Snape came late the next morning to the Leaky Cauldron to get Merlin so that they could go shopping for his school supplies. Merlin hardly slept at all the night before. He's had trouble sleeping since arriving in this time. At first, he thought it was just because the rough concrete behind the building was uncomfortable, but even last night in a bed, sleep eluded him. The exhaustion that Merlin felt didn't stop him from giving Snape a cheeky smile when he walked out to the main room, though. Snape huffed in disdain when Merlin approached him.

"You still have the list we gave you yesterday, correct?" Snape asked. In response, Merlin pulled out the said folded piece of parchment and waved it around. Snape nodded once, taking the paper and then strode off, leaving Merlin to chase after him. At times like this, Merlin cursed his short legs on his small body.

Snape lead Merlin out to a small, walled courtyard, where there was nothing but a trashcan and a few weeds.

"Lovely place you brought us too," Merlin remarked, unable to keep the snark out of his voice. He could almost feel a ghost of Arthur's hand smacking the back of his head for that comment but instead felt a twinge of pain in his heart for thinking about him.

"This trip will go better for the both of us if you keep your comments to a minimum, understood?" Snape said, his jaw tense.

"Yes, sire," Merlin said, deciding to treat this day as if he were back in Camelot and under the servitude of Snape. He figured it would be best not to get on the man's bad side at least before the school year even started, but Merlin didn't know how long he could last without his typical sass. He was never particularly good with authority figures. Snape merely gave a brief, quizzical look at Merlin. He then took out his wand and tapped the brick wall three times.

The brick he had touched quivered — it wriggled — in the middle, a small hole appeared — it grew wider and wider — a second later they were facing a large archway that lead to a cobbled street that twisted and turned out of sight.

"Welcome," Snape said, "to Diagon Alley."

Merlin stared at the sight before him in amazement. They stepped through the archway, and the amazement Merlin felt before quickly vanished. Pain erupted inside of him, causing him to double over and gasp for breath.

"What is with you now?" Snape said, trying to sound exasperated, but Merlin could detect possibly a hint of worry in his voice.

"Nothing," Merlin said, standing up straight, attempting to push the pain aside. He put on the biggest smile he could muster, but he doubted that Snape truly bought it. Whether or not Snape bought it, though, he decided to ignore it just like Merlin was.

"Our first stop will be Gringott's bank to get you money," he said before leading off again.

Despite the pain Merlin felt, he couldn't help but look around in fascination. He turned his head in every direction as they walked up the street, trying to look at everything at once: the shops, the things outside them, the people doing their shopping. It so unlike any market that Merlin had ever visited before. A plump woman outside an Apothecary was shaking her head as they passed, saying "Dragon liver, sixteen Sickles an ounce, they're mad…"

A low, soft hooting came from a dark shop with a sign saying Eeylops Owl Emporium - Tawny, Screech, Barn, Brown, and Snowy. Several boys that Merlin guessed were theoretically his physical age had their noses pressed against a window with broomsticks in it. "Look," Merlin heard one of them say, "The new Nimbus Two Thousand — fastest ever—" There were shops selling robes, shops selling telescopes and strange silver instrument that Merlin had never seen before, windows stacked with barrels of bat spleens and eels' eyes, tottering piles of spell books, quills, and rolls of parchment, potion bottles, globes of the moon…

"Gringotts," said Snape.

They had reached a snowy white building that towered over the other little shops. Standing beside its burnished bronze doors, wearing a uniform of scarlet and gold, was -

"Don't stare at the goblins, boy. You're making a fool of yourself," Snape hissed quietly as they walked up the white stone steps towards him. The goblin was about a head shorter than Merlin. He had a swarthy, cleaver face, a pointed beard and, Merlin noticed, very long fingers and feet. He looked nothing like the goblin that Merlin meet back in Camelot, leading Merlin to believe that they were a different type of goblin. The goblin bowed as they walked inside. Now they were facing a second pair of doors, silver this time, with words engraved upon them:

Enter, stranger, but take heed

Of what awaits the sin of greed,

For those who take, but do not earn,

Must pay most dearly in their turn.

So if you seek beneath our floors

A treasure that was never yours,

Thief, you have been warned, beware

Of finding more than treasure there.

