EXPERTISE DISREGARDED
This is a non-profit tribute to the works of JK Rowling who, together with her publishers and licensees, owns the characters and situations elaborated herein.
Thanks to my reviewers and especially to my previewers, Bellegeste and Cecelle. Acknowledgements to Caeria, who has used a similar house-elf idea in "Pet Project", which may have subconsciously inspired me though I wrote this in good faith. (Thanks to Hebi R. for pointing that out.)
WARNING This fic contains HBP Spoilers. Enter at own risk if you haven't read HBP.
Hermione had never expected that one day she'd be sitting in the common room on a Sunday evening compiling a mental list of "Ways in which Professor Snape resembles a house-elf" (Item one, his life is not his own. Item two, when he says "my master", he doesn't mean "the one who taught me Potions". Item three, his work isn't meant to be noticed…)
If Ron and Harry knew what she was thinking about! She closed her mental notebook with a snap – funny how her internal environment was still stubbornly Muggle after 6 years of immersion in wizardry, with spiral notebooks and pens instead of parchment and quills – and turned to see what they were up to. Ron had given up moaning with Dean and Seamus about the Apparition test coming too soon – there'd be practice sessions every weekend though - and was struggling through his essay on Dementors while they huddled in a far corner over their own work. Harry was scouring that blasted Potions cheat book again and everyone else had gone to bed.
"You won't find anything in there," she told Harry. As if a student from fifty years ago could explain how to persuade a professor he (or, more likely, she) had probably never met, to incriminate himself over critical information he'd given a developing Dark Lord!
Unless – She toyed for a moment with the question of whether it could be Slughorn's own student text. No! Ridiculous! If it was his, firstly he'd have recognised it at the outset, when he handed it over in their first lesson, and secondly, he'd surely have published his improvements in the meantime, if only for the money and professional acclaim. Instead they were still struggling through Libatius Borage's error-filled excrescence. Advanced Potions Making? More like potions-bungling!
"Don't start, Hermione. If it hadn't been for the Prince, Ron wouldn't be sitting here now," Harry said.
"He would if you'd just listened to Snape in our very first year." Our very first lesson!
For the first time, she wondered if there had been any significance to the fact that all three of his questions that long-ago day had involved poisons – well, almost. The Draught of Living Death wouldn't actually kill you, but it mimicked death so well you might end up buried alive.
But Harry never would listen to Snape. (Item five, his expertise is disregarded, right after item four, he gets no thanks, only blame.) Not even now that he was teaching them a subject Harry actually cared about. A subject that Harry would definitely need, if he were going to fight a Dark Lord to the death in the probably-near future.
Then again, when did Harry ever listen to anyone? He certainly wasn't listening to her. If there were a way of using magic to get Slughorn speaking, wouldn't Dumbledore already have used it? Unless it was illegal, like Imperio, of course. And that left only one logical conclusion.
"Only you can get the memory, Dumbledore says. That means you can persuade Slughorn where other people can't." Presumably that meant either because Slughorn used to be fond of Harry's mum or something to do with the "Power the Dark Lord knows not" - whatever that was.
Ron's hand slowed, then stopped. He stared at his parchment, shaking his quill so hard his friends turned to look at him.
"How do you spell 'belligerent'?" he asked. "It can't be B-U-M -"
"No, it isn't." Hermione pulled his essay closer to have a look. It was so full of errors she could barely make sense of it. What on earth? Maybe someone had hexed his quill?
"It's one of Fred and George's Spell-Checking ones … but I think the charm must be wearing off…" he said.
Fred and George's Spell-Checking quills? Oh, how typical! She stared at the essay in horrified fascination. "How to Deal with Dugbogs" by Roonil Wazlib. Had all of Ron's schoolwork for the last however many months been written with this quill? She wondered if the spelling had changed after he'd written it, in which case all his notes might be useless, or whether he'd somehow managed to write his own name and half his essay wrong without even noticing.
Those two! She'd have to have a word with them next time she saw them, not that they'd listen, any more than Harry did. Less, in fact, but she hadn't forgotten the trick of getting their attention. Mrs Weasley wouldn't be very impressed if Ron failed because he didn't have any readable notes to study from.
