"Look, over there!"
"Is that him?"
"Of course it is! Look at that scar!"
"I thought he'd be taller…"
"Well, I thought he wouldn't be in Slytherin."
Whispers followed Harry around constantly for the first few days of the term. Everywhere he went, people would stop to stare, most of them with some combination of awe and fear. It had been vaguely gratifying for the first few minutes, but it quickly became an irritation. Everything was hard enough to find in the shifting maze that was Hogwarts Castle without the distraction of a constant audience.
There was no doubt that Hogwarts was a magical castle. The floor plan wasn't constant. Staircases would shift; one day a path would take you to the great hall, and the next day it would dead-end by the charms classroom. Finding paths that were reliable would take time.
More confusing than the geography were the classes: they studied a dizzying array of topics.
Every Monday they had to wait until midnight and climb what felt like a hundred flights of stairs from the dungeon up to the top of the astronomy tower, the highest point in the castle. There, they studied the night sky, memorizing the placements of the stars and learning about their significance to certain spells.
Charms class, with Professor Flitwick, promised to be occasionally fun and occasionally infuriating; the various spells they would be learning seemed interesting but difficult. After the first class, Millicent Bulstrode and Theodore Nott spent a long time with their heads together snickering over rude nicknames for the diminutive teacher. Harry felt faintly embarrassed by it, and tried not to listen, but had to admit that some of them were fairly clever.
Professor McGonagall taught Transfiguration, a genuine disaster of a class. She was a stern disciplinarian, and demanding; by the end of the first class period with her, Slytherin had lost thirty-five points for misbehavior. The twenty they had gained for correct answers and good performance seemed almost insulting in that context.
McGonagall seemed determined to show that she would not show favoritism towards Harry, the "class hero" as many had called him with varying degrees of sincerity. She had called on him several times, sending disapproving looks when he failed to answer her inevitably difficult questions.
"Honestly, Mr. Potter, I would think you would have taken the time to at least crack your books before arriving in my classroom. You are wasting everyone's time."
Once or twice, a snicker came from the back of the classroom in response to a particularly scathing commentary. McGonagall could cut with her words. Harry's cheeks burned, and he seethed inwardly at the injustice of it. The extra attention did nothing to make his work easier; they were attempting to turn a match into a needle, and he could tell that he was having absolutely no success without McGonagall's disapproving looks.
History of Magic was painfully dull. Blaise sat next to Harry, and Theodore Nott joined the pair of them. "We can always steal the notes from a Hufflepuff," Theodore said, breaking out a deck of cards and shuffling while Professor Binns droned on obliviously. Professor Binns was the only one of their teachers who was not alive: a ghost, his lessons seemed to be at the same misty distance as his physical body. Nothing his classes did ever seemed to affect him. Harry felt slightly guilty about ignoring him, but not guilty enough to try to stay alert through his tedious lectures.
Everyone had been very excited about Defense Against the Dark Arts, with Professor Quirrell, but the class failed to live up to expectations. Professor Quirrell spoke very quickly and uncertainly, as though a bit afraid of his students – no real surprise, since he seemed to be afraid of everything else. His classroom was hung with bunches of garlic, and he wore that absurd purple turban all the time. A foul odor tended to hover around it, and Blaise theorized that he was afraid of shampoo as well as everything else. Although Quirrell told great stories about dangers he had faced, he seemed to have lost his nerve.
"Don't worry too much about that," Malfoy had said suggestively that evening in the common room when people complained about the classes. "We'll pick it all up somewhere." When people pressed for more detail, he just smiled coolly. Harry suspected Malfoy was the kind of boy who wasn't comfortable unless he was controlling events around him. He seemed resentful of the attention Harry was getting from their classmates, but hung around them anyway, always with the hulking shadows of Crabbe and Goyle, his two henchmen.
Herbology was a double class with Ravenclaw, and was a fairly peaceable event. The Ravenclaws lived up to their reputations as intellectuals, focusing on their work while the Slytherins worked with each other. Harry paired with Blaise for most of his work.
Finding his way around the labyrinthine contortions of the Slytherin social life was even more difficult than his classes. It seemed there were special protocols for addressing everyone, based off of a combination of age, family, social standing, class standing, and popularity. Most frustrating was the fact that everyone except Harry seemed to know it automatically.