"Well, that certainly isn't ominous," Merlin said, not realizing that he spoke aloud until Snape spoke back to him.

"You'd have to be mad to try to rob this place."

"Noted," Merlin replied grimly.

A pair of goblins bowed them through the silver doors and they were in a vast marble hall. About a hundred more goblins were sitting on high stools behind a long counter, scribbling in large ledgers, weighing coins in brass scales, examining precious stones through eyeglasses. There were too many doors to count leading off the hall, and yet more goblins were showing people in and out of these. Snape and Merlin made for the counter.

"We're here to acquire the school allowance for Morgan Emrys," Snape said to a free goblin.

"Do you have the proper papers for such a request, sir?"

Snape already had the papers pulled out when the goblin began speaking, and he presented them to him the moment the goblin finished his sentence.

The goblin looked at them closely.

"Everything seems to be in order. Very well. I will have someone bring you the money. Griphook!"

Griphook was yet another goblin. The goblin that Snape had been talking to showed Griphook that papers. Griphook nodded and disappeared behind one of the doors. Snape was handed back his papers, and he was putting them away when there was a voice behind him.

"Fancy seein' yeh here, Professor Snape," the voice said.

Merlin turned around to see the man the voice belonged to, and what he saw made his jaw drop open. A giant of a man was standing there. His face was almost completely hidden by a long, shaggy mane of hair and a wild, tangled beard, but you could make out his eyes, glinting like black beetles under all the hair.

"Hagrid," Snape greeted the giant. "What brought you here today?"

"I'm doin' some business fer Dumbledore. What are yer doin' here?"

"Hogwarts business. I'm here to escort Mr. Emrys while he gets his school supplies for the upcoming year since he as no one else to take him."

The giant man — Hagrid — turned and looked down at Merlin, apparently noticing him for the first time. If Merlin didn't already feel small enough with his de-aged body, he felt like an ant compared to the man.

"Hello there," Hagrid said, taking Merlin's small hand into his enormous one, giving him a firm handshake. "Rubeus Hagrid, Keeper of the Key at Hogwarts. Yer a first year, aren't yeh?"

"Yes, sir. I'm Morgan."

"Well, it was nice meetin' yer, but I best be going. I have that important business."

Almost as soon as Hagrid finished biding his farewells and left, Griphook returned, handing a small pouch to Snape.

"Mr. Emrys' school allowance from the Ministry," the goblin said, before disappearing to go help Hagrid.

"I want you to understand how this day is going to work," Snape said as soon as they stepped outside Gringotts, blinking in the sunlight. "I will be the handling the money. We will be going around to the necessary stores to only purchase the required materials, nothing more. Is that understood?"

Merlin just nodded his head, thinking it best not to argue with the man, even though he was perfectly capable of doing the shopping himself. Well, maybe not. He had no idea what it was that he needed to purchase, nor did he know how the currency worked here. He just didn't appreciate that he was being treated as a child despite physically appearing to be one. Merlin supposed that he should get used to it, though, since he had no clue how long he would be stuck like this.

"We'll get your uniforms first," Snape said, striding off towards Madam Malkin's Robes for all Occasions. Merlin begrudgingly followed.

Madam Malkin turned out to be a squat, smiling witch dressed in all mauve.

"Hogwarts, dear?" she asked, looking at Merlin as soon as he walked in.

"Yes," Snape said, effectively drawing her attention to him. Her mood automatically sullied when she laid eyes on the professor. Merlin was begging to feel like the man had that effect on most people. He wasn't particularly pleasant to be around.

"There is another young man being fitted as well," she said, pointing to the back of the store.

As Merlin and Snape made their way back there, Merlin leaned over and whispered to Snape. "What a lovely effect you have on people." That earned him a swift whack to the back of his head. Merlin couldn't help but smile.

In the back of the shop, a boy with a pale, pointed face was standing on a footstool while a second witch pinned up his long black robes.

"Hello, Draco," Snape said to the boy.

"Severus," the boy replied, respectfully inclining his head to the man.

"It's Professor Snape now that you are attending Hogwarts."

The boy — Draco — hesitated for a bit before nodding his head in compliance. Madam Malkin stood Merlin up on a stool next to the boy, slipped a long robe over his head, and began to pin it to the right length.

