Chapter 3: The long dark teatime of the soul I
Harry mounted up and soared high into the air above the Quidditch field, displaying all of his usual skill but nothing of his usual enthusiasm. Although the time at the team practice when he could fly on his broom and see all over Hogwarts and its surroundings, he normally felt best, today his concentration was occupied with other things. Or more precisely with trying to forget his dream from last night.
Which proved itself quite a difficult task for he only had to close his eyes, just for a second, just for a the shortest of times and he was there again:
...Darkness. Endless black night and in its midst grave and silent, nearly peaceful the graveyard where the beautiful pale boy lays down a single blood-red rose on the lonely gravestone standing apart from the other. He whispers no prayer, sings no requiem, sheds no tear, just lays down the rose with an unreadable expression on his handsome face.
As he noticed the other's arrival he looks up and Harry stares into dark green eyes, feeling no fear but only a weird, tired kind of understanding and sympathy...
Forcing himself back into the reality of the breathtaking beautiful autumn day, the boy felt his face growing hot, knowing exactly that it wasn't from the effort of flying. The last thing he needed or wanted now were dreams like this. Dreams that suggested just too clearly that he was heading deeper and deeper into darkness with every step he made, following ties that bind him against his will, ties that ran deeper than blood...
"Stop daydreaming Harry, this isn't History of Magic! And George, you're supposed to be helping your team to get the Quaffle, not knocking them off their brooms!"
Luckily for him, the rest of the team had joined him in the air just now and the captain's demanding voice soon drove all thought from Harry's mind as he tried to spot the Snitch that had already been released into the air.
Bending low over his broom, the wind whistled past him as he rushed through the air, narrowing her eyes against the rushing breathe. Suddenly he caught sight of a glimmer of gold. Just a fraction of a second more and- there!
The rest of the afternoon passed in a blur. By the end of practice he was tired, sore, bruised and generally knocked about. If he had ever thought that training would be easier with Oliver graduated, this hope had surely proven itself futile.
"How did I ever get so out of shape?" he moaned as he walked back to the castle with Fred, whose twin had still not fully recovered from a painful collision with Alicia and had therefore decided to remain on the field to talk to Angelina about her way too brutal training or - what stroke Harry as more realistic - to flirt his hardest with the pretty captain. "Gah, this is going to hurt tomorrow."
"Just be thankful it's Saturday and we won't have to go to classes." Fred winced and reached up to rub at the back of his neck. "Gosh, and I thought _Oliver_ was a fanatic. But sweet Angie tops him easily."
Harry snorted. "Tell me about it. I don't even know if I can make it back to the Tower at this rate. I might just crash in the Great Hall."
Both boys laughed heartfully before they fell silent again. "Harry?" The Weasley twin suddenly asked. "May I ask you a question?"
Harry looked up astonished. "Of course."
"Ah well", Fred bit his lip a bit uncomfortably. "I know that it is really none of my business, but you seemed to be a bit distracted when the training begin. As if something was bothering you a great deal."
Harry felt himself paling. Had he been this transparent? Had everybody seen the direction his thoughts had went to?
Misunderstanding his friend's reaction, Fred grinned quickly. "Hey, don't look at me like I want to marry you or something", he joked. "You weren't obvious, really, I just noticed. Don't you want to talk about it?"
Confronted with the bright blue eyes, Harry simply could not bring himself to answer the question. Not that he believed Fred to be capable to understand it anyway. It wasn't the boy's fault, he knew that, it was nobody's fault but there was no way in hell any of his friends would ever understand the hidden part of him that would always ache for the soothing peacefulness of darkness, the part that knew death and pain very well for living close to them all the time, and that had at some point of his life gone numb to them. "It's nothing, really", he finally returned, noticing himself how unconvincing his voice sounded.
And indeed Fred remained suspicious. "It's not this stupid story about the big Slytherin Git being friends with your mother, is it? You know, Ron told me and George about it."
As Harry blinked in surprise, the Weasley twin obviously misunderstood this as a "yes". "Honestly, Harry, you shouldn't worry about it. If you ask me, trying to understand Snape is like fishing in the lake around school." He shrugged his shoulders, his eyes narrowing as he considered another solution for his friend's problem. "Have you thought about interrogating Hagrid on the matter? Like why he never told you about it?"
"I already did", the boy confessed.
"And what did he say?"
Harry's mouth quirked sarcastically. "´Yeh never asked.´"
Fred began to laugh heartily. "Not the brightest god in heaven, is he?"
"He told me...", the dark-haired boy broke up, feeling himself blushing at the memory. "Well, he said that there were rumours about...my mum and Snape...you know people gossiped that... they were in love or something."
Fred whistled quietly. "And furthermore?"
Still deeply red, Harry's eyes focussed on the cloudless blue sky. So perfect. Almost too much to take. "Obviously, they had a fight when they were in their sixth year", he eventually continued with his weird story. "Hagrid said that from one day to the other, without anyone knowing the reason why, Snape and Professor McGregor wouldn't speak a word to my mother anymore. As they withdraw, she began to befriend my father and this is the end of the story."
The redhead looked very thoughtful. "And Hagrid had absolutely no clue what their quarrel was about?"
"Not really. He just said...", Harry paused, trying to give back the gamekeeper's words appropriately. "He said that people considered Lucius Malfoy to be involved somehow. Snape and McGregor must have been hanging around with him a lot after they broke with my mum."
Fred's usually merry eyes flashed dangerously at the mention of Draco´s father. "If this slimy Deatheater-bastard was involved, there was something foul about it, no question", he predicted darkly. Then he suddenly began to grin, obviously coming up with one of his wicked ideas. "Have you ever considered to ask McGregor about this? Her tests are really cunning, but apart from that she is a real angel. I am sure she would agree to tell you something about your mum."
