Author: Again, Melian, Andria, Melamorie and Cay Ju- thanks.
Chapter 10: Sword of Slytherin.
…Darkness. Light. Bleary patches of darkness mingled with foul yellowish
light. Then darkness again. Am I alive? Am I dead? Where am I? Cobwebs,
dusty cobwebs, sweeping against my cheeks, dusty floorboards, old tattered
floorboards. Screech, whisper, silence, darkness. Attic. Attic of my own
life.
***
"He won't come"
"He will"
"He won't, I'm going to fetch him"
"He will come on his own will, and soon, because there are only three hours left before the appointed time"
"Why did you insult him in the first place?"
"Why don't you go and join Melian?"
Tehhie snorted derisively and marched out of the room.
Severus scowled and looked expectantly at the huge clepsidra, towering on the top of the dusty cupboard. They-he and Tehhie-had returned back at his office after an hour of tiresome ransacking of castle and grounds. Melian and Filch, still slightly dizzy but determinate to execute and punish, accompanied them during their search. No trace of either Maleficent or Draco had been found, and the only fruit of their labors was uncovering of Hagrid, locked in his hut and deadly drunk. When Snape awakened him and expressed, rather roughly, his feelings about gamekeeper's grievous state, Hagrid only opened one bleary eye, moaned "Dragons…outside…murdered…slain …poor things, couldn't bear ter see" and slumped again into his prostration, to Headmaster's great amusement.
Melian and caretaker were busy outside, trying to get rid of dragons' remnants, which started already to smell foully at burning sun. Now Tehhie joined them and Headmaster remained alone in his office, alone except of cheerless thoughts in his head and several sulkily-looking spiders on the ceiling.
Severus rose slowly and looked through the window at the scorched tree and small figures bustling underneath. His hand slid down the glass as the Whomping Willow, people, dark rim of forest and vast shadows of the mountains on horizon dissolved in blinding sunshine-sunshine, streaming from the opening overhead, along with the song of bugles and shrill cry of trumpets…
Snape's nails dug deeply in his palms, and pain shook off the delusion-he was pretty sure, however, that not for a long. Headmaster hit the wall with all his might and searing agony in his shoulder reminded him that he's still alive and bound to do something. Something…he whirled around and opened the secret door for a third time.
He bent over Death Eater's decayed body to make a closer examination and reached for his tattered robes when the gurgling noise from behind distracted him. Headmaster straightened himself and smiled, then turned slowly, holding a large flask in his hands.
Potter, chalk-white and gagging, stared at him from the entrance.
"What, Potter", muttered Snape softly "Have you seen something unusual recently?"
"This…that…what the Hell is that?"
Snape felt a strong temptation to say something like 'remnants of a rebel student after I'd went through him', but suppressed his best self and instead of it answered "the corpse".
"Er…that I see" said Harry wisely, and added mentally "and sniff, too".
Then he approached cautiously, uncertain about Snape's reaction on somebody who had walked into him right when he was busy robbing a dead body.
Snape, however, didn't seem to be astonished or enraged, as, on Harry's mind, looters disturbed during their dirty work are used to look.
That was pretty surprising, because Harry had privately doubted that Snape would be able to look him into eyes-or that he'd be able to look into Snape's eyes without killing him. Now Headmaster was as cool as a trout in a mountain river, whereas Harry's inside was squirming with rage and loathing.
"Only for you, Herm", sighed he mentally and raised his head to meet Snape's undecipherable glance. Then his gaze traveled to the flask in Snape's hands and became even more apprehensive.
"No, Potter, it's not the extract of his testicles or the sample of his saliva or whatever you think"
Harry blushed, because his real hypotheses were not far from that. He felt more and more uneasy under Snape's sneering glance-again he got this unpleasant sense that Snape could read minds.
"So…what is it?"
"Just a Polyjuice Potion. I think it will be quite handy in our next little adventure"
"Our adventure?!!"
After these words Harry's eyes acquired a shocking resemblance with
Dobby the House Elf' goggling orbs.
***
…I will never forgive him. I hate him. How could he look I my eyes after what he had said?
Harry leaned his sweating forehead against the cold stones of passageway.
Could it be true? He loved my mum? He loved her? How could it be? Why did he say this, why?
I won't think about it now.
***
Revolting treacle-thick solution bubbled, frothed and splashed out of the cauldron onto the open fire. Flames hissed fiercely, coloring in nauseating tint of bogey.
