There were, he had to admit, a few bright spots in a world of darkness. Most of them were kippers. What could ever be better than salty, smelly little fishy things that glared at you while you ate them, with a tendency to crunch unexpectedly? Severus would never understand what was so unnerving about biting their heads off.

"Mr. Snape, I've been calling you for five minutes." He looked around with a start, finding professor McGonagall staring down her nose at him, mildly miffed. "I would be happy to convey your compliments to the chefs, but there is a limit understood."

As he'd actually heard her and assumed she wanted Hector, Severus decided not to argue. "What?"

"The headmaster has informed me that he's awarded you a position as a teacher's aide." She didn't seem to approve. Quite honestly, Severus didn't mind working for McGonagall, but an irritated McGonagall promised an inevitable fiasco. "Professor Slughorn would like to see you in the potions classroom."

He winced. She smiled slightly. "You've brought it on yourself, you know." Severus decided not to correct her and sped to the dungeons. Even if that unctuous heap of steaming fewmets did teach down there, it was his favorite part of the school. He fit.

The door was closed. With a brief glance upward, though whether he sought strength from some higher power or the ceiling he didn't know. Now, to step into the power of the Slug. He knocked. "Professor? It's me."

"Ah, Sevvy, my boy, enter!" boomed the phenomenally annoying voice from within. He might have known this would happen. Keeping his expression neutral, he slid into the classroom. A pile of very decidedly dead lizards was stacked in a cauldron, horribly sloppy laboratory procedure. Slughorn himself was lounging in an armchair that matched him fairly well in shape and size.

"What do you want me to do, professor?" His voice sounded jarringly mechanical, but he'd realized long ago that he spent so much time controlling himself that people thought he actually sounded that way.

"Oh, this and that, nothing too strenuous." Slughorn gestured imperiously to something covered with a sheet. "Rather odd artifact Miss Sparrowhawk uncovered during her unwonted sojourn in the old classroom. From what I've been able to piece together, it's some sort of guarding spell, but needs a particular potion to awaken its powers. Nothing conventional has worked, and we've tried quite a bit. If you could give it a good dusting and bring it up to the table, then…?"

Severus conjured a rag, doubting the Slug concerned himself with such mundane details, and yanked the sheet off the "artifact," which turned out to be an exceptionally fearsome gargoyle, barely visible under a layer of scum. It looked like fairly mundane mold to him, but as regarded unknown magic, it was risky to assume. He prodded it a few times with his wand and, noting nothing untoward, attacked it with the rag.

Slughorn went on, rambling to himself and agreeing as usual, certain he had an audience. Severus couldn't help listening. "Clever, isn't she, Miss Phoebe? I think she's even passed you in potions, and almost a year younger! Of course, being born in September is always a set-back in schooling. Not at all fair."

There was a pause, so Severus nodded, aware Slughorn probably wouldn't notice. "How's your mother getting along, by the way? I've always thought it a pity such a bright girl couldn't make a bit better of herself. No insult intended, of course, but marrying some muggle flyboy? Nothing wrong with muggles, but, well, you know what can happen!"

Severus bit his tongue to keep from answering.

"How is your father, by the way? I was having a word with Healer MacDunstan the other day—have you met her? Excellent young witch, finished her Healer's qualifications very quickly, a favorite student of mine. Says your mother's still trying to get St. Mungo's to treat him!"

"She is." He scraped viciously behind the gargoyle's head, clawing at the crust of mildew as though it were Slughorn and very other pompous, pure-blooded, condescending separatist wizard he'd ever spoken to.

"If we treated every sick muggle, we'd have them running to us for every cold. A bit of bias of your father's behalf is natural, but if you think practically…"

"Yes, sir." Severus gave the matter some practical thought. He thought of all the harm that could come of removing the tumors from his father's lungs, straightening his mangled arm, and returning his failing liver to healthy performance. Grudgingly, he admitted that curing any terminally ill muggle would be a massive breach of the Statute of Secrecy, but for one whose brother, wife, and children were all quite magical, the bloody exception begged to be made.

"How's that potion you were experimenting with coming along, anyway?" Though he didn't bother to look, Severus could feel the smugness on Slughorn's face. "Interesting idea, though, I must say, negating magic could be quite dangerous. In theory, quite thrilling, but what would you use it for?"

Douse you in it, for starters. Mostly, he wanted to see if it was possible to (impermanently) block a person's magic use and, as an apparently unavoidable side effect, any effects it might have on them, for the sheer joy of doing something weird. It also satisfied him to think he could probably prove that the difference between muggle and wizard was more a matter of degree—if a potion existed, a potion with the opposite effect did, whether known or not. Standard principle. Though few would actually believe him, it would give him considerable personal satisfaction. "To throw at my brother and see if anyone notices." He attempted to look like he hadn't meant to say that out loud.

