Thank you for the reviews yesterday!
This is just a notice that after Chapter 13, I may not be able to update for a few days, as I'll be moving and I don't know for certain if my new apartment has Internet access. If not, then I'll simply continue writing the chapters and post several of them in a row when I get Internet set up.
Enjoy this chapter!
Chapter Twelve: The Old Mastiff
Harry turned with the grip on his shoulder, gaze fixing on the man who stood over him. He tried, automatically, to meet the man's eyes, but found it unexpectedly difficult.
Of course, one of the eyes was a blue coin rolling around to the back of his skull, which would have puzzled even Snape on how to meet it, Harry thought. The other was dark, but piercing, and looked through Harry as though judging him for the Dark spell he had just used.
Harry knew where he was when he looked at the man's face and saw the scars that twisted over every inch of skin, and the nose that looked as though someone had taken a hammer to it. Add to that a wooden leg replacing the real one, and Harry was on firm ground. "Auror Moody," he said.
The man's hand loosened on his shoulder, and Moody let out a blistering laugh, shifting his weight onto his good leg. "Not Auror any more, boy," he said. "Retired. And your new Defense professor, at Dumbledore's request." He studied Harry for a moment with a grim smile, then pulled the collar of his robe away from his neck. "And I suppose it's only fair that you know about this."
Harry blinked when he saw the silver gleam of a collar that was similar to the ones the Hounds wore.
Regulus snarled in his head. Maybe he was the one I sensed before, as well as Bellatrix. I think he must have a connection to Voldemort of some kind, Harry, but that damn collar is in the way. Can you ask him to take it off?
Harry blinked again and met Moody's eyes; the blue one had rolled into the front of his skull to stare at him. You ask him, he thought.
"Heard that you had a bit of trouble with former Aurors wearing collars like these," said Moody expansively. "You don't have to worry, boy. I was the one who made them, back when we had to face real Dark wizards every day, not bored children like Fudge and fourteen-year-old Parselmouths." He spat. "These 'Hounds' copied my design. I don't take mine off, but I'm also not under Fudge's control." He smiled, and his eye spun wildly. "Just so that you know."
Harry nodded at him, then turned and knelt over the Ravenclaw girl again. He supposed that Moody had some other reason for coming over than just to speak to him about the collar, but since the professor was done talking, Harry intended to see the girl to the hospital wing.
"What's your name?" he asked, as he helped her to her feet.
"Harry," Draco whined.
"Cho Chang," said the girl, with a faint smile at him. "And you're Harry Potter, of course. No need to ask that."
"Harry," Draco insisted.
Harry balanced Cho on his shoulder—she was taller than he was, but considerably lighter—and peered at Draco. "What?"
Draco was watching Cho with an expression of intense distaste, but, Harry thought, that was nothing new. Draco seemed to be jealous of any other person who touched Harry for so much as a second. "Can't Professor Moody take her to the hospital wing?" he said. "I think that you should get back inside the wands. There was just a Death Eater here, in case you forgot."
Harry blinked. Yes, he had forgotten. And now that he thought about it, he wondered how he could have. The image of Bellatrix's arm erupting in blood and bone was vivid, just waiting behind his eyes to pounce him.
He shuddered and glanced at Professor Moody, who had stalked over to the bloody mess on the ground that was Bellatrix's hand and wand. He prodded at them for a moment, then knelt with a grunt and a splay of his wooden leg. Harry watched in sick fascination as he unfolded the fingers from the wand.
"Don't want to leave Death Eaters' wands lying about, boy," he said, wagging the long black stick at Harry. "Nasty business. I've known more than one of them to be a death trap for enemies." He drew his own wand and waved it at the one he held. "Inopia!"
The wand shivered once, and than a cage of blue force built around it. Harry shivered. Perhaps she's good at wandless magic after all, he thought, to Apparate away after leaving her wand here. Or perhaps someone else snatched her.
Or perhaps Moody had something to do with it, Regulus suggested in his head. I don't think I trust him, Harry.
Like I said, said Harry, readjusting Cho's weight on his shoulder, you can be the one to ask him if he can bare his left arm and show you the lack of a Dark Mark. I'll believe his story about the collar for right now, until I learn otherwise. A Hound wouldn't be stupid enough to come in openly wearing the collar, anyway.