"Is it Malfoy's essence, then?" grinned Harry, stepping back to escape the shower of angry sparks.
"We'll see what yours will be like", answered Snape icily, making sure that the filter is screwed firmly on he top of the fractions collector.
"Anyway, I didn't get what you are going to do", pointed out Harry, staring at the cauldron with growing uneasiness.
"That's not surprising, Potter. If during my lessons you had been doing anything but imagining me under Cruciatus Curse, it would have been of great use now. But-alas!"
Harry dropped his jaw, his cheeks burning. Snape COULD read minds after all. Then he met Snape's eyes and blinked- they were aglow with something almost like Weasley twins' roguish look when they were planning a nice dirty trick. Was Snape…just joking?
Harry cleared his throat and tried tentatively
"Er…Headmaster…Was it that obvious?"
"Almost, Potter. Almost"
Now he definitely could see the smile hiding in the corner of Snape's mouth, and, somehow, the sight was reassuring. Harry gulped…and smiled in response.
"So you are going to reuse it, right? Just get it through the filter and that's all?" interrupted Melian, who appeared to be very interested in Snape's manipulations.
"Five points to Slytherin, Miss Millstone"
"Professor Millstone. Besides, I started at Gryffindor, and Polyjuice is just a simple trick for the beginners", grinned Melian and winked at Tehhie.
"Then you are welcome to help me with these pipes", answered Snape coolly, pointing at ominous-looking glass cylinders.
Melian's smile faded immediately, and Harry had been delighted to see that DADA teacher was as terrified with the thought as he would be. Meantime Snape managed to get the collector running and thick black potion streamed down the tubes to the retort. Headmaster scrutinized the outcome of his efforts and poured it into the glass.
"Well" drawled he, looking at Harry.
"Well what?" blinked the boy.
"You hair, Potter. Or should I pluck it by myself?"
Harry instantly imagined Snape scalping him with a big knife and pulled hurriedly one of his hairs. Headmaster eyed it with visible disgust and then dropped into his glass. Potion hissed, frothed and colored into emerald green.
"Not so bad", muttered Harry, "it could have been maroon"
'And I'd like to know what your essence would have been like, Snape' added he in his mind.
Then he peered at Headmaster expectantly. Melian and Tehhie stared at Snape with anticipation, too.
"What you are looking at?" snarled Headmaster. "It's not so pleasant process, so I'd like to ask you to leave me alone"
Harry sighed with disappointment and walked out of the Snape's laboratory, followed by giggling Melian and frowning Tehhie. Door snapped, shutting behind their backs.
"Imagine what's gonna happen if it doesn't work. Severus with his left side like Harry and right like Lucius, won't it be cute?" snickered Melian, gazing at the closed door.
"It's not funny", snapped Tehhie.
"Well, he's so great in Potions, he always kept bragging about how he could whip Memorizing Solution single-handily. Come on, he's gonna be all right"
"Aha, precisely like when he had overturned a vial with Switching Mixture on himself and sprouted several rat tails from his knee" smiled Tehhie "And then when he had grown vampire fangs and bat wings for the Halloween feast and got stuck with them for two weeks"
Harry listened to their conversation, fascinated. He had never heard anybody talking about Snape like that - even Dumbledore always kept some distance and kind of grim respect addressing to the Potions Master. But they had been at school with him, reminded he to himself. Apparently he wasn't that bad and boring, not at all like Sirius used to describe him. Apparently…at that moment his pondering had been interrupted, because the door of the laboratory opened and very pale, very sour looking Harry Potter emerged from it. He surveyed the scene with kind of puzzled expression on his face, squinted and turned to the real Harry. The boy flinched slightly
"What? Something wrong with my ears or you don't like the form of my nose?"
"Potter…have you got a spare glasses?"
***
Two boys, identical as a two grains of sand on the seacoast, entered the secret room, and the door noiselessly closed behind them. Then one of them turned to face another.
"Are you ready?"
"Ready for what?"
Second boy shifted awkwardly, but then braced himself and stared fixedly at the first one.
"That's pretty interesting, Potter. How is it, to look at your own face?"
"It's not my face, Professor. Just a mask"
"Mask?"
First boy smiled, and cruel mirth, unusual for one so young, glinted in his emerald-green eyes.
"Professor Snape?"
"Who speaks about Snape? I am legendary Harry Potter, school celebrity, the best ever Quidditch player and you know-they all loves me, because I'm so special. I'm the school champion. Even Voldemort flees from me, terrified. Isn't it fascinating, what do you think?"
