Chapter Twelve The Potion and the Potion Master

Harry was left with his questions even though he was in so much pain he could have screamed. What did she mean Pettigrew talked to Sirius? Over a phone without wires? He shook his head and closed his eyes against the waves of pain. I'm just losing my mind, he decided.

"Potter?" Snape groaned. He was on his feet, holding his arm across his chest. The wound was just above his heart. He was standing over Harry much like a vulture. Harry opened his eyes and the room was blurred. He thought for a moment the figure was Voldemort. He struggled to find his wand.

Snape leaned over and slapped him with his good hand. It was not a gentle slap. "Potter!"

Harry squinted up and recognized the Potion's Master, "What? What did you do that for?" he asked petulantly.

"What is the Room of Requirement and where is it?" Snape asked, now down on one knee beside him.

"Not…not.. telling," Harry moaned, and rolled away, barely conscious. "It'll get everyone in trouble."

"Potter?!" Snape rolled him back on his back. "Miss Granger needs assistance. Tell me where the Room of Requirement is."

Harry made a gesture as if to 'zip his lips', a childish gesture of resistance. It was obvious the poison was racing through his system unchecked.

"Harry," a deep voice spoke soothingly. His eyes were closed. "Hermione is in trouble and you need to tell me where she's is. How do I find the Room of Requirement?"

"Dad?" Harry's head rolled back and forth. "Mum?"

"This is your father, Harry. Where's the Room of Requirement?" the voice asked gently.

"Oh dad," Harry whispered, "I miss you so much dad. Can I go with you? Can we go see mum?" He raised himself with the last of his energy, his eyes closed and hugged the figure at his side. He squeezed and felt the warmth of a return embrace.

"Yes," came the reply. "She's in the Room of Requirement."

"Seventh floor," Harry murmured. His head was now hanging back over someone's arm. "Walk back and forth and when you really need it the door appears. You have to really want to go inside! Give me a second dad and I'll go with you. I'm just really so very tired." Harry's eyes were closed and he continued to speak. "I love you dad." His voice was muffled and feeble as Snape laid him back on the cold stone bed.

Snape stood looking at the young man and dropped his cloak gently over him and then turned to leave the room. He stopped, reached in his pocket and pulled out Harry's wand and left it by his shivering body.

"He loves you too, Harry."

….

Hermione made her way through the dungeons and past what would have been Hogwarts kitchens. It was the same hallway at Azkaban and she could smell the rancid odor of old cooking smells instead of more familiar scents. She hurried up the hallway and glanced back once. Dressed in Rom clothes as a male, she slipped into the main hallway and stared at the marble staircase.

How am I ever going to get to the seventh floor? she wondered.

"Miss Granger." The voice was behind her. She turned to see Snape approaching.

"Egads," she whispered. "What are you doing Professor?!" She noticed he held his arm across his chest but otherwise didn't look a lot different than he normally would in the classroom. "You'll only slow me down if you come. I can do this," she whispered vehemently.

He nodded. "Yes, I know you can. I will go with you and take care of any problems along the way." He was calm.

She was frowning and feeling anxious. Time was flying by and she knew Harry was close to death. "Why are you helping me?" she asked.

"You put on a very good show," he answered. "You made it sound like it would be very easy to get the antidote, when I know differently." He checked the hallway and stepped back into the alcove. "Miss Granger, there is a part of you that you never show to anyone. There is that part in each of us. Voldemort entered that place." He turned to her. "I know what he did to you, I know what it feels like." Snape stared down at her with his dark eyes and she shivered.

"I don't know what you're talking about," she said coldly, with her chin in the air.

He stared at her without blinking. "Oh, I think you do." It was said without anger or sarcasm. "You have changed. Potter is too sick to notice, but I have."

She stared back and she dropped her head thinking about his words before answering. "Don't tell anyone." She looked up with pleading written in her face. "If I can endure having it done and not tell; then you can know about it and do the same."

He nodded solemnly and responded, "I will not tell."

She dropped her eyes to his chest where there was a hole and massive stains of blood. He dropped his arm and stood straighter. "Miss Granger you are a witch and you survived the most evil wizard in this world. There are few fully mature wizards or witches who have survived such mental probing without becoming insane." He turned back to the hallway. "There will come a time, I think, when you will wish to talk about it. I hope you will come to me."

