14

Shortly after midnight, Snape admitted defeat. He had looked for the baby highland dragon in every corner and crevice in his quarters. He even had tried summoning the beast but to no avail.

The potions master donned his winter cloak and stomped through the snow to Hagrid's hut. It took a while of knocking before a light was lit inside.

"What is it?" thundered the half-giant as he opened the door. "Oh, Professor Snape! Is there something wrong?"

"My highland dragon has hatched and I can't find it!"

"Oh!" Hagrid had fetched his cloak and set out for the castle. "Are you sure you didn't sit on it?" he asked.

"Of course I did not sit on it," panted Snape as he tried to keep pace with the taller man.

"No need to be offended. It can happen easily enough with small animals," huffed Hagrid and Snape wondered which creature he had sat on by mistake. On the other hand, that was information he really didn't need.

"I'm sure it can, but I didn't sit on it." Snape overtook the gamekeeper when they reached the stairs that lead down to the dungeons.

"Have you tried summoning it?" Hagrid looked around the potions master's quarters when they entered as if he expected the baby dragon to sit in plain view.

"I have, but it didn't work."

"Where did you keep the egg?"

Snape showed Hagrid the terrarium.

"What a wonderful home for a baby highland dragon!" cried Hagrid. "I knew the right person had got the egg!" He fished the shell out of the tank and handed it to Snape. "Here, better put that away." Snape took the eggshell and went to his desk to get a small box for what could turn out a valuable potions ingredient. He still hadn't had time to look up what highland dragon eggshell could be used for.

"Cracking the egg is pretty exhausting. Most hatchlings stay near the egg for a first nap," Hagrid continued behind Snape. "Have you looked in the nest you provided?"

Snape rolled his eyes. "Of course I looked in the nest!"

When he turned around, Hagrid was gone.

"Hagrid?"

"I've got him. Lay right in the middle of the nest. I heard that they could turn invisible sometimes but I never saw one powerful enough." Hagrid's disembodied voice informed the potions master. "What a powerful little beastie you are!"

"Hagrid," Snape said carefully, "I think that baby highland dragon is not only powerful enough to turn invisible but also to make you invisible."

"Whoa!" cried the half-giant. "You are right! I cannot see myself!"

"Better put the dragon down," suggested Snape. "It's strange to talk to you but not see you."

There was a moment of quiet before Hagrid talked again.

"I put it down but I still can't see myself."

Snape spent the next half hour casting every single spell to counter invisibility on the gamekeeper but Hagrid would not reappear. At last Snape called for a house elf and sent her – it was Happy again who answered his call – to fetch the headmaster.

"Severus, you better don't make this a habit," yawned the headmaster. He looked at Snape's sofa. "I take it this is not about another visit of the Dark Lord?"

"I can't see Hagrid," Snape informed the old man.

"That can be easily explained. He is not here," Dumbledore pointed out.

Snape sighed. "No, I cannot see him."

Dumbledore looked puzzled for a moment but then understanding dawned. "No, no, Severus. That's wrong. You may both be males but you can still see Hagrid if you both choose to. We are living in the twenty-first century after all!"

"No!" cried Snape impatiently. "I cannot see him because he is invisible. Hagrid, help me and say something!"

"Good evening, Professor Dumbledore, Sir!" the gamekeeper boomed merrily. He didn't sound as if being invisible worried him.

"Oh my," said Dumbledore. "How did that happen?"

Snape explained. Hagrid added some details about the Scottish highland dragon.

Dumbledore listened and asked a question here and there. When his two teachers were done, he started casting spells.

The headmaster, being almost a century older than Snape and more powerful, knew many more spells than the potions master and it took him almost an hour to try them all. At last, he had to admit defeat, too.

"We have a second exceedingly powerful wizard at the castle," he suggested at last. "It would be unwise not to ask him to try."

The Dark Lord was thrilled to be asked for help. Dumbledore, Snape and Hagrid had walked up to the dark wizard's quarters at Snape's request. The potions master liked his new sofa and he didn't want to have to burn it should the Dark Lord choose to sit on it.

