Draco was almost beside himself with glee at Gryffindor's defeat. He had finally taken off his bandages, and celebrated having the full use of both arms again by doing spirited imitations of Harry falling off his broom. Malfoy spent much of their next Potions class doing Dementor imitations across the dungeon; Ron finally cracked, flinging a large, slippery crocodile heart at Malfoy, which hit him in the face and caused Snape to take fifty points from Gryffindor.
J.
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, 1999
Early October, 1993
The potions storeroom is riddled with secrets. Kept airless and dark, it houses far more than beetle-eyes and batwings. In the castle's days of origin, the builders and masons here struck a line of bedrock that was so resistant, they simply built around it, and the storeroom has, deep within it, its own alcove of stone connected to the ancient earth herself.
Mother Nature had mysterious designs, it was discovered. As if knowing that the future purpose of this part of the castle was to hold precious and delicate things, the deep recesses of the alcove was gentle with objects in its care, and the learned men of long ago had brought their treasures to store here, in this darkened capsule, protected from those destroyers of all known things: light, temperature, time and air.
Over the centuries, the collection became so rarified that the items were considered too precious to use. They were loosely referred to as the Eternal Exhibits, and comprised those odd and singular things that a whimsical world sometimes experiments with, but ultimately the blueprint is swiftly discarded in preference for more practical form. Things that appear worthless at a quick glance, nondescript to the untrained eye, but are in fact priceless in the most fundamental of ways. They are unobtainable.
On this Monday morning, Severus Snape, Potions Master, lit the gaslamps in the potions storeroom and, through a labyrinth of shelves and cabinets, made his way first to the Eternal Exhibits. When he had been introduced to them, many years ago and by his own Master at the time, he'd needed little convincing or education as to what he was witnessing. His instinct for value had quivered like a divining rod, his eyes had devoured the display and his entire being felt eclipsed by an existential moment of pure wonder. His tread across the creaking floorboards brought him to the Exhibits first because, although he had proper business in the storeroom, he was unable to resist the lure of this little museum of marvels, this sanctum so ingeniously hidden in the last place anyone would look. His inbuilt self-controls steadied his hands behind his back as he perused the display. He tried to avoid even breathing too deeply, each mortal exhale gathered and issued with prudence, only his eyes could revel with abandon. But his expression revealed none of the deep pleasure he felt. That didn't mean he didn't feel it.
One article in particular drew him often. It was a glass and stone receptacle, filled with clear, fresh water. Magic maintained a steady rivulet across a miniature, mossy rockery, cascading into the tank through a profusion of floating plant-life. Within the tank, more rocks and waterweed provided habitat for its sole occupant: a small fish, about as long as his hand. The Master had taught Snape that the fish was known as an Erpetoichthys Primordialis, and it was sinuous, with fan-shaped pectoral fins, a fine row of barbs along its tail and feathery-like projections around its gills. Although it was mostly found at the bottom of the tank in repose, Snape had occasionally caught it resting half out of the water on the rockery, like a mudskipper, since it had an elementary pair of lungs. It had never, as far as Snape's in-depth investigations could uncover, been identified or recorded in Muggle science, which was unusual enough, but his Master had also informed him that this individual fish was over nine-hundred years old. The self-same specimen had been caught in a burn in the Forbidden Forest by a Hufflepuff student in the schools' inaugural year, which, at least reliable records maintained, was around 990AD. Its care had been transferred from generation to generation of teacher or student, each increasingly anxious that the supposedly immortal creature would die from their neglect. But it had never expired, it didn't even appear to age, and yet over all that time, still no-one truly knew what kept the fish alive.
And alive it was, its faint respiration trapping tiny bubbles in the feathery appendages. Snape inspected it for several minutes, taking this responsibility very seriously, and then appeased, he turned his attention back to the task at hand.
He was here for the preserved hearts, the wet specimens in formalin. The tissues were fixed in their golden, liquid tombs but the colour always faded – preserving could only suspend the natural progression of decay. The colour was the first surrender after Death took his spoils.
Snape knew where the hearts were stored, their place upon the shelf, their retirement. Potioneers did not examine too closely whether dead hearts better belonged with their owners when prime specimens such as these became available. Snape had read the attached field notes earnestly, wanting to know what had brought a quietus in the animal, that its heart had been the last organ to let go.
Damage was something of which he was intolerant when selecting his potion ingredients. He took especial pleasure, when sampling the products, to identify flaws that could diminish the potency or corrupt the compound, like a particularly astute monger at dawn in the fishmarket, he scrutinized every aspect, every angle of his purchases looking for defects. When he encountered one, he would silently hand the ingredient back to the vendor and murmur "Another?"
These hearts he had purchased at Diagon, from the Apothecary, still his preferred place to acquire select samples. When ingredients were required in bulk, they were ordered and delivered to Hogwarts, the quality of them being more dependable. Insect wings, for instance, or dried berries, could be stored in sacks or bins. They were apportioned by the scoop. But hearts…a good, unblemished heart was scarce.
From Diagon, he had carried the hearts carefully in special, drawstring bags made of a particular hide that maintained a constant moisture and temperature. Once returned to his dungeon, by flickering candlelight, he had handpicked a jar for each of them, and at his scrubbed wooden bench had meticulously measured the correct solution of preservative and filled the jars halfway. Sterilized tongs were employed to transfer each organ into a jar, then the remaining space was topped up to ensure their complete submersion. The lids were screwed tightly. The label was written in small, cramped script, detailing the contents, its source, age and treatment, and then attached around the lid of the jar with sturdy string.
Snape did not trust a levitation charm to transport the jars, he did so by hand, up from the dungeon to the Tapestry Corridor on first floor, and two trips were necessary. Then he'd had to appropriate space in the storeroom to accommodate his hearts. Other preserved organs had to be rearranged and re-cataloged. There had been a good hour lost to moving his jars and bottles and canisters about, an hour that had made him late for dinner. But these were hearts – what was an hour in the history of a heart? The making, the breaking, or a lifetime, long or short, a heart's journey as told in beats was no more worthy than that now embalmed in the dark, suspended. Such a heart deserved thoughtful handling.
