Disclaimer – I do not own any fictional character.
Legilimens-Chapter 12
Severus Snape was having a bad day, and it was just the morning; knowing the school as he did, he had no doubts that those imbeciles would try their best that it did not end well.
Part of it was his own fault, he was the one who never took heed to the Headmasters warnings; He was the one who despite several letters of complain, continued to bully the children.
Although it was not completely for his personal reasons that he bullied children, and he agreed to the fact that he was a bully. He truly believed that fear was healthy for good performance in a class room. He did not possess the Grandfatherly persona that Dumbledore employed, he was strict and he had to generate fear amongst those imbeciles, lest they blow themselves up.
He knew it was unnecessary; the potion curriculum was designed in such a manner that under no circumstance would a set of ingredients explode; sure they could boil the cauldrons, they could hiss but never explode if mixed in any reasonable amount and any way possible.
The potion-making instructions were sometimes thrice in length than required, just to make sure that the potion has no chance to blow up in face. But that was not the point! They should never make mistakes, even if precautions were taken. Anything less than perfect was useless in potions.
The no good bastards always had the tendency to mix red looking substance in abundance, and let us not forget bright green ingredients. Somehow the more impressive looking ingredients were added twice or thrice the required amounts, because it looked impressive.
Those imbeciles never understood the beauty of simmering cauldrons, the glorious fumes and the ability to predict exactly what would happen and why. He made sure that they understood. They compared his potions to cooking, to chemistry and sometimes to painting! Those dunderheads never understood that the potions actively interacted with the magical core; they never required foolish wand waving.
The beauty of casting magic and doing it so subtly, without any fanfare, to be able to bottle up the spells; to bottle life and to contain death, all in a small vial.
He made sure of it, perhaps he was harsh or maybe he was not. A small part of him loathed himself that he was good at potions because Sirius Black was. His own parents were never rich enough to buy him the required materials. He specialized in the Dark arts, but the Marauders employed potions in their pranks because a lot of spells were above their grasp. Lily had helped him to counter those pranks; it had all started with an itching potion combined with a boil inducing potion.
Black found it amusing when people scratched their face to relieve an itch only to see a boil forming on the same place. Lily had brewed him a small boil relief potion when he was being stubborn about visiting the infirmary. He had wanted to hex those boils off, but Lilly stopped him from it. A good thing too, considering he would have scarred his face permanently.
From then on he studied potions, to be closer to his friend, to her. He truly enjoyed potions and later pursued Mastery on the subject. Deep down he knew that his chances with Lilly were slim, he was not good enough.
He knew he had nothing to offer; she was beautiful, smart and was a rallying point for all muggle-borns and he was hook nosed, pale skinned dark arts maniac with no qualities to make him her equal. It was speculated that one of the light sided families would try bringing her to their fold, once she left Hogwarts. She was no ordinary muggle born after all, she gave all signs of power seen in people like Albus Dumbledore, Voldemort, Lucius Malfoy, and Bellatrix Black had previously shown.
Severus was witness to that; he had seen Lilly use magic consciously when he sat alone, trying to muster up some courage to talk to the pretty red haired girl. He had seen Lilly moving flower petals at will. Very few children could manage that and even fewer wizards tried to learn when they were mature enough.
While basic wandless magic was neither impossible nor too difficult to learn for most adult wizards, yet most did not care to learn it. After Hogwarts most would pursue further training and then other priorities of life took over. At Hogwarts few had the focus, fewer had the power and very few had the drive to achieve independence from a wand.
Lucius could cast hygiene charms without a wand as easily as he could breath and he used it to humiliate others after he shook their hand. Dumbledore could be seen transfiguring things around when needed, without a wand. The Dark Lord could blast things and people away at a mere thought, Bella do the same, on a smaller scale and Severus himself could use Legilimency without a wand and without any preparation, at a moments notice.