Luckily, she knew how to fix this. All she had to do was tap each mistake with her wand and think Reparo. Ron sank back in his chair, rubbing the weariness out of his eyes, and said something that left her breathless.
"I love you, Hermione."
How long had she been waiting to hear him say that? For a moment, she let herself luxuriate in the longed-for words, but he didn't mean it the way she wanted it, not really. Anyhow, he was someone else's boyfriend now. She knew what she had to say.
"Better not let Lavender hear you saying that."
"I won't." Ron's face was still hidden. "Or maybe I will … then she'll ditch me…"
Hermione's breath caught again. Did he want Lavender to ditch him? And if he did, what did that mean? Was it prompted by anything more promising than boredom and the realisation that he and Lavender had nothing in common except hormones (as Snape had put it), or had that earlier comment been more than mere pleasantry? If she'd ever thought she didn't mind whom Ron loved, the thudding of her suddenly hopeful heart disillusioned her.
She said nothing and went on painstakingly identifying and correcting errors as the boys started rambling about break-ups. If they knew how desperately she was listening to their conversation, they'd change the subject and she wanted to hear this.
"The more I hint I want to finish it, the tighter she holds on," Ron grumbled. "It's like going out with the Giant Squid."
Hermione smiled inwardly. So that answered that. Yes to her first question and as for the second – She could wait. Lavender might cling like velcro, but sooner or later she'd have to get the message and give up. She wasn't the sort to try to trick Ron into an engagement. She might be silly and shallow, but she'd never been sneaky.
It took twenty long, tedious minutes to correct all the spelling mistakes in the essay, by which time she'd begun a new mental list, "Hexes the Weasley twins deserve". If she had to do that to the rest of his notes, the twins might find themselves transfigured to something really nasty, like a toilet brush set.
By the time she at last handed the parchment back to Ron, first Dean, then Seamus, had gone to bed. Harry finally closed the Potions book with a sigh and Hermione kept her "I told you so" to herself and picked up the book she'd been pretending to read before.
There was something she'd been trying not to think about, something she'd been using her silly lists as a distraction from; what was "the terrible thing" Professor Snape refused to talk about, the unwanted task that he was going to be forced to perform?
So many possibilities, each worse than the other! Freeing the Death Eaters from Azkaban, going on Muggle raids – but if he hadn't had to do any of that until now, why would that have changed? Why would Voldemort risk losing his Order spy for jobs any Death Eater could do?
So it must be something that only he could do. Something involving Hogwarts, like letting Death Eaters into the school. Only, he'd said that it was nothing to do with her friends, that they'd be protected. So either it was aimed at specific students, say first year Hufflepuffs or seventh year Divination students or something, or it wasn't going to happen till after they caught the train home.
She jumped at a sudden Crack! It startled Ron into knocking ink all over his freshly corrected essay. Kreacher? What was he doing here?
"Master said he wanted regular reports on what the Malfoy boy is doing -"
Crack!
Dobby was suddenly beside the other elf, scowling resentfully at him.
"Dobby has been helping too, Harry Potter!"
Hermione stared at them. What was going on, she wondered? What had Harry done now? A brief guilty silence followed her question.
"Well … they've been following Malfoy for me," Harry said weakly.
She would never understand boys, never! Harry couldn't stand the sight of Kreacher! He blamed him for helping to get Sirius killed last year. She'd have thought him more likely to punch Kreacher than to employ him. It just showed how obsessed Harry was with Malfoy. If she didn't know it was Ginny that Harry wanted, she'd be thinking some rather disturbing thoughts right now. Urgh, Harry and ferret-face! She gave her mind a scrub with an imaginary piece of steel wool.
And what? The poor things had stayed up all night for a week to do it? She glared at Harry. Had he told them not to sleep?
"No, of course I didn't," Harry disclaimed hastily.
If Hermione hadn't been so angry, she might have laughed at the contrast between the two house-elves. One saying "Master Malfoy moves with a nobility that befits his pure blood"; the other calling him "a bad boy", then having to be restrained from diving into the fire. (Ways Snape resembles a house-elf, item six, he daren't speak against his master – except to his other one. Item seven, he's always punishing himself.)
"Kreacher should know that Draco Malfoy is not a good master to a house-elf!" Dobby added.