Given the class he was about to teach, he had questioned his own judgement about using these ingredients for he lesson. Misgiving crimped every movement, his fingers hesitated on the lids of the jars as he lifted them from the shelf. It was not unusual for him to have doubts, he quite freely communicated his lack of confidence in his students, had done so for years, it didn't help them to have false expectations – but the third-year Gryffindor Slytherin class went further. They weren't just incompetent, they were hazardous. Some kind of alchemy, the fermentation of peculiar chemical reactions between the students, the presence of Potter: they combined in such a volatile fashion that he never knew when to expect the explosion. Or from where the explosion would ignite - it could be a potion, a student or himself. It might not necessarily even be in his classroom – only that weekend Potter had managed to throw himself off his broom and tempt a hundred Dementors to the Quidditch pitch. A furious argument with Dumbledore in his office had followed; the boy could have died. As Head of House, Snape had withdrawn the Slytherins from playing in such tempestuous conditions, how in Merlin could a Quidditch match have justified that level of risk? The gamble had nearly been lost. And then Dumbledore had demanded his silence because the Arresto Momentum had not been issued from Snape's wand, nor the Patronus. Where had he been? "He fell fifty feet, Severus. And you did nothing. I thought we had an understanding?"
The masonry jars clinked against each other with bland innocence inside their wire crate. The hearts trembled with each step. Snape carried them through the corridor as the bell rang for first period, and reservation blossomed into full-fledged unease. He could hear the grand oak doors of the Hall open and students flood forth from breakfast, their incessant chatter, always talking, always opening their mouths to pollute the air with their half-witted opinions and moronic observations. Descending the stairs, his robe billowing behind, he watched those of his imminent class turn for the dungeon. He saw the Gryffindor ties, the huddles of now familiar faces that had convened to gossip. Clearly an hour for breakfast hadn't been long enough to discharge the entirety of their sentiments on whatever matter preoccupied them since waking. No doubt Potter's near miss was a lively topic.
It would appear he'd nailed it in one. Just as he reached the bottom step, Draco Malfoy exited the Hall, clapped eyes on the gathering of Gryffindors and immediately launched into a pantomime involving much waving of arms and panicked expression. It took Snape a moment to realise that he was pretending to fall, mimicking Potter's descent, although anybody who'd watched closely would recall the eerie lifelessness of Potter as he'd plummeted to earth. There had been no circling of arms, no fear on his face as the unconscious Potter raced his own discarded broom to the earth.
The group of Gryffindors, which included Potter and his ill-advised compatriots, retaliated with shouts and gestures. Then Granger spotted Snape approaching and her eyes widened; she barely had a moment to warn the others before Snape found voice.
"Why are you all standing here like herd of confounded wildebeest? Do you require directions to the dungeon? Are you uncertain of the time? It is nine! First period! Get to class!"
There were mumbles of assent and the group hurried off, except Malfoy and his goons who were more inclined to loiter. That suited Snape. He called Malfoy back.
"Sir?"
"I see your arm has made a miraculous recovery," said Snape quietly.
Malfoy smiled and waggled it in demonstration. "Yes sir. It feels much better today."
"Quite sudden, wasn't it. Apparently it still needed bandages only on Friday. Has Madam Pomfrey seen to it?"
Malfoy quickly glanced at his own arm as if noticing for the first time. "Um, there's nothing to see really -,"
"Nothing to see?" repeated Snape, raising a brow. "Then your healing powers are quite unsurpassed. Don't you think you could have feigned your injury at least one more day? To be convincing? You're coming across as amateurish, Draco."
A flush rose in Malfoy's cheeks and the smile faded.
"To class." Snape's cool eyes scanned the trio. "Immediately."
The majority of the students were seated when he arrived at the classroom; a few scrambled to their desks from wherever they'd been, presumably more chatting, the ceaseless effusion of mindless prattle. "Quiet!" he barked and mounted the steps to the dais before placing down the wire crate on his desk.
In the dim, mildly vaporous air of the room, the gaslamps were haloed, the light from the candle-sconces struggled to penetrate. A lone candelabrum on his desk managed to pick out the glass and liquid of his jars and rejoiced with a gentle glinting off their edges. While the students waited, he withdrew each jar and placed them in a row along his desk, letting the candlelight radiate through. The students observed.
That done, he took to his seat and brought forward his quill and register and, in a monotone, called the roll. Each affirmative earned a small tick in the correct column. The procedure was deadening. Snape knew that not all the teachers bothered, preferring to manage by exception, but he'd learned that this dreary, pointless officiousness sapped the students, suffocated any lingering over-excitement from whatever nonsense was currently elevating their blood pressures. By the time he'd deliberately closed the register's cover, they sat dully.
Rising, he stepped to the front of the dais and clasped the lapels of his robe, letting his gaze rove over them. He took a mental note of where they were seated – few surprises there, most students soon favoured certain desks or seats and returned to it throughout their schooling years, and today was no exception. Slytherins to the right, Gryffindors on the left. Perhaps some friendships had fallen out over the weekend since a couple of inseparables were now pointedly sitting apart. Snape couldn't have cared if his life depended on it, in fact it would likely spare him the annoyance of having to separate them later.
"This lesson has a practical," he said. "And…you'll be working in…groups."
The moment the word was issued, he regretted the entire concept. The formaldehyde must be finally getting to him. What had he been thinking? What madness had wormed into his brain that convinced him this could possibly work?
His hearts.
He only had the four.
There was no reaction from the students and he made sure that nothing showed on his face. "We will be creating the potion on page a hundred and eighty-eight of your texts. Open your books, page one hundred and eighty-eight."
Movement now. Those who'd bothered to get their copies of Magical Draughts and Potions onto their desks began to flip the pages aimlessly while others rummaged through their rucksacks. "Page one hundred and eighty-eight…" enunciated Snape, knowing some would have forgotten in the short interval. "Eighty-eight…yes, eighty-eight. A one an eight and an eight…No the book doesn't go to two hundred and eighty-eight, does it?"
Texts opened to the right page before them, the students looked at him expectantly.
"Would anyone care to tell us the name of the potion?" he asked, swallowing back a weary sigh. This was going to take a while.
Their heads bent over their texts. He could see them reading, knew their eyes travelled over the words and some, some among them would know, but most of them…he could see their mouths silently moving, trying to remember their scant French.
"Ralentir le Coeur" mangled Miles Bletchley eventually.