She stared up at the face turned away from her and searched it. She pulled a wand from her shirt. "Let's go, we're running out of time."

They quickly moved out into the hall.

Hermione followed a circuitous routed and Snape followed without speaking or arguing. She was grateful. She felt that anymore attempts on his part to question her or talk about what had just been disclosed would have sent her around the bend straight into St. Mungo's.

Move over Longbottoms, move over Professor Lockhart, here comes Hermione Granger, she thought as they climbed the wide marble staircase. She pointed out the stone steps they had to step on. Each step was marked with a symbol in ancient runes. She could read them easily since it had been one of her favorite subjects at school. They read: All who enter here are forsaken; for you have entered a hell for which you cannot escape.

Towering over the center staircase was a stone replica of a Dementor. When Hermione had first seen it she had cowered back; thinking it real. Although made of stone, it still seemed to suck warmth from the air. They passed the statue and moved down the hall in the dark. She closed her eyes and began to count her steps. She reached back and took Snape's hand, pulling him behind her. He reacted quickly and followed without speaking.

Hermione remembered the first time she'd made the trip.

…...

"What is your name again?" someone asked.

Hermione opened her eyes and looked around. She was puzzled. The office looked very like Dumbledore's. The walls, the floor even the cathedral ceilings arching towards the magical transparent ceiling were the same.

Somebody must be playing tricks on me, she thought. Who would go into Dumbledore's office and paint it all gray?

She still felt fuzzy and had a strange taste in her mouth. It was when she swung her head around to the voice speaking that she realized her predicament.

"I see you recognize me," Lucius Malfoy said. He came around the edge of the desk and stopped in front of her. She was bound with a charm to a chair sitting in front of the desk.

She glared at him without speaking.

"Good, that will expedite things." He perched against the desk and smiled. "I trust you recognize this office?"

She looked around again, puzzled and shook her head.

"Well, perhaps not," he smiled. "You are in Azkaban Prison, uhm…oh yes... Granger, Hermione Granger. Very few people know the two castles; Hogwarts and Azkaban are made from the same hands. However, they are not identical in every aspect," he said and grinned at that and spun around to return to his seat.

"I have a treat for you, Miss Granger." He pulled a Pensieve from the desk drawer and set it on the table. "We've retrieved some of your most recent memories and saved them for you to review. I think everything will make sense."

He pulled his ebony wand from the tip of his walking stick and swirled the substance around in the bowl. Tendrils of it flew towards her. She tried to move to avoid the squid-like appendages and found it was to no avail. They wrapped around and sank into her head and she gasped and laid her head back on the chair.

She saw herself abducted by a Death Eater she had seen in the Department of Mysteries only a few short weeks before. She saw herself walk up to the front door of #4 Privet Drive and saw herself speak words not her own. She climbed the stairs and entered the room where Harry lay asleep in his own dirty clothes. He looked horrible and Hermione cried out in her mind; but turned and smiled at the fat surly man Harry called Uncle Vernon.

She watched as she administered the potion pulling his head back, tilting the vial and pouring it into his mouth.

Sitting bound in the chair she moaned and Lucius laughed. Finally, she reviewed the trip to Azkaban and her situation as Lucius Malfoy's bait. She opened her eyes to study Malfoy's gloating face. Unable to speak, she glared.

He grinned and waved the wand at her bindings and she was immediately free. "Let's have some tea and pass away the time a little, Miss Granger. We'll have a visitor momentarily and we won't have any time to speak after that."

"What would I possibly have to say to you?" she asked venomously.

A house elf appeared at her elbow carrying a heavy tray. She was caught off guard by it's appearance and looked down into it's face. The elf looked back and then moved quickly to set the tea service on the desk. Malfoy picked up a cup and poured a cup of tea before someone entered at her back and spoke gruffly to him. "There's problems you need to attend to," the figure behind her said.

"What the devil!" he exclaimed and sat the cup down. "Very well." He stood and was about to leave the room. "Please remain here and be my guest. Help yourself or let Behimie help you, but please do not leave the office. Azkaban may look familiar, but it is a very deadly place to wander around in."

He leaned down emphasizing his words, "Dementors, you know." He left abruptly.

Hermione stared at the house elf who stared back.

"I didn't know there were house elves in Azkaban," she finally stuttered.

