See Ch. 1 for disclaimer.

Readers may note that this chapter is shorter than the others, about half as long. Well.

I have discovered that having massive amounts of school homework every day, as well as participating in a math contest, a trivia competition, and doing volunteer work at a debate tournament all on the same day (Saturday) is not particularly conducive to writing.

Translation: I've been insanely busy. Real life has not been kind to me. Not. At. All.

However, I did promise myself to stick to my deadlines, and so here is the update, albeit a much shorter one than I thought it would be:

Chapter 9

(Severus remembered.)

His room was in one of the highest towers of Castellum Serpens, which was what he had asked for when he came there, seeking a refuge from the various elements searching—or rather, conducting a manhunt for him: the Ministry, the Order of the Phoenix.

Manhunt. The word tasted sour and bitter all at once in his mouth, as he gently rolled his tongue around it. A manhunt, for a murderer.

The moonlight shone through the single square cut window, falling upon the thickly carpeted floor in sheets of gleaming white. The decorations, of course, were green and silver, as were the embellishments twisting around the border of his papers scattered across the desk. On the opposite side of the room, several rows of wooden shelves were nailed into thick white plaster walls, each of them bristling with potions vials. The bed, its covers obscured by liberal amounts of draperies, was shunted over into one of the corners, and next to it was a small corner table.

He paused, looking up from his writing, just long enough to wearily rub at his eyes. His eyes passed over a small calendar, tacked up on the wall. It was the twentieth of November, nearly half a year after Albus had died.

Or, to be more precise, nearly half a year since I killed him.

No. Do not think about that.

He frowned, stuck that thought away into one of his mind's pools of quicksilver, and continued writing, every once in a while glancing at the book which lay open next to him. Now, with his work as a spy ended—at least, so the Dark Lord thought—he mainly spent his days brewing potions for the Dark Lord, or simply researching and patiently working his way through all the books in Castellum Serpens's extensive library, taking notes on any magical spells and such that the Dark Lord might find of use.

But he was still a spy.

Much of his time, he spent chatting with the others, trying to figure out the actions the Dark Lord would take next, then trying out how to subtly sabotage and derail those actions. So far, his work had been successful, and gone unnoticed. He was good at that sort of thing.

The nib of his quill broke under the pressure of his fingers, which were pushing down on the writing utensil and had pinched it into two. With an irritated look at the black ink presently oozing its way onto his mahogany wood desk, Severus impatiently said, "Scourgify." The soap bubbles bubbled out of the tip of his wand and scoured the inky spot clean.

He put the broken quill down on the blotter next to the paper, and leaned back in his chair, trying to suppress his urge to yawn. It was not that he hadn't had any sleep—he was one of those types of people who naturally had less sleep, and could go perfectly fine all day without it. He recalled days at Hogwarts, when he would go to sleep late and wake up early, yet wide awake, his mind working and twisting around various scenarios and planning and thinking… Even Hogwarts was quiet, their link momentarily relaxed and not providing a channel for communication. But perhaps he had kept his eyes open for too long—they were beginning to sting with a dry prickle, and Severus blinked several times before his sight focussed again. He sighed, and pushed his chair out, stretching his arms. Maybe he would go down to the kitchens for something to eat.

Then his glance fell upon another book, tucked discreetly among his papers. It was a book on a subject which he was quite sure the Dark Lord had not told him to research—but then again, he didn't necessarily have to follow his orders. Instead, he was following the orders of a dead man.

Severus moved back towards the desk, picking up the book and opening it to a page he had marked. He hadn't had much time to look through it, and this was as good a time as any.

He had found the book on a routine search through the library a few days ago. It was titled Fonts of Knowledge, the author was named Nawan Corrumpe, and it would have not drawn Severus's attention at all, either way. Except, of course, that as he idly flipped it open, he found the Dark Lord's slanted handwriting in it.

And after that, how could he not take it from the library of Castellum Serpens, to see what the Dark Lord had found so interesting in the book?

Severus turned the pages, skipping the introduction and foreword. The writing was dry, and somewhat antiquated. However…

He stopped at the second chapter, "The Function of the Fonts."

Often referred to as places that have, so to speak, "known magic," these springs, these fonts of self-knowledge and wisdom, are revered by many pureblood families as ancient places of magic. Such places are usually reserved as women's places. Often they may require some blood to enter (another sign of female-related imagery), which signifies the old age of these places—very old magic, after all, has always been tied to blood.

Drinking the water from these fonts often allows the person who imbibes the liquid to become aware of one's self—that is, the times in one's life which has affected future decisions, one's fears, weaknesses, and desires. Such self-knowledge was considered almost dangerous by many; indeed, it was left to a privileged few who were allowed to partake of the water, and know themselves. Often times, only the most unblemished of soul could do so; those whose souls were tattered and torn, if daring to do the same, usually went insane from the enormity of what they had done.