Lilly completely distanced herself from him and it was expected after the blunder he made. And James Potter used the opportunity to great effect. Snape knew Potter liked Lilly, he hated to admit it but Potter was a better choice for Lilly than he was. Potter was talented, he would never admit it aloud but he was talented and could become a transfiguration master. The Potters were rich, not Malfoy rich but rich enough.
Potter could provide her an opportunity that he could not. It burned his blood but he could not deny the facts. He was far too lost in Dark Lords fold to ever come out, even if his name was in possible recruits list, he owed Malfoy and Mulciber a lot of favors.
Thus while Lilly married Potter, he got branded. He was sent to spy on Dumbledore where Dumbledore caught him.
Dumbledore blackmailed him to serve under him as a teacher in a school full of brats. The crafty bastard made sure that the world knew he was a traitor to the Dark Lord; he made several appearances with him in tow, trivial things like a few Death Eater trials, an errand at Gringgots, etc.
This resulted in his old friends turning their backs on him and making sure that whenever the Dark Lord returned; half of his pay would be spent brewing nerve repair potions for himself.
Not to mention losing favor of a lot of powerful friends, friends that could prove useful during a time like the present. He had no one he could ask for help; Lucius had flat out refused to be a part of childish pranks. He even sent him one of those infernal dolls as a present to – "cheer him up".
Dumbledore actually lectured him while giving a twinkling smile before returned to his paper work for some bill at Wizengamot.
"Now, now Severus, I'm sure you truly don't want that. It is the first step towards fame, my boy. You will be remembered eternally. Why, one day you would find yourself on one of the chocolate-frog cards! I must say I was so happy when I saw myself in those cards, my greatest accomplishment indeed."
Severus had enough of the act and in fit of rage grabbed Dumbledore's shoulder to yank him away from his work. An instant later he knew he had crossed an invisible line when he felt himself thrown against the wall face first, his hands yanked back and his wand flying out of his hand in Dumbledore's own, all before he could blink.
Facing the wall Snape could feel Dumbledore's overwhelming presence nearing him. The hair of his back and neck stood up and he could feel fear creeping up the second time in the day. He had started regretting his action the moment he had laid his hand on Dumbledore's shoulder, but it was late already.
"You should not have done that, my boy." Snape heard Dumbledore's soft voice as he was turned around, face to face, none too gently. "I have given you a lot of leeway in your methods of teaching. I have received a lot of complaints about you over the years, yet I have done everything to save you from the consequences of your actions. Do you know how troublesome it was to appease Tiberius when you handed out a month long detention to his nephew? Fortunately, young Cormac is not known to be polite, and it worked out in the end. At this rate half of my time would be spent answering mails and floo calls and sooth ruffled feathers all because of your wrong doings."
Severus could feel his hands being twisted, slowly and painfully.
"You will serve as a spy, whether you are amenable or not. There is no backing out, and making my life difficult might result in unpleasant consequences, for you of course."
"I will not help you out of this; my only concern is that you are alive and able to take the position of the spy, nothing more. You dug the well; you find the rope to get out."
His demeanour changing in an instant, gone was the hardened face and cold eyes, eyes twinkling he continued - "I believe you missed breakfast, it wont do if my own staff is not fed well, will it? I expect you to be present at lunch." That being said, Dumbledore returned to his work although his mind was not on it, now that he could see change in the air. Hopefully Severus would change for the better, at least towards the students and save him a lot of trouble.
What did he not do for the British wizarding world, for the greater good?
A decade ago he received a prophecy, a prophecy told to him by one of his current staff. He interviewed her in his office, but for the prophecy to take effect, arranged young Severus to overhear a part of it. Severus had been tailing him for some time on Tom's orders. A memory charm on Sybil, an appointment at Hogs Head, a compulsion on his brother and a bit of tweaking the privacy wards of the place; not difficult since he was the one who warded the Hogs Head in the first place.
He had to find the child of prophecy, but only Tom could choose. Then he saw a miracle happen, the muggle born girl somehow chained a few rituals and probably invented at least one. She somehow anchored her soul and magic to linger with Harry, as a shield to protect him and attack whoever attacked Harry Potter.