"Hello," Draco said to him. "Hogwarts, too? I didn't know that Severus — I mean Professor Snape — had any relatives."

Merlin tried, and failed horribly, to choke back a snort. The thought of being related to Snape was completely absurd to the warlock. Even though he had practically just met the man, he already had a not so good opinion of the man and was thankful for not have such a relationship with him.

"We are not related," Snape said sternly, giving Merlin a death glare.

"Then why..." Draco started only to be cut off by Snape.

"Mr. Emrys here has nobody to take him to get his school supplies. I was assigned to the task."

Draco frowned for a bit, then a sneer began to take over his face.

"Raised by Muggles, then?" he asked, disdain evident in his voice.

Merlin had already gathered that there was tension between magicals and how they viewed non-magicals, but it seemed that this boy took it too far. He couldn't stand for it. He had worked so hard back in Camelot for there to be peace between the those with magic and those without magic. He failed in bringing the two together, and this boy is one of the ones that is making the rift between the two groups grow bigger, so he decided to put Draco in his place.

"If it matters so much for you, my father actually had magic. It doesn't quite matter, though, since he and everyone else is dead, does it? And even if I was raised by muggles, that does not inherently make me inferior to you. My mother didn't have any magic, and she was the best parent that I could have ever asked for. She was more kind, compassionate, and accepting than you currently are, which puts her — a muggle — above you. To think that you are superior to those like her is ignorant."

Draco opened his mouth to retort, closed it, and then turned back to face the mirror in silence, his ears taking on a reddish tint. Merlin smiled in his victory, but internally winced when he heard an almost inaudible groan come from Snape. He really was not getting on the man's good side.

The rest of the fitting was done in complete silence. No one spoke a word, and the atmosphere was tense. Merlin didn't mind it too much. He was used to tense.

"That's you done, my dear," Madam Malkin said, her voice shattering the silence. Out of the corner of his eye, Merlin saw Draco jump a bit, causing a small smirk to appear on his face. He hopped down from the footstool and waited patiently next to Snape as he paid. The man was surprisingly calm. The calm only lasted until they were outside. That is when the Professor rounded on him.

"Do you have no tact or any knowledge of social etiquette when meeting a new person? That was my godson in there," he whispered harshly as he pulled Merlin to the side of the street.

"Was what I said to him wrong?" Merlin said back, staring defiantly back at the professor.

Snape faltered, stunning Merlin. The man had struck him as a stoic person. The warlock could almost never read any emotions off him and seeing this was not something that he had prepared for. Snape relinquished his hold on Merlin and stepped back. He took a second to compose himself, before he spoke again.

"Let's hurry up and get the rest of your supplies, so that I can be done with you," he said, pulling the list out of his pocket.

Merlin had no argument with that and followed the man to the next shop.

They stopped to buy parchment and quills. They bought Merlin's school books in a shop called Flourish and Blotts where the shelves were stacked to the ceiling with books as large as paving stones bound in leather; books almost as small as his thumb in covers of silk; books full of peculiar symbols and a few books with nothing in them at all. The place was more impressive than the library back in Camelot, and that was saying something.

Next, they got a nice set of scales for weighing potions ingredients and a collapsible brass telescope. Then they visited the Apothecary, which strongly reminded Merlin of Gaius. At least Gaius' place smelled better. This place smelled of a mixture of bad eggs and rotting cabbage — Merlin was very well acquainted with the smell of rotten cabbage thanks to the extensive amount of time that he found himself spending in the stocks. While Snape asked the man behind the counter for a supply of some basic potions ingredients for Merlin as well as some specific items for himself, Merlin decided to look around. He was examining a few minuscule, glittery-black beetle eyes when he felt another wave of pain hit him, this time worse than before.

When Snape found him after purchasing the ingredients, Merlin was still leaning against a wall, breathing deeply to try to get the pain to subside. He felt sick, like something was very wrong.

"Quit fooling around," Snape sneered.

Merlin just gritted his teeth and followed him out the door. Once outside, Snape consulted the list again.

"You are allowed a pet at Hogwarts. You can have an owl, cat, or toad. Most students bring an owl because that it how we wizards deliver mail," he said.