The Dark Lord's slanting, elegant handwriting was in the margins. It read, Where is the wellspring? Could the wellspring be affected?

Farther down, in darker ink—Severus supposed that it must have been written later—some more words had been written. Requested B. B. to show me font. Found wellspring. See Potions book for potions.

At the bottom of the page, there were only eight words, terse and at first glance incomprehensible to casual readers. The font is ready for one of them.

But Severus was not a casual reader. He had a very good idea of what the Dark Lord had meant by the font being ready. There was something very helpful about having a link to Hogwarts, he thought to himself. The castle readily informed him of any goings on that he might find of use to him, and Potter's exploits with Albus to the cave had been aired to his friends, and he had briefly mentioned it to Minerva McGonagall (although Severus grudgingly gave the Potter boy credit for not immediately blurting out the information on the Horcruxes and the existence of the aforesaid objects). According to Potter's rather convoluted story, they had been forced to swim in order to reach a cave, where Albus had splattered his blood over a stone wall to enter it, they'd been in a boat across a lake filled with Inferi, and they had retrieved the locket from a basin. Translation: cave, used blood, Inferi, and, finally, font of knowledge, except it was a fons de knowlechen corrupted by some unknown potion that had forced Albus to relive painful memories.

Severus thought, So the Dark Lord used the font to hold his Horcrux, except that it turned out to be fake. And who showed him the font? B. B.?

In his mind, he quickly skimmed over the names of the Death Eaters. Antonin Dolohov, Evan Rosier, Lucius Malfoy, Walden MacNair, Bardolph Avery, Simon Wilkes, Rodolphus Lestrange, Rabastan Lestrange, Regulus Black, Bellatrix Lestrange—

No. Not Bellatrix Lestrange. Bellatrix Black Lestrange. B. B. She showed him the font, because he ordered her to, and she would willingly do whatever he wanted her to do—

R. A. B.

Once again, a sentence from Corrumpe's Fonts of Knowledge rose up in his mind: "…these fonts of self-knowledge and wisdom, are revered by many pureblood families as ancient places of magic…"

And Severus nodded to himself in understanding, his mouth curling slightly with distaste and a little bit of smug satisfaction.

Dear, dear, Bellatrix. Knowing you, you openly boasted about it to the other Black Death Eater in your family, but it seems that your young cousin did not approve of desecrating a font. Tradition rules in pureblood families, after all.

And how could he have known…? Yes, he was the errand boy, how could he have known about the Dark Lord's Horcruxes…? He was never that highly ranked—

He was the errand boy. He brought the Inferi for the Death Eaters to use. He would have seen it. Maybe he didn't know what it was, but he knew the Dark Lord valued it…

And he was still true to the pureblood beliefs and traditions, long before he swore an oath of loyalty to the Dark Lord.

And the final piece of the puzzle slotted into place, and Severus smiled, feeling very pleased with this new turn of events. And this new turn of events called for some observance of itself.

He stood up and headed for the door, walking across the threshold and quietly locking the door behind him with a series of wards which even Gringotts curse-breaker Bill Weasley would have been unable to penetrate. Treading softly on the twisting stone steps that led downward, he came to the bottom of the curving staircase, his right hand on the stone wall and trailing over the cold hard stone, the shallow crevices that separated them. He was also probably the only one still awake right now. Severus briefly entertained for a moment the flitting thought that he might sneak into the Dark Lord's room and kill him—except, of course, that the chances of success for that were not very high (which was itself, admittedly, an understatement), and his intuition did not agree to it either—in fact, it objected to it rather vehemently. Quite strenuously.

And there was that ridiculous prophecy, after all.

He glided down the corridors, finally halting in front of a small door set into the wall. He bent down and said, lazily, "Increscere Sise." The little door expanded until it was big enough for him to walk through in a stooped fashion. He grasped the door knob and twisted it carefully, stepping into…

The realm of the house elves.

One of the house elves turned around and saw him. She wore a somewhat dirtied tea cosy, and Severus glanced commandingly at her. "Master Snape!" she said. "What would you like?"

Severus suppressed the urge to smirk again. "Some scones, Tilly," he replied. "And a glass of wine. Australian Shiraz, if you have any."

Here's to you, Albus, and to Hogwarts and the Order. It seems that Regulus Black was very helpful indeed.

oOo

Much to his irritation over the next few days, Severus found that just because Regulus Black had taken the locket, it did not automatically mean that he had destroyed it. There was the extreme likelihood that the younger Black brother had simply left it at 12 Grimmauld Place, in which case Kreacher could have stolen it away, the Order could have thrown it into the rubbish bins, or Mundungus Fletcher could have taken it and, ignorant of its true significance, sold it on the wizarding black market.