"She already offered to", Harry admitted.
The blue eyes were looking at him incredulously. "So why don't you simply go and ask her?"
"Well because...", the younger boy hesitated, not sure how to explain this. As he thought about it, there was no real reason anyway. "I think you are right", he finally said wistfully. Then for the first time this day his expression lightened up. "Thanks, Fred."
"Hey, no problem. Wherefore do you have such a smart, brilliant and good- looking guy as a friend?" The redhead grinned. "I take it that think of me when you visit Honeydukes the next time?"
Harry grinned back. "Sure."
**************************************************************************** ****
Walking down the darkening corridors, the boy's feet barely made a sound as he padded over the stone floor.
He did not know himself why he hesitated so much to go to Professor McGregor, but ever since she had made her generous offer, he had felt rather reluctant to accept it. Not that he did not want to hear something about his mother, the contrary was the case, but then a rather bitter part of him never failed to remind him that the lack of memory he had of his parents could also be seen as a blessing. He had been too young to remember anything about them, too young to understand the finality of death and although he felt their loss keenly, he had to admit to himself that it was barely more than a dull ache in his heart that was not even there when he did not think about it. He could not grieve their deaths so much, because he had nothing of them to miss. Or more precisely, he added sarcastically, he had had nothing of them to miss until the Dementors in this third year had made blurry visions and therefore the vague pain sharper and clearer.
Cursing himself for his egoism, he angrily bit himself on the lips and stopped before the DADA teacher's private rooms, taking a deep breath.
It was not like Professor McGregor would mind his visit, he told himself. In fact, the carefree blonde was by far the most understanding teacher he had met so far. Although expecting a great deal of her students, she never got angry or impatient if anyone did not understand something at once, and after she had actually managed to teach Neville how to use a rather complicated spell effectively, everybody considered her a walking miracle anyway. Hermione of course never failed to remark that some of the attacks and counter curses the blonde taught them were way too powerful for them and sometimes damn near to be officially forbidden, but since Professor McGregor's mischievous fun loving nature, her interesting lessons and her unprejudiced attitude towards all Houses had made her the favourite teacher of the entire school in no time at all, nobody listened to those complaints.
It was nearly a joke how the blonde attracted everybody to her without the tiniest bit of effort, the boy thought to himself. Even Snape showed some human trades when being in her company - and that he was surprisingly often. If anyone had ever told Harry that the Potion Master would actually befriend the new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, he would have told this person to go and see a therapist but then it was quite obvious to everybody that the unbelievable had actually happened.
Harry had to grin. He knew more than a couple of boys at school who would kill to be in Snape's place.
Already less nervous he finally knocked on the door before him.
"Come in", he heard a melodic voice.
Following the invitation, Harry stepped into the blonde's private space - and gasped. He had known the room from his visits at Lupin´s, but he barely recognized it now. Instead of the old worn carpet, a blue Persian with pink and golden roses now laid on the floor, beautifully fitting to the deep dusty golden colour of the wallpaper and the big gorgeous blooms of fresh flowers arranged in porcelain vases here and there. Together with the pretty little porcelain dolls on the majestic bookshelves, the room suddenly seemed very beautiful and elegant, yet in the same time comfortable to behold.
"Do you like it?"
Harry jumped at the sound of his name and blurred around to the source of the voice whom he had nearly forgotten in his admiration. Professor McGregor was sitting on an elegant sofa, not covered with the worn velvet he remembered but with the same pink damask which hung from the windows, gorgeous and warm in the flickering light of the unfamiliar chandelier hanging from the oval cluster of plaster leaves on the ceiling.
Obviously she had already been ready for bedtime since she only wore a simple white cotton gown that made her look like an angel from some old Renaissance masterpiece or like some pretty little girl that was waiting for her goodnight kiss. The dim light let her hair shine like a soft cloud of pure gold around her creamy skin and her big blue eyes shimmered brilliantly as she laid the book, she had been reading in aside to greet Harry with her heartbreaking sweet smile. "I was already wondering when you were going to show up."
Harry nodded, still a bit taken aback. "I nearly didn't recognize the room", he made a humble attempt at small talk.
Throwing her shimmering golden locks back, the DADA teacher laughed agreeable. "Well, Hogwarts has been a place of safety for generations of wizards and witches and since I honestly hope not to leave its walls so soon again, I've decided to make myself a bit at home", she explained cheerfully. "To be honest, the last years have been a bit...unrested."
The boy tried to nod intelligently. "You were living in Ireland, right?" he recollected the information Dumbledore had given them on the Start-of-Term Feast. "What were you doing there?"
The blonde shrugged. "Nothing interesting, really. I just needed some time away from England, so I took a job at the Irish Ministry of Magic. But I don't suppose that you came here tonight to hear about your old teacher's boring life?" As she twinkled teasingly at him, she didn't appear any older than him. "You want me to tell you something about Lily, right?"
Blushing, Harry nodded. "But if you don't have time at the moment..."
"Oh nonsense", she interrupted him with a wink of her hand, while standing up in one fluid movement. "Listen, what do you think about a cup of tea? I make us some and then we just chat a bit, okay?"
Somehow relieved that she made things so simple for him, he nodded agreeing. "Sounds good."
"All right then." With her usual grace she turned around to a door which led to a little kitchen as Harry knew. "Take a seat and make yourself at home while I am preparing everything", she offered him before sweeping out of the room. "It won't take too long."
With her vanished, Harry took place on the sofa hesitantly, his eyes curiously glancing towards the book, the blonde had been reading in.
"The Flowers of Evil" by Charles Baudelaire, he read with a frown. Baudelaire...wasn't that some old muggle poet?