"We's been sent here with our masters, miss. If they are imprisoned we must come with them and attend them," the little elf said.

Hermione frowned, suddenly ignoring her own predicament. "That's not very fair at all!" she exclaimed in horror.

"We's must be quick," Behimie said and poured the tea. "If you be Hermie Granger the muggle-born friend of Harry Potter's, then we have a message for you." The elf was almost spinning in circles as he surveyed the room and twitched the long hairy ears at the noises that were not in Hermione's range of hearing.

Hermione turned in her seat and watched the door, then leaned down to let the elf whisper in her ear. Her eyes grew wider as he spoke and she nodded vigorously and said, "Oh I will, I will. I promise."

She straightened abruptly when the double oak doors opened behind her. She had not taken a sip of the tea and forgot about it when she heard the voice. The elf in front of her went to his knees and bowed his head all the way to the floor. In a flash of light, he disappeared and left her looking at the desk and feeling the hair on her neck raise up.

…...

Hermione struggled to not think about what had happened next. She kept walking and feeling her hand grow colder and tingle with numbness. She was grasping Snape's hand so tightly she couldn't feel her fingers. He had not complained or slowed her. They stepped behind a hanging tapestry and climbed a set of narrow rickety stairs. They were now stepping through a door to the second floor.

"Don't touch the railings on the stairs," she leaned back and whispered. "They have poison on them. There are traps on every other stair too. If you step on the wrong one you'll release doxies." She grasped his hand and pulled it around the crook of her elbow. "We walk side-by-side together, matching steps." She pulled him along the hall, thinking how strange it was to give her Potion's Master orders and have them obeyed.

Her eyes were getting adjusted to the dark and she saw the ghost before it saw them. With a perfect swirling dance step she sidestepped her partner around the edge of a statue and into an open doorway. Her head was against his chest and she could hear Snape's beating heart. She also felt the dampness of his blood washing her cheek.

The ghost floated by wailing and screaming like a banshee. Hermione scrunched her face at the sound and held her breath dipping her head into Snape's chest. The ghost went by quickly and it took her a second to realize she was hugging him to her. It had been the first time someone familiar, someone from her world, was near her and she wasn't shouldering it all on her own. She closed her eyes, took in a deep breath and smelled the acrid smell of blood, of earth and a touch of sweat. She felt comforted grasping his shirt.

"Miss Granger," he said in his softest voice. "We must move on."

"Sorry," she whispered.

They moved down the hall and towards the stairs leading to the second floor.

….

Voldemort stepped in front of her. Trailing behind him was Peter Pettigrew. Hermione looked into Voldemort's face once and then struggled to keep her eyes pointed towards the rat-like figure of Pettigrew. The teacup slipped from her hand and smashed on the floor. She looked down at the white porcelain and red roses on the shards and saw blood dripping from a cut on her hand mixing with the brown liquid of the tea.

"Legilimens," the voice said, when her eyes came up.

Hermione was screaming aloud, thrown back in the chair and writhing in the grip of his mind. "Yes, Yes!" she screamed. "I gave him the poison." She broke into tears and sobbed. "No, I don't know what he has. Sirius didn't give him anything. He never told me!" At that point she wasn't sure if the words were coming from her mouth or her mind. The hideous face swam in front of her inches away. The eyes, so much like a snake's, lit up with lively interest as she recounted the last day at Hogwarts before boarding the train at end of term.

She felt the Cruciatus Curse and was on the floor tucked into a fetal position and holding her stomach against the wracking pain enveloping her whole body. "I don't know!" she screamed. "I don't know what the prophecy is." She gagged and vomited on the floor only to roll aside and scream again.

An hour later, she was left lying on the floor. Her hair was wet with her sweat and she could taste the sourness of her own vomit in her mouth. She opened her eyes to stare at the transparent ceiling.

At one time, she had been amazed at the ceiling in the Great Hall at Hogwarts and how it mimicked the sky outside. This was the same. She looked at the many brilliant points of light from the thousands of stars making up the great Milky Way and she broke into wrenching sobs.

….

They made their way up the staircase toward the second floor holding each other's arm like lovers taking a stroll. Hermione stopped Snape as he raised his foot and nearly stepped in the wrong spot. She realize then that he was weak and in pain as his weight shifted to her.