Tom in his confidence simply brushed away the presence or perhaps the defense hid itself from detection. The Killing Curse when cast would have detached Harry Potter's soul from his body, only it never struck the target. The shield erected took the blow and then attacked Tom viciously, destroying his body completely. In normal circumstances it would have killed him and everyone around him, but Tom was not a Dark Lord for nothing.
He expected the existence of a Horcrux or perhaps several, unfortunately he was not disappointed. Tom never understood the concept of overkill and although he could never guess the exact number he expected more than two.
The alarms notified him and he arrived within half a minute, performing as many detection charms as he could. He marveled the work done but sadly he had to destroy the evidence of such a ritual. Who knows what the department of mysteries would have done, had they found out about the rituals.
Even he would never subject a child to their experiments. It would have been easy to do; the knowledge about Harry's survival would have been suppressed or claimed false and the boy would be under study. He could not allow that! The boy was needed.
He quickly performed the detection charms, hastily recorded the information and then destroyed all magical evidence, his and Lilly's. To this day the department of Mysteries is still baffled of what truly happened. His next step was to spread rumors far and wide, soon people were celebrating and any possibility of Harry Potter disappearing was negated.
Still, destroying evidence meant that he could not study the magic thoroughly and all information he had was based on hastily done diagnostic charms and no thorough analysis was possible.
A lot of people had their attention on the boy. It would have been very difficult to kidnap the boy and keep him secret. Croaker was a devious person and his deviousness was only beaten by his ruthlessness. He is known to throw his nephew from the window so that he could show signs of magic.
He was also the reason he truly wished Harry Potter to be the child of prophecy. Who knows what that man would do to his nephew? Protecting Neville would have been much more difficult, doable but difficult.
Taking Harry out of any wizards grasp was another difficult thing, but luck was on his side; Sirius was not liked by either sides. Barty Crouch hated all Blacks; he never gave him a trial. Sirius alienated the "Dark" families and the Light families were never on his side to begin with. Sirius was very naïve person, and to think he was born in the Black family!
Malfoy family did not dare try to adopt the boy after Lucius was caught, Dumbledore had fabricated the evidence that made him a suspect, and although Malfoy was a death eater he was good at covering his tracks.
Even the flimsy excuse of imperious curse and a few galleons at the right place got him out of the trouble. A lot of people were actually under the imperious and thus the task was not too difficult.
The Longbottoms were one of his regrets; he regretted what he had to do. He would have had a lot of trouble, but again luck was on his side. A little manipulation here and a bit of help from elder Diggle brother and the problems were solved.
He wished that all this was not needed, but he had to play with the cards he was dealt with. What else could he do? He could not train the boy; he could not create a child soldier. What were the chances of a child surviving a sixty year old Dark Lord? One does not hand out weapons to a child, any child.
The boy was a Horcrux too! He would have removed the soul but what would happen to the child? The struggle would have damaged the boy beyond repair. Tom would not have gone without a fight. His options were limited.
Kill the boy. Not possible since he was needed.
Remove the Horcrux, again inadvisable due to the damage which could occur was unknown.
Wait and watch.
He chose to wait. Again he had multiple options, he could
Train the boy, not advised because the extent of the effect of Horcrux was unknown. He could be training a Dark Lord in making.
Give him to a family, a magical one. Again it was not advised since the Horcrux could decide to possess those in his proximity, not to mention he did not need Harry Potter with an ego twenty times his father.
Remove him from magical environment and wait.
He chose the third. The Horcrux would never posses a muggle since it could not survive in a powerless body; also the muggles were relatively expendable in the big picture.
He eventually bound the Horcrux to the boy and enhanced the protections, those that lingered from his mother's sacrifice.
Now Harry Potter was at Hogwarts, and doing better than expected. Not the best but still good at studies. He did not feel the need to hamper his abilities; he was hardly a match for one such as Tom Riddle. And Dumbledore doubted that Harry Potter could learn enough to be a threat. Tom not only had magic and experience to wield it, he also had the knowledge of the World and its workings.