But before he could try to recollect his memory further, Professor McGregor reappeared, carefully balancing a try with small pretty cups of steaming liquid. "I hope you like jasmine tea. It's the only one I have at the moment", she said merrily.
"Ah...thanks", Harry quickly stood up to help her with the tray. After they had set it down, he pointed at the book. "Is he any good? Baudelaire I mean?"
"Huh?" Following his eyes, she threw a casual glance to the book. "Oh that. Severus borrowed it to me. He's absolutely addicted to depressing stuff like that. So was your mum, by the way." A little smile appeared on her sweet lips. "The library was sort of her second home, I daresay."
The boy's throat suddenly felt dry. "She liked poetry?" he repeated.
"I don't think `like` does express it accurately", the blonde smirked, unmistakably amused by the memory. "To say she revelled in it would get straighter to the point."
Harry stared into his teacup. "I did not know that", he muttered. As he noticed her surprised look, he blushed. "I know it sounds foolish but sometimes I feel like...you know, there are dozens of people out there who knew her better than I did. I have no idea what she liked or what she disliked and I...it's just not fair."
"It doesn't sound foolish at all", she returned softly. "Life is rarely fair and it has always proven itself rather cruel to you in particular. I would understand it perfectly if you felt sometimes bitter about your fate, Harry."
As he looked up astonished, she moved forwards to lay her slender white hand tenderly on his, her expression totally sincere. "I know that many people just see "The Boy who lived" when they look at you. But I can imagine how much pressure this title puts on you and I wager that you would give it away freely, if you just could have your parents back again." Her voice was gentle although her eyes did not really seem to focus on him but on some distant point only she could see. Then she suddenly shook her head abruptly and removed her hand. "You say that you don't know anything about Lily. How comes it that Lupin hasn't told you anything about her when he taught here?"
It took one moment for Harry to follow her sudden change of subject. "He told me a great deal about my dad", he finally answered, still shaken by her earlier words. How came that a complete stranger could read him so well, could tell his most secret thoughts when even his closest friends couldn't? "But then he said that he did not know my mum well enough to judge her."
To his surprise, the blonde snorted in a tone that reminded him greatly of Snape. "For once I agree with him."
The boy looked puzzled. "You don't think very highly of him, do you?" he asked carefully.
Professor McGregor wrinkled her nose girlfully. "That's a nice way of understating things." Taking a nip from her tea, she hesitated for one moment, obviously not sure how to explain this to him. "Too be quite honest, I wasn't great friends with your father or the rest of his clique either. For me they were just some stupid Gryffindor gits and they didn't think of me any better."
A bit taken aback at this, Harry first had to clear his throat before demanding his next question. "And why was this so?"
She only shrugged her shoulders, giving him a pointed look he could not quite read. "Can you explain your unqualified dislike of Mr Malfoy?" she countered. "Was there even one moment when you might have become his friend?"
"I guess I know what you mean", the boy returned after a while of silence, feeling slightly uncomfortable with the comparison. Then another question popped up in his green eyes. "And my mum? How was her relationship to my father when she still befriended you and Professor Snape?"
"Lily's?" Professor McGregor's eyes softened as much as her voice at the name of her dead friend. "Who can know for sure what she thought or not? You must know, Harry, your mother was everything but easy to understand. Although we were friends from our third to our sixth year here at Hogwarts, there was always some part of her that I could not reach, that was beyond my tenderness or my concern."
She leaned back on the sofa, obviously searching for the right words to explain it to him. "She was probably the prettiest witch of the entire Gryffindor generation far and wide, and surely the most intelligent and the most reckless, and yet there was something vulnerable about her, something that most people did not notice when dealing with her." A little smile graced the Professor's crimson lips. "Surely she was not the typical Gryffindor at first sight, but if you knew her a bit better, you began to understand the Sorting Head's decision perfectly."
"How...", Harry had to breathe in deeply, painfully conscious of the old familiar constriction around his heart. "How do you mean that?"
"She feared nothing", the blonde answered with surprising tenderness. "No power on this earth could ever scare her or make her feel uncomfortable with herself. Lily Evans was on every count a winner." Her blue eyes searched Harry's green ones. "She always tried so hard to understand everything and except from the stupid potions, there was nothing in any realm which she could not grasp. Sometimes there was something violently disregarding about the way she demanded to know the unadorned truth about the things that interested her and people considered her cold for it but I swear she was never heartless or cruel on purpose. In fact, I never met a person more loyal than Lily. She had the bravery of a lioness when it came to defending her loved ones and she would have willingly sacrificed her life for her friends. - But then you are the living proof of my words."
Harry felt a crush so painful that it could scream his lungs out. Then he shook his head in rough denial. "If you were so close, why did you finally break up?" he finally demanded to know in a voice he barely recognized as his own.
For one moment something he had never before seen in her azure eyes flickered brightly in their depths and hid itself again. "This is a long story, Harry", she eventually returned after what seemed an eternity. "A story about betrayal and power, but above all about greatness."
Staring at the ceiling, a distant expression appeared on the blonde's features as if she was listening to some distant, ominous music she alone could hear. "Greatness", she repeated softly. "Perhaps you are too young to know this, but greatness never comes without price - and since your mother, in contrast to Severus and me, was not willing to pay it, this was how it all ended."
The ghost of a memory clouded her eyes for a short instant. "She would not adjust and suddenly nothing was as it had been before. Lily began to befriend your father while Sev and I turned to Lucius Malfoy. And these, Harry, were worlds that could not be united."
"I suppose", Harry muttered, somewhere between sarcasm and thoughtfulness, before he looked up again, not knowing how challenging his green eyes suddenly flashed. "Why Malfoy?"
