Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters.
Web of Lies: Revelations.
Severus had been relaxing in his rooms after a stressful day of teaching his annoying students, when someone knocked on his door. Grumbling under his breath, he stood up from the chair he had just collapsed in and walked tiredly to the door. He was a bit surprised to see Minerva standing there, with Alec just behind her; he hadn't expected them to visit him. Stepping aside, the man allowed the teacher and student in and closed the door behind them. Focusing his gaze on Alec, he put on his sternest face. "Shouldn't you be doing your homework, young man?"
Harry smiled lightly up at him. "I already finished it, Uncle Severus. I was just trying to think of what to do next when Aunt Minerva found me and told me she was coming down here."
The woman chuckles lightly. "And of course, when I offered for him to come along, he accepted at once."
Snape rolled his eyes and sat down in his chair, inviting Minerva to sit in the other seat while Alec went to lie down in front of the fire. Once they were all comfortably seated, and a house-elf had brought them tea, the two adults started to talk in hushed voices about school things. At first, Harry listened to them, trying to make out what they were talking about, but soon he found his mind drifting, and his gaze got lost into the fire.
He had been sitting there for a long while, ignoring everything else that was going around him, when suddenly something flashed in front of his eyes. Startled, he leaned back against his forearms, refocusing his gaze on the fire.
The sharp movement didn't go unnoticed by the two teachers sitting behind him. "Alec? Is there something wrong?"
The teen looked for a moment longer before turning to look at his teacher. "It's nothing, Aunt Minerva, I was just lost in thoughts, and I thought I saw something. It was probably just a spark."
The woman nodded with a small smile, and resumed her conversation with Severus that wasn't sure if he should believe the teen.
Harry returned his gaze to the fire and concentrated in trying to find what had startled him. For a while, nothing happened, but then, slowly, an image started to form in the fire. Harry frowned lightly, trying not to move for fear he'd lost the image again. In a few moments, the full face of a man had formed in the fireplace, and it was staring back at him with deep black eyes. Alec could have sworn that he had seen that face before, but right now, he was trying too hard to focus on what was happening instead of thinking about when he had seen that face before.
If he hadn't been so used to weird things happening to him, Harry would have jumped up when the strange image started to speak softly. At first, the voice seemed a bit strange; it wasn't until Derek started to shift a bit around his wrist, that Harry noticed that the face was speaking in parseltongue.
*Well, well, well, what a surprise; I haven't seen a fellow speaker in quite a while. * Harry felt as the large eyes looked at him intently. *What's your name, little one? *
Harry opened his mouth to answer, but then he remembered about the adults sitting behind him. He couldn't talk to the face, much less in parseltongue. Somehow he doubted that the two teachers could see the face; after all, having a strange face sitting in your fireplace was something that wasn't very hard to notice with a simple glance, and he knew that at least Snape was still watching him from time to time.
Alec had been so lost in thought that he didn't notice the face showing the first signs of impatience. *Are you going to answer me, young speaker?*
Harry blinked and shifted a bit. Luckily, he was spared an answer when Derek slithered his head from under his robe and started to hiss softly. Alec tensed, thinking that his teachers would be able to hear the snake, but they were luckily still talking, and the soft hiss went unnoticed.
*My massssster cannot sssspeak in front of the other humansssss. *
The face raised an eyebrow at that, and then looked at the two people still sitting behind Harry. *I ssssee, then we'll have to talk later. I don't usually leave thissss fireplace, but it'ssss been too long ssssince a fellow parselmouth walked through these hallssss and I'm curioussss to know about you. I'll find you tonight. Issss curfew sssstill at ten?"
Harry looked a bit puzzled, but nodded very lightly.
*Very well. I'll ssssee you two hourssss after that. *
Then, in the blink of an eye, the face was gone, and Harry couldn't help but rub his eyes, wondering if he had imagined the whole thing.
"Maybe it's time for you to go to bed, Alec. It's been a long day."
Harry turned around sharply, and saw the two adults gazing down at him in amusement. Blinking, he tried to make out what the woman had been saying. He was still trying to think of a suitable answer when Severus stood up, approached him, and with strong hands, lifted him off the floor.
"Come on, Alec, off to bed with you; I can't have you falling asleep on us."
Minerva joined them, taking in the child's dazed face. "I don't think it would be a very good idea to send him alone, Severus, he seems to be dead on his feet. How about you take him to the common room, and I go talk to Albus about what we discussed?"
