Author's note: Thanks for the positive feedback on Chapter 9. I hadn't planned to have Snape's mother in the story, but then it seemed to tie in OK... I am trying to limit the French motif though, because if it were a dominant element in Snape's character, it would be noticeable in his everyday life at Hogwarts etc, which, obviously, it isn't. So, I'm saving the alter ego thing for moments of extreme stress... (And there might be a few of those!)
To Zachiliam: if you're French, please can you correct my French grammar, if I mess up?
We're back to Hogwarts again in this next chapter. Harry's personal crises are one thing, but there is the rest of the wizarding world to consider too... If you remember, Harry and Hermione had been having a chat about the séance etc...
LOST PERSPECTIVE III : REPERCUSSIONS
By Bellegeste
CHAPTER 10: W. A. R. REPORTS
There was quite a rumpus going on in the Great Hall. Harry and Hermione could hear the noise even as they came down the main stairway into the vestibule.
"No," Harry was saying, in reply to Hermione's sharp question, "we didn't row about Sirius..." He had decided that it would be sensible to tell Hermione something, even if it meant being economically creative with the truth. "It's just that there was this ghost at the Manor house - "
"What kind of ghost?" Hermione was intrigued.
"Oh, just some batty old hag. But she could be a bit dodgy, apparently, and Snape gave me a solid rollicking for going there alone. And then I heard him..."
"Who?"
"Oh, it doesn't matter."
How could Harry explain to Hermione that, lying unconscious on the floor of the circular tower, he had heard the voice of Sirius?
He was saved from having to go into further explanations. As they entered the Hall the entire room fell silent. Then, from the direction of the Slytherin table, someone began a slow hand-clap. Gradually its hostile heart-beat filled the Hall.
"What's going on?" Hermione whispered. "What've you done now?" She could sense the pulsating waves of antagonism curving round her and tuning-in to Harry.
"Just keep walking," he answered grimly.
The red and gold sea of Gryffindors parted at their approach, but it was not a friendly reception. Harry and Hermione endured the 'four-minute warning', watching for the mushroom cloud... And then the hissing began; and the boos and the jeering, and a crude, rhythmic chanting, pumped with primitive aggression like a Zulu battle cry:
"Potty-Potter! Potty-Potter!"
Ting! Ting! The clink of Professor McGonagall's spoon on glass pierced the threatening mob of sound.
"SILENCE! We will have silence at mealtimes, thank you."
She sat down. Harry wondered why she didn't say anything else. He soon found out. A rolled-up copy of the Daily Prophet, hurled like a stick thrown for a dog, cart-wheeled through the air and caught him in the small of the back. Another followed, and another, until Harry was cowering in the face of an angry avalanche of newspaper.
"ENOUGH!" McGonagall was on her feet again. "Mr Potter, when you have finished your breakfast, if you would be so good as to join me in the headmaster's office. In the meantime, we shall have no more of this nonsense!"
With a stab of her wand she transfigured the papers into a scandalously misinformed white rabbit, which hopped under the table, where Ginny started to feed it chunks of chopped apple.
Showing her customary presence of mind, Hermione had secreted a copy of the Prophet under her cloak. Under the stony scrutiny of the rest of the table, she laid the paper with its sensational headline in front of Harry.
IT'S W.A.R. !
The death toll in the continued campaign of anti-Muggle atrocities has now reached 147. The latest in the series of attacks against non-Magical persons and property took place yesterday afternoon. A coach party of pensioners on a day trip to the Illuminations was lost in quicksand on the M6, five miles north of Blackpool. Ministry sources confirm that W A R (Wizard Alliance Rebels) have claimed responsibility for the incident.
The WAR faction is believed to be a splinter group of disaffected wizards, working in conjunction with He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. WAR action is, allegedly, in retaliation against a recent assault on You-Know-Who by The Boy Who Lived, Harry Potter.
"There is no need for alarm. Every effort is being made to contain this outbreak and safeguard the Muggle population. Muggle calming measures are underway, and memory modification teams are working overtime to mitigate the Muggle backlash. Interactive Muggle-Wizard Initiatives are already proving most successful in the promotion of harmonious Muggle relationships and co-operation," said Cornelius Fudge, Minister for Magic.
Preliminary results from survey company, Independent Muggle Research Bureau, indicate a rise in reports of Satanic and Occult activity and W.I. (Witchcraft Inquisition) membership has shown a three-fold increase over the past seven days."
A photo of Harry, on his broomstick, grinned out from the page. It must have been taken after Gryffindor had won that cup match last term: in the picture Harry punched the air in triumph and did a neat victory roll in mid-air, before resuming his pose. The rest of the article dealt, in embarrassing detail, with Harry's exposé of Snape, their imprisonment, torture and escape, and dwelt with voyeuristic relish on the 'human interest' Snape-Harry-James triangle.