"Raaylentur?" said Snape, with one eyebrow cocked. "Coo-er?"
The students all looked at each other, back at the book, up at him.
"Ralentir," he said, pronouncing it with emphasis. "Le Coeur. Meaning?"
"Something heart," said Bletchley, looking a little affronted. He thought he'd done well.
"Yes. Hence my specimens. We are dealing with matters of the heart. It is a potion that does what to the heart? Anyone?"
"But it's French, sir."
This incongruous statement was met with a glare. "Yes? The French have invented a potion. What are you implying? You are familiar with the Girding Potion – it is French in origin: Potion d'endurance. And they have invented an ancient and magnificent potion L'élixir de méditation…but then I wouldn't expect you to know that one."
Kevin Entwhistle frowned hard at his desk and three seconds passed in complete silence. Snape flapped his lapels once then folded his arms and let free his sigh. "I repeat. Can anyone tell me the meaning of Ralentir le Coeur? No? Why am I not surprised? It is a potion to slow the heart. Here in the United Kingdom we call it Heart Subdue." He cast a glance around the room. "Why might a potioneer have Heart Subdue in his cabinet?"
Shuffling feet, a cough. "Is it a love potion?" said Andrew Clevely.
Matters of the heart, when it came to teenagers, almost always involved love. Being young, vigorous, only aware of their heart when it pounded; a firm, thudding heart posed no risk to them, it never felt pain until their first spoilt tryst, the maiden romance turned sour. That first love…the heart only throbbed so hard the once. Snape swallowed.
"No," he said, and cleared his throat. "No. Not a love potion. We are aiming to subdue, not excite."
Anjali Kapoor raised her hand. "So you can slow somebody's heart down?"
"Yes, precisely," said Snape. "The clue's largely in the name. Why could it be helpful to slow a patient's heart?"
He waited a few moments and watched them. Up the back, Pete Balsall was distracted by something in his lap and Snape dreaded to think. The Slytherins were passing a note around and Potter was lifting his glasses to massage his eyes. Granger glanced at him sympathetically. Daphne Greengrass was staring at the ceiling and idly plaiting her hair.
"So they don't have a heart attack?" suggested somebody, but Snape was moving, swiftly descending the steps and marching up the aisle. He snatched a box of Shock-o-choc from the stunned Pete Balsall and held out his palm so that Balsall could spit out the last ball he'd popped in his mouth.
"Ye-e-e-s," he said, dropping the damp chocolate into the box with the others, then walking to the fireplace and throwing the whole box into it. "If you were lucky enough in a crisis to have Heart Subdue on your person and gave it to someone having a heart attack, then yes, it could have an effect. What else?" He faced the class again, surveyed them, noticed they were paying attention once more. "Why is it most valuable?"
"Sir?" Granger put her hand up. "Could it help you live longer?"
He could detect the impatience in her voice, impatience with the plodding pace of the class and her own self-restraint. His eyes narrowed at the implied criticism. "Indeed. Thank you, Granger," he replied, thin-lipped. She half-rolled her eyes and glanced back at Potter who gave her a tired smile.
"It has been known to prolong the life of an individual by a factor of point five. That means, by taking Heart Subdue you can extend your life but not indefinitely." He roamed the room again, his hands behind his back, watching the students carefully. He was on the Gryffindor side, disdainfully observing Lavender Brown flipping her tie up and down as though trying to swat a fly with it, when out the corner of his eye he glimpsed Malfoy with his arms waving above his head. He turned instantly, but Malfoy had already dropped them and was gazing back with bright eyes. Snape paused, then continued. "It might be long enough to enable something to be completed, or survive a situation, or suspend the body while other life-saving work is underway."
With deliberate steps, he returned back along the aisle and up to the dais, where he drew his robes together and folded his arms. The class watched and waited.
"In these jars…" he began, eyes scanning. "Right. You – Davis – bring that here. Bring it here. Now."
Tracey Davis, most recent recipient of the Slytherin note, looked suddenly terrified. Everyone turned to watch as she slowly extricated herself from the desk and, carrying the folded note, walked stiff-legged up to the dais and handed it to Snape. He snatched it from her, unfolded it and read: One hundred things only half as good as Gryff losing to HP by 100 points. There was a starter list of suggestions, and the idea was people added to it until presumably a hundred ideas were obtained. It was illustrated with a poorly drawn badger in a tutu holding a splintered broomstick to pierce the heart of a slain lion.
Another sigh welled in Snape, but he stifled it. This was his House. He held a degree of accountability for their conduct. That they were so impassioned about Quidditch came from some inner-borne wellspring, their natural competitiveness, he supposed, because they didn't learn it from him. He remembered notes almost exactly like this during his own school years, he participated with the precise amount of contempt it was possible for him to conceal: enough not to earn the rejection of his Housemates, but enough that the radar never picked him up. He quietly rejoiced when Slytherin won and otherwise tried to ignore it entirely.
Unwittingly his gaze lifted to Potter, who met it, and he quickly looked away again. The note was not about Potter directly, Malfoy had enough sense to avoid that, but there was obvious unspoken blame laid on the Seeker. The broken Nimbus said everything.
The Slytherin side were hushed and staring at him…
…."Oi!" shouted James Potter. An affectation: Potter spoke Surrey; Snape doubted he'd ever even been to Essex. "Oi! Watchit!"
The Marauders, and a handful of other fifth-year Gryffindors, were lounging away their lunchtime within the covered bridge, about halfway across. Why wasn't immediately apparent, but it wasn't unusual – the bridge looked and felt structurally precarious, it was concealed from the rest of the castle, and its slightly derelict appearance (and all those tired 70's adolescent clichés that went with that), was surpassed only by the Shrieking Shack. It wasn't terribly original to choose the bridge as a hangout, but it certainly wasn't unusual.
Snape had to cross it. He was on the wrong side of it and had to get back, like one of the billy goats gruff. The Marauders and co. hadn't been there when he first went over, but now, on the return, he had to run the gauntlet.
Bracing himself, and taking his wand into his hand, he stepped onto the bridge. As always, the wood creaked and groaned, protesting any weight. Daredevil kids liked to jump while on the bridge and make the whole thing sway slightly. But not Snape. He didn't much care for it. He kept his gaze firmly on the other side, trying not to imagine the Marauders wrestling him over the edge of the handrail. Faces turned to look at him, apparently only just noticing he was there, and for a moment he hesitated, wondering whether it wasn't too late to just turn back, spend a little longer in the Sundial garden until they had to return to class. A few minutes delay was a small price to pay.