"So, you're telling me that Hagrid is in here but invisible," he said when Dumbledore and Snape had settled down on the sofa in front of the fireplace. He sat in one of the armchairs – or tried to. The wizard yelped when he sat on the invisible half-giant and hurried to sit in the second armchair. "I see. Or rather, I don't. What happened?"

Snape repeated the story and again Hagrid added some information about the highland dragon.

"Are you still holding the dragon?" asked the Dark Lord when Snape had finished his tale.

"No, I put it back into the terrarium," Hagrid said.

"Have you tried 'Finite?'" the Dark Lord looked at the other wizards expectantly.

"We did," huffed Dumbledore. He proceeded to give the other wizard a detailed account of every single spell they had tried.

It turned out that the Dark Lord did not know more spells than Dumbledore when it came to countering the effects of an invisible highland dragon.

"We need to find out how the lizard made Hagrid invisible," suggested Snape.

The two supposedly most powerful wizards alive started a discussion of magical theory. They were just trying to agree on why the lizard didn't make the terrarium invisible, when suddenly Hagrid reappeared.

"What did you do?" asked the Dark Lord.

"I didn't do nothing!" Hagrid cried.

"You must have done something," Dumbledore pointed out. He and the Dark Lord cast spells on the gamekeeper and the Dark Lord even went so far to prod the half-giant with his wand.

At last it was Snape who solved the riddle. "Don't move," he cried. He transfigured a piece of parchment he had in his pocket into a pair of tweezers and stepped closer to Hagrid. He picked something up from the floor.

"What is this?" Dumbledore posed the question the whole group wanted to ask.

Snape turned the tweezers this way and that. At the tip, something was dazzling silvery. "It must be one of the dragon's scales!" he cried.

"You are right!" cried Dumbledore.

"Excellent," yawned the Dark Lord. "Can we go to bed now?"

And they did.

When Snape came to the Great Hall for breakfast, everybody was waiting impatiently for him and the headmaster. The Dark Lord was missing, too. Hagrid was already present but he looked very tired.

"We had an emergency," Snape told McGonagall who had taken over for Dumbledore and prevented the students from mutinying.

"Hagrid explained already," the witch said kindly and placed a mug of black coffee in front of the potions master.

The Dark Lord and Dumbledore turned up a couple of minutes later and given the time, Dumbledore allowed the students to open the advent calendar before he and the Dark Lord had had a bite to eat.

There was an excited squeal when Luna Lovegood discovered a chain made of chocolate frog cards in her parcel. "Whoever put this into the calendar: thank you, thank you, thank you!" shouted the blonde happily. She then proceeded to show her housemates the pictures of famous witches on the cards.

Parvati Patil was equally excited at the Gryffindor table. She had got a brandnew set of tarot cards. She promised to unveil their future for her housemates but from the Head Table it looked like Lavender Brown was the only one who wanted to make use of the offer.

Bellatrix Lestrange got a small dagger like the ones that were part of every student's potions kit. This particular one had a nicely decorated hilt. Protective runes were cleverly hidden in the decorative pattern. The witch was delighted.

Dumbledore got a new diary and started to write in it immediately. The Dark Lord tried to catch a glimpse of the pages over the headmaster's shoulder but the old man moved cleverly and prevented it.

The Dark Lord was now the owner of a jar of muggle chocolate cream. He tasted it carefully and then proceeded to spread a thick layer of the stuff on his toast. While he chewed happily, he informed Lucius Malfoy that he was to find out where to buy this chocolate cream and get a generous supply as soon as they left the castle after Christmas. Lucius promised to take care of the task.

Snape got woollen socks. Somebody must have used all leftover threads to make them because they had stripes in every colour of the rainbow and some colours Snape didn't even have a name for.

Since the three wizards had come to breakfast so late, there was not much time to enjoy the advent calendar gifts. Snape had only time for a quick sandwich before he had to hurry down to his classroom.

How he made it through a whole day of lessons, Snape could not tell. By the time the last student had left his classroom, the potions master was asleep on his feet. He decided to forgo dinner and went to bed.