Harry felt as sick as if he'd swallowed one of Quig's purple mushrooms. His mind was suffused with dark, bleeding images; guilt distending and contracting around him like a giant leech glutted on shame and confusion. He pressed both palms flat against the table-top to stop them shaking. Unable to meet the eyes of his friends, he stared down at the damning paper. Only then did he notice the second story to make the front page.
PSYCHO - POTTER
The Daily prophet can exclusively reveal that Harry Potter (16) has been referred to a medical specialist for psychological evaluation and assessment. A leading Ministry psychologist, known to have been involved with the Potter case, has declined to make an official comment, but has issued the following statement:
'Any reports that Harry Potter is psychotic, violent, delusional and a danger to himself and society must be taken seriously and thoroughly investigated..."
Damn Lardon! thought Harry. Damn Fudge! Damn the Ministry! Damn the Daily Prophet! He felt numb, but outraged; trapped inside a pressurised container that had been maliciously tossed onto a bonfire. He didn't know whether to protest in indignation or simply despair - or put on a ranting, hysterical floorshow for his 'fans', foam at the mouth and wait for the wizards in white coats...
Desperately he looked to Snape for support - surely they were in this together - but there was no sign of him at High Table. His seat was empty.
That is so bloody typical. Where the hell is he when I actually need him? He must have been tipped off about the 'Prophet' and decided to keep well out of it. He might have warned me! When it comes to the crunch, he's only interested in saving his own skin. Selfish bastard!
Slytherin was jubilant, just about ready to party at Harry's expense on the strength of the article alone. Every moment of Harry's mortification was ambrosia to Malfoy. Harry's gaze sidled in his direction and was rewarded by Draco slyly signing 'success', his raised thumb and forefinger joining in an outstanding 'O'.
Even the Gryffindor's were cold-shouldering him. Friendships were dropping around him like First Years with a box of Fainting Fudge.
"Dung-bomb detonates!" Harry commented to Hermione, his one remaining ally, attempting a flippancy he did not feel. But Hermione's eyes were swimming with condemnation and reproach.
"How could you, Harry? How could you do that to him? Deliberately betraying him! Your own father!" she said, looking away, adding the final straw...
Then, when it seemed as though he might just as well give up and transfigure himself into a lettuce for the rabbit to nibble, he felt a heavy, warm, reassuring arm round his shoulders. He turned, expecting and hoping - hoping more sincerely than he cared to admit - to see Snape behind him. It was Professor Lupin.
"I'll walk with you to Professor Dumbledore's office, Harry," he said.
X X X
"Every body hates me," said Harry.
"Not true, Harry old boy, not true." Remus' presence had got them into the corridor unscathed, bar some minor jostling and the occasional anonymous hiss. "They shouldn't believe everything they read in the papers. This news has got them all fired up now, but they'll calm down. They'll realise soon enough that they can't blame you for everything."
"Even if it's true?"
"It's the interpretation you put on the facts, Harry. That article was totally one-sided. When they've heard your side of the story..."
"I'm not doing another flaming interview with Rita Skeeter!" Harry was adamant.
"No, I hope it doesn't come to that. Professor McGonagall was going to address the school and set them straight on a few details. You can't be held responsible for You-Know-Who's every move. And as for the rest of it, well, they'll get used to the idea about you and Professor Snape. By the weekend they'll have forgotten all about it - they'll be too busy planning their costumes for the Halloween Ball and buzzing off to Hogsmeade."
"But that's this weekend, Remus. They won't forget all this by tomorrow."
"Maybe not, Harry my lad. But the principle holds good. Give 'em time. It's not always easy adjusting your perceptions of people..." Remus spoke with feeling; Harry could tell that he was talking about James rather than Snape.
"Have you got used to the idea, Remus?" he asked, quietly.
"About Severus? Can't say that I like it, Harry, to be perfectly honest with you. But, from what I've seen this week, he's prepared to do the honourable thing. I had a little chat with him, you know..."
"Yeah, he said." Harry was entertained by the discrepancy between Remus' version of events and his father's.
"It seems I have been wrong about a lot of people," Remus went on sadly. "Makes me think I must have been a hopelessly poor judge of character in my youth - Peter, Sirius, maligning him for all those years; Snape and now James. How could I have been so blind? Maybe even Lily too..."
"What do you mean? What else do you know about her?" Harry was fiercely defensive.
"Nothing, my boy. Nothing. But looking back it now seems as though everybody else was playing by a completely different set of rules. Who knows what your dear mother was thinking at the time. Women tend to see things from a different perspective."
"You're telling me!" Harry was suddenly reminded of Hermione's reaction to the Daily Prophet's article. "Even Hermione's gone and put the boot in. She's started sticking up for Snape. She's... actually, she's a bit weird about him; it's sick," he confided, glad to get it off his chest.
