8. A Dog in a Poke
If you don't believe in ghosts, you've
never been to a family reunion.
~ Ashleigh Brilliant
The last three days before the 31st of July the elder Malfoys and Snape mostly were not at the camp, coming in and soon going away again. Harry was not really interested in details, though. He played Exploding Snap with Draco, missed Ron and Hermione somewhat terribly and sometimes wondered what the Order was up to these days. But mostly he longed for his coming of age. Three more days, and he will be able to use magic! On the 30th, he even tried to go to bed early so that his birthday would come sooner.
As it always goes with such good plans, he had trouble getting asleep first, and then slept straight through the night missing his usual midnight wake. So, the first person who congratulated Harry on his seventeenth birthday was Snape.
"Congratulations, Potter," he said, taking off his mask and yawning, "you are a wanted person now."
"What? Whatever for?"
"The Ministry seems to think you are involved in Albus Dumbledore murder. Either as a main witness or as an accused, it does not matter. By the way, I would not use magic yet, if I were you. You will be detected immediately."
Harry sat down right on his bum in shock, missing the log.
"But how is that possible?" he wailed.
"Elementary, Potter," Snape shrugged off his Death Eater garbs, as the sun was starting to shine in earnest. The day promised to be hot. "Since the Dark Lord could not find you tonight on Privet Drive, he decided that a small military takeover should console him after he was denied his bit of Potter hunting. The Ministry is virtually under his control now, so they simply did not take the tracking charm off you. It will end by itself, of course, but not for a week yet, at the very least."
"And Scrimgeour let them?" Harry could not believe his ears.
"They did not ask his opinion," Snape answered darkly. "And this is very good for him, because otherwise he would certainly say something imprudent. You Gryffindors are never able to bite your tongue when it is necessary."
"They just bite somebody else's head instead," quipped Draco, coming out of their hut. This time he was quick enough to avoid his mother's cuff.
"Stop being vulgar, if you please," she rebuked him. "Anyway, today is Harry's birthday. Please desist from talking politics."
"Never mind, I am interested in politics right now," Harry insisted. "I am curious."
"Curiosity killed a cat," Snape hissed.
"I am also curious," Lucius interfered, coming up to them. "I want to know what's going on, Sev."
"Nothing good," the Potions master admitted with reluctance. "Scrimgeour is in Azkaban, allegedly for letting Albus's murderer go and not really looking into the matter. We have a new Minister for Magic, one Pius Thicknesse. His is under Imperius, of course. And his right hand, Mr. Potter, is your good old friend Dolores Umbridge. The Dark Lord is going to make all Muggleborns give themselves up for registration and interrogation, because they steal magic of pure-bloods."
"What a farce," Harry growled.
"Real circus," Snape answered sourly, taking his usual place by the campfire, as Narcissa made for him his usual mug of coffee.
"That's enough," she said strictly. "Harry should have fun today and get presents, not worry out of his mind. Could you please bring here the blue package, Luce? You know where it is. I hope you have found what I asked you to, have you, Severus?"
Sighing, Snape nodded and took a small pack out of his robes.
"This is it," he said in lugubrious tones, giving it to Narcissa. "Everything, including vanilla and candles. Don't ask me for my cauldron, however. You can perfectly use your cooking pot for the dough."
Narcissa had not time to object, because at that moment Lucius came back, levitating the 'blue package', which turned out to be a dark-blue sack as big as a boar. The sack wriggled in the air.
"Happy birthday, Mr. Potter," said Lucius with a slight sneer. "That's from all of us."
He dropped the sack on the ground, and it barked angrily in a painfully familiar voice. Snape winced.
Harry went numb and could do nothing but stare.
"You know, Potter, it is traditional to open your birthday presents and to say 'thanks'," Draco told him snidely.
With shaking hands, Harry untied the sack. Something big, black and hairy burst out and jumped at him. When that something, looking strangely like Sirius Black's Grim form, started licking his face, barking madly and wagging its tail, Harry felt the world tilting. The last thing he heard before everything went black was Draco's indignant cry, "I told you! I told you we should get him a stiff drink first!"
ss SS ss
He was woken up by a simple Ennervate. Rubbing the bump on his nape, Harry sat up and looked around. Draco was standing nearby, grinning outright. Narcissa sat by the fire, energetically whipping up something in a big cooking pot. On the far side of the clearing, Snape and Sirius shouted at each other. Lucius looked smug, watching over them and holding two wands that he had obviously taken from them.
"How...?" Harry asked feebly.
Narcissa stopped whipping for a moment.
"He is my cousin, for what it's worth," she said in a matter of fact voice. "And the Blacks are able to get to a cousin wherever they are. It's a family thing. Now, could you be a dear and bring me a new sack of flour from our hut, please? Draco, you go help Harry."
When they returned with the flour, shouting had already stopped. Sirius, however, had a split lip, and Snape got a thick ear that went thicker and redder every second. Sirius looked almost guilty, as his furious cousin berated him. Snape stood aside, dishevelled, and tried to cover the injured ear with his hair, without much success.
"Why I am even trying?" he grumbled. "You will be the death of me, all of you. I don't know who is the worst here, really. I have a wedding to visit tomorrow! How I can go to a wedding with such an ear? Damn you to hell, you stupid mutt! Hey, by the way..." he suddenly brightened. "Black!"
"What do you want, Snivellus?" Sirius cried back. Narcissa immediately reached out and hit him on the forehead with the big spoon she used to knead the dough. Harry could not help giggling. It was obvious that Narcissa did not consider his godfather an adult.
"I was just going to tell you good news," Snape said with a sly smirk. "Your moon-suffering fluffy little friend got married to Cissy's niece. So you and Cissy are twice related now."
Everybody went silent. Even Narcissa stopped her work.
"Remy got married?" Sirius roared like a wounded hog. "Without me?!"
"Petrificus Totalus!" Lucius said quickly, and Sirius fell like a cut-down tree. "Mr. Potter, I hope you would not mind very much if your present just lies quietly for some time? Meanwhile, you can tell him all the news, and he will just listen. Silently. By the way, I am very sorry to remind you, Sev, but the only spare bed is in your hut."
"Over my dead body," Snape said in a terrifying voice. "Over my dead body! I would prefer even Potter over Black!"
"I say!" Harry exclaimed, offended. "You are not that much of a prize yourself, sir. And I sure want to share a hut with Sirius."
Now everybody turned to Draco. He sighed tragically in response.
"All right, all right. I already suffer terrible hardships here, with the mosquitos, and all that, but as it's your birthday, Potter... You don't mind if I move to your hut, Professor?"
Snape stared at them for a while and sighed too.
"Do what you want. Do a cancan for Potter's birthday, what do I care? Just don't you dare to touch my things, keep quiet when I am sleeping and clean after yourself..."
To this grumbling and nagging, Draco started moving his meagre possessions to the Potions master's hut. Narcissa returned to her dough pot, and Lucius just shrugged and went to his own hut to take a nap. Harry sat down in the grass near his Petrified godfather.
"And that was just usual everyday stuff," he told Sirius in a low voice. "By the way, Snape is usually the sanest of them all, you know. Although, it was Lucius who let me have some Firewhiskey, so he is all right too sometimes. Just wait until Dumbledore flies by, you will see for yourself what it means to live in a real madhouse."