Oh, she could believe that all right. How could he be? Snot-nosed pasty-faced ferrety little copy of not-so-dear-old-dad! He'd be about as good a master to a house-elf as – as Voldemort must be to Snape. She bit her lip. (Item eight, his master – one of them anyway - is merciless and cruel.)
Dobby was talking again. Hang on, what was that? Regular visits to the seventh floor? A variety of students who keep watch while Malfoy enters?
"The Room of Requirement!" Harry exclaimed, smacking his book on his forehead.
That was where Malfoy kept sneaking off to and that was why Harry couldn't find him on the Marauder's Map. It all made sense now. That must be part of the magic of the Room of Requirement. If you needed it to be unplottable, it would be. The only reason Malfoy had been able to find it when they used it last year was that stupid Marietta had blabbed that it was DA Headquarters. Unfortunately, that meant they weren't much further forward than before. They knew where ferret-face went, but they couldn't follow him in or see what he was doing there.
"You don't know what the Room becomes when Malfoy goes in there, so you don't know what to ask it to transform into," she pointed out since Harry didn't seem to understand and was excitedly making plans. He dismissed that, as he always did when her conclusions were unwelcome.
"There'll be a way around that," he said, congratulating Dobby.
"Kreacher's done well, too," Hermione added automatically. All right, yes, he was a horrid, prejudiced old thing who'd betrayed Sirius to his death and loved the Malfoys, but he was a slave so you could hardly blame him. (Snape's a slave. You can't blame him either. What did that make, item nine? And item ten, he doesn't want to be freed. He's been a slave too long to know any other way. Or is it just that he doesn't believe he can be?)
As usual, Kreacher wasn't grateful. He stared at the ceiling and muttered darkly about Mudbloods. Harry ordered him away, then more gently sent Dobby off to get some sleep.
Ron was glumly but ineffectually mopping at his ink-soaked essay. Hermione pulled it to herself for another rescue operation, this time using her wand as a siphon. Surprisingly, it was Harry who solved the next question.
"There aren't a whole variety of students standing guard for Malfoy," he said, jumping up and starting to pace. "It's just Crabbe and Goyle as usual." Malfoy must have stolen some Polyjuice Potion in their first lesson. So that little girl they'd met on the way down from the Infirmary, the one who'd dropped her scales and Hermione had mended them –
"Of course!" Harry added. "Malfoy must have been inside the Room at the time, so she – what am I talking about? – he dropped the scales to tell Malfoy not to come out, because there was someone there." He remembered another "little girl" on another occasion, who'd dropped toad-spawn as they passed. "We've been walking past him all the time and not realising it."
So Crabbe and Goyle were Polyjuicing themselves into girls? That didn't sound very smart, considering the possible long-term side-effects of cross-gender transmutation.Well, this was Crabbe and Goyle. They weren't known for their brains..
Hermione rolled up Ron's essay and gave it back to him before it could come to any more harm. This was all very well, but Harry was still on the wrong track. What he was supposed to be concentrating on was getting that memory from Slughorn. She told him so and the next morning at breakfast, she told him again.
The news in The Prophet was worse. Mundungus arrested for impersonating an Inferius during an attempted burglary – served him right, the sneak-thief, but he was still an Order member and it would be disastrous if he was interrogated under Veritaserum – Octavius Pepper vanished and oh, how horrible! A nine-year-old arrested after having killed his grandmother while under Imperio.
It was Ancient Runes first, without the boys, then Defence. Harry was late again. Snape took ten points off immediately and Hermione managed not to nod in agreement. That was fair enough and besides, where had Harry been? Her heart sank at the suspicion that he was still wasting his time on Malfoy.
Everyone – except maybe Harry and Ron – could tell that Snape liked teaching Defence much more than Potions. Even Neville breathed easy and today Seamus actually interrupted him with a question. Catch anyone doing that before this year!
"Sir, I've been wondering, how do you tell the difference between an Inferius and a ghost? Because there was something in the Prophet about an Inferius -"
Snape corrected him without even taking points.
" - Nothing but a smelly sneak-thief by the name of Mundungus Fletcher."
"I thought Snape and Mundungus were on the same side," Harry muttered. "Shouldn't he be upset –"
Hermione set her teeth. Oh, really, she thought. Didn't stop you from trying to strangle him last time we saw him! Why did Harry always have to start? He knew Snape wouldn't let students chatter in his lesson, especially when he was talking himself. Naturally, Snape pounced.