You never know, Regulus muttered, but he fell obligingly silent.
"Sorry about this," Harry said to Cho, as they started to walk towards the school. Cho was recovering with every step of the way, but Harry didn't like the way she breathed. She must have at least a slight case of shock, from being so suddenly snatched and used as a hostage like that. "Even with what tends to happen around me, that was a bit extreme."
"I've been reading the papers over the summer," Cho assured him as they walked up the front steps of Hogwarts. "I thought this was practically normal for you."
Harry gave her a surprised glance, and then snorted when he saw the smile curving her lips. "Practically," he agreed. "But this is the first time that I've ever really managed to wound a Death Eater, instead of the other way around."
"Good," said Cho. "I wouldn't want her to get away unharmed for attacking me."
Harry reevaluated the girl as he helped her limp down the corridors to the hospital wing (it seemed she'd also twisted her ankle when Bellatrix flung her the ground). Cho was already recovering, color flushing her cheeks again, her head coming up and a faint grimace of embarrassment twisting her mouth whenever she looked at Harry. Harry supposed she was stronger than she looked.
Of course, she plays for Ravenclaw, doesn't she? he recalled abruptly. Their Seeker. She would have to be less delicate than she looks.
"Harry."
Harry blinked and turned around. Draco was in the hallway behind them, panting as though he'd run to catch up with them.
"Professor Snape wants to see you right now," he said. "I'll take Chang the rest of the way to the hospital wing."
He glared at Cho, who blinked back, frowning slightly, as though she didn't know what she'd done to earn Draco's enmity. Harry rolled his eyes. The jealousy was rising off Draco like steam, and he would have wagered many things that this was only a ploy to get him away from the girl.
He can calm down. No one else is going to become a better friend to me than he is.
Harry would have wagered that, and refused to abandon Cho, if Draco hadn't chosen Snape as the excuse. Snape would have assigned Draco detention in moments if he found himself being used in a trick like that.
That meant he really did want to see Harry.
Harry nodded apologetically to Cho. "Professor Snape is my legal guardian, and I sort of have to do what he says. If you don't mind—"
"Not at all," Cho assured him. "I told you, I read the papers. And I think it's wonderful that Professor Snape is looking after you. Obviously, the Ministry can't be trusted to make the proper legal deposition for you." She squeezed his hand, giving him a sympathetic smile.
Harry nodded back to her, with a smile in return. At least there's someone in the world who doesn't think Professor Snape is an unfit guardian. He turned and trotted in the direction of the dungeons, while Draco took his place at Cho's side.
Draco waited until Harry was out of sight and earshot before he spoke. He'd walked with Chang, of course, and the idiotic girl had tried to make a few stabs at conversation, but he ignored them. He was just making sure there was no chance that Harry could hear them.
When he was certain, he turned and glared straight at Chang. She'd opened her mouth to say something else, but she closed it now and watched him with her eyebrows drawn down. "What's the matter?" she asked after a moment.
"Stay away from him," said Draco softly. "Stay away, do you hear?" It was a blunter threat than he might have made otherwise, but he could still see the way that his aunt had faced Harry, and the surge of pride and terror he'd felt on seeing Harry's Dark spell. It was wrong that Harry had felt forced to defend the Chang girl like that. He didn't want to use violent spells; Draco knew he didn't. And that spell was not only violent, it was also Dark. Draco knew, if Harry didn't, that the sympathy of the wizarding public was as easy to lose as it was to gain. Let word get out of him doing Dark spells, and more people might swing back to support the Minister.
Chang shrugged at him, uncomprehending. "I don't know what you want me to say, Malfoy," she said. "At the very least, I owe him thanks for saving my life, which I'll present to him more formally later. And it looks like he knows a lot of magic. I've never even heard of that spell he used on the Death Eater." Her dark eyes sparkled with a Ravenclaw's curiosity. "I could probably learn a lot from him."
"So you are planning on talking to him again?" Draco demanded.
Chang lifted one of her eyebrows. "I would think that would be obvious."