Professor McGregor gave him a very strange look. "It seemed...fitting", she finally returned, her expression unreadable. "We made a good team, Lucius with his charisma and his charm the born leader, Severus the schemer and planner and me the person, who could easily bedazzle everybody she ever laid her eyes on, to clear the way out for them. Call it Slytherin ambition if you like."
"Did my mum understand it?"
The bitterness of her smile shocked him. "Just too well, I fear. And I think in your heart of hearts you do as well."
Her eyes now laid with brutal intensity on him as though they could see something in him nobody else was supposed to know about. "People may have told you that you come after your father, but that's not true. You're totally like Lily", she finally said, the tone of her voice not leaving space for any argument. "You were both Gryffindors but only by a hair. You nearly ended as serpents."
Harry felt himself flaming. How could she know? How could she know that the Sorting Head had wanted to place him into Slytherin? And what was this comparison with his mother about?
"Don't look so shocked, boy, that wasn't an insult." Without loosing their serious expression, her eyes softened again. "We are not evil as a rule, Harry, I thought you would have learned this much already. True, we have 'Great ambition' and we are 'cunning', but nevertheless some of us can be trusted."
Eying him thoughtfully, she flipped back a strand of golden locks back absent-minded. "Take Severus as an example. I know that you and your friends do not like him very much, and from you're perspective that's not really surprising, I guess, but do you actually think that he, however curt, nasty and downright mean he can be, would actually harm any of his students? Do you really think that he would ever, ever physically harm a child under his care?" She shook her head unwillingly as if she was about to enter realms of her memory she was not prepared to handle. When she continued her voice was strangely hoarse. "That man would die to protect you, Harry. I know he would."
Harry, not able to face the expression of those blue eyes any longer, had to look away. "You're probably right", he murmured. "But why is he always so bitter? Why does he hate me so much if he and my mum were friends?"
The blonde's eyes clouded until they became some blurry shade of midnight blue. "If you ask me the problem was that the two had been too close for their own good", she finally answered absent-minded. "They had been soulmates from the very beginning on; sometimes they only had to look at each other and they knew exactly what the other one was thinking. Severus was the only one to understand Lily and she was the only one to understand him. He had trusted her with all his heart and I suppose that seeing her and his arch-enemy together, had...stirred something in him. He had always been so proud."
The last words were spoken with a strange melancholy the boy did not understand, but that he denied himself to think about just now. Hesitating shortly before his next question, he blurted it out nevertheless. "When he was so damn proud, how could he then go to Voldemort?"
The blue eyes opened in a flash, staring at him with something like fire in their depths. For one moment the boy felt a prickle of fear up his spine, but as suddenly as the change had come over the blonde, it disappeared again. "For the same reason so many people in Slytherin did, I suppose - because he was driven to him", she finally answered his question in a frightening blank voice, her words more addressed to herself than to Harry. "We come to this school as innocent children and everyday for eight years of our lives we are told that we are snakes, attached to darkness, evil. Isn't it ironic how surprised everyone acted when so many of us went into the Dark Arts, when most of us never had a choice or anywhere else to go?"
"Aren't there always other options?"
"Are there?" she returned thoughtfully. "Do you know how many employers demand to know what house you were in at school? If you don't have parents, who can afford to buy you a high position in society, this means that every Hufflepuff is more likely to get the job than a Slytherin. Well, why be stigmatised, when you can get power, and everything else you ever dreamed of, from Voldemort? Sooner or later, we all had to make that choice."
One moment he marvelled at the fact that she spoke the name aloud. Then another, far more shocking aspect about her words made his heart stop beating for a moment. "You all hade to make this choice?" he repeated, his breath only coming in slow intervals. "This means...you too?"
Her smile sent a shiver down his spine. "You of all people should know that there are different sorts of choosing and ways apart from the Dark Mark the Voldemort can get at you."
Pressing her lips together in a firm line as if trying force back the ghost of some ugly memory by sheer willpower, the usual bright light in her eyes faded away abruptly, only leaving a frightened, desolate and empty-eyed child-woman behind. Harry suddenly remembered her words from the first DADA lesson *My elder sister and my very best friends had both been Gryffindors and they had been wiped out as a symbolic assertion of the power and truth of Slytherin philosophy...*
"I'm sorry, Professor", he murmured, feeling guilty of having suspected her so easily. "I didn't mean to bring back bad memories."
To his surprise a little absent-minded smile formed itself on her delicate lips. "Such a good little Gryffindor heart." Her eyes cleared in amazing speed as she was suddenly reaching out her hand for him. Before he could even register her intention, her finger softly hooked aside some of his hair to expose the scar hidden on his forehead. Tracing its the brief length with her thumb, she made him shiver inwardly and outwardly.
...and for one moment he stands on the graveyard again, a lonely person against the vast horizon. I cannot remember them, the pale boy says. No, he replies, laying down another blood coloured flower on the cold stone. Neither can I...
"But why am I telling someone about marks who has felt the hand of Hate itself?"
Her words made him jump back into reality. "Professor?"
The usually so brilliant blue eyes were clouded by something dark he could not name. "That is Hate's kiss, Harry", she told him very seriously. "Be thankful to every God you believe in that you don't remember how you've gotten it."
"But I do." The words had left his mouth before he had had the slightest chance of holding them back. Staring at the beautiful fairylike woman in front of him, there was nothing that he could do but continuing. "When the Dementors approached me, I could hear it", he whispered, lost in the endless depths of her eyes. "I could hear Voldemort telling my mum to step aside and killing her when she did not obey."