Severus thought about what he would do to Fletcher if the last was the case, and his fingers itched to go for his wand and curse that idiot into oblivion.

But in any case, he would not be able to retrieve it. So instead, Severus turned his attention to the other Horcruxes. Diary, destroyed. Ring, destroyed. Locket, missing. Nagini, here in Castellum Serpens. Cup, in an unknown location. And some other godforsaken artefact.

Painstakingly, he spent a good many months carefully tracing all the Founders' belongings over the centuries, and found that while most of them were either in keeping by the Ministry or some family, the Slytherin locket, the Hufflepuff cup, and the Ravenclaw seal had disappeared. Then he had to slowly track down and find the road a certain Tom Marvolo Riddle had taken after disappearing from England soon after Hepzibah Smith's death. Severus discovered that the aspiring Dark Lord had set off immediately for Germany, spending a few days at the Lebenszeit University in Berlin before venturing far into Eastern Europe. Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Albania…

Then Tom Riddle had turned up in the Soviet Union, seeking out the Rasputinists, the notorious cult which sought immortality as much as Riddle did.

On his next visit to the Soviet Union—ordered by the Dark Lord, of course, to recruit some new Death Eaters—Severus discreetly asked about the Rasputinists, and found that they had received the gift of a golden goblet from some unknown benefactor decades before, which they kept secure in their vault. So that was where the Hufflepuff cup was located.

Then, Severus knew, Tom Riddle had traipsed back to Hogwarts, asking Albus for the Defence position, and spending many days in and around Hogwarts. As the Dark Lord's most trusted follower (he had killed Albus, after all, so of course he must be loyal), the Dark Lord had been more relaxed in speaking to him, and Severus discovered that the Dark Lord had a vast amount of knowledge about the Forbidden Forest, and one time even spoke of something he had left there which he needed to keep secure. So there, Severus decided, is the place for the Ravenclaw seal, I suppose.

There was only the problem of how to get this information to the Order, as Severus would not be able to get the Horcruxes by himself without attracting the Dark Lord's attention—frequent absences from Castellum Serpens would be noted. But by then, the Ministry had been destroyed, the Order had barricaded themselves into Hogwarts, and Potter and his friends were in some unknown place in the country.

Misfortune after misfortune, and then the resistance finally collapsed.

oOo

HOGSMEADE ATTACKED! UNKNOWN ALLY?

By Eliot Danton, Daily Prophet reporter

Late last night, Hogsmeade—the only entirely magical settlement in all of Great Britain—was attacked by Death Eaters. Followers of You-Know-Who, who has only recently acknowledged to have returned, they engaged in a pitched battle with Aurors. However, it seems that even our valiant fighters were in dire straits. The Dementors, who deserted the prison of Azkaban, were slowly weakening the Aurors. Auror Beckett Sumner, currently still at St Mungo's, says, "There were simply too many of them for us. The Death Eaters fought us, and then the Dementors came up, and we couldn't cast our Patronii."

Amazingly enough, there was an unknown benefactor, who cast a huge Patronus to drive the Dementors. Yet it was no ordinary Patronus—instead of silver, it was a flaming black phoenix which many Aurors say seemed to actually destroy the Dementors. "It tore into them, and the Dementors just seemed to fall apart," says Auror Nymphadora Tonks.

Many people are now looking to Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, as the caster. Since it is openly known that a phoenix resides at the castle with the Headmaster…

Dumbledore has already denied this, however. So if the caster was not Dumbledore, then, we must ask, who was it?…

oOo

Ron's love of the day rested in magnificent repose upon the table. The redheaded boy gazed adoringly at it, his eyes full of longing. It was gleaming brown, shining with crispiness, a latticed top…

"No, Ron, you can't eat the apple turnover," his mum admonished gently. "That's saved for Ginny, she helped me make it."

"Really? And she didn't blow up the house?"

"Ron!"

Next to him, Harry looked at the newspaper headlines, and then his right hand rose up to rub at his scar. "So that's why," he said, more to himself than to the others. "I thought it was a little sore last night."

"What do you mean?" Ron leaned over to peer at the day's edition of the Daily Prophet. "Oh. Hey, mum, was that why everyone in the Order was staying up late into the night?"

"Because of the attack on Hogsmeade? Yes," said his mum. "What a horrible thing to do."

Ron glanced with concern at Harry, whose fingers had absent mindedly found their way to his scar, which stood out against his skin, a white lightning bolt etched into his forehead and marring his facial symmetry. "Your scar hurts, mate?" he asked sympathetically.

"Not that bad," Harry replied. "But it itches sometimes. For a moment last night it really hurt like hell, and now it's all right."

Ron nodded, watching Harry. "I don't get it though," he said abruptly to Molly Weasley, who paused in the act of wiping a dish. "Why doesn't the Order say that it was Dumbledore with the phoenix anyway?"