Draco drew his wand. Chang took a hobbling step backward, supporting an obviously twisted ankle, but didn't draw her own. She just watched in fascination while Draco hissed at her, "I don't want you coming near him again." Once again, he felt compelled to be blunt. Harry had actually been talking with the girl, smiling at her. He had obviously been comfortable in her company. There weren't many people Harry was comfortable with. Draco didn't want the circle to expand further.
Chang didn't back down, to Draco's fury. She simply watched him with her head on one side, the skin around her eyes pulled tight in a frown, as though trying to figure out why he would do this.
"Promise me," Draco whispered, one of the nasty little hexes that his father had taught him an inch from his lips.
"I think that you should ask Harry about that," said Chang calmly, not moving. "After all, does he usually let you choose his friends for him? There was nothing in the papers about that."
Draco's fury grew. Her words forced him to think back to Snape's pronouncement yesterday evening, that he was acting irrational. He didn't want to think that he was acting irrationally. He was the only one who knew the actual depth of his love for Harry, and that meant he was the only one who had the right to make decisions based on that.
"I mean it, Chang," he said, striving for a tone that would permanently scare the girl. "Stay away from him."
The girl rolled her eyes. "Are you going to help me to the hospital wing or not?"
Draco studied her. She was avoiding his eyes now, and making odd little grimaces of pain as she hopped, obviously trying to avoid supporting weight on her ankle. Draco noted that she hadn't said she would stay away from Harry.
Well, she hadn't said she wouldn't, either. Draco was content, for now, to put his wand away and help her, so that he could tell Harry he had, later. If she came near him again, then he could hex her without remorse.
"You wanted to see me, sir?" Harry asked, putting his head around the door of Snape's office. In truth, he was shocked that Snape was still here. He'd have expected him to be at the Sorting Feast by now, overseeing the introduction of the new Slytherins into his House. But perhaps the Sorting Feast had been delayed for the Death Eater attack. Harry wouldn't have put it past Dumbledore to make sure everyone was calmed down and could properly enjoy the food and the Sorting, perhaps with some of his compulsion.
"Yes," said Snape, his voice quiet. He was watching a bubbling cauldron, full of a clear potion that Harry didn't recognize. "I want to know why you used the spell that you did against Bellatrix Lestrange."
Harry winced. He really didn't think his guardian was angry. He sounded weary, which was worse. "It was the best one I could think of," he answered honestly. "I thought she could resist an Expelliarmus, and I wanted to cause enough damage that she would retreat from the field permanently." He shrugged. "Making her leave her wand behind was just a bonus."
Snape turned around. Harry blinked. He had never seen that particular expression on his guardian's face before, rather as if Snape had watched him drop off a cliff and then winds levitate him back up. It was a fortunate coincidence, but one couldn't count on it to happen again.
"Sir?" Harry whispered.
Snape strode across the room to him and stared down into his face. Harry stared back, craning his neck to do so.
"I have accepted that you are in danger from moment to moment, whatever you may think of me," Snape began quietly. "I have accepted that many of those dangers, I can do nothing about. I can only make sure that you know the spells and the defenses that you will need to survive them.
"But there is one danger that I can make sure you do know about, Harry, because I was in the thick of it from the time I was seventeen to the time I was nineteen."
Harry blinked. "When you were part of the Death Eaters, sir?"
Snape bowed his head with a sharp slashing motion. "When I was willingly a Death Eater," he agreed. "I used Dark spells before any other kind. I struck with the same kind of motivation that you used on Bellatrix tonight—that I had to make sure I killed or wounded my enemies before they could do me any harm. Oh, I told myself I was fighting to protect innocents, so that no pureblood child would ever have to know any harm from Muggles, but an excuse was all it was in the end."
Harry swallowed. "Sir," he said, his voice wavering, "I hardly think you need to worry about me becoming a Death Eater."
"That is the one thing I will never fear from you," said Snape, his voice going dry for a moment. Then it sobered again, into that tone that was frightening on its own, because Harry had never heard it from Snape before. "But I think I do need to worry about you using Dark spells, violent spells, as solutions to your problems. You are powerful, Harry. You could have done many things to Bellatrix other than cut off her hand. Why did you choose that instead?"