There were quite a few meters between them, but even from the distance Snape could see the grins forming. He quickly searched among the girls in the group but was relieved to see no sign of Lily. "Oi!" shouted James Potter, coming to a standing position with hands on hips, grinning and shouting at him down the length of the bridge. "Oi! Watchit! You coming across?"
Too late to turn back. Snape swallowed and gripped his wand, then slowly started walking.
The other Marauders, who'd been leaning or slouching against the rails, also took to a stand and watched him approach. They exchanged words, Snape couldn't hear, but Black laughed and gave Potter a nudge. Lupin looked at the floor and shoved his hands in his pockets. Snape tried to keep his eyes fixed on the other side, his fingers gripped around his wand, felt his chest tighten with nerves.
The boards of the bridge creaked with each step.
Potter had a snitch. He let it unfurl its wings just enough to take flight, then would catch it. Pettigrew had another kind of ball, leather by the looks of it, probably a bludger. But it seemed dead, nothing more than a heavy stitched ball being tossed from hand to hand. Snape smelled cigarette smoke and saw the tendrils drifting up from between Black's fingers, wafted away by the ever-present cold breeze blowing through the ravine.
"It's a s-s-s-Slytherin!" exclaimed Potter, as Snape came closer. "Crawled out from under a rock!"
"Not just any Slytherin," Black said, and tossed his hair. "Snivellus!"
Snape slowed. "I'm just -,"
"Just what, s-s-s Snivellus? S-s-s Snape? Just what?"
Snape came to a stop a few feet shy of them and gestured with his hand. "Passing. I'm just passing."
For some reason the Marauders found this amusing and jostled each other.
"Let him through," said one of the girls, sounding a touch jaded. "Go on, Sev."
Lupin stepped back but the remaining three stood their ground. Potter said: "Where've you been Snivellus, all on your lonesome? Shedding your skin?"
Snape closed his eyes, the adrenalin in his system made his head spin a little. The nicotine turned his stomach, so crude to his nostrils. He took a step forward.
"He wants to pass," said Black, and took a long draught of his cigarette, then released it slowly, blowing it gently in Snape's direction. "C'mon lads, it's a free bridge."
But they didn't move. Snape took another step and paused.
Pettigrew lurched suddenly, twice, and the bridge groaned. He laughed, and the girls cried out, grabbing for the handrail and cursed him. Snape jumped too, but involuntarily; his nerves were so on edge.
"Look!" cried Pettigrew. "Jumped like a girl!" The others laughed as well and Snape felt hot anger and humiliation flame up his neck and cheeks. He stormed forward before they noticed, but they still didn't move, and he was forced to push his way through them. His wand connected with Black's face, who jerked back.
"Hey! Watch your fuckin' wand, tosser!"
"Move out the way!"
"Careful! Careful!" said Potter, raising his palms and backing up. "Don't want any snivelling, alright?"
"Fuck you!"
Snape didn't swear very much, as a rule. It was so unexpected that the Marauders were actually silenced for a few seconds, then Potter burst out laughing. "What did you just say?"
Snape shouldered his way through, and the Marauders laughed, the girls laughed, he even heard Lupin laugh, the damned werewolf, the freak, laughing at him. So much blood pounded from his heart to his head he thought he might explode into fire. He got a last face full of smoke and then he was on the other side, only empty bridge before him. It creaked in welcome.
Jinxes ran through his mind. He would, if any of them tried anything, he would jinx them. But he kept going, one foot after another, concentrating on not tripping…a fall now…it wouldn't be worth living…
The laughter suddenly stopped, and next thing he knew was a blow to the back of the head that knocked him clean off his feet, that whammed the back of his head so hard he saw stars, that threw his head down to the wooden boards of the bridge. His breath flew out; his wand scattered, he'd hit the deck before he knew he'd been hit.
"Oh Wormy! Direct!" he heard Black remark in admiration. "Not even a bat!"
The bludger rolled benignly away to the side of the bridge and Snape, seeing it, gathered himself, pushed himself up and staggered to his feet. His head swam. A brew of emotions - complex, potent emotions – had come to the boil. Bubbles popped on the surface; he could taste them, bitter on his tongue.
Rage. Pure, unadulterated hate.
His wand was a few feet away and he bent to pick it up. Then he heard, "Sev?"
He knew even before he looked, her voice was as familiar to him as his own. Standing at the entrance of the bridge – for how long, he didn't know, presumably enough to witness everything – was Lily. She was staring at him: concern, bafflement etched on her face. Why she should be confused he never knew, the situation was not difficult to understand. Her new friends were everything he'd always loathed. He'd told her that, told her repeatedly and she'd agreed. Now she was one of them, she feigned a superior kind of independence from the situation, a world-weariness, as though it were nothing more than the rambunctious frolics of quarrelling toddlers. But she treated him no differently to them, he'd earned no special dispensation for all their years of friendship. She'd let the balance re-set to zero the minute they'd taken her into the fold.
Wand in hand, he straightened and met her gaze, but he was impassive.
"What happened?" she asked, a touch condescendingly. What have you done now?
"Lily!" yelled Potter. "C'mon love, we're waiting!"
Love? Love? Snape looked at her, a rich contempt of his own hardening his eyes. She looked back, and while a breed of guilt suddenly flared, she stamped it out and squared her shoulders. "What happened?" she asked again.
"Spare me," he muttered. She probably didn't even hear him. Rolling his wand, he directed it to the bludger which suddenly quivered.
"Lily!" yelled Potter again.
Snape didn't look back. He cast an incantation and then strode purposefully to the path on firm land, glancing Lily one last icy look as he passed before saying: "Stay off the bridge."
"Why?" she said, blinking, looking slightly dismayed at the thunderous expression.
The bludger spun into the air, and Snape heard the Marauders' astounded comments. But he didn't turn around when the sound of the bludger crashing and smashing through the frail wooden struts beneath the decking caused screams and panicked shouts. He didn't look when the tortured timber supports groaned under the sudden weight. He heard fearful wails, crying, and still he walked. And smiled…
He folded up the note and handed it back to Tracey Davis, who still stood before him, oblivious to the decades that had just rolled over. "Not in class time," said to her quietly, and she nodded, then returned to her seat with the note firmly in hand. The Gryffindors glared at him.
