Chapter Seventeen
Ron was disappointed that he hadn't been asked to come along and help. I suspected that the omission had had more to do with Professor Sinistra then any lack of talent on Ron's part. I had the impression back then that she had knowledge that she wasn't sharing with Draco and I. As a side note, which I'm sure you already suspect, she did have an ulterior motive for her actions; nothing nefarious I assure you. It won't take me too much longer to get there.
Seeing as we had nothing much else to do but study that weekend, Draco and I thought we'd get a start after lunch, so I packed up my books after another few hours of studying, returned to the dorm to change into some more casual clothing, suited to packing and moving, returned to the hall for a hearty lunch; having skipped breakfast as I earlier mentioned, and then met Draco outside Snape's old rooms.
Draco looked decidedly less casual than I, but for all I knew, he didn't even own a pair of jeans or a t-shirt. Really, it made no difference to me, but his white shirt is important later on, so I thought I should make sure to mention it. We knew it was safe to push open the door, Filch had done that much without being harmed, but that was about as far as we knew, and both of us proceeded cautiously into Snape's former space, taking the place in before daring to touch anything.
"You ever been in here before Draco?" I didn't quite know why I was whispering, it was as if I expected Snape's ghost to appear out of nowhere to defend his territory. For a second it crossed my mind that there were other castle ghosts, why not Snape? But of course I had no idea what circumstances produced a ghost and right then didn't seem to be the time to inquire.
"No, I haven't Harry. You?"
"No." I'd spent enough time in Snape's office, especially with those failed Occlumency lessons, but I didn't recall ever seeing this place before, not even in any of Snape's memories.
"It's really dark." I could see the half sneer on Draco's curled upper lip. He didn't mean the lighting either. It looked almost as if the place had been carved out of the stone the castle was built on. The walls were grey, the countless bookshelves black, the floor, something in between with a splash of brown thrown in for flavor. All the furniture was ebony wood; with great, carved handles that looked as though they would just as soon take a bite of you, as provide a way to open their charges. The fireplace, stone, of course, took up much of the far wall, which must have been an outside wall to have a proper flue, unless it was magical of course, and the center of the room was overpowered with a great desk and credenza set, one door of which was hanging quite askew, and must have been what drove Filch from the room. And that was just the sitting area, I was afraid of what the bedroom must look like.
"I can't believe he lived here, like this, all those years." I spun slowly. I mean, it fit his personality, or the one he let everyone see at least. I guess I had just hoped that his whole life hadn't been miserable and lost like he let on at the end, when he gave me all his memories. I had wanted there to be something happy and joyful in his life, but this place certainly wasn't it.
"How do you want to do this Harry?"
"Maybe start with the book shelves and check out everything there for curses and traps before we start pulling them off?" It seemed a reasonable place to start, and a big enough task to keep us going for a few hours. Draco summoned a few boxes from a hall and placed them down in front of the first bookcase and we got to work.
Sure enough, the bookcase had a hex on it, but it wasn't hard to spot, with the right spells, and the swarm of beetles stayed put in their magical little sleep as we moved their cage from the top of the shelf to one of the boxes, sealing it, and putting it in the hall immediately. Moving one book at a time, with our wands, and behind magical shields; protegio spells work quite well, we cleared out the first case in about thirty minutes. The second case had glass doors which wouldn't open with the 'alohomora' spells, so that took us a little longer to get around. Those were the Dark Arts books, and moving too close to their glass front caused a fine static-like noise, which had me concerned. The charm on them turned out to be one that turned the glass outwards into razor-like shards if anything touched it, but a charm to freeze it into ice, from Draco's wand, and then heat it to steam took care of them and we packed up another few boxes, pausing every once in a while to read the titles of the books. We didn't dare open any of them, figuring they had their own curses.
Fortunately Snape hadn't cursed every bookshelf, and the final ones took only a few minutes each to pack up. That might have made us a little cocky in retrospect. We figured that Filch had probably already trigged the noxious curse from the credenza, so we moved to that one next and unloaded scrolls, and boxes of potions paraphernalia like scales and measuring spoons, and phials. Some containers still had mixtures or powders in them, and as we had no desire to sort out what each one could be, we sealed them in boxes as well, figuring the new potions master could take his or her time discovering them. Hermione and Pansy probably would have enjoyed going through them, and who knew, maybe that's where they were destined to go after us. At that point it seemed safe enough to start up a bit of a conversation.
"Do you have any notion of who Professor McGonagall has hired on as our new professors Draco?"
"I have heard some talk that one of them is coming over from France, but I don't know which one, and if it's even true."
"Well, you've heard more than I have I guess."
"Some of the girls gossip in the common room, it wasn't as if they were sharing the information with me, I just happened to be there at the time. Mostly they don't notice me much these days."
"Yeah, I guess I know what that's like." Memories of the time, times, when my house mates had ignored me, falling victim to the lies of The Prophet about my ulterior motives for claiming the re-emergence of Voldemort. There had been a lot of sleepless nights with twisted up stomachs back then too. "Their loss anyways Draco." I smiled at him, wanting to give him some measure of comfort, and brushed an errant piece of hair out of my eyes.
"Thanks."
"Find anything interesting?"
"Sadly no, but maybe in the desk." Having finished his side of the credenza he pivoted, being the closest one to the desk, and pulled open the bottom drawer.
I felt the explosion more than heard it, like a thump in my chest that knocked the wind out of me for an uncomfortable few seconds, and if it had been bad for me, I knew it would have been worse for Draco who had taken the full force of it. It had knocked me to my knees, and I whirled upright as fast as I could to reach Draco.
He was lying on his back, still breathing, thank goodness, I could see the rise and fall of his chest, but he was covered with a thick black tar-like substance, which had left a splatter pattern on his shirt and splashed up onto his face and into his hair. If I hadn't been so worried about his safety it might almost have been funny. I didn't laugh, which was a good choice.
"Bloody Hell!" He called out, and then I knew he was okay. I helped him to sit up. "Did that sot have to booby trap everything he owned? Where did he get off thinking he was so damned important as all that!" Draco had interspersed the statement with a few choice curse words, which didn't add to the story, so I've left them out.
"Why don't you go into the bathroom and see if you can get cleaned up."
"Merlin only knows what kind of horror will meet me in there." He mumbled, but fortunately, nothing did, probably because the house elves needed access there and he didn't dare start endangering them. I heard the water start running, another string of curse words, and some furious splashing. I chanced to look into the drawer; a crystal decanter and two glasses. Snape had been protecting his liquor; I shook my head in amazement, it must have been pretty expensive to warrant a guardian like that.
"I think he's ruined my shirt!" I heard Draco call from the bathroom. I got up off the floor and wandered over there. Draco hadn't known I was going to do that, or he hadn't been thinking about it at least, because when I got to the door he had left open I saw him standing there without his shirt, back turned to me, and I don't think the image of his body just then will ever leave my mind.