Harry shook his head. "I—don't know. It seemed to fit, once I'd thought of it. Cause her pain, make her retreat, and render her harmless to anyone else. But then she Apparated out, so maybe I haven't rendered her harmless."
Snape nodded again. "We all had abilities that we hid," he said, as if musing. Harry held his breath. Snape rarely talked about his time among the Death Eaters. "It may well be that one of Bellatrix's was wandless magic, or at least the ability to Apparate without the spell. There are a few other times that has happened." He focused on Harry again, and his eyes glittered, bright and sharp and present. "If you will use Dark spells and study the Dark Arts, and not just the defense against them, then you will do it with me. You are still less experienced with offensive magic than other kinds, Harry. You could have slipped up tonight and sliced the Chang girl, and if someone had not got to her in time, she would have bled to death. And with the Dark magic yesterday…" Snape shook his head. "I take it that I need not tell you how dangerous that was."
Harry winced. "Yes."
"Go to the Feast," said Snape, still quietly. "I will be along in a few moments. And remember, Harry. With Dark magic as with any other kind, you need to know and understand it before you use it, not afterwards."
Harry bowed his head, then slipped out of the office. He made it a few steps up the hallway before he stopped and leaned on the wall. He was shaking.
I really didn't think, did I? Just reached out and chose that spell, and then focused it on Bellatrix's hand. Snape is right. There are less dangerous things I could have done, both for myself and for those around me.
If I'm reckless with Dark magic the way I was with my life last year, then I stand to hurt not only myself, but other people.
I never want to be like that.
He stood, straightened his shoulders, and went to the Feast, grateful for the company of chattering voices at the Slytherin table and Draco's warm press against his shoulder as he slid into the seat beside him.
"Harry!"
Harry turned around, with a smile on his face, as Connor ducked under Ron's arm and hurried towards him. He and Draco were on their way to breakfast, and Harry could feel his friend shifting impatiently beside him, but he could certainly spare a few moments to greet his brother. He'd smiled at him across the Great Hall last night, but had had no chance to get away. All the Slytherins wanted to talk to him about his summer and his abduction and his use of Dark magic and what spell he'd done in saving Cho.
Connor hugged him, roughly, and Harry was a bit surprised to realize that they were of a height now. Connor's hair had also gone slightly wilder, as though trying to look more like Harry's, and flopped back and forth over his heart-shaped scar as he held Harry back a short distance and examined him critically.
"You'll do," he said at last. "I suppose Snape's been feeding you properly?"
Harry rolled his eyes, but he was grinning. He thought both Connor and James must think that Snape was feeding him on grave dirt and cobwebs, or perhaps James just thought that and had given the impression to his brother. "Yes, fine. Not as fine as the meals at Lux Aeterna, maybe, but more interesting. We eat while we're discussing potions sometimes."
Connor wrinkled his nose. "Harry, try not to bore me to death before we even get to class, all right?" He turned and walked beside Harry into the Great Hall, ignoring both Draco's attempt to shove him away and Ron's prompt and growing spat with Draco. "Lux Aeterna was boring without you," he confessed in a murmur. "Dad and Remus tried, but there's only so much dueling you can do before it gets boring. Same with reading. And sometimes Remus wouldn't duel with me—"
"Near the full moon?" Harry asked. They were near the point where they would have to split to go to their House tables, but he decided, abruptly, that he wanted to sit with his brother this morning, custom be damned. There was no actual rule that someone from Slytherin House couldn't eat at the Gryffindor table, so he strolled over with Connor and sat down with a nod at the various other people gathered there, listening as Connor talked to him.
"Well, yes, then, of course." Connor piled his plate high with pancakes and handed the platter to Harry, who mimicked him. He seemed to be hungrier lately than he had ever been in his life, Harry thought dimly. "But sometimes he sat around and relived memories of the First War and said that he wished Sirius was alive to help train me, that that was the only way I would ever gain a greater understanding of some of the spells." Connor winced. "I think he wanted me to be in deep mourning with him half the time, and laugh half the time to help heal him of his grief."
Harry stifled his irritation that Remus would ask that of Connor. Remus probably hadn't even realized he was asking it. And it wasn't Connor's fault that he wasn't the type of person to lie around on his bed for weeks and refuse to eat when he was grieving someone. "That does sound boring," he agreed around a mouthful of pancakes. "I was relieved to hear that you'd got home all right from the World Cup. Did you suffer any injuries when the crowd started running?"
