harry asked. "And the Aurors didn't learn they were yours?"
Now Snape appeared even more reluctant. Finally, he said, "They weren't used on the kind of people whose death the Aurors would investigate."
"Oh."
"Except for one in the first war, but in that case, the Aurors were not going to be overly particular about the way the most notorious creature trafficker and Greyback's direct competitor died. In fact, they claimed it was their achievement."
"But they know that was your potion?"
"Yes."
"So they are aware of the... possibility."
"Indeed. If you're quite finished rubbing it in my face—"
"I'm not trying to rub it in your face. I'm just trying to understand the situation. Are there a lot of Voldemort's potions going around?"
"I personally retrieved the rest of the stock from the Malfoy manor after the war. At least, I thought it was the rest of it."
"Maybe the Malfoys are involved!" Harry exclaimed, falling into the old patterns easily. "Malfoy Senior is out, after all!" Lucius Malfoy had been punished with seven years in Azkaban, the last three of which were substituted with home arrest for 'good behaviour,' whatever that meant in the context of solitary confinement in the language of bribe-greedy officials.
"I assure you, Lucius is the last person to be involved in something like this right now, even if he still had the poison. Which he doesn't."
"Who had the poison in the Order, other than Remus?"
Snape twisted his lips into a cynical scowl. "Hestia Jones; she vanished the vial in my presence that first summer. Shacklebolt; he claimed he did as well."
Something in his voice tipped Harry off. "You don't believe that he did?"
"Politicians know the power of leverage."
"Kingsley is not that kind of a person."
"Perhaps," Snape allowed non-committally.
"So you don't know what happened with the rest—how many?"
"Three. And no, I don't." Snape sat back against the high leather back of the chair, steepling his fingers. He looked bone-weary, which was probably the reason he had not started snarling at Harry up until now.
"Dumbledore preferred to keep his cards close to his chest."
"You used to be his biggest proponent."
"I'm not a child anymore. I'm not blind to his faults."
"You've been one surprise on another so far, Potter." Snape regarded him down his prominent nose before taking a potion bottle from his desk—off-colour Pepper-Up, clearly a student's work—and looking at it thoughtfully.
"If you want to fling it at me right now, I would understand."
"I might take you up on that later."
"That's a one-time offer." Harry gave him a hesitant smile. Seeing Snape so defeated made something in his chest pang. Having Snape rage and snap would be at least familiar and thus, manageable.
Snape was still fiddling with the bottle in his potions-stained fingers. "I find it strange that this particular poison was in the wine. It would lose some of its potency upon prolonged contact with alcohol," he said. "Unless, of course—"
Snape stood up abruptly, and Harry followed suit.
Snape's steps were springing with the newfound sense of purpose as they went through the dungeons. Cold air left Harry's lips in puffs, and he realised he was freezing despite a thick sweater—Molly's present from several Christmases ago—with a double-layer wool robe over it. Snape's office seemed to be much warmer; or maybe Harry simply had not noticed the chill among all the revelations.
The doors of the Great Halls were closed, and Professor Binns was floating back and forth in front of them, muttering under his breath. He straightened to his unimpressive height as Harry and Snape approached.
"Halt!" Binns said, puffing his translucent cheeks. "No one is coming in. Headmistress's order."
"We need to inspect the crime scene," Snape said in an authoritative voice.
"But wait, aren't you the Headmaster?"
"Let us through, Cuthbert."
"Everything is so confusing these days," the ghost complained, moving aside.
The table looked exactly as it did before: the dark red stain blooming on the white cloth among the cutlery, plates and goblets. Snape went right to the overturned one.
"Should you touch it?" Harry asked dubiously. "Won't you leave, like, incriminating fingerprints?"
"Reading muggle crime novels in your spare time? Since you didn't follow your childhood dream career, I'll inform you that wizarding law enforcement do not rely on such crude methods."
"I was simply concerned. How stupid of me."
"Indeed. Beside, whyever would I touch it?" Snape said derisively, raising his wand. Mid-motion, his hand stopped.
"What's wrong?" Harry asked, not able to discern his expression behind the curtain of hair.
"Nothing." Snape's tone was so even it had to be faked. Cutting off further questions that bubbled on Harry's tongue, he started murmuring a long incantation in Latin. The cadence of his voice, rising and falling, somewhat lulled the nervous foreboding roiling inside Harry.
The edge of the goblet glowed with a pale blue light. Snape swore under his breath but didn't look surprised.
Harry looked at him questioningly, even though he already suspected the answer.
"The poison was not in the wine," said Snape. "It was applied to the goblet itself."
"What's the practical difference?"
"Use your brain, Potter. This means the culprit had to do it here, in the Great Hall, after the house-elves had already set the table."
There was a wail from across the Hall. "The murderer is among us!" Trelawney was walking between the long tables to them, Flitwick in tow.
Harry winced. They should have kept the door shut.