Snape nodded in agreement. Dumbledore had already told them all that they should treat Alec as they usually did, no matter what the other students thought of it. At first, the Potions Master hadn't thought it would be very fair, but Dumbledore had made it clear that he would let the student body know that Alec was his grandson and that as such, he had some privileges. In his mind, Snape was grateful for those orders. Now he had an excuse to be nice to the kid he had started to love during the summer, and he had the perfect excuse should Voldemort remark on it.
Taking Alec's hand, the Potions Master escorted his young charge to the Ravenclaw common room, ignoring the confused and startled gazes he was getting from the few students that were hurrying to their own common rooms before curfew.
For a moment, Snape considered leaving the child in front of the common room's entrance, but then, with a mischievous smile, he thought against it. Alec seemed to be really out of it for some reason, and he always enjoyed shocking his students. Turning to the boy standing next to him, he knelt down next him.
"Alec, can you tell me the password?"
The boy looked up at him, a bit confused, his mind still thinking about the strange meeting in the fireplace. He knew he was acting strange, but he didn't seem to be able to stop it. The instant the face disappeared from the fireplace, he had recognized it. He was nearly sure he knew where he had seen that face before, and if he was right, he had just had a very weird chat with a dead founder. He was once again trying to get his mind around the fact that he had been talking with Salazar Slytherin who has been dead for years, when a hand on his shoulder shook him lightly.
"Snap out of it, Alec! I need you to tell me the password, and I'll get you into bed."
Harry blinked again, recognizing Snape's voice coming from somewhere in front of him. He was just focusing on the man, when the professor spoke again.
"What's wrong with you? Do you need to go to the hospital wing?"
Now that got Harry's attention. He snapped his head up and finally focussed on Snape's face. The man in front of him seemed to be mildly irritated but the worry shinning in his eyes was quickly overcoming that irritation.
"I'm sorry, Uncle Severus, I must be more tired than I thought."
Snape visibly refrained himself from making a sarcastic comment while Harry softly spoke the password. Getting back on his feet, Snape gently pushed Harry into the common room, which got completely silent when they saw the feared potions master entering their domains. Anthony immediately walked up to them, looking sternly down at Alec.
"Is there something wrong, Professor?"
Severus smirked at him and drew the small teen closer to him when he felt the boy tense at his side. "Nothing's wrong, Mr. Teheran, I was merely escorting Mr. Dumbledore to his room."
While the other students gapped at him, Severus turned to Harry. "Will you be alright on your own now, Alec?"
The teen nodded, trying to fight down his embarrassment. He was sure Snape was doing it on purpose; well, he wasn't going to let the man play his little games with him. He should have learned by now that he could be just as Slytherin as his professor. In his brightest voice, the teen contently chirped: "I'll be fine, Uncle Sev, thanks for walking me here."
The man immediately slapped him lightly on his behind, knowing he was found out, and then ruffled Alec's head affectionately. "Brat, up to bed with you. I'll see you tomorrow."
Harry nodded lightly, briefly he thought about hugging and kissing the man goodnight, but he refrained himself. After all, he wanted to keep all his limbs intact. Once the man left, all the attention shifted to Harry, who had started to squirm under the intense looks he was getting. Finally, he broke the strained silence by surging. "Stop looking at me that way! He's one of my grandfather's friends, and I spent a lot of time with him this summer. You don't honestly think he's going to act different out of class just because we're back in school?"
The other students nodded reluctantly and turned back to their business while Harry started to walk up the stairs after nodding goodnight to Lan. He had tried to make light matter from the professor's strange behaviour, but he was also confused about it. He would have thought that Snape would keep his distance; after all, his spying duties were already difficult enough without the junior death eaters knowing that he was coddling the Headmaster's grandson. And Alec didn't doubt that the news of what had happened in the common room would be around the school before classes started tomorrow.
Shaking his head, he tried to put those thoughts out of his mind. After all, Severus had been a spy for almost twenty years now, and he probably knew what he was getting himself into. Quickly changing from his clothes to his pyjamas, he got into bed. He didn't know if or when the strange face was going to show up, but he might as well get some sleep before that happened. After all, while he was not tired of his lessons, he had just had a few shocks, and he had the feeling he would need to be rested for what was to come.
To be continued...
A/N: Thanks for all reviews and to my beta reader Vinnie and to Leena.