She bit her lip and guided him to the correct place. We are never going to make it in time, she thought. I've killed my best friend. She could still hear Voldemort as he explained the plan. She knew it all, or almost all of it, and could do nothing to stop it from happening. Hermione glanced at Snape as they reached the top of the stairs. The moonlight was sifting through the open casement window. He looked drained of blood. Hermione was reminded of a picture of a vampire she had seen at one time.

"You aren't going to make it," she said as quietly as she could manage. "You have to let me go on or I don't have a chance to get the antidote and get it back to Harry."

"It's time to use your time-turner," he answered and leaned against a wall. "I will go up to the office and meet Malfoy. He doesn't know I've traveled with Potter or that I've met up with you. It will give you time. My understanding of time turners tells me the small one that hangs at your neck will give you minutes not hours. Is that not correct?"

"Won't there be a password?" she asked staring down the hall avoiding the question. It was the same as at Hogwarts. She could even see the stone gargoyle; the same kind that guarded the passageway to the stairs leading to his office.

His head was down and she turned back to him. "Professor?"

His head came up and he nodded, "Malfoy likes to imitate Dumbledore. He has lusted after the position at Hogwarts for years. He'll use the kind of password Albus would use."

"Are you going to be alright?" Hermione asked.

He nodded. "What else haven't you told me?" He looked at her and then nodded slowly. "Malfoy doesn't leave his office does he? You were going to go in and force him to give you the antidote?" Snape smiled in puzzlement. "You really are braver than I gave you credit for Miss Granger. Malfoy is almost as lethal as Voldemort. How did you plan on doing that?"

"The house elves, Professor," Hermione said quietly. "One of them, Behimie, said he would help me by distracting Malfoy. In return, I have to promise to help free them."

Snape stood straighter and then looked down at himself. "If you would do a little cleanup detail I think I could pass, and I will be your diversion."

Hermione waved her wand and spoke the spell words softly. The shirt was repaired and the hole gone; the blood was also gone. She studied him for a moment and then nodded.

"Give me a head start of five minutes, no more," she said, grasping the tiny time-turner in her hand. "When I go into his office, I will have less than a minute to grab the antidote and leave. I'll enter through the doorway from the staircase in the Room of Requirement. It will open up somewhere near the fireplace, I don't know where exactly."

Snape nodded and smoothed out his clothing.

"He'll see me enter and take the antidote and disappear. As you know it will have take place five minutes after you arrive." Hermione fingered the delicate hourglass-shaped time turner. "Professor, how are you going to escape? I think the door only opens from the stair-side."

"Let that be my problem," Snape answered.

She looked at him and he returned the look. "If I don't show up in that room within six minutes, then I'm not coming."

They both turned as they heard heavy clunking footfalls coming down the hall. Hermione stared in wonder as a squad of suits of armor marched towards them. They held razor sharp ancient swords and other medieval armor. The hallway was filled with the sound of their creaking and rattling armor.

"Go now," Snape said pulling out his wand.

She gasped, looked at him once and sped off.

The way to the seventh floor had its own set of obstacles but none that sounded as deadly as the fight taking place between Snape and the troop of rattling Suits of Armor. She ran through the third floor and past where she would have found the Charms Classroom at Hogwarts. Instead, there seemed to be some room that appeared to be an old torture chamber; it's horrible implements still lying around.

Hurrying past, she flew up the stairs staying on the left side with her back to the wall and side-stepping up the thirteen stairs, down the hallway past the infirmary, which was dust-covered and didn't appear to have ever been used and then up another flight of stairs to end up in front of the library.

At least here, the libraries of Hogwarts and Azkaban looked very similar; the entryway and the intricate carved wooden doors were the same. She chanced to take a peek into the library and almost lost track of her task. Standing in rows upon rows of bookshelves were books green with mold. They were terribly ancient and foreboding. The room itself exuded black magic and the floors were shiny and polished from many footsteps over the years. Books were sitting on desks, open and talking to themselves. She listened to one, close at hand, extolling the virtues of using humans and their entrails, newly ripped from their bodies, in the art of divination. "One cannot underestimate the value of seeing the freshly removed liver in terms of forecasting the weather," the book intoned. The voices of the books droned on intermingling with the cacophony of noise from the other volumes.