Connor shook his head, looking faintly amused. "That Ill Wind curse roused protective instincts in Dad. I think it sent him back about fifteen years, to when he used to be an Auror. He grabbed me, ran to the nearest Portkey, and got us out right away. Luckily, he went to Lux Aeterna and not somewhere else."
Harry nodded. "I thought something like that might have happened, but I wasn't sure."
"Harry, what are you doing?"
Harry blinked and looked up at Draco, who sounded far more indignant than he should, given that Harry hadn't run out of his sight or battled any Death Eaters this morning. "Having breakfast," he said.
"With them?" Draco made it sound as though the Gryffindor table was thick with flobberworms.
Harry caught a glimpse of movement out of the corner of his eye, and turned his head. The Weasley twins were sitting a few seats down from Connor, and had turned to watch Draco. A speculative gleam lit their eyes. Harry winced. "Um, Draco," he said, "some of them are my friends, too, and a lot of them are Connor's friends. Yes, I wanted to have breakfast with them."
Draco folded his arms. "Well, I don't want you to have breakfast with them."
Harry rolled his eyes and turned away, taking a bite of the pancakes. It was best just to ignore Draco when he was like this. He would get past it soon enough, especially when he saw how unimpressed Harry was with his childish behavior.
Draco's hand abruptly latched onto his shoulder. "Come on, Harry," he hissed in his ear, sounding furious. "Let's go back to the Slytherin table, where we're at home and we belong."
"Harry doesn't just belong there," Connor spoke up. "We all read the papers, Malfoy. Harry dashed into danger at the World Cup to save everyone else. I think that's pretty damn Gryffindor."
He looked along the table. Surprised, Harry followed his gaze, and saw other people nodding, or at least not looking as if they disagreed outright. Neville Longbottom caught his eye and gave him a shy smile.
"Yeah," he said, loud enough to make just a few people turn to him. He coughed and repeated himself. "Yeah! Harry was brave, and I think that means that he can sit here if he wants." He flinched then, as if expecting to be attacked by a pride of rabid lions, but Hermione, looking up from her book just then, nodded firmly.
"Yes, he can," she said. "And I want to know more about the Ill Wind curse, Harry, and what you did to counter it."
Harry relaxed. Having a discussion of what Rosier had done in the abstract was just the thing he needed to keep the memories of what it had been really like at bay. "Well, the Ill Wind curse affects the mind, so there are a few ways of fighting it. I used the Ventus spell on Draco. That clears his thoughts with a wind from my own thoughts, which had resisted the spell. But you have to look someone directly in the eye to do that, so of course it's of limited use with that many people. The other solution is Finite Incantatem, but—"
Draco abruptly seized his shoulder and yanked, hard. Harry released his fork and plate in time for them to land on the table, but his spoon went flying across the room and hit someone else on the head, provoking a startled yelp.
Harry tensed his muscles and called up his magic, breaking free of Draco's grip with a twist. "What the hell are you doing?" he snarled at his friend, straightening up and brushing at his robe where Draco had knocked it askew.
"We are going to eat at the Slytherin table," said Draco. "I don't like being here."
"Then go sit down at the Slytherin table." Harry had to fight to control his anger. Draco had always been protective of him, but, in this case, there was nothing to be protective about. The Gryffindors were being perfectly pleasant. "I'll join you for lunch, I promise you."
"Oh, does poor ickle Draco not feel at home at the Gryffindor table?" one of the Weasley twins crooned abruptly. "Don't worry, we'll make it all better for him."
Harry turned just in time to see the twins make flinging motions with their hands, wrists snapping in unfamiliar motions. Two small objects flew towards Draco, exploding at his feet. Trails of scarlet smoke raced into the air and curled around Draco, hiding him entirely from sight for a moment.
When the smoke cleared, most people stared and began roaring with laughter. Harry could even hear chuckles coming from the Slytherin table.
Draco now had hair in shocking shades of Gryffindor red and gold. His tie was striped in the same colors, with a prancing lion in the center of it, which paced and roared quite realistically. His robes had gone gold in the top half, scarlet in the bottom, and appeared to be covered in stars, from the way they glittered.