Even if somehow Harry Potter could equal Tom in a duel, there were many things that could work against him. Tom controlled a large part of Wizarding upper class who served him directly and then there were the sympathizer's, light and dark that did not like the muggle borns.
If Harry Potter was able to match Tom in a fight, he would be assassinated the next day. Only Tom Riddles desire to personally kill the two children saved them both. He could have sent his minions to kill the children. He could have waited, but he did not.
Even if somehow Harry Potter survived, he could not kill Tom, he himself was a horcrux. Tom would be prepared to get resurrected very soon. The number of times a person got lucky was limited, eventually Harry Potter would fall and if somehow all the Horcruxes were destroyed and Tom lost his body, he himself would kill the boy to eliminate Tom.
The true loss in the whole war was Lilly Potter. She was a once in a century witch. Had she lived, she would have been a great asset. She died barely at the age of 21 years and he, Dumbledore had a hand in it. Although given her blood status she was already a target, but he practically engineered her demise.
Had she lived, she would have rivaled himself at her prime. Once the responsibilities lessened she would have learnt a great deal. Horace and Filius had considered taking her as their apprentice and would have a few later. He himself would have kept an eye on her development and would have involved personally after some time.
With a sigh Dumbledore dropped the quill and got up for a walk. His mind was not on the work, he was getting old. He truly wished his family would forgive him once he died. He still could not truly make amends with his brother.
He did not expect forgiveness from Lilly and James, had they lived to his age then perhaps. People rarely understood the burden that falls upon those who square their shoulders for it. Had he not done what he did, countless more would have been dead.
The war was a civil war; Wizard borns were rarely a casualty except order members and resisting Auror forces. Only muggle borns and muggles suffered.
Muggles were not his concern and were not his responsibility, the wizards were. Muggle born or Pureblood all fell under his responsibility whereas muggles were a different country entirely. They had different government and different laws.
Had he not stopped the madness, Tom Riddle would have been in power. He was very good at playing from the shadows. It would not have been a great loss, since most of the wizarding population was pure-blood, but then his sights would have been set on other countries. An all out war was never a good thing for anyone concerned. It would have been Grindelwald all over again.
He always said – "Do what is right, not what is easy"; few could ever understand it. The easier option would have been to ignore the prophecy, to let Harry live with Sirius, to let Longbottoms gain Harry's custody. He chose the difficult one. It was very easy to give the child the childhood he deserved. It was very difficult to arrange someone's death, to incapacitate someone mentally, to imprison someone illegally and to arrange a child's death. The burden he bore, any lesser man would have crumbled underneath it.
Steeling his resolve, he straightened his back, the lifeless blues eyes twinkled again, with a smile on his lips he murmured
"For the greater good . . . all For the Greater Good . . . . ."
It was time to take a round of the school.
Severus Snape meanwhile had resumed pacing around his room. Today he had crossed the line; he had been toeing it for past decade. But today he crossed it. Dumbledore, the man of infinite patience was annoyed with him. You do not want Dumbledore annoyed with yourself unless you lacked self-preservation instinct or were perhaps equally powerful as he was.
His first instinct was to blame it all on Potter as he had done to Potter Senior previously. But even he could not blame Potter, Potter was a Hufflepuff, he would never have that kind of subtly. A decade worth of work was finished. He suppressed a snort.
He truly wished that Dumbledore released him from this hellhole, but Dumbledore would not have him out of sight, an action lot of people approved. No one wanted him free, with Dumbledore keeping an eye on him, a lot of people held lesser resentment towards Dumbledore for saving him at his trial.
He was truly helpless now; the morons would never let him live it down. He could have Filch ban the products, but it would only increase their popularity, you ban something and the sales double and he was not keen to talk to Filch either.
He could already see those filthy toys running around, stirring toilet seats that came along them and he could see banners that would be hanging within days sporting the "potty master". This "prank" had beaten almost all the pranks done by the Marauders except perhaps the time when he was lead in front of a Werewolf.