"In these jars," he then said, addressing the class, "are hearts."
The students were listening, looking at him, occasionally letting their gaze fall to the specimens.
"You will be assigned to one of four groups. Each group will get one heart. Your group will work together – together – to complete the practical on page a hundred and eighty-nine. The type of heart you will be given is significant. I am about to assign your groups – listening please."
Against his better judgement, he broke up the class. He did not mix the Houses, he couldn't be bothered. Perhaps his more enlightened colleagues would have been tempted to try, he most certainly wasn't. Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs, he didn't doubt, would work famously in mixed groups. But not this lot. Not this lot. He was tired, Merlin knew, he was all manner of vexed. But he was not stupid.
"Group one, send someone to retrieve your heart," he said, holding a jar out and waiting for the designated individual to hurry up to the dais. "Group two…"
A jar, gently glowing, was duly positioned in the center table of four work groups. The students examined each curiously.
"Group one – read the label. What is your heart?"
"Bear, sir. Brown bear."
"Two?"
"Marmot."
"Three?"
"Weddell seal, sir."
"And four?"
He glanced at table four with an arched brow. Gryffindor, comprising Potter and friends. "Crocodile," responded Longbottom.
Snape grasped his lapels and began a stroll among the tables. "What do you know about these animals, hm? What, do you suppose, might they have in common?"
Contemplative silence. "They're from America?" yelled Millicent Bulstrode.
"Hands up!" Snape scowled at her. "And it is a Nile crocodile. From Africa."
More thought. "They eat meat?" guessed Gregory Goyle, and Malfoy kicked him. "Idiot. It's a marmot. They eat grass and shit."
"The heart…" Snape prompted, and Granger raised her hand.
"They have the ability to slow their heartrate," she said. "Through hibernation, dormancy or controlling oxygen, for instance, when diving."
"This class is slowing my heartrate," someone behind Snape muttered, followed by a snort of laughter and he swung around, but all eyes were fixed firmly on their desks.
"Thank you, Granger," he murmured, eyes narrowed and watching sharply for any giveaway smiles. A couple of faces started to turn purple from the effort of staying neutral. "That is correct."
He resumed his saunter between the tables. "The hearts in your jars contain the essential properties – by which we mean those properties which make it work – for slowing down the heart. These animals figured out how to do that. How? Muggle scientists will tell you it's evolution and adaptation. What else do we know, in our world?"
His students fidgeted and Gregory let loose an enormous yawn. Then a worn and dispirited Potter said, "The heart is magic."
"The heart is the most magical organ," conceded Snape. His eyes slid around the members of group four, noting they all appeared despondent, or in Weasley's case, impassioned. The boy could ill-afford that much colour in his face. "And how might we be intending to use these magical organs, in today's potion? Hm? Entwistle?"
"I don't know, sir."
"Have a look at your books, people. What is it we're attempting to extract? Finnigan? Haven't heard your lilting tones this lesson. What are we attempting to extract?"
Finnigan flipped his textbook page back and forth. "Don't know, sir."
No answer. Granger clearly knew but she was trying not to be a know-it-all. "It's in your textbook, students, page one hundred and eighty-eight."
"The blood?" attempted Amity Button.
I might well be extracting blood by the end of this class, thought Snape, but he said, "No blood left in these hearts, they've been preserved. Anyone else?"
Still no answer. Snape considered just telling them. They sat like stuffed ducks, enduring, outlasting. In what little brains they had in their heads, buzzed nothing but nonsense, drivel, the preoccupations of single-celled organisms: Breathe. Eat. Mate. At what point could Snape rescind his responsibility to teach, and instead simply inform? Nothing would come from either approach, they all knew the remaining hour would be little more than an exercise in fulfilling a contract: his to give them information, theirs to sit at a desk. There was no obligation to pretend on the part of either party that there was actually an intention to make potioneers of them.
Perhaps his impatience generated something even their dulled antennaes could detect, for a couple sat up straighter and several turned to look at him. He gathered his robes and strode to the front of the classroom again, up on to the dais and grabbed a piece of chalk. Swiftly, with brusque strokes so that his chalk tapped audibly on the blackboard, he drew a diagram and then stepped back for them to see it. "There, see? We covered this last term. What is it that potioneers seek to extract? Think! What is the essential property?"
Time was ticking away now. To get this practical done, completed and not waste the ingredients, they would need to start in less than five minutes. But the ingredients would be wasted anyway, this whole lesson wasted, if they hadn't learnt this fundamental principle by third-year.
A smattering of faces flashed through his mind, seventh-years' at the end of year feast, the three-digit scores on their NEWTs: a handful in a decade that he believed might go on to achieve in his field. He'd since encountered their names in various journals, at the apothecary for St Mungos. Those seminal few in ten years of his career. Who was failing? Could it be he?
He waited, his pulse rising, and finally, dreadfully, Hermione Granger stuck up her hand. In response, in a horrible cold dawn of realization that her knowledge had nothing to do with him, that it was indeed he who'd produced so little, he slowly closed his eyes and inclined his head.
"The magic that made the mutation," she said quietly. "An animal that has evolved for certain conditions did so through an evolutionary adaptation of its genes. Science believes that natural selection favoured a gene that mutated giving the animal an advantage. In potions, we seek to extract the magic that made the mutation. Or qui facit mutationem magicae."
The mantlepiece clock ticked down a few seconds. Snape nodded. "Excellent Miss Granger," he said, his gaze bent to the floor. The students strained to hear him. "Ten points to Gryffindor. All of you, read page a hundred and eighty-eight. If your Heart Subdue is to work, then your brew will need to destablise the mutated gene therefore liberate its magic. There should be no animal heart remnants in the final potion, it should be a distillation. If I find any residuum in the final result, I will deduct points from your final mark." Turning back to the blackboard he used his wand to recreate the instructions. "You can commence work. Get your supplementary ingredients from the cupboard."
The classroom erupted into noise and movement. Above the commotion of students talking and bickering, dragging cauldrons and chairs and emptying rucksacks, Snape said loudly, "Remember you are a team. Do not forget to adapt the recipe for the kind of heart you have – the variations are in the appendices. Watch that jar, Malfoy! If you spill the formalin anywhere near the other ingredients, they're ruined."