The beautiful face became frightening pale as the teacher's body went rigid. "My God", she whispered, her blue eyes turning dark. And then in a spasm, she threw her head back and began to laugh hysterically. **************************************************************************** **** I always wanted to write a cliff-hanger ^^
Harry mounted up and soared high into the air above the Quidditch field, displaying all of his usual skill but nothing of his usual enthusiasm. Although the time at the team practice when he could fly on his broom and see all over Hogwarts and its surroundings, he normally felt best, today his concentration was occupied with other things. Or more precisely with trying to forget his dream from last night.
Which proved itself quite a difficult task for he only had to close his eyes, just for a second, just for a the shortest of times and he was there again:
...Darkness. Endless black night and in its midst grave and silent, nearly peaceful the graveyard where the beautiful pale boy lays down a single blood-red rose on the lonely gravestone standing apart from the other. He whispers no prayer, sings no requiem, sheds no tear, just lays down the rose with an unreadable expression on his handsome face.
As he noticed the other's arrival he looks up and Harry stares into dark green eyes, feeling no fear but only a weird, tired kind of understanding and sympathy...
Forcing himself back into the reality of the breathtaking beautiful autumn day, the boy felt his face growing hot, knowing exactly that it wasn't from the effort of flying. The last thing he needed or wanted now were dreams like this. Dreams that suggested just too clearly that he was heading deeper and deeper into darkness with every step he made, following ties that bind him against his will, ties that ran deeper than blood...
"Stop daydreaming Harry, this isn't History of Magic! And George, you're supposed to be helping your team to get the Quaffle, not knocking them off their brooms!"
Luckily for him, the rest of the team had joined him in the air just now and the captain's demanding voice soon drove all thought from Harry's mind as he tried to spot the Snitch that had already been released into the air.
Bending low over his broom, the wind whistled past him as he rushed through the air, narrowing her eyes against the rushing breathe. Suddenly he caught sight of a glimmer of gold. Just a fraction of a second more and- there!
The rest of the afternoon passed in a blur. By the end of practice he was tired, sore, bruised and generally knocked about. If he had ever thought that training would be easier with Oliver graduated, this hope had surely proven itself futile.
"How did I ever get so out of shape?" he moaned as he walked back to the castle with Fred, whose twin had still not fully recovered from a painful collision with Alicia and had therefore decided to remain on the field to talk to Angelina about her way too brutal training or - what stroke Harry as more realistic - to flirt his hardest with the pretty captain. "Gah, this is going to hurt tomorrow."
"Just be thankful it's Saturday and we won't have to go to classes." Fred winced and reached up to rub at the back of his neck. "Gosh, and I thought _Oliver_ was a fanatic. But sweet Angie tops him easily."
Harry snorted. "Tell me about it. I don't even know if I can make it back to the Tower at this rate. I might just crash in the Great Hall."
Both boys laughed heartfully before they fell silent again. "Harry?" The Weasley twin suddenly asked. "May I ask you a question?"
Harry looked up astonished. "Of course."
"Ah well", Fred bit his lip a bit uncomfortably. "I know that it is really none of my business, but you seemed to be a bit distracted when the training begin. As if something was bothering you a great deal."
Harry felt himself paling. Had he been this transparent? Had everybody seen the direction his thoughts had went to?
Misunderstanding his friend's reaction, Fred grinned quickly. "Hey, don't look at me like I want to marry you or something", he joked. "You weren't obvious, really, I just noticed. Don't you want to talk about it?"
Confronted with the bright blue eyes, Harry simply could not bring himself to answer the question. Not that he believed Fred to be capable to understand it anyway. It wasn't the boy's fault, he knew that, it was nobody's fault but there was no way in hell any of his friends would ever understand the hidden part of him that would always ache for the soothing peacefulness of darkness, the part that knew death and pain very well for living close to them all the time, and that had at some point of his life gone numb to them. "It's nothing, really", he finally returned, noticing himself how unconvincing his voice sounded.
And indeed Fred remained suspicious. "It's not this stupid story about the big Slytherin Git being friends with your mother, is it? You know, Ron told me and George about it."
As Harry blinked in surprise, the Weasley twin obviously misunderstood this as a "yes". "Honestly, Harry, you shouldn't worry about it. If you ask me, trying to understand Snape is like fishing in the lake around school." He shrugged his shoulders, his eyes narrowing as he considered another solution for his friend's problem. "Have you thought about interrogating Hagrid on the matter? Like why he never told you about it?"
"I already did", the boy confessed.
"And what did he say?"
Harry's mouth quirked sarcastically. "´Yeh never asked.´"
Fred began to laugh heartily. "Not the brightest god in heaven, is he?"
"He told me...", the dark-haired boy broke up, feeling himself blushing at the memory. "Well, he said that there were rumours about...my mum and Snape...you know people gossiped that... they were in love or something."
Fred whistled quietly. "And furthermore?"
Still deeply red, Harry's eyes focussed on the cloudless blue sky. So perfect. Almost too much to take. "Obviously, they had a fight when they were in their sixth year", he eventually continued with his weird story. "Hagrid said that from one day to the other, without anyone knowing the reason why, Snape and Professor McGregor wouldn't speak a word to my mother anymore. As they withdraw, she began to befriend my father and this is the end of the story."
The redhead looked very thoughtful. "And Hagrid had absolutely no clue what their quarrel was about?"
"Not really. He just said...", Harry paused, trying to give back the gamekeeper's words appropriately. "He said that people considered Lucius Malfoy to be involved somehow. Snape and McGregor must have been hanging around with him a lot after they broke with my mum."
Fred's usually merry eyes flashed dangerously at the mention of Draco´s father. "If this slimy Deatheater-bastard was involved, there was something foul about it, no question", he predicted darkly. Then he suddenly began to grin, obviously coming up with one of his wicked ideas. "Have you ever considered to ask McGregor about this? Her tests are really cunning, but apart from that she is a real angel. I am sure she would agree to tell you something about your mum."