"I have no one that I could send a letter to," Merlin replied curtly.

Snape stared at him for a moment before moving on. "Well, all that is left then is for you to get your wand."

Merlin froze. "My wand?" he asked.

"Yes, your wand," Snape said, rubbing his brow.

"Do I have to have one?" Merlin had been noticing how many people had been carrying around wooded sticks and using them to perform magic like the Dumbledore did yesterday. It stuck him as odd that everyone would be using suck things.

"To perform magic, yes, you must use a wand."

"Can we not just do magic without one?"

"Wandless magic is very difficult. It is only taught to older students, and even still, not even the most powerful wizard can fully rely on wandless magic alone. So, you need a wand to channel you magic through."

Merlin balked at Snape's words. Magic must have changed drastically, or people have become so weak overtime if they need something to help them perform magic. It reminded him of Gilli and his ring. It also reminded him of the Sidhe staff which also was a conduit of magic and amplified his powers. At the thought of the staff, Merlin's hand flew into his pocket. One of the only possessions that he had on him when landed in the future was a wooden stick — a wand. He examined it the first night that he spent here. It was almost just like the Sidhe staff, but much smaller. Merlin wasn't sure why the Old Religion decided to give the staff to him, or why it was even shrunken down and changed, but he now reasoned that the Old Religion wanted him to have this specific wand for some reason.

"Okay," Merlin said. "What if I already have one, though?"

"Do you now?" Snape question, doubt and curiosity leaking into his voice.

Merlin pulled the wand out of his pocket so that the professor could see. It was a knotted piece of light, brown wood, with blue highlights near the tip and an inscription on the handle that Merlin was purposely covering up with his hand. He yanked it out of reach when Snape made a move to hold it.

"Where did you get that?" he asked.

"It was given to me," Merlin lied.

"By whom?" Snape asked disbelievingly.

Before Merlin could answer with another lie, a third wave of pain hit him. This time it was bad enough to make him scream out. The ground came rushing towards his face, but he had already blacked out prior to hitting it.

Snape was not enjoying having to take Morgan Emrys shopping at Diagon Alley, and he was already irritated with the boy. He had better things to do today than having to go to the Ministry to make sure that the kid could first go to Hogwarts and then take him for school supply shopping. It wasn't really until after the ordeal in Madam Malkin's shop that the Potions Master began thinking about Emrys differently. The way he went off on Draco, clearly no tolerating his bigoted view, sparked curiosity in Snape.

After that, Snape began studying Emrys better. He could tell something was off about him, and the way he seemed to be in pain was a bit unsettling. Snape wouldn't allow himself to care, but he did surprisingly feel a hint of concern in the Apothecary store when he found Emrys hunched over again like he was when they first stepped foot into Diagon Alley. He quickly covered it up, though. He would sooner talk trash about the Dark Lord than he would show concern over someone other than his Slytherin students.

Seeing the wand that Emrys had was a shock. Snape had never seen such a wand and was kinda angry when he couldn't hold it to analyze it better. That anger quickly dissipated when the boy screamed out and crumpled to the ground completely knocked out. The unwanted concerned feeling slipped its way back into Snape's chest.

Ignoring the stares of everyone around him, Snape wasted no time in scooping up Emrys into his arms and aparating to just outside the wards of Hogwarts. He hastily made his way up to the castle, and walked swiftly down the corridors towards the hospital wing

Minerva crossed paths with him on the way there.

"Who is that and what happened?" she gasped upon seeing the limp boy in arms.

"Tell Albus to come to the hospital wing," was his only reply.

When Snape made it there, he gave Madam Pomfrey a quick rundown of what had happened. She just shook her head before hurrying over to start running diagnostic spells on the boy who was now placed on one of the white, hospital beds. Dumbledore then came bursting in, followed shortly by Minerva.

"What happened?" Albus asked, striding up to Snape.

"I am not sure," Snape answered truthfully. "The boy seemed to be in some pain during the trip and then screamed and blacked out."

"And you did nothing?" Minerva said harshly.

"I brought him here," Snape countered.

"After he had passed out from the pain."

"Calm down, Minerva," Albus said. "Mr. Emrys is now in good hands, isn't that right, Poppy?"

"I will do my best to help this poor, young man," the healer replied.

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