"Because it wasn't," Sirius answered, stepping into the room. Ron's head swung up to see the escaped convict sit down across the table, still clad in red and gold sleepwear. "We don't know who summoned the Patronus, but whoever it is has got a wicked one. Look here." He angled his body slightly so he could see the article, and pointed further down the page. "Here it is. '… It was no ordinary Patronus—instead of silver, it was a flaming black phoenix which many Aurors say seemed to actually destroy the Dementors…' It did literally tear them apart, you know."

"But Dementors can't be destroyed!" was Hermione's surprised exclamation. She yawned as she came into the room, her thick brown hair falling in ringlets on her shoulders. "All the books say so!"

Ron muttered, "So proclaims the venerated Hogwarts, a History—"

"It wasn't Hogwarts, a History, it was another book." Hermione frowned at him.

Sirius was shaking his head. "Hermione," he said, "when you've seen Tonks's memory of the battle—it's just disproved all those books. Really, I mean it."

Hermione frowned again. "Budge over, Ron," she told him. Ron scooted over to make some space for her, and she sat down, reaching for a plate piled with eggs and bacon. "Then how was it destroyed?"

Sirius raised his hands, palms facing out, in a sign of bafflement. "Don't ask me, Hermione. I don't know much about it, other than it happening."

As the others were talking, Ron thoughtfully chewed his food. Ever since the Ministry of Magic had—finally, he thought with disgust—acknowledged the return of You-Know-Who—no, not You-Know-Who, but Voldemort (he tried hard not to flinch), the wizarding world seemed to have entered some sort of hysterical state. Their family seemed to constantly switch between the Burrow and 12 Grimmauld Place sporadically, and Ron suspected it was to lessen the risk of being attacked. The last time they had visited Diagon Alley…

Ron still recalled the first time he had been allowed to go into the commercial hub of the British wizarding world. He idly remembered the short, yet clever and dangerous goblins guarding the bank of Gringotts, the sleek and shining brooms lined up neatly in the window display at Quality Quidditch Supplies, the wild, colourful, loud explosion that had momentarily rocked Gambol and Japes and sent Fred and George into ecstasies of excitement at what they could do with the joke shop's merchandise. Then there was the mustiness of Flourish and Blotts which was vaguely reminiscent of the atmosphere of a library, the rustling robes and cloaks of Madam Malkin's in numerous shades and colours, the horrible smell of the apothecary (he remembered that there were unicorn horns and beetle eyes, and then there was that horrible sulphuric smell…), the delicious Fortescue ice cream…

Except this year, it was different. When Ron had gone there at the beginning of July to visit Fred and George's shop, he could sense the palpable tension and fear in the air. They said Ollivander had, one day, mysteriously vanished from his shop, which had become a taboo topic for discussion—no-one liked to think if Ollivander had left, or been captured by Death Eaters. Florean Fortescue was missing, his ice cream parlour now without the cheery atmosphere that had once been there. People now moved around in groups, wands hidden within the voluminous folds of their robes, wary and suspicious. He remembered the newspaper kiosks, with the sight of the screaming black headlines, "Potter—Chosen One?" which was what the newspapers were calling Harry now, and which was met with great disgust and annoyance from the dubbed "Chosen One" (No one mentioned it around Harry—he was extremely touchy about the issue).

The world, to put it plainly, had changed drastically, and Ron felt it was for the worse. Not like that could be a surprise, with the Death Eaters and the murders and the fear—the atmosphere of pervasive fear, so thick that sometimes Ron thought a knife would be sluggish in cutting through it.

So I'm afraid, Ron thought. Who isn't? He watched his best friend, as he spoke to Sirius and Hermione, with a weary tone in his voice. Harry's emerald green eyes were shadowed, his usually messy black hair even more wild than ever; Ron saw the way that his face seemed to weigh down with the responsibility, the deaths that were beginning to gather and pile up.

I'm afraid, I know, but I'll stick with you, Harry, I swear. Friends always stay together, and I'll be here whenever you need me. To the end.

oOo

The name Nawan Corrumpe is from "cnāwan" in Old English, which means "to know," and from "corrumpere" in Latin, which is for "corrupt." (corrupted knowledge—i.e., the corruption of the font of self-knowledge in the cave).

Fons de knowlechen is from "fons" (Latin for "spring) and "knowlechen" (obsolete, "to acknowledge").

"Increscere Sise" is from the Latin for "increase" and the Old French for "size."

The name Lebenszeit University comes from the German for "lifetime."

I'm aware that this chapter does not have the promised Wang Qin and Ming-yue scene with lycanthropy. (looks sheepish) Heh. I didn't have enough time to get to it. That'll be the next chapter, I promise!

Please review!

Talriga