"She already offered to", Harry admitted.
The blue eyes were looking at him incredulously. "So why don't you simply go and ask her?"
"Well because...", the younger boy hesitated, not sure how to explain this. As he thought about it, there was no real reason anyway. "I think you are right", he finally said wistfully. Then for the first time this day his expression lightened up. "Thanks, Fred."
"Hey, no problem. Wherefore do you have such a smart, brilliant and good- looking guy as a friend?" The redhead grinned. "I take it that think of me when you visit Honeydukes the next time?"
Harry grinned back. "Sure."
**************************************************************************** ****
Walking down the darkening corridors, the boy's feet barely made a sound as he padded over the stone floor.
He did not know himself why he hesitated so much to go to Professor McGregor, but ever since she had made her generous offer, he had felt rather reluctant to accept it. Not that he did not want to hear something about his mother, the contrary was the case, but then a rather bitter part of him never failed to remind him that the lack of memory he had of his parents could also be seen as a blessing. He had been too young to remember anything about them, too young to understand the finality of death and although he felt their loss keenly, he had to admit to himself that it was barely more than a dull ache in his heart that was not even there when he did not think about it. He could not grieve their deaths so much, because he had nothing of them to miss. Or more precisely, he added sarcastically, he had had nothing of them to miss until the Dementors in this third year had made blurry visions and therefore the vague pain sharper and clearer.
Cursing himself for his egoism, he angrily bit himself on the lips and stopped before the DADA teacher's private rooms, taking a deep breath.
It was not like Professor McGregor would mind his visit, he told himself. In fact, the carefree blonde was by far the most understanding teacher he had met so far. Although expecting a great deal of her students, she never got angry or impatient if anyone did not understand something at once, and after she had actually managed to teach Neville how to use a rather complicated spell effectively, everybody considered her a walking miracle anyway. Hermione of course never failed to remark that some of the attacks and counter curses the blonde taught them were way too powerful for them and sometimes damn near to be officially forbidden, but since Professor McGregor's mischievous fun loving nature, her interesting lessons and her unprejudiced attitude towards all Houses had made her the favourite teacher of the entire school in no time at all, nobody listened to those complaints.
It was nearly a joke how the blonde attracted everybody to her without the tiniest bit of effort, the boy thought to himself. Even Snape showed some human trades when being in her company - and that he was surprisingly often. If anyone had ever told Harry that the Potion Master would actually befriend the new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, he would have told this person to go and see a therapist but then it was quite obvious to everybody that the unbelievable had actually happened.
Harry had to grin. He knew more than a couple of boys at school who would kill to be in Snape's place.
Already less nervous he finally knocked on the door before him.
"Come in", he heard a melodic voice.
Following the invitation, Harry stepped into the blonde's private space - and gasped. He had known the room from his visits at Lupin´s, but he barely recognized it now. Instead of the old worn carpet, a blue Persian with pink and golden roses now laid on the floor, beautifully fitting to the deep dusty golden colour of the wallpaper and the big gorgeous blooms of fresh flowers arranged in porcelain vases here and there. Together with the pretty little porcelain dolls on the majestic bookshelves, the room suddenly seemed very beautiful and elegant, yet in the same time comfortable to behold.
"Do you like it?"
Harry jumped at the sound of his name and blurred around to the source of the voice whom he had nearly forgotten in his admiration. Professor McGregor was sitting on an elegant sofa, not covered with the worn velvet he remembered but with the same pink damask which hung from the windows, gorgeous and warm in the flickering light of the unfamiliar chandelier hanging from the oval cluster of plaster leaves on the ceiling.
Obviously she had already been ready for bedtime since she only wore a simple white cotton gown that made her look like an angel from some old Renaissance masterpiece or like some pretty little girl that was waiting for her goodnight kiss. The dim light let her hair shine like a soft cloud of pure gold around her creamy skin and her big blue eyes shimmered brilliantly as she laid the book, she had been reading in aside to greet Harry with her heartbreaking sweet smile. "I was already wondering when you were going to show up."
Harry nodded, still a bit taken aback. "I nearly didn't recognize the room", he made a humble attempt at small talk.
Throwing her shimmering golden locks back, the DADA teacher laughed agreeable. "Well, Hogwarts has been a place of safety for generations of wizards and witches and since I honestly hope not to leave its walls so soon again, I've decided to make myself a bit at home", she explained cheerfully. "To be honest, the last years have been a bit...unrested."
The boy tried to nod intelligently. "You were living in Ireland, right?" he recollected the information Dumbledore had given them on the Start-of-Term Feast. "What were you doing there?"
The blonde shrugged. "Nothing interesting, really. I just needed some time away from England, so I took a job at the Irish Ministry of Magic. But I don't suppose that you came here tonight to hear about your old teacher's boring life?" As she twinkled teasingly at him, she didn't appear any older than him. "You want me to tell you something about Lily, right?"
Blushing, Harry nodded. "But if you don't have time at the moment..."
"Oh nonsense", she interrupted him with a wink of her hand, while standing up in one fluid movement. "Listen, what do you think about a cup of tea? I make us some and then we just chat a bit, okay?"
Somehow relieved that she made things so simple for him, he nodded agreeing. "Sounds good."
"All right then." With her usual grace she turned around to a door which led to a little kitchen as Harry knew. "Take a seat and make yourself at home while I am preparing everything", she offered him before sweeping out of the room. "It won't take too long."
With her vanished, Harry took place on the sofa hesitantly, his eyes curiously glancing towards the book, the blonde had been reading in.
"The Flowers of Evil" by Charles Baudelaire, he read with a frown. Baudelaire...wasn't that some old muggle poet?