One by one, hands were raised, students needing his help. Four cauldrons had been successfully lit, and at each table, the teams had loosely assigned roles: the preparers, the stirrers, the one following the recipe and barking instructions.
At this point in his double lessons he felt control slip away through his fingers, and no amount of frantic grasping seemed to help. He would come to the aid of one student or group, check their weights or measurements, show the correct way to hold a scalpel, when another hand would fly up and he would quickly intervene at an over-heated Bunsen, demonstrate the stirring technique required and move them away from the emission of a toxic gas. No sooner had that group rallied, than another hand would be raised. "Lower your heat, your flames are too intense! There should be no boiling!" he'd announce to the glass. One group couldn't get the lid off their jar, then someone slid on some spleenwart and pulled a stool down with them.
He stalked between the desks, closely observing and supervising as his robes swished about his ankles. A bad cut on table three requiring a quick Episkey. "This blade is not sharp enough, you shouldn't have to force it to slice -,"
"Sir! Finnigan added the tincture already but I told him after the egg-white!"
"Turn off the heat. Quick, use the sieve, you can still save that -,"
"Please sir! This herb doesn't have the sap in it!"
"Lengthways – did you slice it lengthways? Read the instructions! Get another, quickly."
"I can't read this bit of the instructions, it's in French!"
"That's not French, it's Latin! Parkinson! Leave that note – help him with the Latin. Crabbe! You do not need that many. Do not eat them. Put some back – back in the cupboard, not on the table. Where you found them!"
Something didn't smell right. He swirled and saw purplish smoke billowing on table two. How could it be purple? But it wasn't from the cauldron, plangentine had gotten into the naked flame. "Cover the cauldron – don't let those fumes enter the mixture!"
He tried to be everywhere, and if ever he raised his eyes to scan the whole class all he could see was chaos aspiring to disaster, but uniformly so, if nothing tipped enough to demand him and the students largely had their heads down, he simply hoped for the best.
He was assisting table three clean up a broken beaker and substitute their lost ingredients when a fracas broke out on table four. It was Ron Weasley, and he'd shouted: "Just cut it out you moronic pus-head!"
Snape glanced over to catch Malfoy pulling a face in retort and quickly drop his hands to his side when he realized Snape was watching.
"What's going on?" he snapped.
"Weasley's copying sir!"
"That's crap! Sir, he keeps doing Dementor impressions -,"
"Malfoy – back to your table. Eyes on your own work Weasley."
He returned to table three, but out the corner of his eye he saw Malfoy lift the hood of his robe down over his eyes and then make kissing noises in Potter's direction.
"Malfoy!"
"Sorry, sir. Sir, do our condensers need to be sterilized before we attach them to the flask?"
"I'm not going to dignify that with a response, Malfoy. I believe you know the answer to that perfectly well." Malfoy's unnecessary and overly obvious question was intended to broadcast that he and his table were the most advanced along the procedure. It was in greater part due to Parkinson than Malfoy, who had taken a token supervision role.
Snape straightened to address the class in an orotund voice: "You should, about now, be ready to gently – gently – lower the heart into the infusion; they should be drained and the formalin removed with the potassium acid. You may section any arteries…the aorta if necessary, although I would prefer that to remain…Tongs! Sterilised tongs Miss Bulstrode!"
He hastened to table two before Bulstrode lost her fingers… and then all hell broke loose.
He did not see Draco Malfoy once again pull his robe over his head and sneak up behind Longbottom while Crabbe and Goyle chuckled (long-sufferingly) from their seats. With his back turned, Snape was unaware that Malfoy's jostling bumped the crocodile heart free of the tongs that Longbottom was using. He missed the retaliatory push from Granger, the push back, nor did he see Potter dismount from his stool to approach Malfoy, and Malfoy's goons get to their own feet. By the time he'd turned around, a fight had freshly hatched, battle cries were being hollered and wands were aloft.
Every Gryffindor at table four was on their feet, their faces furious, but it was Potter and Weasley who had their hands balled into fists, readied for action. The Slytherins at table one scoffed and teased, but they were laughing with palms raised as they backed away, and as Snape came storming over Crabbe and Goyle quickly resumed their seats.
"Put those wands away!" Snape seethed, "before I confiscate the lot. Back to your seats immediately and stay in them!"
Time, now, time was against them. The window for submersing the heart was closing; the hearts lay exposed on the desk, flayed; disintegration had begun. Each looked to Snape as if they might still be beating, their flanks scarcely rising like grounded fish. He found them oddly compelling, and their vulnerability affected him more than the trite impetus of adolescent warfare. "Get on with your tasks, there isn't long."
"Sir! A message!"
Snape glanced towards the sound of the voice. A first-year stood in the classroom doorway, wide-eyed, absorbing the fume-filled melee, and in his hand was a rolled-up scroll. He held it out at arm's length as a furious Snape descended on him and snatched it. "Fine. Dismissed."
The boy disappeared and Snape only had time to quickly glance at the message from Lupin when there was an ear-splitting shriek, a clattering of stools hitting the floor, shouting and a crash of glass. He swung round. He saw Malfoy doubled over with his hands over his face, the Gryffindors of group four once more on their feet, the Slytherins on table one either running to Malfoy's assistance or, in the case of Crabbe and Goyle, yelling at the Gryffindors. Weasley was beetroot, remonstrating and yelling: "He fuckin' deserved it! He's had that coming for days! It's his own fuckin' fault!"
The rest of the class had gone quiet, straining to see and glancing fearfully at Snape who took one impotent step forward while he absorbed the spectacle, trying to process what was going on. When he noticed blood dripping between Malfoy's fingers, the rage enveloped him. The explosion, the inevitable explosion, had finally happened.
"What happened?" he roared.
"My dose -!" wailed Malfoy from behind his cupped hands.
Snape seemed to fly across the room towards the scene. The students shrank back as if to clear from some kind of radioactive fallout. He went directly to Malfoy and pulled the boy's hands away from his face. Blood poured from his nose and dripped down his chin; his collar, tie and the top of his jumper were liberally spattered. In seconds, Snape had his wand out and Episkied the wound, and Malfoy then busied himself groaning and smearing the remaining blood from his face with his sleeves until Pansy Parkinson came to her senses and found a handkerchief.