The only solution he could see was to "tone – down" his bullying. He could see now how he would start finding those "toys" at unexpected places whenever he deducted house points off someone.
There was no other option, either he stopped bullying or the torment intensified. He could imagine the kids sending ideas in letters; he could see newer models of him clothed in a woman's clothing and a stuffed eagle hat.
He could not write to Zonko's to stop the bullying, he could not sue them either. There were a lot of people who disliked him and he knew from experience that Justice was always for the rich and for the powerful, be it anywhere, any country and any time. He was not rich and Dumbledore's little games left him without any power.
Meanwhile Harry and Neville, in the Gryffindor boy's dorms were having a little disagreement.
"Why do I have to do this Harry, it hurts!"
"Because I told you. Stop throwing a tantrum around and prepare yourself." A mere glance in Neville's eyes gave him access to his mind where he promptly started "shouting" or generating noise giving Neville an incentive to expel him from his mind.
A few minutes later
"Why do I have to learn it to such proficiency? I could keep Mum out before we arrived at Hogwarts! And I can falsify passive scans from Snape. Why are you insistent that I learn, I was never good in the first place?"
Harry rubbed his temples and sighed, Neville was throwing a tantrum about learning Occulmency. Well he was throwing a tantrum about learning how to resist full blown attack from someone like Harry. Neville was soft spoken and shy but was very hard working. He always believed himself to be a squib and hence when he saw that he could learn magic, his drive to learn increased. He always worked hard, never complained and never refused to practice. But today it seemed his increased confidence was working against him.
Neville loved the Mind-Arts lessons since they finally enabled him to control his magic and the method of sending messages mentally was very cool in his opinion. He did not had to even read any charms and transfiguration books because Harry sent him all the information he read and very quickly too. He was then able to visit the greenhouses more and it even earned him points.
But fending full attacks gave him headaches and Harry claimed that he was not even going at half of the power. How powerful was Harry?
His thoughts were broken when his mind was suddenly invaded and it was done without eye-contact! Harry said he was developing a technique to use Legilimency without eye contact. Although he said that passive legilimency was possible without eye contact, he wanted to push the limits and actually invade the mind without any eye contact.
Suddenly the world shifted and he found himself inside a greenhouse, but the whole greenhouse had a single plant, the devil's snare. The plant crept upon him and was dragging him, he could not breathe, and it. He struggled, he tried to get away, but he knew it was futile. Just as he gave up the hope the world righted itself, the previously green-tinted world now consisted of red and gold walls.
Blinking around, he saw Harry watching him amusedly. "The bastard did this, but how?" Neville thought angrily.
"Yes I did this" Harry replied with a sweeping gesture, "I simply invaded your mind and convinced your brain that you were in a place that was the most frightening. Your mind conjured up the images; it is an interrogation technique where a person is convinced that he truly is rescued from prison. The mind is convinced that what it sees is real and with the help of a few suggestions the person starts believing that the vision is actually true. Then a familiar person, perhaps a family member is brought in front and he asks the required questions. The person then answers them only to find himself returned back to the prison cell."
"I can recreate almost anything; or rather your own mind creates everything that you would consider realistic. I merely gave it suggestions to act upon. Do you see why I insist that you need to learn?"
Neville could only give a shaky nod, He knew Dumbledore had locked his parents mind and Harry meant well, but he disliked the headaches and he never wanted to be a part of that vision again.
"How about we do something fun?"
The predatory grin on Harry's face told him that it was another one of his schemes and he was going to be dragged in it.
"What would we do?"
"Snape is not going to take today's class, we can watch the twins planning a new prank on him or we can play one of our own."
"But you have already tormented Snape enough? And somehow Gran agreed to be a part of it!"
"Your Gran hates all death-eaters, we both know that. Not to mention she could see the money out of a small investment. And let us not forget that if this succeeds then we will have a very effective weapon to target the ministry with. The Prophet maybe in control, but even the Ministry would never stoop so low to stop a joke shop. At the end of the day it is just a small prank, after all."