"Ah, now, Severus, there's really no need for jealousy." Slughorn popped some crystallized pineapple, the smell of which made Severus gag from across the room. He couldn't even imagine swallowing a lump of congealed sugar for recreational purposes. "I've never met twins so different as you two, and I do know several pairs. The Latoya sisters, for instance, met them on a teacher exchange program in Madrid, you might have seen them at the Quidditch cup this year. They did a wonderful show after the game. No? Well, in any case, you have your strengths and he his. Honestly, what is charm and a knack for Quidditch next to pure intellect? My advice is to be pleased, not disappointed, with your own talents."

He nodded vaguely, deciding not to point out that he was better at Quidditch than Hector. Slytherin didn't allow mudbloods on the house team. Nodding at appropriate intervals throughout Slughorn's next tirade, he swiped the last of the crust of dust off the gargoyle's head. As it was cleared away, he saw that the stone was inscribed in fairly bad Latin. Squinting, his nose so close it actually touched the grimy marble, cursing his lousy eyes, he skimmed the passage. Though he didn't know half the words at first reading, it was pretty clearly instructions, presumably for making the gargoyle do whatever it was supposed to do.

"Uh, professor? I think I found the manual." Sloughorn cut himself off in mid pomposity to make a quizzical noise. "There's something written here. It's pretty scratched up, but there're definitely some kind of instructions." Haltingly, he tried to translate. "Stone… ex ostia… Sounds like a vacation destination… Take you… That's an imperative. Oh, I got it. Take the stone from the mouth, and… don't know that word… in water… must be soak or something… Yeah, must be. Cover… Well, I'd kill for a dictionary, but I'm pretty sure we take some kind of stone from either the mouth of a river or this thing's mouth… Depends how well this guy knew Latin. And then we take water that the rock's been soaked in and pour it on the gargoyle."

"Grotesque."

"It's not that ugly…"

Slughorn laughed indulgently. "It's only a gargoyle if there's a fountain in its mouth. Otherwise, the architectural term is 'grotesque.'"

"Well, okay, but that's pretty much how we wake it up. But there's a lot more written here, and I won't try for it all off the top of my head." Severus almost let himself smile. Whatever he was about to find out had to be interesting at the least. "I'll run for a dictionary. And maybe Dumbledore." Severus stood, wiping the dust off the front of his robes.

"Oh, where's your sense of adventure?" Slughorn actually stood up, and waddled over. "Go ahead, check it's mouth for a stone. Great discoveries aren't made with dictionaries and careful planning!"

That was news to Severus, but he didn't dare disobey. Slughorn's ire was nothing he wanted to provoke. He was mildly more afraid of his teacher's temper than of releasing an old, mostly unknown magic. Swiping some of the dust off the dragon-like snout, he wriggled his fingers between the wickedly sharp fangs. He couldn't fit them past the second joint, but groping for a minute knocked something small and smooth free. He pulled out his fingers and a polished red stone fell out.

"Well, we don't have to go trawling in any rivers, excellent, excellent," Slughorn gloated, picking up the stone an turning it over in his fingers, more like a pawnshop owner than an accomplished wizard.

"Er, are you sure we shouldn't go for Dumbledore?" Severus had cut himself on one of the teeth and found it increased his apprehensiveness. Not knowing what that thing was supposed to guard or how dangerous it might be, he didn't want those teeth given any leeway they didn't have at the moment.

"Nonsense! I should think he'll be quite pleased with us, solving the problem without his needing to interfere." Severus felt this was a terrible choice of words, and started to inch away. "Well, what are you waiting for? If you've got it right, all we need to do is steep this stone in some water."

He realized where it was all going. If his translation was wrong, or something truly unpleasant happened, it was all Severus' fault. Grinding his teeth, he filled a cup lying on the desk and allowed Slughorn to drop the stone in. The water immediately turned the muddy red of rust.

"Well, something's certainly happening," Slughorn observed brightly as the cup's temperature soared, scorching Severus' fingers. Wincing, he emptied the cup over the grotesque's head.

For a long moment, nothing happened, and Severus decided that with such sloppy potion use and simplistic directions that was all that could have been expected. Then the grotesque's wings snapped open, and it launched itself into the air, landing on top of the door to glare down at them and shake off some of the dust.

"What on Earth?"

Shocked with himself, Severus had to admit he was thinking roughly the same thing. The gargoyles, no, grotesques guarding several doors around Hogwarts could move, certainly, but only in one way, and had no choice about it. Supposedly, giving life to something to the degree where it could move and, apparently, think freely was as magically impossible as raising the dead.

The creature opened its mouth, flashing fangs that seemed to have grown considerably through the awakening process. A hiss and some dust escaped, then, quite clearly, it spoke. "I am the Servant of the Half Blood Prince."