Snape whirled around to table four. "Who hit him? Who?"
The Gryffindors were silent. Only Potter held his fierce gaze.
"Weasley threw the heart, sir!" said Goyle with a prolonged point. "It's there on the floor. He threw it at Draco's face sir!"
The crocodile heart lay a little to one side on the flags, a small stain showing where it had slid to a stop. Snape's first inclination was to stoop and delicately lift it. The engrossed students observed this peculiar one-act performance: their dumbstruck Professor cradling the ruined organ in his hands, bent over it, his expression horrified at the meaningless brutality.
Weasley swallowed hard. "I'm sorry sir – but, but -," A hand came to rest on his shoulder – Potter's – who shook his head warningly.
"It's demolished," Snape muttered, seemingly to himself. He lowered it onto some blotting paper on the desk nearest Granger. She watched him, enthralled and stunned. "It can't be salvaged…"
"Uhr, my dose hurts!" said Draco plaintively, "I think it broke," and this roused Snape. He turned with a scowl and barked: "Goyle – escort him to the Hospital Wing. Now. Go. Tell Madam Pomfrey what happened. She'll see to him."
Malfoy and Goyle duly left in the persistent silence, and Snape put his hands to his hips and hung his head, giving latitude to the wave of rage. With eyes trained on the heart, his mind turned back to the afternoon he'd purchased it, at the Diagon Alley apothecary. He'd had levity in his step, what should have been a routine and uneventful series of errands were lightened by a spontaneous gift he'd bought, his first gift since Lily, the anticipation of presenting it, the reward he hoped for, enough to buoy him for hours.
In good spirits, he hadn't balked at the cost of nine Galleons and seven sickles for the crocodile heart, and it had laid nestled in its drawstring hide, wrapped in brown paper, carried back to Hogwarts alongside the gift. The hearts of the large saltwater species were hard to obtain since the protections placed on these animals by Muggles proved a significant interference, but those of the Nile were better for Ralentir le Coeur anyway, since those were of the species that had adapted to dormancy, burying themselves somewhere dark and alone when their world became unendurable, patiently waiting for the life-giving rains. It had been the unexpected prize of the crocodile heart that had given rise to the day's lesson plan.
To see it now: flattened, bruised, discarded – used as a weapon – it affected him strangely. His own heart constricted a little. A slight frown dented his brows as he tried to fathom his own reactions.
"Sir -!" began Weasley in desperation. "He just wouldn't stop doing the Dementor impressions, it was –,"
Snape gradually raised his eyes and Weasley's words lapsed.
"Really? That's your excuse?"
The class went more than quiet; it held its breath. But Snape wasn't thinking about them, he was trying to stem the anger, the tide that seeped and spilled and trickled through every crack, every cranny in his willpower.
"DO YOU THINK THAT EXCUSES YOU?"
Weasley flinched. They all did, at table four. "No, sir."
The cauldron on table three suddenly started billowing black smoke and Snape started. Even as those students leapt to the burner, he shouted at the rest: "Turn off your Bunsens! Immediately! Unless your heart has been immersed already, it's too late. The infusions are ruined. They're all ruined! The hearts can't be used. This whole lesson is wasted."
His own breath came shakily and he watched as flame after flame was turned off and the stricken students sat back down, trying to be invisible. He turned back to Weasley who was chewing on a thumbnail.
"You have injured a student," Snape told him in low and dangerous tones. He lifted one finger in a count. "You've failed this class. You've failed everyone in this class. You've damaged valuable school property and you ignored a direct instruction. Ten points for each infringement, Weasley." Five fingers were held up.
"But -,"
"Fifty points off Gryffindor! And, Merlin knows, you're lucky it's not more!"
"But sir -," cried Weasley.
"NOT ANOTHER WORD! I DO NOT WANT ANOTHER WORD OUT OF YOU!"
Weasley slumped in his seat and those in group four burned their gaze into the desk before them. Breathing hard, Snape looked at them each in turn. "You lot. He has cost your House fifty points. Why don't you do something?"
They would not be dwelling on the reasons or their role in it, they would be seizing on the injustice, the perceived inequity. It was Malfoy's fault! It was provoked! Fifty points was completely unfair.
Snape had heard it all, a thousand times. He'd given up asking for the contract that proved life was fair at the tender age of ten. That these teens still bristled over it really just proved how little they'd bumped up against real life; even Potter, for all his hardships, still bleated like a lost lamb over petty injustices. Just like his father. Snape had learned to even the scores himself, and where life, fortune or opportunity resorted to his temporal hand in the wake of a feckless fate, he was pragmatic enough to extend it, and manipulate accordingly, such as evolution had intended.
So he ignored their furrowed brows and instead turned his attention back to the rest of the class. "There's twenty minutes remaining. Pack away the equipment, scourgify your cauldrons and any of you that have time left, answer the questions on page a hundred and eighty-nine. Well? What are you waiting for?"
During that interval, Snape's time and attention was dedicated to the winding up of the class and the rescue of one sole distillation, that of group three with the seal heart, and it didn't look particularly promising, however he took the single vial of Heart Subdue to his desk for later testing and marking. Desks were returned to their original places, equipment put away and the students packed up their texts, all seated and looking at him expectantly as the bell rang.
Snape himself had taken to his seat, feeling utterly drained, but he raised his hand in a cue for them to remain where they were for one more minute.
"This being Monday morning," he said, flicking his eyes from student to student, "your werewolf essay is due. If you have your completed scrolls, bring them to me now."
The message from Lupin had informed him that his DADA class was scheduled as normal and Snape would not be required to cover for him that morning, as had been tentatively arranged. After the fiasco the previous Friday, the intransigence of the Gryffindors at the prospect of learning something unplanned, the criticisms, the utter failure of any of them to grasp the significance of a lesson on werewolves, he was somewhere between neutral to glad at the cancellation of his services. But he had set them homework and he expected compliance. If they refused to learn in class time, then they'd learn in their own time.
There was a generalized shuffling among the students and then began the gathering of belongings, the hoisting of rucksacks and the scraping of stools. Snape, at his desk, waited for the delivery of scrolls. Two Slytherins brought theirs to him, but one after the other, the Gryffindors left without a word.