But before he could try to recollect his memory further, Professor McGregor reappeared, carefully balancing a try with small pretty cups of steaming liquid. "I hope you like jasmine tea. It's the only one I have at the moment", she said merrily.
"Ah...thanks", Harry quickly stood up to help her with the tray. After they had set it down, he pointed at the book. "Is he any good? Baudelaire I mean?"
"Huh?" Following his eyes, she threw a casual glance to the book. "Oh that. Severus borrowed it to me. He's absolutely addicted to depressing stuff like that. So was your mum, by the way." A little smile appeared on her sweet lips. "The library was sort of her second home, I daresay."
The boy's throat suddenly felt dry. "She liked poetry?" he repeated.
"I don't think `like` does express it accurately", the blonde smirked, unmistakably amused by the memory. "To say she revelled in it would get straighter to the point."
Harry stared into his teacup. "I did not know that", he muttered. As he noticed her surprised look, he blushed. "I know it sounds foolish but sometimes I feel like...you know, there are dozens of people out there who knew her better than I did. I have no idea what she liked or what she disliked and I...it's just not fair."
"It doesn't sound foolish at all", she returned softly. "Life is rarely fair and it has always proven itself rather cruel to you in particular. I would understand it perfectly if you felt sometimes bitter about your fate, Harry."
As he looked up astonished, she moved forwards to lay her slender white hand tenderly on his, her expression totally sincere. "I know that many people just see "The Boy who lived" when they look at you. But I can imagine how much pressure this title puts on you and I wager that you would give it away freely, if you just could have your parents back again." Her voice was gentle although her eyes did not really seem to focus on him but on some distant point only she could see. Then she suddenly shook her head abruptly and removed her hand. "You say that you don't know anything about Lily. How comes it that Lupin hasn't told you anything about her when he taught here?"
It took one moment for Harry to follow her sudden change of subject. "He told me a great deal about my dad", he finally answered, still shaken by her earlier words. How came that a complete stranger could read him so well, could tell his most secret thoughts when even his closest friends couldn't? "But then he said that he did not know my mum well enough to judge her."
To his surprise, the blonde snorted in a tone that reminded him greatly of Snape. "For once I agree with him."
The boy looked puzzled. "You don't think very highly of him, do you?" he asked carefully.
Professor McGregor wrinkled her nose girlfully. "That's a nice way of understating things." Taking a nip from her tea, she hesitated for one moment, obviously not sure how to explain this to him. "Too be quite honest, I wasn't great friends with your father or the rest of his clique either. For me they were just some stupid Gryffindor gits and they didn't think of me any better."
A bit taken aback at this, Harry first had to clear his throat before demanding his next question. "And why was this so?"
She only shrugged her shoulders, giving him a pointed look he could not quite read. "Can you explain your unqualified dislike of Mr Malfoy?" she countered. "Was there even one moment when you might have become his friend?"
"I guess I know what you mean", the boy returned after a while of silence, feeling slightly uncomfortable with the comparison. Then another question popped up in his green eyes. "And my mum? How was her relationship to my father when she still befriended you and Professor Snape?"
"Lily's?" Professor McGregor's eyes softened as much as her voice at the name of her dead friend. "Who can know for sure what she thought or not? You must know, Harry, your mother was everything but easy to understand. Although we were friends from our third to our sixth year here at Hogwarts, there was always some part of her that I could not reach, that was beyond my tenderness or my concern."
She leaned back on the sofa, obviously searching for the right words to explain it to him. "She was probably the prettiest witch of the entire Gryffindor generation far and wide, and surely the most intelligent and the most reckless, and yet there was something vulnerable about her, something that most people did not notice when dealing with her." A little smile graced the Professor's crimson lips. "Surely she was not the typical Gryffindor at first sight, but if you knew her a bit better, you began to understand the Sorting Head's decision perfectly."
"How...", Harry had to breathe in deeply, painfully conscious of the old familiar constriction around his heart. "How do you mean that?"
"She feared nothing", the blonde answered with surprising tenderness. "No power on this earth could ever scare her or make her feel uncomfortable with herself. Lily Evans was on every count a winner." Her blue eyes searched Harry's green ones. "She always tried so hard to understand everything and except from the stupid potions, there was nothing in any realm which she could not grasp. Sometimes there was something violently disregarding about the way she demanded to know the unadorned truth about the things that interested her and people considered her cold for it but I swear she was never heartless or cruel on purpose. In fact, I never met a person more loyal than Lily. She had the bravery of a lioness when it came to defending her loved ones and she would have willingly sacrificed her life for her friends. - But then you are the living proof of my words."
Harry felt a crush so painful that it could scream his lungs out. Then he shook his head in rough denial. "If you were so close, why did you finally break up?" he finally demanded to know in a voice he barely recognized as his own.
For one moment something he had never before seen in her azure eyes flickered brightly in their depths and hid itself again. "This is a long story, Harry", she eventually returned after what seemed an eternity. "A story about betrayal and power, but above all about greatness."
Staring at the ceiling, a distant expression appeared on the blonde's features as if she was listening to some distant, ominous music she alone could hear. "Greatness", she repeated softly. "Perhaps you are too young to know this, but greatness never comes without price - and since your mother, in contrast to Severus and me, was not willing to pay it, this was how it all ended."
The ghost of a memory clouded her eyes for a short instant. "She would not adjust and suddenly nothing was as it had been before. Lily began to befriend your father while Sev and I turned to Lucius Malfoy. And these, Harry, were worlds that could not be united."
"I suppose", Harry muttered, somewhere between sarcasm and thoughtfulness, before he looked up again, not knowing how challenging his green eyes suddenly flashed. "Why Malfoy?"
