- CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE -
Harry's Solution

Harry felt like an eleven-year-old again, standing in Ollivander's with no clue how to make his wand work. Resuming his use of magic after the effect of the Thaumentors was like having to relearn everything again. He knew what to do, but he had to try and try just to perform spells he'd grasped in his first few months at Hogwarts.

"Wingardium Leviosa!" He grimaced as the feather - donated by a rather peeved Hedwig - stubbornly refused to do any more than quiver.

"Brings back memories, doesn't it?" said Ron from the doorway. They were both still restricted to the hospital wing, a situation Harry didn't protest since it allowed them to keep a closer eye on Hermione than would otherwise be permitted.

He smiled slightly, then grew more solemn. "How is she?"

"No change." Ron sighed, and sat down on the end of his bed. "Madam Pomfrey wants Snape to try another potion, but after the last one..." He trailed off.

All attempts to administer cures to Hermione so far had met with either no effect or disaster. Whether it was whatever nasty curse Dolorus had used or some side effect of the Thaumentors, spells and potions just weren't working as they should. She was lucky that her unconsciousness meant Madam Pomfrey had only managed to feed her a dribble of Invigorating Elixir before she had a violent reaction to it.

"Maybe the potions will work again in a few days once her magic has come back," Harry said. It had become something of a mantra, they only thing they had to hold on to without Hermione awake beside them to grab a pile of books and seek out a better answer.

"Yeah." Ron flopped back on the bed, and covered his eyes with an arm. "I just feel so useless, sitting here like this. Right now, I'd even volunteer to help Snape if I thought he'd let me." Snape's potion-making skills, at least, seemed unaffected, although his wand-work was probably as bad as Ron and Harry's. Of course, Madam Pomfrey wouldn't dare force him to stay in the hospital wing and keep practising first-year spells.

Harry sighed, and fiddled with his wand. Ron was right - it was not being able to do anything that was the most frustrating. His wand might as well be a stick for all the good it could do him right now.

He tossed it up in the air and caught it a few times, agitated. It wasn't until the third or fourth metallic clunk that he paused, and looked down at his hands. Of course, he was still wearing the ring. He usually took it off to sleep, but what with everything that had happened since he fell unconscious out in the maze, he'd completely forgotten about it.

The enchanted ring his father had taken from a group of Slytherins. The ring that had twice alerted him to the fact he was about to drink something deadly dangerous.

He leapt to his feet.

"Huh? What?" Ron snapped violently out of his semi-doze, reaching automatically for his wand and then grimacing as he realised he couldn't use it. "What's happening?"

"I've had an idea," said Harry. "Come on! We have to go and find Snape."

Harry had quite lost track of time while they were incarcerated in the hospital wing, but it turned out to be midway through lunch, so they lurked in the dungeon corridors waiting for the Potions master to return. Several passing Slytherins gave them looks that ranged from suspicious to outright hostile, but Harry was entirely too agitated to pay much attention.

Snape's lips compressed into a thin sneer as he saw them waiting there. "Potter. If you are here to beg for a chance to re-take your missed Potions exam, you will only be wasting your breath. Since only your wand-work has been affected by your foolish Gryffindor attempt at heroics, you should have been able to sit the Potions practical, and your unauthorised absence will give you a mark of zero."

"We were in the hospital wing!" Ron said, outraged.

"Malingering, no doubt," he said dismissively. "Neither of you were injured, and if inability to cast spells was sufficient reason for an overnight stay, Longbottom would never be allowed to leave."

"Sir, I had an idea that might help Hermione," Harry said, determined not to let himself be distracted.

"Fascinating, I'm sure, Potter, but believe it or not there are parts of the world where we do not wait with bated breath to hear your opinion."

Harry gave Ron a warning look before he could go off again, and pulled off the ring. "I thought that... this... might help you make a potion for Hermione that won't poison her."

The ring had resumed its silver snake form, and sat quivering in the centre of his palm. Snape's dark eyes glittered with some unreadable emotion for a moment as he stared at it.

"Where did you get this, Potter?" he demanded, in a dangerously low and controlled voice.

Harry hesitated, somehow feeling despite his hatred for the Potions master that he owed Snape the truth, or at least some part of it. "In a box of things of my father's that I think he... took from some Slytherins when he was at school."

"Indeed." If it was possible to cast a spell using only the strength of a glare, Harry would have been splattered all over the wall by now. A half-formed hunch solidified into near-certainty.

"It's yours, Professor, isn't it?" he said. What other Slytherin at school with his father would have had a ring enchanted specially to help in potion-making?

"It was - but of course, the Potters are lords and masters of all they survey, and can take what they please from the mere mortals around them," Snape said cuttingly.

Harry bridled at the suggestion that he should be tarred with the crimes of his father, but at the same time felt a stab of irrational guilt. "I didn't know who it belonged to!" he protested. "I would have given it back if I did."

"Of course. And the fact that you wore it for sixth months without the slightest attempt to advertise its properties or attempt to locate its true owner bears this out."