Except Hermione Granger. She dithered a little, searching through her bag, and Potter frowned at her. "Coming?" he urged, clearly anxious to get away.
"Yes, in a minute, I've just got to find something…" she replied, a quick appeasing smile, and with a shrug her companions left. Quite sure she was alone, she then quickly extracted a sealed tube from her pack and brought it to Snape's desk.
"Two scrolls," she said, handing it to him. "Ways to recognise and kill werewolves."
He looked at her, trying to glean if she understood why. She gazed back, eyes widening a little, but he didn't detect her comprehension, only her obedience. The pause had unnerved her. "Sir?"
"You, alone?"
"Uhm," she glanced away, frowning. "I – I think the others are still working on theirs…"
He took the scrolls from her and she gave a quick, tentative smile then hurried away, out of the classroom, leaving him alone.
Just before the bell for recess, he took from his desk the homework scrolls, the distillation and the damaged crocodile heart, now wrapped in wax paper and tied with string. The scrolls went to his office, the distillation to the brewing chamber for settling and then he carried the heart with him to the Hospital wing, having a vague idea as to its final resting place but thought it best to have it on his person in case Madam Pomfrey had any interest in it as a projectile.
As expected, he found Draco Malfoy resting on top of one of the cots, Goyle and now also Crabbe sitting on the adjacent one, attending to him as if in vigil. With his back propped against plumped up pillows, Malfoy was toying with a compress which he hurriedly brought to his face upon seeing Snape enter. Snape came to a standstill at the end of the bed and appraised him with folded arms, while Malfoy gently dabbed at his face, now almost entirely normal.
"Sir!" said Malfoy. "First my arm, and now this! It's -,"
"- not fair."
Malfoy frowned, a little perplexed. "No. It's not fair."
"It would appear Madam Pomfrey has supplied you with an excellent treatment; I see no sign of bruising-,"
"That's not the point, sir. Weasley was bang out of order! I hope you're giving him a month of detentions. My father will be hearing about this."
On hearing voices, Madam Pomfrey bustled from of her office and Snape stepped aside to meet her, turning her out of earshot.
"Is he alright?" Snape asked in modulated tones. "It was a direct hit but shouldn't have been heavy enough to cause lasting damage." He held up the wrapped heart which she glanced at but otherwise ignored.
"He'll be fine. Mostly bruising, your Episkey fixed him up. That compress has an ointment on it; I thought I'd just keep him here for the rest of the period. He can leave when he's ready." She then went to the bed on which Crabbe and Goyle sat, swept them aside with an annoyed wave of her arm and briskly straightened the cover. "That's been a good, long application of the Dittany, Draco, you should be feeling right as rain now. Off to recess, hmm?"
Malfoy scowled at her retreating back. "My nose was broken, sir, I'm certain of it."
Snape returned to the end of the bed and looked at him levelly. "Draco, do you think about the consequences of your actions?"
"Sir? I don't know what you mean."
Did Malfoy genuinely have so little awareness about this collision-course of a life he'd set himself on? Snape narrowed his eyes, trying to discern the guile, the cunning. All his serpents were crawling with it, sometimes so masterful he couldn't even pick it himself. Malfoy had the very best of role-models, the epitome of duplicity in his bloodlines, a breeding that left the self-taught Snape for dust when it came to being a Slytherin.
"It is in extreme poor taste to be lampooning a Dementor," he said coolly. "I'm sure you don't need your father to remind you of the many Slytherin families ruined by the torment of Dementors, those who have served in Azkaban, driven to madness. What were you thinking?"
Crabbe and Goyle looked at the floor, but Malfoy's eyes flared with resentment. "Whose side are you on, Professor?"
"It's not that simple, Malfoy, it's never that simple. Don't reflect badly on Slytherin on my watch. Your father is, as ever, welcome to contact me."
Snape swirled his robe as he strode away, leaving Malfoy staring after him with his mouth open.
The heart had a weight to it. To the racket of students across the castle emptying into the corridors for recess, Snape swiftly returned to the potions storeroom and slipped inside, careful to lock the door behind him. In here, there was stillness. The gaslamps flared to life, tendrils of smoke coiling to the cave-like ceiling, and Snape spent a moment holding the package in both hands, feeling, for the first time since the day had begun, a kind of calm.
The storeroom contained a single, clear bench of marble. It was intended as a working space to measure and divide ingredients. On this, Snape placed the package and, taking up a scalpel, cut the string holding the wrapper so that the organ was revealed. He gave it a cursory inspection, a smell test, ensuring all vestiges of acid and formaldehyde had been rinsed clean. The faintest trace of animal tissue reached his nostrils, and this satisfied him – the cellular fabric of the crocodile lingered, its essence still condensed into its heart.
With short, precise movements, he used the scalpel to cut fine slivers off the heart, a few grams merely, and he placed these into a shallow dish. Then to the light of a single candle, he held the dish carefully as he advanced through the shelves and cabinets to the alcove of the Eternal Exhibits.
The Primordialis in its tank was roused by the flickering candlelight, Snape saw the feathery gills pump once or twice, and its spines lift. Snape paused to watch it intently for several moments, then raised the lid of the tank and dropped a fragment of heart into it, saw it drift down through the water and gracefully come to rest on the sandy bottom. The fish did not move. Snape dropped another, and the fish's bobble eyes raised and tracked the descent of the morsel. Snape supposed that there was a manner of closure to this act, that crocodiles, those unrelenting dinosaurs, had fed their hearts to the fish of African lakes and rivers for a millennia. Did such cold-blooded reptiles feel love? He did not know. He didn't know if these fragments of heart had ever clenched with adoration, or bled hard when they were broken. But this heart was not to be wasted after all, it had fulfilled its purpose to prolong the life of another, to help another live. Perhaps eternally.
The Primordialis twitched its tail and slowly swam towards the third sliver of flesh that now sank towards the bottom.
It was consumed in seconds.
The End
a/n: Thank you so much for reading! I had a lot of fun writing this one-shot, and I really hope you enjoyed it! Please let me know if you did, or share with me anything I could do better.
And if you did enjoy this story, please check out my other Severus Snape works - this one-shot is an adaptation from my longfic, The Uneven Orbit, a tragic lovestory.