Part 30 – Deeper Trouble

For the next few weeks Severus found his Sundays to be the most pleasant times at the school since he had arrived in September. With the work load of the older students becoming heavier, Severus found it easy to slip away to meet Lily and her friends for the morning study group. Then after lunch he would make his way to Professor Slughorn's office and help out with mixing potions, taking an inventory of the school stores and occasionally going outside the castle to replenish the stocks of some of the ingredients that were found growing naturally in the school grounds.

After the shaky start before Christmas, Severus was now finally settling into life at Hogwarts and to make things even better he found that James Potter and his friends were no longer seeking to make his life a misery. Instead they were keeping their distance from him and leaving him out of their pranks.

They still called him Snivellus whenever they had cause to speak to him though he was grateful it was not very often. He also knew that they were still pulling stunts on both students and teachers and their reputation as the greatest pranksters the school had ever known was practically sealed. But as long as they left him out of their hexes and spells he was not bothered what they were known as.

Severus was sitting in the Slytherin common room one Saturday morning at the end of January, struggling to finish his History of Magic essay which he had been labouring over since the evening before. The Slytherin versus Ravenclaw Quidditch match was that afternoon and it did not help his concentration that everyone in the room was busy discussing and arguing about tactics in an effort to ensure that there was no repeat performance of the match against the Gryffindor team.

The room only quietened when most of the occupants headed down to the Great Hall for lunch. Severus sighed in relief and carried on with his essay, hoping to have it finished in time to go watch the match.

"Severus," the silky voice of Lucius Malfoy echoed in the now almost empty common room. Severus looked up to see Lucius walking towards him and taking a seat opposite him at the table. "Been meaning to have a little chat with you."

"What about?" Severus asked cautiously. He knew he hadn't heard of any more students who were anti-muggles and suspected that Lucius was becoming impatient with him failing to come up with any names. He'd compared him unfavourably to Sirius the last time they'd spoken; the older boy was sure that Sirius Black would have been far more successful in the task than Severus had been. Expecting more criticism the next words from Lucius were something of a surprise.

"I hear you made a bit of an impression on the Dark Lord at the Blacks."

"The Dark Lord?" Severus asked in confusion. Severus frowned as he tried to put a face to the name. He had met so many people that night he could not recall them all, and he didn't think that he had made much of an impression on anyone.

"He said he met you outside," Lucius explained. "You were, um, drawing."

"Oh, you mean Lord Voldemort." Severus finally realised who it was that Lucius was talking about.

"Don't use his name," Lucius hissed. "Yes, the Dark Lord. He was speaking with my father after meeting you. My father said he was quite impressed with your vision."

Severus shrugged, more because he didn't know what to say than out of any type of modesty.

"I didn't know you could draw," Lucius commented as he sat back in his chair. "Let's see how good you are. Draw something now for me."

"Like what?" Severus asked, trying to hide his annoyance at the interruption to his completing his essay.

"Hmm. How about Narcissa, over there." Lucius pointed across the room to where Narcissa was seated on the sofa polishing her nails.

"Okay," Severus agreed. If he did this perhaps Lucius would leave him in peace for a while. Finding a piece of blank parchment he settled back with one of the magical pencils from Lily and began to sketch.

"Gold," he said firmly as he pictured Narcissa's golden hair. The pencil complied and he began to shade in her hair.

"Green," he requested again and the pencil changed so that he could shade in the green of the uniform.

"Where did you get the pencil?" Lucius asked casually.

"A Christmas present," Severus answered absently.

"Who from?" Lucius asked in a tone that this time tried a little to hard to be casual.

"My grandfather," Severus lied after a moment's hesitation. He glanced up at Lucius from beneath his long dark hair as he hung over the parchment. He couldn't tell if Lucius had believed his lie or not. Looking back down he finished the drawing as quickly as he could and passed the parchment across for Lucius to approve.

"A good likeness," he praised with a nod as he looked over Severus's handiwork before tucking the sketch into the pocket of his robe.

Severus shrugged again and turned back to his essay.

"I hear you've been spending time with Professor Slughorn on Sundays," Lucius suddenly said.

"Yes," Severus answered, curious as to the sudden change of subject. "How did you know?"

"I have my methods of finding out things," Lucius said vaguely with a wave of his hand. "It's beside the point. Thought you could do me a few favours since you'll be working with Slughorn."

"What sort of favours?" Severus frowned. He didn't like the sound of this.

"Just a few fetching and carrying favours. Thought you could get me some ingredients now and then for a project I'm working on."

"Why can't you get them yourself from the student stores?" Severus asked.

"What I need is Abyssinian shrivelfig. Slughorn has been keeping it in his private stores since that business with Filch being shrunk to the size of a mouse back in September. They still haven't figured out who managed to shrink him yet. Slughorn's taking no chances with some of the more potent ingredients these days."