Neville sported a predatory grin that was seen only upon the Weaseley twins when they carried out a prank.
"Imagine Snape's face when he sees an advertisement of "Potty-Master" in the Prophet."
"Let us see how effective it is and then if it sells then it would fund its own advertisement, let's leave the Weasley twins to torment Snape for now. I have something else in mind and you might learn something from it."
.X.X.X. . .
"Why are we here Harry?"
"You'll see"
Rummaging through his pocket Harry pulled out a thick piece of parchment with a painting of blue snakes. The snakes did not look like any Neville had seen in any of his picture books.
"I've never seen such snakes in any of the books Gran made me read." Neville wondered aloud.
"Because they aren't, these are fictional snakes." He replied with a grin.
"fictional snakes?"
Witnessing the confusion on Neville's face, Harry elaborated –
"Just like the comics you read about super powered characters, these snakes do not exist. But in a portrait they can, which means these snakes will have abilities that were envisioned by the creator of the portrait."
"But why are we putting this portrait up?"
"This little portrait is the solution of all my problems, you will know in time. Now help me put this up."
". . . "
What Neville did not know was this portrait used to be in the castle fifty years previously, when Tom Marvolo Riddle attended Hogwarts. The snakes in the portrait were drawn by Tom with some specific abilities in mind.
A portrait could not influence the physical world except perhaps making noise. Some portraits were given a few privileges such as keeping passwords for doors.
Yet, a portrait could influence the 'portrait world' they had access to, as they pleased. Wizards in a portrait could use their weapons and wands, although the effects would reset after sometime. Similarly these beautiful blue snakes were able to disillusion themselves and move around, invading other portraits. Other exceptional ability was to possess other portrait characters.
Although Harry did not have the privilege to add or remove portraits, Tom being of the Slytherin line could. Thus he had added the portrait to remove surveillance of teachers from his group.
The portraits would notify the Headmaster and other staff of any wrongdoings of students. Some people like Filch and Snape abused this to great effect, but no one came close to headmaster Dumbledore in his abuse of power. Anything and almost everything worth noting was noted by the portraits around the castle.
Dumbledore never missed anything that happened around the castle and used this to great effect, gaining favors and collecting information was very easy.
During his later years at Hogwarts Tom used those snakes to falsify information, to choose what was sent or none at all when necessary.
It was very effective measure against such surveillance; the headmaster not being from the founder's line did not know that the castle recognized anyone from the direct lines of founders. Essentially the castle would allow those people the rights to redecorate and renovate if they wished to do so, a few more privileges such as access to certain rooms, etc. The wizards of those times were very private people and respected each others privacy.
This was also the reason why common rooms had passwords; the founders reserved the right to teach a few secrets outside the curriculum to their own house only.
Modification to Hogwarts could be done only upon the permission of the Headmaster, with the exception of founder's lines. Even that was limited and no drastic changes could be made without the permission of the one recognized by the castle as the Headmaster.
"~~Ssscatter~~"
"~~yesss my Lord, any sssspesscific orderssss?~~"
"~~None, only usual sssurveillanssce and no interference until nesscesssary. I trussst your judgement~~."
"~~It shall be done. Five offff usss, ssshall follow you everywhere. The resssst will follow the teachersss. ~~."
In an instant the snakes turned invisible leaving the portrait with innocent purple flowers and grass, very Slytherin indeed. No one could guess that the portrait of flowers served any ulterior purpose.
"What did you just do?"
"You are asking a lot of questions today, Neville." That shut Neville up, afraid that he may have crossed a line. Harry never answered any question related to his unnatural competence and advanced skills. How he knew things he should not have known were the question that irked all the Longbottoms, but they never pushed too far, they owed the boy too much.
"Come on its time for Herbology and I do not want to be the one who handles dragon-dung. Let other late comers filthy their clothes with it. Only Weasley is capable of lunch after Herbology and without a change of clothes."