Professor McGregor gave him a very strange look. "It seemed...fitting", she finally returned, her expression unreadable. "We made a good team, Lucius with his charisma and his charm the born leader, Severus the schemer and planner and me the person, who could easily bedazzle everybody she ever laid her eyes on, to clear the way out for them. Call it Slytherin ambition if you like."
"Did my mum understand it?"
The bitterness of her smile shocked him. "Just too well, I fear. And I think in your heart of hearts you do as well."
Her eyes now laid with brutal intensity on him as though they could see something in him nobody else was supposed to know about. "People may have told you that you come after your father, but that's not true. You're totally like Lily", she finally said, the tone of her voice not leaving space for any argument. "You were both Gryffindors but only by a hair. You nearly ended as serpents."
Harry felt himself flaming. How could she know? How could she know that the Sorting Head had wanted to place him into Slytherin? And what was this comparison with his mother about?
"Don't look so shocked, boy, that wasn't an insult." Without loosing their serious expression, her eyes softened again. "We are not evil as a rule, Harry, I thought you would have learned this much already. True, we have 'Great ambition' and we are 'cunning', but nevertheless some of us can be trusted."
Eying him thoughtfully, she flipped back a strand of golden locks back absent-minded. "Take Severus as an example. I know that you and your friends do not like him very much, and from you're perspective that's not really surprising, I guess, but do you actually think that he, however curt, nasty and downright mean he can be, would actually harm any of his students? Do you really think that he would ever, ever physically harm a child under his care?" She shook her head unwillingly as if she was about to enter realms of her memory she was not prepared to handle. When she continued her voice was strangely hoarse. "That man would die to protect you, Harry. I know he would."
Harry, not able to face the expression of those blue eyes any longer, had to look away. "You're probably right", he murmured. "But why is he always so bitter? Why does he hate me so much if he and my mum were friends?"
The blonde's eyes clouded until they became some blurry shade of midnight blue. "If you ask me the problem was that the two had been too close for their own good", she finally answered absent-minded. "They had been soulmates from the very beginning on; sometimes they only had to look at each other and they knew exactly what the other one was thinking. Severus was the only one to understand Lily and she was the only one to understand him. He had trusted her with all his heart and I suppose that seeing her and his arch-enemy together, had...stirred something in him. He had always been so proud."
The last words were spoken with a strange melancholy the boy did not understand, but that he denied himself to think about just now. Hesitating shortly before his next question, he blurted it out nevertheless. "When he was so damn proud, how could he then go to Voldemort?"
The blue eyes opened in a flash, staring at him with something like fire in their depths. For one moment the boy felt a prickle of fear up his spine, but as suddenly as the change had come over the blonde, it disappeared again. "For the same reason so many people in Slytherin did, I suppose - because he was driven to him", she finally answered his question in a frightening blank voice, her words more addressed to herself than to Harry. "We come to this school as innocent children and everyday for eight years of our lives we are told that we are snakes, attached to darkness, evil. Isn't it ironic how surprised everyone acted when so many of us went into the Dark Arts, when most of us never had a choice or anywhere else to go?"
"Aren't there always other options?"
"Are there?" she returned thoughtfully. "Do you know how many employers demand to know what house you were in at school? If you don't have parents, who can afford to buy you a high position in society, this means that every Hufflepuff is more likely to get the job than a Slytherin. Well, why be stigmatised, when you can get power, and everything else you ever dreamed of, from Voldemort? Sooner or later, we all had to make that choice."
One moment he marvelled at the fact that she spoke the name aloud. Then another, far more shocking aspect about her words made his heart stop beating for a moment. "You all hade to make this choice?" he repeated, his breath only coming in slow intervals. "This means...you too?"
Her smile sent a shiver down his spine. "You of all people should know that there are different sorts of choosing and ways apart from the Dark Mark the Voldemort can get at you."
Pressing her lips together in a firm line as if trying force back the ghost of some ugly memory by sheer willpower, the usual bright light in her eyes faded away abruptly, only leaving a frightened, desolate and empty-eyed child-woman behind. Harry suddenly remembered her words from the first DADA lesson *My elder sister and my very best friends had both been Gryffindors and they had been wiped out as a symbolic assertion of the power and truth of Slytherin philosophy...*
"I'm sorry, Professor", he murmured, feeling guilty of having suspected her so easily. "I didn't mean to bring back bad memories."
To his surprise a little absent-minded smile formed itself on her delicate lips. "Such a good little Gryffindor heart." Her eyes cleared in amazing speed as she was suddenly reaching out her hand for him. Before he could even register her intention, her finger softly hooked aside some of his hair to expose the scar hidden on his forehead. Tracing its the brief length with her thumb, she made him shiver inwardly and outwardly.
...and for one moment he stands on the graveyard again, a lonely person against the vast horizon. I cannot remember them, the pale boy says. No, he replies, laying down another blood coloured flower on the cold stone. Neither can I...
"But why am I telling someone about marks who has felt the hand of Hate itself?"
Her words made him jump back into reality. "Professor?"
The usually so brilliant blue eyes were clouded by something dark he could not name. "That is Hate's kiss, Harry", she told him very seriously. "Be thankful to every God you believe in that you don't remember how you've gotten it."
"But I do." The words had left his mouth before he had had the slightest chance of holding them back. Staring at the beautiful fairylike woman in front of him, there was nothing that he could do but continuing. "When the Dementors approached me, I could hear it", he whispered, lost in the endless depths of her eyes. "I could hear Voldemort telling my mum to step aside and killing her when she did not obey."
The beautiful face became frightening pale as the teacher's body went rigid. "My God", she whispered, her blue eyes turning dark. And then in a spasm, she threw her head back and began to laugh hysterically. **************************************************************************** **** I always wanted to write a cliff-hanger ^^