6. Hope
If Severus had hoped that revealing the truth to Hogwarts' other ghosts would mean a speedy end to his situation, he would have been disappointed. With the exception of Nicholas and Joseph, the other ghosts still felt themselves bound by the headmaster's decisions, even this one. They kept their silence with regard to Nicholas' rebellion though, and joined the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff ghosts on the occasional visit to the Shrieking Shack. However, they were too caught up in their own woes and Hogwarts gossip to get involved. They had been killed or died in a wrongful manner – their memories slighted so that they lingered in the world of the living – and to them Severus' plight was no more urgent than theirs just because it was more recent.
Solidarity between ghosts only went so far, and that was not much farther than it would have in life.
The Bloody Baron floated through the trapdoor every now and then. He did not speak, just stared at Severus while Severus stared back, and then left, not having said a word.
Nicholas raged at their indifference, no matter that Severus reassured him repeatedly that it was all right, that he knew it was not Nicholas' fault, that he was grateful just to have Nicholas and Joseph as his friends. He knew that they were doing their best, and he appreciated it. But the reality was, short of approaching Dumbledore and miraculously managing to change his mind, there was little they could do. Neither Nicholas nor Joseph had been wizards, so the chance that they might hear or learn a way for Severus to escape the spells that bound him to the Shack by sitting on in any of the classes was negligible.
Perhaps enough time had passed for Severus took that summer's disappointment better than he thought he would have. He wondered whether he had finally come to terms with his fate, or whether he had just given up what was essentially a fight he could not win: the rules dictated by Dumbledore, and unhesitatingly changed to ensure Severus would always lose.
To distract both himself and his friends from his situation, Severus asked them to tell him about Harry Potter and what was happening in Hogwarts and the Wizarding World.
The summer was filled with near daily reports on the chaos and scandal at the Ministry of Magic that Peter Pettigrew's capture caused. Aurors had questioned Pettigrew under Veritaserum and he had confessed to having been the Potter's secret keeper and framing Sirius Black for the murder of twelve Muggles. The transcripts were somehow leaked to the press. Yet still the Ministry prevaricated. The Daily Prophet and other publications demanded for more convictions to be re-examined because quite a number of Azkaban's inmates from that time had been sentenced without a proper trial or due process. Now that Voldemort had been gone for nearly thirteen years the Wizarding World finally seemed ready to deal with its past.
Two weeks into the summer holiday, Black came out of hiding and turned himself over to the Ministry, only to be immediately released into Dumbledore's custody until the final pardon came through. Nicholas told him that, in an interview with Witch Weekly, Black had announced he would be suing for custody of Harry Potter, which he had been granted to him under the late Potters' will. Before anything could be done about that, though, Pettigrew escaped.
It was unclear how exactly that could have happened, and the Ministry's spokespeople were vague in their answers and explanations. Black disappeared, leaving a note saying that he would find and this time kill the traitorous rat.
Once Hogwarts was back in session and Dumbledore was once more present, Nicholas and Joseph couldn't spend as much time with Severus as they had over the summer holiday, and that wasn't exactly made up for by Peeves' discovery of Severus. He had followed them one night, and now regularly made his way to the shack to sing annoying songs that the Gryffindors had made up to torment him when he was a student. Nicholas and Joseph both worried that Peeves might betray them to Dumbledore, either intentionally or by accident, and even went to the Bloody Baron, but it would seem that though Peeves himself was not a ghost, he did adhere to the same loyalty. Amazingly, he was careful to attract no attention on his trips to the Shack, although all discretion was abandoned once he arrived at his destination to taunt and annoy Severus.
The endless repetition of 'Snivelly Snapey, Weepy Baby' bothered Severus, but on the other hand, Peeves' treatment gave him a sense of normality, an even stronger sense of belonging to Hogwarts and being just one more of its ghosts, despite his exile to this godforsaken shack.
The year passed slowly but steadily, bearable because of his friend's regular visits. Harry Potter somehow managed to be selected as Hogwarts' second champion in the Tournament, and passed both the first and the second task with near perfect scores. The papers seemed to have forgotten Sirius Black and Peter Pettigrew entirely, and Nicholas could only tell Severus that Harry still occasionally received letters from his godfather. However, in the week leading up to the third task, events rapidly followed each other.
Sirius Black showed up on the Ministry's doorstep carrying the corpse of his one time school friend. The Ministry tried to cover it up, and so the details on how and where Black had caught Pettigrew were confused. Black was arrested, and Dumbledore was still bargaining for his release on the day of the third task. The general state of confusion in the Wizarding World spiralled out of control when, grasping the goblet with Hogwarts' other champion Cedric Diggory, Harry Potter disappeared. He had returned a few hours later, bruised and bleeding, carrying the Diggory boy's corpse and claiming that You-Know-Who had been resurrected.
Nicholas told Severus this that evening, while Harry Potter was still in the school infirmary recovering. He and Joseph took turns in updating Severus on the sequence of events that followed.
Minister Fudge gave an interview that evening to the Daily Prophet, slandering Harry Potter: he said that the boy was mentally ill and implied that Harry might be responsible for Diggory's death. However, general Wizarding consensus was that Fudge was covering something up, trying to keep the public ignorant. The next day Owls and Howlers calling for Fudge's resignation flocked to the Ministry. Trying to placate the Wizarding population as the year before, Fudge released Black with a full pardon, granting him custody of his godson Harry Potter.
Severus was not very interested in Wizarding politics, but aside from the fact that Sirius Black had indeed assumed custody of Harry Potter and taken him away by flying motorcycle at the end of the school year rather than leave Harry on the Hogwarts Express, there was little else for Nicholas and Joseph to report. The two other ghosts told him all about the procession of Order members on broomsticks that had accompanied Harry and Black on their flight to London, and that Dumbledore was seldom at the school all summer: instead he was busy dealing with matters at the Wizengamot and You-Know-Who's possible resurrection.
After a group of known Death Eaters escaped from Azkaban, taking with them all of Azkaban's Dementors, Dumbledore had summoned all of Hogwarts' ghosts to his office and impressed upon them the need to be vigilant and report any unusual activity to him. Fortunately, this time he did not decide that cutting off all contact between Nicholas and Severus was necessary. Either the headmaster had learnt his lesson, or he had simply forgotten about that particular skeleton in his closet.
The first day of September arrived, and Severus floated through the shack in solitude. Nicholas was up at the castle, and would probably not have time to visit him over the next few days as he dealt with all the new arrivals. Severus thought about the antics of the living, and the dark wizard Voldemort being able to return from the dead. His mind briefly wandered to Harry Potter, whom he had seen only twice, but the memory of whom he could not shake for some reason. These thoughts inevitably led to thoughts of Sirius Black, who, pardoned and free and honoured, had been made Harry's guardian, while Severus, two decades later, was still damned, imprisoned and forgotten.
Severus shrieked and let the memory of the werewolf claw his back, maul his leg, his arm, his hand, and tear out his throat.
Severus came back to himself, with the echoes of his screams still echoing through the Shack, to find wide green eyes staring at him in horror from behind round, wire-rim glasses.
In the distance, the Hogwarts Express blew its whistle, announcing its arrival at Hogsmeade's platform. Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, and the ghost of Severus Snape stood silently staring at each other in the Shrieking Shack's main room.