"Headmaster Snape?"
"What about Snape? I don't like him at all. He's ugly, with this large hooked nose, he's untrustworthy, unfair, he always gives my detentions, he tried to kill my friends. You know, I think he's poisoning Lupin with this Wolfsbane Potion, and for sure he was pretty keen to turn in Sirius. He would kill me, too, if he only could …"
"Headmaster…"
"What?"
"You know... really hate you. But I don't think that you'd kill me"
"And may be you are wrong"
Incredible malice flashed in emerald eyes, malice, which never belonged there.
And then their expression changed to the former sneer, which didn't
fit to them, too.
***
Harry simply couldn't understand. This man…
Somehow, he felt by far more comfortable facing enraged Voldemort. But then, he still had a chance to meet Dark Lord today, reminded he to himself, so it would be easy to compare. Harry stiffed nervous laugh and looked at Snape (but was it Snape, this boy with jet-black hair, green eyes and lightning scar, or it was just his reflection in a cracked mirror?), looked to see him crossing the narrow space of the chamber and stopping in front of a large picture on the wall.
"We had came here to fetch the sword, right?"
"Good guess, Potter"
"So…where is it?"
"Here"
Harry blinked and gaped stupidly at the painting. Actually, in any case the picture had been worth to gape at.
Thin, tall, pale warrior in strange ancient armor stared back at Harry from the withered frame. With kind of dull surprise Harry realized that the frame of the picture was made out of the old dark metal.
Most striking about warrior's appearance were his eyes, large, golden, with vertical slits for pupils. It awakened some unpleasant memory in the back of boy's mind, something he had never seen-he had been absolutely certain about that-but nonetheless familiar. He gazed, trying to comprehend…
"Don't look!" snapped a harsh voice from behind and Snape's hand jerked him out of trance.
"Why?"
"Don't you see?"
Headmaster pointed at the background of the picture. Smoking ruins, visible appallingly clear against the pale-gray sky. Ravens, feasting on bulging corpses of horses and humans. And above it all…banister, shining banister with a strange creature on it- creature with scales of dark gold, large bat wings, coiled tail, clawed paws, hooked beak and huge golden eyes. Eyes with black vertical slits for pupils. Creature was astounding, strikingly beautiful and enormously terrifying at the same time.
"What…what is it?" gasped Harry.
"Basilisk. Real Basilisk, creature more vile and more dangerous than dragons and manticores and more ancient than the Wales' mountains. Not the overlarge grass-snake you had encountered at your second year, Potter, but his ancestor. And not only his"
Realization, the thought impossible but nonetheless evident dawned at Potter.
"Are you saying that this man…that he's Basilisk's descendant?"
"Yes. His name was Salazar Ar Neidr, Lord Slytherin, and yes he was a last descendant of Basilisk, offspring of ancient blood, by far more ancient than the blood of any human being. He had inherited some of his ancestor's features-for example, any man without Slytherin's blood in his veins who looks at this portrait for a long loses his sanity"
Severus smiled nastily, as the boy next to him blanched.
Harry felt hairs prickling on the back of his head, and something very like cold writhing snake slithered in his stomach.
"Slytherin…Voldemort's ancestor. But what this portrait is doing here? Where is the sword?"
"My family has been keeping this painting for many generations. It is believed that it's the only one remained original portrait of Slytherin. The others are mere copies, because all the originals had been destroyed hundreds of years ago. As about the sword…It is in its scabbard"
Instantly Snape raised his hand, looked in Slytherin's golden eyes and demanded
"Salazar Ar Neidr, Lord Slytherin, give my thy sword!"
The portrait sprang into life. Clouds floated through the frowning sky, ravens cawed and took their flight, gale of cold wind burst out of the frame, carrying the stench of rotten flesh, smoke and another, almost indiscernible sweet scent.
Snape shuddered when the wind touched his face, shuddered and muttered something, his eyes glassy as if in daydream. Harry strained his ears and caught the words "Apple trees of Avalon".
He hesitated, uncertain what should he do-wake Snape or leave it like that, when the right hand of the man on the painting reached for the decorated scabbard on his belt and pulled out long silver sword, with two snakes entwisted on its hilt, their emerald eyes sparkling.
Daydream expression vanished from Snape's face, he stretched out his
hand-and his fingers clasped on the hilt of Slytherin's sword.
TBC...