Ugh, she thought and spun on one foot and ran headlong down the hall up another set of staircases swinging to the beat of African drums and then on to the sixth floor. She had to return to the fifth floor and climb the stairs again before the hallway opened up on the sixth floor.

Hurry, hurry, hurry, she muttered to herself. I've got to hurry.

The darkness on the sixth floor was profound, unlike anything she had ever experienced. There didn't appear to be any windows to allow the glowing moonlight to pierce the Stygian darkness. As she stepped in, she tried to remember what the sixth floor at Hogwarts was like. There hadn't been much occasion to frequent that floor and she wasn't sure what occupied the hallway. The rooms were seldom used for classrooms and anyone going on up to the Griffindor Common room on the seventh floor usually took another set of staircases.

She felt her way in the dark, knowing the clock was ticking away. Chancing it, she raised her wand and said, "LUMOS". Almost immediately she stepped back and held her breath. The sight before her startled her and then made her gasp in frustration.

It was a hall of mirrors, very much like a carnival. The sight she had first seen and which had startled her, was herself, duplicated a thousand times. The light was also reflected a thousand times. She started forward and immediately bumped into a mirror. The reflection showed her to be rather tall and thin. She stared for a moment and then reached out her hand.

This is going to take forever, she thought, as she began to wind her way through the maze.

…...

Snape walked forward glumly and threw curses at the marching armor. They collapsed into piles of empty metal and he stepped over one after another until he reached the stone gargoyle guarding the entrance to the stairs that led to the office.

If this doesn't attract attention, I don't know what will, he thought.

The suits of armor had not been much of an impediment, neither was the password. Snape spoke the first word that came to mind, 'gumdrops'. The gargoyle stepped aside and allowed his admittance.

The doors were already open and Malfoy was standing behind the desk when he entered.

"Snape, my friend," Malfoy smiled but also frowned slightly. "What has brought you to Azkaban? You should have sent notice you were arriving I would have set aside the guard. I hope they didn't give you too much trouble."

"No trouble at all Malfoy," Snape answered. He knew Malfoy was lying and it gave him sadistic pleasure knowing Snape had to fight off the Suits of Armor. "I brought Potter."

"Oh, very good," the man said, radiant with pleasure. "Is he still alive? The Dark Lord very much wants to question him you know." The man came around the end of the desk and waved Snape into a chair.

"Did you find out what the object was that Black took from here?" Snape asked settling into a chair.

"No," Lucius answered, "but it shouldn't present a problem." He turned and moved back to his seat behind the desk. A vial of blue fluid lay in the grasp of a pewter dragon. The metal holder had eerie red eyes and the glass tube rode its' back. Snape stared at it and Lucius saw where he was looking.

"Oh yes, the antidote," he said smiling. "Where did you leave our famous guest of honor? We shall dangle it in front of him as a bit of enticement to answer our questions."

Snape said, "He is in the north tower and is safe for now."

"Good, good," Lucius replied. "I heard you rode in on a dragon. Little showy don't you think?" The eyebrows went up and he smiled again. "Our Boy Wonder could have been killed. As a matter of fact, that dreadful beast has burned down about half of the castle. We can't seem to get him off the walls."

"You're lucky we didn't get killed by the elves," Severus snapped, "You sent those men to their deaths."

Lucius nodded and then waved his hand lazily. "You survived and brought Potter to us. His Lordship will be very pleased."

Suddenly Snape heard a creaking sound and turned to look at the fireplace. There was a fire burning in it and then the whole outside façade seemed to be breaking away and moving towards them. Snape shot up and stepped back, just in time to see Hermione run in and look wildly about.

Snape pointed to the vial sitting on the desk. She grabbed it and reached for something on her chest and then disappeared back into the gaping hole.

Malfoy was astonished but recovered quickly. The wall had already returned to its' former position. He stared at Snape, looked over the wall and even touched it with his wand and said ALOHOMORA. It refused to open at his command.

He glared at Snape and turned to leave the room, "Stay here, Severus. If you try to leave I will have a guard posted at the foot of the stairs and you'll be killed immediately. I have a few questions I want to ask you. I see Miss Granger is up to her old tricks. She is not going to escape and neither will you, no matter how many secret passages she manages to find. No one has escaped Azkaban and survived to tell the story."

"No one except Sirius Black," Snape said smoothly.

Lucius whirled around and left the room. Snape stood and walked to the fireplace and warmed his hands.