"Potter seems to have a lot to say on the subject. Let us ask Potter how we would tell the difference between an Inferius and a ghost," he said.
Hermione sank down in her chair. Harry had asked for that. Anyone who disrupted lessons by talking when Snape did was asking for that. Then she sank even lower at Harry's abysmally stupid answer. Most of the Slytherins were smirking.
Ghosts were transparent? That was the best he could do? He could at least have said "insubstantial", as in "also able to pass through solid objects or float through the air". Not to mention that ghosts can talk and see and make decisions while Inferi are just corpses that move around by their master's command. And since no one but a Dark Wizard would raise an Inferi, they were always, and by definition, "out to get you".
Yes, ghosts were transparent and Inferi weren't. That was like saying the difference between tigers and zebras was the colour of their stripes or the difference between horses and thestrals was that thestrals were invisible - never mind the fangs and bat-wings and attraction to human blood! Honestly! The only thing alike about ghosts and Inferi was that both were dead!
Naturally again, Snape had to rub it in. An Inferius was a re-animated corpse while a ghost was a departed soul's imprint...
"And, of course, as Potter so wisely tells us," the teacher sneered, "transparent." And still he hadn't taken any more points!
And naturally, Ron had to make it worse by arguing. As if there was any chance of mixing up ghosts with Inferi, no matter how dark the alley! Ten points and a put-down, she really couldn't blame Snape for handing those out, but why did he have to use just what would hurt the most?
"Ron Weasley, the boy so solid he cannot Apparate half an inch across a room."
She flinched, but collected herself enough to grab Harry's arm before he could land himself back in detention. Snape returned with a triumphant smirk to his original subject, the Cruciatus Curse, page two hundred and thirteen in their textbooks.
"I know they asked for it," she told him the next night in their session, "but did you have to be so cruel?"
"Do you have to try to shield everyone around you from the consequences of their actions?" he replied coldly. "Do you think you're helping anyone by doing so?"
(Last two items, eleven and twelve, he doesn't like me and he doesn't want my help.)
If she looked at him, she'd cry. So she didn't.
A/N 1) Some lines of dialogue are taken from HBP, Ch 21, The Unknowable Room.
2) Most dates come from the Harry Potter Lexicon, but it dates the posting of the Apparition Test notice at Mar 16 and the actual test at April 21, five weeks later. However, according to the chapter, the day after the notice goes up is the Defence class described above, followed immediately by Moaning Myrtle's tale of a crying boy. The chapter then continues, "And so the following weekend, Ron joined the rest of the sixth-years who would turn seventeen in time to take the test in two weeks…" It seems, therefore, that the canon time period is only three weeks, not five.
3) I feel I need to explain Hermione's reaction in the Defence class. There are two questions, "Why does Hermione think Harry asked for Snape's ridicule?" and "Why does Hermione think Harry's answer is stupid?"
a) Harry's behaviour (talking over the teacher) implied that Harry thought he knew better than him on the subject under discussion. Therefore it was for Harry to show that he knew the answer, even though they hadn't learnt it in class.
b) How do you tell the difference between an Inferius and a ghost? Easily. One is a body, the other is a spirit and they look like what they are, ie too different to misidentify. At first glance, you might mistake an Inferius for a person (that's why Mundungus tried to impersonate one) or a corpse or a Vampire but you would not mistake it for a ghost.
To a wizard, "Ghosts are transparent" is as obvious as "Tigers and zebras have different colour stripes" - and as peripheral to defining differences. The only similarity between Inferi and ghosts is that both are dead humans. The only visual similarity is that both are human-sized and human-shaped. The human eye and brain take in an enormous amount of other information in an instant, for example, surface appearance (colour, luminosity, pattern), substantiality (transparency, solidity, weightiness), position (stance, location), movement (speed, direction, type), danger/threat (difficult to quantify). Ghosts and Inferi differ in almost all of these characteristics.
When two creatures are more different than they are alike, picking out one visual difference from a plethora of far more essential differences is not useful. In any case, since the subtext to Seamus's question is "How can I recognise an Inferi instantly?" Harry's answer needs to focus on what's distinctive about Inferi, not what's distinctive about ghosts.