He flushed furiously. How was he supposed to have known that the ring's original owner was even alive, let alone at Hogwarts? "I just thought you might be able to use it," he grated.

"Will it be able to help Hermione, Professor?" Ron asked, managing to keep calmer than Harry. That was new, and a little disconcerting. Ron hadn't lost his short fuse by any means, but ever since the tragic news about Percy he seemed to have found a new ability to focus and put aside his emotions when there were more important matters at stake.

Snape plucked the ring unceremoniously from Harry's palm, and sneered. "Perhaps. Doubtless you have been using it as a last-ditch defence against the lethal consequences of your shameful inability to follow instructions, but it is a precision tool, designed for use by someone who understands the subtleties of the art. It may be of some assistance."

He turned around and limped off without further comment.

"Yeah, you're welcome," said Ron sarcastically.

Ron and Harry took up their customary stations by Hermione's bedside for most of the afternoon. Madam Pomfrey had given up on chasing them out, Harry suspected largely because it allowed her to keep a closer eye on the two of them. For some reason, the matron seemed wholly convinced that no magical exertion meant no physical exertion either. She scolded them both soundly if they tried to lift a finger to do anything.

They played several games of chess, most of which Harry lost miserably. Neville came by with a small potted plant called a Rainbow Harponica, which put out multicoloured flowers at different times of the day, and hummed quietly to itself. "They're supposed to give good dreams to people who have trouble sleeping," he explained shyly. "Since we don't know if Hermione's dreaming or not, and it was a Dark curse, I thought..."

"That's really thoughtful, Neville," said Harry. "Thank you."

Ron cautiously prodded the plant with the end of a Sugar Quill. It trilled faintly, and quivered its leaves.

Ginny and Luna visited after their History of Magic OWL, the latter inspecting Neville's plant for Ear-Biting Thrips before she would consent to sit near it.

"They look exactly like leaves until they leap up and bite onto your earlobe," she explained seriously. "That's why people started wearing earrings."

Harry wasn't convinced of the existence of Ear-Biting Thrips, but then he hadn't known Thaumentors had existed a few months ago, so he resolved to be careful around any suspicious looking leaves. The last thing he needed was to start wearing an earring - Snape would probably curse his ears off looking for hidden charms.

"I've completely stuffed up that exam," said Ginny, not sounding terribly regretful. "I just couldn't concentrate. But I know I passed Defence Against the Dark Arts, even with Trelawney teaching us for half the year. It's all thanks to your lessons last year, Harry. You were brilliant! I just hope they let our marks stand even though the external examiners couldn't come in."

"Delightful as this little love-fest is, this is a hospital room, not the Potter appreciation society." Snape stalked in, looking purposeful enough to give Harry hope but scowling as much as ever. "Kindly depart, and Miss Weasley, might I suggest you spend your apparently ample spare time preparing for your Potions OWL tomorrow? Judging by your last three homework assignments, you will be lucky to achieve the marks allotted for correctly spelling your own name."

The fifth-years reluctantly rose and left, Ginny shooting Harry an apologetic smile and shrug. Snape redirected his pointed glare to the two boys.

"We're patients!" said Ron.

The Potions master's sneer said what he thought of that, but fortunately Madam Pomfrey chose that moment to enter the room. "Professor? Do you have the potion?" she asked, sounding unusually agitated. It didn't sit well with the matron to have care of her charges reliant on someone else's work.

"Several variants." He reached within the folds of his robe to produce half a dozen small bottles, each one holding little more than a few spoonfuls of liquid. To Harry's eyes, they all looked an identical shade of pond-water green, and it was only the obscure symbols with which each bottle was labelled that set them apart. Snape set them down, and pulled the ring off his index finger. "With the aid of this poison-detecting device-" he shot Harry a pointed glare, "-it should be possible to test each for adverse reactions without doing Miss Granger undue harm."

He placed the ring on the back of Hermione's unresponsive hand, handling her as dispassionately as if she was something to be dissected in his lab. "Cavere Inuria!"

The ring instantly became a coiled snake, quivering alertly. It slithered across Hermione's hand and wrapped its tail around her wrist, as if to keep a close check on her pulse. The colour of the metal faded down from silver to almost pure white.

"Did it do that when you used it?" Ron whispered. Harry shook his head.

"I just found it in a box, it didn't come with instructions!"

Still, the ring had somehow managed to save his life once, and could have done with the Desanguinating Draught if he'd understood it was trying to warn him. Harry supposed those had both counted as out-and-out poisons, obviously intended to harm. He hoped that whatever Snape had commanded the ring to do would take into account something as subtle as a healing potion that might have ill effects.

Snape unstoppered the first of the vials, and moved to let just a droplet fall. Harry expected him to dab it on the back of Hermione's hand or arm, like an allergy test, but instead he dropped it directly onto the head of the serpent. The snake immediately turned grey, and emitted a hissing sound. Madam Pomfrey tutted in dismay.

"What does that mean?" asked Ron.

Snape grunted in annoyance at the interruption, but said curtly, "Bad reaction." He readied another of the sample jars.