Web of Lies: Revelations.
Severus had been relaxing in his rooms after a stressful day of teaching his annoying students, when someone knocked on his door. Grumbling under his breath, he stood up from the chair he had just collapsed in and walked tiredly to the door. He was a bit surprised to see Minerva standing there, with Alec just behind her; he hadn't expected them to visit him. Stepping aside, the man allowed the teacher and student in and closed the door behind them. Focusing his gaze on Alec, he put on his sternest face. "Shouldn't you be doing your homework, young man?"
Harry smiled lightly up at him. "I already finished it, Uncle Severus. I was just trying to think of what to do next when Aunt Minerva found me and told me she was coming down here."
The woman chuckles lightly. "And of course, when I offered for him to come along, he accepted at once."
Snape rolled his eyes and sat down in his chair, inviting Minerva to sit in the other seat while Alec went to lie down in front of the fire. Once they were all comfortably seated, and a house-elf had brought them tea, the two adults started to talk in hushed voices about school things. At first, Harry listened to them, trying to make out what they were talking about, but soon he found his mind drifting, and his gaze got lost into the fire.
He had been sitting there for a long while, ignoring everything else that was going around him, when suddenly something flashed in front of his eyes. Startled, he leaned back against his forearms, refocusing his gaze on the fire.
The sharp movement didn't go unnoticed by the two teachers sitting behind him. "Alec? Is there something wrong?"
The teen looked for a moment longer before turning to look at his teacher. "It's nothing, Aunt Minerva, I was just lost in thoughts, and I thought I saw something. It was probably just a spark."
The woman nodded with a small smile, and resumed her conversation with Severus that wasn't sure if he should believe the teen.
Harry returned his gaze to the fire and concentrated in trying to find what had startled him. For a while, nothing happened, but then, slowly, an image started to form in the fire. Harry frowned lightly, trying not to move for fear he'd lost the image again. In a few moments, the full face of a man had formed in the fireplace, and it was staring back at him with deep black eyes. Alec could have sworn that he had seen that face before, but right now, he was trying too hard to focus on what was happening instead of thinking about when he had seen that face before.
If he hadn't been so used to weird things happening to him, Harry would have jumped up when the strange image started to speak softly. At first, the voice seemed a bit strange; it wasn't until Derek started to shift a bit around his wrist, that Harry noticed that the face was speaking in parseltongue.
*Well, well, well, what a surprise; I haven't seen a fellow speaker in quite a while. * Harry felt as the large eyes looked at him intently. *What's your name, little one? *
Harry opened his mouth to answer, but then he remembered about the adults sitting behind him. He couldn't talk to the face, much less in parseltongue. Somehow he doubted that the two teachers could see the face; after all, having a strange face sitting in your fireplace was something that wasn't very hard to notice with a simple glance, and he knew that at least Snape was still watching him from time to time.
Alec had been so lost in thought that he didn't notice the face showing the first signs of impatience. *Are you going to answer me, young speaker?*
Harry blinked and shifted a bit. Luckily, he was spared an answer when Derek slithered his head from under his robe and started to hiss softly. Alec tensed, thinking that his teachers would be able to hear the snake, but they were luckily still talking, and the soft hiss went unnoticed.
*My massssster cannot sssspeak in front of the other humansssss. *
The face raised an eyebrow at that, and then looked at the two people still sitting behind Harry. *I ssssee, then we'll have to talk later. I don't usually leave thissss fireplace, but it'ssss been too long ssssince a fellow parselmouth walked through these hallssss and I'm curioussss to know about you. I'll find you tonight. Issss curfew sssstill at ten?"
Harry looked a bit puzzled, but nodded very lightly.
*Very well. I'll ssssee you two hourssss after that. *
Then, in the blink of an eye, the face was gone, and Harry couldn't help but rub his eyes, wondering if he had imagined the whole thing.
"Maybe it's time for you to go to bed, Alec. It's been a long day."
Harry turned around sharply, and saw the two adults gazing down at him in amusement. Blinking, he tried to make out what the woman had been saying. He was still trying to think of a suitable answer when Severus stood up, approached him, and with strong hands, lifted him off the floor.
"Come on, Alec, off to bed with you; I can't have you falling asleep on us."
Minerva joined them, taking in the child's dazed face. "I don't think it would be a very good idea to send him alone, Severus, he seems to be dead on his feet. How about you take him to the common room, and I go talk to Albus about what we discussed?"