Remus received this information with a little bark of amusement.
"I think you'll find it's called 'empathy', Harry. She's seeing the situation from his point of view and, you must admit, you've given him a pretty hard time over the last few weeks. Empathy. It's not one of your strong points. As for anything else, I don't think you need to worry on that score: Severus is far too ethical. And he values his job. Well, well! Oh, there's Filch. Excuse me for a minute, Harry. I must have a word with him about the Howlers."
Professor Lupin, still chuckling, hurried after the caretaker who was disappearing into a broom-cupboard at the end of the hallway. Left alone in the corridor, Harry suddenly felt vulnerable, especially when he looked behind him and saw a gang of Slytherins tailing him at a distance, lions stalking a wounded wildebeest cut off from the safety of the herd. Malfoy, as the dominant male, lead the pride.
"What's this then, Potter - 'Care in the Community'?" he sniped as his opening gambit. Then, turning with a smirk to his cronies, "Careful, chaps, he may be dangerous. These psychos can be unpredictable. He may bite!" In a saccharine, patronising voice he got his claws into Harry, "How are we today, Potty? Paranoid, Schizoid or merely psychopathic? Oedipus Complex playing up, is it? Or didn't you realise that, once you've murdered your father you're supposed to marry your mother? Lost the plot somewhere down the line there, didn't you?
"But you can't help it - poor chap! 'Genetically challenged'..." Malfoy added in a stage-whisper for the benefit of the gang. "Criminality runs in the family, I gather. Dear me. If you must swim in a contaminated gene pool, it's hardly surprising that you pick up the odd bug or two... Let me see now - ah, yes, a father – pillar of the community type, ha ha – who turns out to be a fraudulent maniac, obsessed with revenge; another father - seems you can't have too much of a bad thing, Potter – who is not only a traitor and an assassin but also, we are reliably informed, a rapist to boot! Quite a stack of skeletons in the Snape family cupboard, eh? And never satisfactorily brought to justice, I hear. Tut-tut - something should be done about that...
"Let me see now, where was I? Criminality by association too: a godfather, a murdering coward by the way, who, when he wasn't in prison, sneaked about like the cur he was, disguised as a mangy mongrel, and who could only escape what he had coming to him, by jumping through the Archway... And a mother who was, by all accounts, no better than she should have been... whoa! Watchit, Potter!"
Harry had made a lunge for Draco's neck, but three Slytherin steaks stepped between them, a wall of flesh. Just then, Lupin re-appeared, and the pride dropped back. Draco got in one final swipe,
"And how is Professor Snape today? Do give him my regards, when you see him. If you see him!"
Harry wanted to ask Draco what he meant, but Lupin had grabbed him by the arm and was virtually frog-marching him to Dumbledore's office. It was probably just as well: Harry didn't think his anger would have been particularly manageable in a head to head with Malfoy's offensive mockery.
X X X
For a lump of carved stone, the gargoyle was looking positively apologetic today, decided Harry. He could have sworn that it shrugged sheepishly as he went by. The reason was very soon apparent: Mrs Weasley's voice, screeching like a half-plucked partridge, could be heard through the wall, through the door, down the stairs and half-way along the landing. It was the voice she usually reserved for the twins' most heinous misdemeanours.
Wow! thought Harry, it was brave of her to be yelling at Dumbledore.
"...and I've said it before - you couldn't safeguard a Horklump in a wormery! As a parent, you make a prize-winning pumpkin!"
Whew! Positively heroic of her to be shouting at Snape... But when Harry and Remus entered the round office, neither Snape nor Mrs Weasley was anywhere in sight. There were, however, a few charred curls of red paper floating to the floor.
"Howlers! Most intrusive invention," commented Dumbledore mildly. "Molly's objections can be positively operatic at such close range. Reminiscent of a Fwooper's song, wouldn't you say? Have you ever heard one, my boy? Just as well. Or perhaps she has taken to making her punch out of mulled Mandrakes! Ah, Harry, we have taken the liberty of intercepting any Howlers addressed to you this morning, and there have been, ahem, several... But Mr Filch is supposed to be rerouting those addressed to staff to his own office for vetting. How did that one get in? I thought the gargoyle was on duty."
"Sniffle-Snuff," Remus explained. "The owl had a shaker of it attached to his other leg. The gargoyle said he closed his eyes when he sneezed, and the owl shot straight past..."
"Aha! Ingenious." Dumbledore looked pleased rather than annoyed. He tended to view initiative with indulgence. "The inventiveness of those young Weasleys is an ongoing source of edification. I have frequently wondered whether it was a talent inherited from their mother..."
"Her point though, hysteria notwithstanding, is valid." The clipped, refined, Scottish accent of Professor McGonagall entered the conversation. How had she got there so fast, mused Harry? Didn't Remus say she'd stayed behind in the Hall?