Harry's position was higher than most in his year, given his fame. Because of this, most of his classmates deferred to him in conversations. Draco Malfoy was the exception; Harry could tell already that his early rejection of Malfoy had been a mistake. Malfoy was not the kind of person who took insults lightly, and he seemed determined to win the rest of the Slytherins away from their support of Harry.
He was always making snide comments about Harry's supposed arrogance and how overrated he was. "I'm sure Potter can tell us what we're doing wrong," he drawled as the first years sat struggling with their Charms assignments. Pansy Parkinson snickered. The Slytherins were fast learning that Draco would react much worse than Harry would if they didn't side with him, so several of them were riding the fence of responding to Draco's mockery while still spending time with Harry.
Harry tried to tune out Draco's sniping, but it was harder to do when the person doing the mocking was his Head of House.
The Potions classroom was not far from the Slytherin common room, and most of Harry's housemates were excited about the first class. The rumors that Snape went easier on Slytherins were a source of comfort for students who had been fighting with difficult teachers in other classes. Harry was a bit uneasy. He remembered that flash of pain in his scar at the start-of-year feast; it didn't seem like a reassuring sign.
The class was a double with the Gryffindors. For the first time since the sorting ceremony, Harry saw Ron Weasley again somewhere other than his house table. Although he knew he was risking displeasure from his fellow Slytherins, he offered Ron a smile and wave as Ron came in the door.
Ron hesitated when he saw Harry, just a few steps inside the door. There was an empty seat beside Harry, which he had left deliberately. Ron's eyes moved to it, but after a few seconds, a black boy Harry only half-remembered from the Sorting came up and caught his elbow. "Ron. There's a table back there."
Ron turned to look at him, offering a quick grin. "Right. Let's go." The two of them walked past Harry's table and to a seat in the back, beside another Gryffindor.
In the end, Harry wound up sitting with the girl he'd met on the train, Hermione Granger. She didn't pay much attention to him, instead taking her copy of One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi out of her bag. She placed it neatly in front of her, then took out a quill, ink pot, and clean scroll, poising attentively. The professor hadn't even arrived yet, and she was gazing raptly at the place where he was likely to stand eventually.
Professor Snape arrived promptly as class started, walking in through the back door of the classroom with his black robes swirling around his ankles. He let the door slam closed behind him and paused for a moment to survey the class. Harry didn't think it was possible, but Hermione drew herself up straighter at this.
Snape began the class by taking roll call, and when he came to Harry's name, he paused, looking up from the scroll. "Ah, yes," he said softly. "Harry Potter. Our new – celebrity."
Harry felt himself bristling defensively, but didn't say anything. He heard Draco snigger, and giggles from a few of the Gryffindor girls. Harry straightened his back and set his jaw in a kind of defensive defiance. Snape finished calling the roll and looked up. His eyes were pitch black and felt like deep tunnels, cold and empty.
"You are here," he began in a low, compelling voice, to learn the subtle science and exact art of potion-making." The entire class was silent; despite the quiet tones, they could hear every word. "As there is little foolish wand-waving here, m any of you will hardly believe this is magic. I don't expect you will really understand the beauty of the softly simmering cauldron with its shimmering fumes, the delicate power of liquids that creep through human veins, bewitching the mind, ensnaring the senses... I can teach you how to bottle fame, brew glory, even stopper death-- if you aren't as big a bunch of dunderheads as I usually have to teach."
Harry swallowed hard in the silence that answered this speech. Hermione was sitting on the edge of her seat beside him, her attention so intense it seemed to be an attempt to bore into Snape's mind the idea that she, at least, was no dunderhead.
"Potter!" said Snape suddenly. "What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"
Hermione shot her hand instantly into the air, but Harry had no idea. He stared at Snape, wracking his brain to try and place either of the words, but he had no hope of answering correctly. "I don't know, sir."
A faint titter of laughter answered this. Harry felt his face flush. Snape's lip curled into a sneer. "Tut, tut – fame clearly isn't everything."
Ignoring Hermione's hand, he went on. "Let's try again. Potter," he hit the name hard, with a disdainful twist, "where would you look if I told you to find a bezoar?"