Snape nodded in agreement. Dumbledore had already told them all that they should treat Alec as they usually did, no matter what the other students thought of it. At first, the Potions Master hadn't thought it would be very fair, but Dumbledore had made it clear that he would let the student body know that Alec was his grandson and that as such, he had some privileges. In his mind, Snape was grateful for those orders. Now he had an excuse to be nice to the kid he had started to love during the summer, and he had the perfect excuse should Voldemort remark on it.
Taking Alec's hand, the Potions Master escorted his young charge to the Ravenclaw common room, ignoring the confused and startled gazes he was getting from the few students that were hurrying to their own common rooms before curfew.
For a moment, Snape considered leaving the child in front of the common room's entrance, but then, with a mischievous smile, he thought against it. Alec seemed to be really out of it for some reason, and he always enjoyed shocking his students. Turning to the boy standing next to him, he knelt down next him.
"Alec, can you tell me the password?"
The boy looked up at him, a bit confused, his mind still thinking about the strange meeting in the fireplace. He knew he was acting strange, but he didn't seem to be able to stop it. The instant the face disappeared from the fireplace, he had recognized it. He was nearly sure he knew where he had seen that face before, and if he was right, he had just had a very weird chat with a dead founder. He was once again trying to get his mind around the fact that he had been talking with Salazar Slytherin who has been dead for years, when a hand on his shoulder shook him lightly.
"Snap out of it, Alec! I need you to tell me the password, and I'll get you into bed."
Harry blinked again, recognizing Snape's voice coming from somewhere in front of him. He was just focusing on the man, when the professor spoke again.
"What's wrong with you? Do you need to go to the hospital wing?"
Now that got Harry's attention. He snapped his head up and finally focussed on Snape's face. The man in front of him seemed to be mildly irritated but the worry shinning in his eyes was quickly overcoming that irritation.
"I'm sorry, Uncle Severus, I must be more tired than I thought."
Snape visibly refrained himself from making a sarcastic comment while Harry softly spoke the password. Getting back on his feet, Snape gently pushed Harry into the common room, which got completely silent when they saw the feared potions master entering their domains. Anthony immediately walked up to them, looking sternly down at Alec.
"Is there something wrong, Professor?"
Severus smirked at him and drew the small teen closer to him when he felt the boy tense at his side. "Nothing's wrong, Mr. Teheran, I was merely escorting Mr. Dumbledore to his room."
While the other students gapped at him, Severus turned to Harry. "Will you be alright on your own now, Alec?"
The teen nodded, trying to fight down his embarrassment. He was sure Snape was doing it on purpose; well, he wasn't going to let the man play his little games with him. He should have learned by now that he could be just as Slytherin as his professor. In his brightest voice, the teen contently chirped: "I'll be fine, Uncle Sev, thanks for walking me here."
The man immediately slapped him lightly on his behind, knowing he was found out, and then ruffled Alec's head affectionately. "Brat, up to bed with you. I'll see you tomorrow."
Harry nodded lightly, briefly he thought about hugging and kissing the man goodnight, but he refrained himself. After all, he wanted to keep all his limbs intact. Once the man left, all the attention shifted to Harry, who had started to squirm under the intense looks he was getting. Finally, he broke the strained silence by surging. "Stop looking at me that way! He's one of my grandfather's friends, and I spent a lot of time with him this summer. You don't honestly think he's going to act different out of class just because we're back in school?"
The other students nodded reluctantly and turned back to their business while Harry started to walk up the stairs after nodding goodnight to Lan. He had tried to make light matter from the professor's strange behaviour, but he was also confused about it. He would have thought that Snape would keep his distance; after all, his spying duties were already difficult enough without the junior death eaters knowing that he was coddling the Headmaster's grandson. And Alec didn't doubt that the news of what had happened in the common room would be around the school before classes started tomorrow.
Shaking his head, he tried to put those thoughts out of his mind. After all, Severus had been a spy for almost twenty years now, and he probably knew what he was getting himself into. Quickly changing from his clothes to his pyjamas, he got into bed. He didn't know if or when the strange face was going to show up, but he might as well get some sleep before that happened. After all, while he was not tired of his lessons, he had just had a few shocks, and he had the feeling he would need to be rested for what was to come.
To be continued...
A/N: Thanks for all reviews and to my beta reader Vinnie and to Leena.