Harry shook his head. The twins really were magical geniuses. Harry could have willed that effect into being, maybe, but he could not have combined the dozens of small spells they would have had to combine to produce it.
The twins were half-collapsed over the table, they were laughing so hard. Even Connor had joined in, though Harry thought he had tried to resist, for his brother's sake. Neville was blinking, but other than that, the only one at the Gryffindor table not laughing was Harry.
Draco stood where he was for a moment, face Gryffindor red with humiliation, then turned and ran out of the room.
Harry tried to find it in himself to feel sorry for Draco, and couldn't. Draco had been asking for it. It was one thing to complain and moan and grumble about the Gryffindors—most of Slytherin House had done that, at some time or another—but another thing altogether to try and tug Harry away when he'd agreed to have breakfast with them. Harry rolled his eyes and turned back to his pancakes, hoping that the twins' enchantments would wear off soon.
"Harry?"
Harry blinked and turned around. He'd been so occupied with watching Draco and the results of the prank that he hadn't noticed a small delegation approaching him from the Ravenclaw table. Cho was in the lead of it, but behind her were a girl that Harry vaguely knew from his own year, Padma Patil, and Luna. Harry smiled at Luna, who gave him a slow, dreamy smile back.
"Hi, Cho," said Harry. "Has your ankle recovered?"
"Madam Pomfrey healed it in an instant, thank you," said Cho. "But I did not yet thank you properly for what you did in saving my life." She inclined her head and held forth a silver plate that Harry took in bewilderment. He studied it. It was round, with a pattern of what he thought were trumpet flowers along the sides. He had never seen anything like it that he could remember.
"My family has been dedicated to the Light for generations," said Cho, solemnly, and turned to take a small object from Padma. "But that does not mean we cannot recognize the old magic of sacrifice and life debt. We simply choose a different means to acknowledge it than blood."
She set the object in the center of the plate. It was a dish, Harry saw, also silver, with its sides worked as petals. It was also empty, but it tingled with magic when it was set down, and then sealed itself to the center of the plate. Harry balanced it carefully. It really wasn't much heavier than the plate alone had been, and he had to marvel at the craftsmanship.
"I choose to acknowledge my debt with water and with air, with earth and with fire," Cho went on, utterly serene, as she took a pitcher from Luna. She turned around again, and Harry realized for the first time that she wore a silver clip in her long dark hair, shaped like a trumpet flower itself. "Metal from the earth, forged with the aid of fire, and water that has fallen from the sky." Carefully, she poured the pitcher's contents into the dish.
Harry saw it was rainwater, silver and trembling. It landed in the dish and rippled for a moment, then stood utterly still.
Cho extended a hand towards plate and bowl and water, and whispered, "Memento vitae."
All three objects promptly began to shine with a white light so brilliant that Harry had to shield his eyes. When he could see again, they had become a silver bracelet, edged with a pattern of trumpet flowers, and trembling in color like rainwater. Harry held it up and stared at it.
"I—thank you," he said.
"I owe you my life," said Cho simply. "This is a reminder of it. If you are ever in danger, touch the bracelet and repeat Memento vitae. I will hear it, or a member of my family will if I cannot help you, and we will come." She fixed her dark eyes on Harry's face, and waited to hear what he would say.
Harry nodded and clasped the bracelet around his wrist. "Thank you. I will wear it with pride."
Cho bowed once, and then turned and walked back towards the Ravenclaw table, Padma and Luna following her. Harry turned and sat back down, blinking, at the Gryffindor table.
"You have to teach me Light rituals," said Hermione abruptly, shattering the silence. "There's so much I don't understand!"
Harry, relieved, joined in the laughter this time.
Snape narrowed his eyes as he stood to make his way to his first class. He had seen the pressure Draco put on Harry, and he understood it, probably far better than either boy did.
He would not be able to use detentions, either to give Draco more freedom and time apart from Harry, or to simply separate the boys. He would have to give Draco something to occupy his time alone, something special and personal and answering to his interests.
A certain Potions book, waiting patiently on the shelf in his office, contained the answer.