"So why would he give me any?" Severus asked, especially since the potions professor knew he was responsible for the rotting teeth incident.

"I didn't mean for you to ask for it." Lucius sighed impatiently. "You just have to acquire some whilst you're there."

"You mean steal it?" Severus asked in shock.

"It's hardly stealing when my family has contributed so much money to the running of Hogwarts," said Lucius. "But if you don't think you're up to the task…"

"No," Severus interrupted. "I can get some tomorrow. I'm helping with the inventory anyway."

"Great," said Lucius as he stood up. "By the way. The Dark Lord said something about your vision being an inspiration for others. Do you know what he meant by that?"

"No," Severus shook his head puzzled.

"I guess we'll find out some time," Lucius said as he stepped out of the common room.


The next afternoon Severus found himself once again in Professor Slughorn's office. The potions professor was in a great mood following the Slytherin win on the Quidditch pitch the previous day. Severus listened as the professor recounted a play by play account of the match. He was tempted to tell the enthusiast that he had been at the match himself but he knew that the more distracted the professor was, the easier it would be to obtain the Abyssinian shrivelfig for Lucius.

"And then Malfoy scored again, to bring the Slytherin score high enough that even if Ravenclaw had caught the snitch they wouldn't have enough points to win." Professor Slughorn grinned in delight as he continued to tell Severus about Professor McGonagall's reaction to the outcome of the match.

"You have plenty of armadillo bile," Severus said as he looked at the jars.

"Better order some more of that though." Professor Slughorn grabbed a quill to make a note. "Going to have the fourth years making the wit-sharpening potion next week so it'll all be gone by then. How we doing on ginger root and scarab beetles?"

"Lots of ginger root," Severus said as he checked the cupboard. "But there are only a couple of beetles here."

"Right then, better order them too." Professor Slughorn noted the ingredients on the parchment.

"What next?" Severus asked.

"Let me check the lesson plans," Professor Slughorn said as he scratched his head. "Be right back." With that he left Severus alone in the storeroom.

Severus looked around and saw the Abyssinian shrivelfig on the second shelf. He hesitated a moment, still unsure whether to take any or not. Then he recalled all the times he had heard Lucius arguing and bossing the younger students around. He remembered his shouting at Bellatrix Black the first Monday of the year. He had never found himself on the receiving end of Lucius's temper and he felt sick to his stomach at the thought of having to face him and explain that he had not been able to obtain the ingredient for him.

"Now where did I put the second year plans?" Severus heard Professor Slughorn muttering in his office.

His hand shook slightly as he reached for the jar and quickly shoved some the contents into his pocket. Putting it back he had only seconds before Professor Slughorn came back into the storeroom.

"Got 'em," he announced. "Hair-raising potions. Hmm. How are we stocked on rat tails?"

"Loads of them," Severus answered.

"Good, good," Professor Slughorn said as he saw the healthy stock of them. "Now how about Abyssinian shrivelfig?"

Severus turned and pretended to look for the jar for a moment before commenting that the contents were a little low.

"That's funny," Professor Slughorn muttered. "Thought I had more than that. Oh well. Better order some more. And keep an eye open for shrunken caretakers."

Severus smiled. He had heard all about what had happened with Mr Filch. Unfortunately he had never seen one of the famous photos of Mrs Norris playing with her owner. As far as he knew they had all been confiscated he'd had the chance to see them.


Later that afternoon Severus found Lucius in the common room where he was talking quietly with Rabastan Lestrange and Narcissa.

On seeing Severus enter the room Lucius looked up and waved him over.

"You get any?" Lucius asked.

Severus nodded with a wary glance at the others.

"It's okay," Lucius confirmed. "Rab here has spent all week trying to get into Slughorn's office himself. Knew you'd come through for us, Severus."

"You mean he's…?" Rabastan asked with an unpleasant sneer.

"He's been working with Slughorn this afternoon," Lucius explained. "Since he was already in the office it was an ideal opportunity. Couldn't let it go to waste now could we?"

"But he's just a first year," Rabastan complained, shooting a look of venom at Severus. "You know I'd have got the ingredient eventually."

"Yes, eventually," Lucius agreed. "But Severus has got it now."

Rabastan grumbled under his breath as he stood up and stalked out of the room with a final glare at Severus.

"Ignore him," Narcissa said. "He'll get over it and stop sulking soon."

Severus nodded and sat down in the now vacant seat. Reaching into his pocket he put the ingredients onto the table in front of him. Lucius quickly slid the same across the table with a look of triumph.

"Nice job, Severus," he said. "I'll let you know if I need anything else."

Severus nodded in agreement whilst silently hoping that he wouldn't have to steal anything else from the Potions Professor. He didn't care how Lucius tried to rationalise it, he knew it was stealing and he knew that it would be himself who was expelled if he was caught, and that Lucius's reputation would be entirely unblemished.