"For the Prophet to have published that confidential information is nothing short of a scandal. We should have done something to prevent or forestall it. I thought Minister Fudge had agreed to a media blackout?"
"He did, Minerva, he did. And, while it was politically expedient, he stuck to the agreement. Now one can only assume that the interests of the Ministry are better served by offering up a sacrificial scapegoat."
Dumbledore peered meaningfully at Harry.
"But, Albus, can you not insist...?" pressed Professor McGonagall.
"Alas, I have no authority to issue a gagging order - 'freedom of the press' and all that. Though we may have a case against Mr Lardon for breach of patient confidentiality. He has, though, maintained an element of discretion, for which we must be thankful. I'm sure there is more he might have revealed..."
Harry squirmed, thinking of his second session. Dumbledore continued:
"I'm afraid the paper may take similar liberties with yesterday's developments..."
The three Professors exchanged strained glances that Harry felt both concerned and excluded him.
"Wizard Alliance Rebels! What kind of a name is that?" exclaimed Lupin. "I can't believe You-Know-Who has sunk so low - does he really think a snappy set of initials is going to further his cause?"
It seemed to Harry that Remus was steering the conversation away from some submerged rocky hazard. Why had he been brought to Dumbledore's office if they weren't going to talk to him?
"If you ask me," said Professor McGonagall, "it's the Daily Prophet who have coined the name. WAR makes a headline-grabbing acronym - dramatic and emotive. Pure media hype. If it provokes a hysterical reaction, that will merely further the cause of his ridiculous party game – or whatever it is he's playing at."
"Quite so, Minerva. The arbitrary exercise of power is chilling in its very randomness, but effective." Dumbledore was in no hurry to enlighten Harry. "Think what he has achieved so far, at minimal risk to himself: he is spreading dissent amongst the Muggles, destroying relationships of trust that have taken generations to establish, and monopolising the resources of the best Aurors, other ministerial departments and our own Order.
"This kind of threat is unpredictable and uncontainable - I do not think we are meant to understand it. With no discernible pattern to the attacks, we are very much at the mercy of his whim. It is the work of an unsound mind. It is unfortunate that we no longer have access to insider information..."
Again Dumbledore cast his gaze in Harry's direction, and Harry had the familiar feeling that he was up before a judge, awaiting sentence. But he had stood there listening quietly for long enough. He had to ask:
"Professor Dumbledore, Sir, - where is Professor Snape?"
"Quite so, my boy, quite so. A most pertinent question, if I may say so. When did you last see your father, Harry?"
The direction this questioning was taking made Harry nervous. He'd been uneasy ever since he'd heard Mrs Weasley's Howler, thinking that, perhaps, there was more to Snape's non-appearance than avoidance of the students' opprobrium. He thought hard.
"He came to tell me that my therapy sessions had been cancelled," he said, recalling Snape's unexpected relief at the analyst's resignation.
"Ah yes, the loquacious Mr Lardon. A deplorable lack of professional etiquette... Yesterday evening then. And you have not seen him since?"
"No, Sir. Sir? What is this about?"
"And how did he seem?"
"Seem?" Harry didn't know what Dumbledore was getting at.
Professor McGonagall approached Harry and looked at him kindly but intently, searching for clues.
"Was he calm, Mr Potter, irritated, angry? Did he seem upset to you?"
"What's happened? What's going on? Is he ill?"
Harry was frightened now. Something had happened to Snape and they weren't telling him.
"Sit down, Harry - " Professor McGonagall gently took his arm and guided him towards a chair, but Harry shook her hand off sharply.
"I don't want to sit down. I want to know: where is my father?" He surprised even himself at how much he cared.
"There has been an 'incident', Harry." Dumbledore had been absently dividing the ends of his beard into three strands and weaving it into a loose plait. Now he folded his hands in front of him, his face solemn. "An incident involving your family, the Dursleys..."
Harry didn't want to know about the Dursleys; he was frantic to hear about Snape.
Dumbledore continued gravely:
"The whole family - that is your Aunt, your Uncle and the overweight child - "
"Dudley," Harry muttered automatically, indifferent to any event that might have befallen Dudders. The worse the better.
"- have been attacked. Now, don't distress yourself, my boy; they will survive. They have been taken to a Muggle hospital - one situated near St. Mungo's, just in case magical intervention becomes necessary. They were all, er, poisoned."
To be brutally honest, Harry couldn't give a toss whether they had been poisoned, bludgeoned or eaten alive by Quintapeds.
"But what has this got to do with my father?" he demanded.
"Professor Snape has been arrested for their attempted murder."
END OF CHAPTER. Next chapter: DRACO'S PROMISE. Why would Snape do that? What have Draco and Luna got to do with all this?
18