Harry had no idea, and his confusion was not helped by Hermione's contortions as she stretched her hand desperately upwards. He could hear Draco's laughter, and didn't turn around.
"I don't know, sir," he had to say again.
"Thought you wouldn't open a book before coming, eh, Potter?"
Harry had flipped through all of his books at the Dursleys', and thought this an unfair accusation. Did Snape expect him to remember all of the thousand magical herbs and fungi in their textbook? He forced himself to meet Snape's eyes squarely, though he could feel Hermione quivering with excitement beside him, her hand stretched high.
"What is the difference, Potter, between monkshood and wolfsbane?"
This was horribly unfair of Snape, and Harry felt himself simmering. Unable to raise her hand further while seated, Hermione actually got out of her chair, which only served to make Harry feel smaller beside her. Not only was he feeling stupid, he had to acknowledge that beside Granger's obvious knowledge, he was letting Slytherin House down.
"I don't know," he said quietly. He longed to tell Snape to ask Hermione instead, but didn't want to make the difference between the houses quite so blatant.
Snape finally acknowledged Hermione, snapping an irritated, "Sit down," at her. "For your information, Potter, asphodel and wormwood make a sleeping potion so powerful it is known as the Draught of Living Death. A bezoar is a stone taken from the stomach of a goat and it will save you from most poisons. As far as monkshood and wolfsbane, they are the same plant, which also goes by the name of aconite. Well? Why aren't you copying that down?"
The last question was addressed to the entire class in an irritated snap, and everyone busied themselves rummaging for quills and jotting down notes. Hermione slumped disappointed beside Harry, giving him a look of pity that Harry suspected had more to do with his ignorance than the way Snape had been hassling him.
For the rest of the class, the Potions master seemed more interesting in harassing the Gryffindors than Harry. He had set his pupils to work on creating what he said was a simple potion to cure boils. It seemed dizzyingly complex to Harry, with dozens of ingredients and painstakingly complex instructions for assembling it. He was relieved for the first time that he was sitting beside Hermione Granger, as she seemed to know instinctively how to do these things.
As Snape circled the room watching them measure out porcupine quills and count horned slugs, he had some kind of rude word for nearly everyone in the class, though it was clear he was hardest on the Gryffindors. Only Draco escaped any criticism; it seemed Snape liked him. He sneered so derisively at Neville Longbottom that the boy looked near tears. Harry heard a chorus of snickers. Draco's he expected, but he had to avoid meeting Blaise's eyes when he realized he was participating.
"Harry, you're doing that wrong!" Hermione said, taking away the mortar and pestle he'd been using to crush his snake fangs. Harry's face burned, but he tried to push it down, instead swallowing hard and focusing on what Hermione was doing. Snape came by and looked down at the pair of them with a disapproving expression, but he didn't say anything. The back of Harry's neck prickled.
A loud hissing sound began behind Harry, and he turned in his seat to see that Longbottom had managed to melt a hole in his partner's cauldron. Their potion was spreading over the floor, burning holes in everything it touched. Harry hurriedly scrambled up onto his stool, and he wasn't alone. Neville had been drenched when the cauldron gave way, and angry red boils were springing up all over his arms and legs. He was giving helpless pained moans.
"Idiot boy," Snape snarled with a total lack of sympathy. He pulled his wand from a pocket of his robe and, with a single wave, cleared away all of the spilled potion. "I suppose you added the porcupine quills before taking the cauldron off the fire?"
Neville could not answer. Boils were spreading across his nose now.
"Take him up to the hospital wing," Snape spat at Longbottom's partner, who looked furious. Snape rounded on Harry.
"Potter," he snapped. "Why didn't you tell him not to add the quills? Thought it would make you look good if he got it wrong, did you?"
This was so unfair that Harry couldn't keep down his protest. "I was looking completely the other way!"
Snape's expression darkened, but Harry thought he saw a gleam in his eye. "How dare you talk back to me? Detention, Potter. I will see you tonight in my office."
Detention in his first week! Harry wanted to protest again, but stomped hard on the impulse; it certainly wouldn't help his situation. Draco and Crabbe and Goyle were openly laughing, and a few of the Gryffindors looked amused. Harry turned determinedly back to his cauldron. Hermione cast him a sidelong long, then went quietly back to work.