This time, the snake turned pure black, and Harry hissed, not needing a translation. "Deadly poison," he said aloud. The ring had turned black from the 'Butterbeer' left for them in the Gryffindor dorms when he'd tried to drink it. He supposed that its default function was to check for poison in anything the wearer intended to drink. If it hadn't been for his idea, Snape's second attempt at curing Hermione could well have killed her.

If the Potions master was thinking as much, it didn't appear to faze him. He sorted the remaining vials according to some system Harry couldn't divine.

"Is there a common element?" Madam Pomfrey asked, and Snape nodded.

"It seems that several of the more intrinsically magical elements are not acting as they should. The results are similar to those I would expect should the potions be drunk by a Squib."

"Wait - Squibs can't drink potions?" Harry asked, surprised. Snape shot him a look full of contempt.

"Mr. Potter, if you had made any attempt to follow the background reading for your classwork, you would be aware that many of the ingredients used in potion-making require interaction with the consumer's innate magical talent to function. Do you honestly think it would be safe for a person to drink a mixture containing dragon's blood or snake fangs if they had no magical talent whatsoever?"

"I never really thought about it before," he admitted sheepishly.

Snape narrowed his eyes. "Hardly an uncommon attitude for you, Potter. Believe me, if it were my decision - as it most certainly should be, were it not for the plethora of interested parties determined to bend the rules to allow you to do as you will - you would not be taking NEWT level Potions at all."

Harry exchanged a glance with Ron, who raised his eyebrows in commiseration and shrugged, apparently not having known that snippet about Squibs and potions either. Harry was willing to bet that it was not common knowledge at all, but probably tucked away in the third footnote of page one thousand and something of a textbook that hadn't been used for decades.

Snape chose one of the remaining vials, and dispensed a single drop onto the head of the snake. This time it remained white, and he nodded to himself.

"Does that mean it's going to work?" Ron demanded urgently.

"It means it will do no harm," he allowed. He looked to Madam Pomfrey before giving the rest of his explanation, obviously considering the two of them beneath his notice. "I had already surmised that the more potent magical ingredients were likely to be the problem. This version uses herbal substitutes for the Sisiutl flesh and Varengan feathers; it will be less effective, but Miss Granger should not experience any problems with the ingredients."

Snape straightened up, and returned the snake to its usual ring form with the command "Anularius!" He stood back, and allowed Madam Pomfrey to deal with the more awkward proposition of getting the unconscious Hermione to swallow the remainder of the potion.

"Will that be enough?" Harry asked doubtfully. Snape sneered.

"This is medicine, Potter, not cookery. You cannot just alter the dosage as the mood takes you, and, difficult though it may be for your feeble schoolboy mind to grasp, more is not always better."

Harry exchanged a wry glance with Ron. Apparently saving Snape's life hadn't mellowed him towards them at all - not that he'd expected it to.

They all watched Hermione. If the potion was having an effect, it was not immediately visible. Was that a touch more colour in her cheeks, or was it just wishful thinking? Snape had warned that the potion with substitute ingredients would be less effective - what if it wasn't enough? What if she stayed in a coma forever, trapped maddeningly out of reach of a cure because the magic just wouldn't work for her?

Some reassurances would have been good right then, even if they were empty, but Madam Pomfrey was already bustling off to see to other patients, and from the way Ron's knuckles had turned white as he clutched the edge of the blanket, optimism was too much to ask of him right now. Harry shifted uncomfortably, and glanced at the only other prospect for conversation, grim though it was.

His eyes fell on the ring, still loosely clutched in the Potion master's long fingers.

"How does the ring detect poisons like that, Professor?" he asked.

Snape looked less than thrilled to be addressed, but merely held out the ring and spoke the word, "Apertoforma!" The ring changed form again, this time into a rough black sphere, furrowed with wavy lines. "I would hope, Potter, that you at least have the background knowledge to recognise one of these."

"It's a Cobra Stone!" Harry realised. He remembered the description from a homework assignment the previous year, although he had never seen a real one. They were used to remove the poison from snake bites; the ring must be one with enchantments placed onto it so it could be worn all the time and protect the wearer before anything toxic even entered their system.

"Correct, Mr. Potter. And, of course, you remember the properties of Snake Stones as a family and Cobra Stones in particular?" The thick sarcasm made him want to prove Snape wrong, and he fumbled for half-forgotten details.

"Er... they come from inside the heads of snakes," he managed. "And... if you hold them against snake bites, they sort of suck the poison out." There was more, he was sure, but it was wasn't coming to him. Oh, yes: "They get saturated, and to use them again you have to soak them in, um, soak them in..."

"Milk," croaked a very weak voice from the bed. Harry whirled around.

"Hermione! You're awake!"

She smiled at them all, rather shyly. Ron smacked his forehead theatrically.

"Of course, Harry! We should have started on the revision questions days ago. You know Hermione can never resist a chance to tell us we're wrong."

They huddled around the bed, eager to tell her everything that had been going on before Madam Pomfrey came in and turfed them out again.