Harry managed to get out of Potions without further mishap. He met up with Blaise outside the hallway, who offered a commiserative, "He has it in for you."
"I don't know why!" Harry protested. "I didn't do anything in there!"
"Maybe you should try a little harder not to get upset," Blaise said. "He can't do anything too bad if you don't lose your temper with him."
Just then, Ron Weasley came out with Dean Thomas, the boy he'd only half-recognized before. Thomas offered him an unfriendly grin and said, "Next time, maybe you won't be so quick to show off, eh, Potter?"
Harry ached with the injustice of this accusation, but didn't respond. It hurt to see that Ron smiled along with the gibe. Instead, Blaise snapped back at Dean, "Talk to me when you've got decent magical blood, Thomas."
"Back off, Zabini," Ron snapped. Blaise just laughed and led Harry away. Harry glanced back over his shoulder at Ron as he left, watching the red-headed boy disappear around the corner.
It was with a deep sense of dread that Harry descended from the Great Hall to his detention with Snape that evening. He paused outside the door for a long minute, steeling himself to knock.
His tentative rap was answered by a low word: "Enter."
Harry pushed the door open and stepped into the office. Snape was sitting in front of a cauldron, brewing something noxious and foul-smelling. His black eyes rested on Harry as he came in through the door, glittering darkly. Harry resisted the urge to look away.
"Potter." Snape let the name hang there, dripping verbal poison.
Harry forced himself to remain respectful, "Good evening, Professor."
Snape's lip curled at the greeting. "Sit," he ordered, jerking his chin to indicate a chair. Harry crossed to perch uncomfortably on the edge of the seat. He swallowed the lump forming in his throat.
"This," Snape said, his voice that same quiet sneer, "is the Draft of Unquenchable Thirst. It will cause the drinker to fixate upon an object, able to focus on nothing else until they have obtained it. It is a difficult potion to make, and requires painstaking diligence. Tonight, you will stir it for me. Exactly one stir every two seconds, reversing direction every six stirs. Continue until it turns to a thick amber syrup. Three hours should suffice."
Three hours? The smell of the potion was already beginning to sting Harry's eyes. He knew better than to complain, however. "Yes, professor," he said helplessly.
"Should you botch the job," Snape said, "as I am certain you will, you can return here tomorrow to try again. Eventually, I imagine you will grasp the fundamentals."
Snape's eyes shone with malice. Harry remained mute, staring defiantly at him. After a moment, Snape continued. "I will leave you to it. Take the cauldron off the fire when you are done. And Mr. Potter… Do be careful. This potion has an unfortunate tendency to scar the mixer. And I should hate to see you… marred."
He held the spoon out to Harry. After a second of staring at Snape, Harry accepted it and stuck it into the cauldron, beginning his slow stirs. He didn't look at Snape, but he could hear the smile in his voice as he said, "Good night, Potter."
The door banged shut behind Snape.
The silence in the room was overpowering. Harry sat in front of the cauldron, whose quiet hiss somehow deepened the silence, instead of cutting it. It was going to be a long night. For the first few minutes, he concentrated on his stirring, but the slow monotony of it grated his nerves. Once he had a rhythm established, it took very little effort to maintain: six stirs clockwise, six stirs counterclockwise, reverse.
Before long, his attention began to wander around the room. The glass jars on the wall were filled with unrecognizable objects, shining wetly in the dim light. Across the table, a scattering of parchment sheets rested, including a clipping from the Daily Prophet. Bored, Harry read the article.
GRINGOTTS BREAK-IN LATEST
Investigations continue into the break-in at Gringotts on 31 July, widely believed to be the work of Dark wizards or witches unknown.
Gringotts goblins today insisted that nothing had been taken. The vault that was searched had in fact been emptied the same day.
"But we're not telling you what was in there, so keep your noses out if you know what's good for you," said a Gringotts spokesgoblin this afternoon.
31 July was the day Harry had gone with Hagrid to Gringotts; it was possible the break-in had happened while they were there! In fact… Hagrid had emptied a vault that day, vault seven hundred and thirteen, and had been so secretive when Harry pressed him on it. Was there a connection? And if so, what did Snape have to do with it? Why had he kept the clipping?
With so much to think about, the rest of Harry's detention flew by.