Well, it was only natural that he should try to move things along. Harry figured that Snape not only not taking points, but not even lecturing him after the Malfoy incident, was enough of a green light. He'd tried deciphering that damned text once more without Hermione's help, but it was no use. He had as much information as he'd ever have. If only he could remember even one little bit of that theoretical nonsense.

Though standing here outside Snape's door, staring in at the man as he worked, now this plan suddenly seemed ill-advised.

"Mr. Potter." Snape stared up calmly from his desk, quill still gripped in his hand, an eyebrow arched in question, and perhaps the slightest hint of annoyance.

Harry shifted nervously from foot to foot, the parchment with his (well, Hermione's) notes clutched tightly in his sweaty palm. "Professor. I've finished looking over Ramkin's theory, and I thought we could go over it—"

Snape's lips thinned. "You've discovered something useful?"

Harry swallowed thickly. "Um, yes?"

"You do realize," Snape began slowly, "that Ramkin's theory has been debunked by at least two other sources on the list I gave you, and that the only promising part of his writings was his emphasis on the permanent formation of relationship between signifier and signified via the creation of an incantation?"

Harry blinked, willing that string of words to make sense in his mind. He resisted the urge to pull out his parchment and desperately read through it to find something to say. "Um…."

"I'll take that as a 'no'." Snape's eyes fell back to his work. "Please refrain from disturbing me until Miss Granger has discovered something that is actually of use, Mr. Potter. I've just taken on a number of additional duties and my free time has become somewhat limited." The quill paused over a length of parchment, and Snape's cool eyes flickered back up briefly, filled with a mundane sort of contempt. "In fact, it occurs to me that Miss Granger must be equally overwhelmed by her commitments, so refrain from pestering her as well."

Harry shuffled a bit forward, his heart thudding. This shouldn't be so nerve-wracking, but it was. He hated that Snape thought he was stupid and lazy; he hated that this was so far beyond him. "Professor, are there texts I could read so that—well, you know. So that I might be able to understand all of this and be a little bit useful."

Snape's brow furrowed slightly. "Potter, this is an extremely complicated subject, even for dedicated scholars. It is highly unlikely that you will gain more than a rudimentary grasp of concepts, even if you were to devote significant time to the subject. I… appreciate your persistence, but I advise against pursuing this folly. You've better uses for your time."

No, he didn't. But Snape would never see that. "Please, sir." He knew better than to angle for any other kind of association. Snape would hex him back out the door in seconds flat. Best to stick with this, as unlikely as it seemed that it would get him anywhere.

Snape cast his quill down and pushed a hand through his hair, a gesture of exasperation. "I don't suppose you'll give this up."

Harry felt a faint grin stretch his lips. "No, sir."

"Very well. Surprisingly enough, the theory of spell creation intertwines heavily with Muggle philosophical movements, particularly those related to the relationship between the abstract, or the signified, and the forms used to represent the signified abstract, the signifier. In spell-crafting this goes far beyond the philosophical abstract, as the bond formed between gesture and language—the signifier—and the abstract—the function of the magic called upon—becomes a permanent linkage."

Harry nodded slowly, desperately trying to appear as though everything Snape had said did not sound like Greek.

Snape stared at him for a moment, then dropped his eyes and began massaging a temple with one hand. "The magical power we call on is something that is far beyond words or description. It is a raw force that alters the very world before us, adjusting the natural laws in our favor. You follow so far?"

"Yeah." Actually, now that Snape was using normal language, Harry was sort of fascinated. He'd never thought much about what magic actually was, having never gotten much past marveling at its very existence. "So, we somehow use words to call on that."

Snape nodded to his desk, apparently finding the conversation too taxing to lift his head. "Words and gesture. In normal context, both are slippery and transient. For example…." Snape lifted his head slightly and searched over his desk for a moment before selecting a thin book. "I can call this a tome. I can call this a book, or a volume, or a novel, a text, a publication, and so forth. All of these are established referents in our language, used to represent the abstract concept of this." He tapped the book cover. "I can choose another language as well, which has already established a distinct series of sounds to communicate this concept—therefore, I can also call it a Buch, a livre, a libro, and so on. These are established and accepted. However, what is to stop me from calling this a chair, and in my mind choosing to associate that series of sounds, that posturing of the mouth and emission of certain syllables, with the abstract concept of this?" Another tap to the cover of the book for emphasis.

"Right," Harry agreed excitedly. This was actually kind of making sense. "Like, I could decide to call it a—a google-nurgle—and refer to it as a google-nurgle—"

"Say that asinine phrase one more time, Potter, and I will hex your mouth shut," Snape warned. Harry couldn't tell if the man was serious or not.

"I can make up whatever word I want to represent it," Harry concluded a bit sheepishly. "So—with magic, if you were making up a new spell, couldn't you just pick whatever sounds you wanted, as long as you believe them to mean a certain thing?"

"Oh, certainly, Potter," Snape agreed sarcastically. He drew his wand. "Why bother making up sounds, though? Why not use words that already mean something to us? For example, turn into a pig!" Snape brandished his wand at his desk, and, of course, nothing happened. Snape's sarcasm somehow managed to grow thicker. "Well, isn't that odd. And here I'd thought you'd solved a mystery that centuries of scholars have grappled with."

Harry felt his cheeks heat. "I didn't say—I was just asking a question."

"An exceedingly stupid question," Snape admonished him, replacing his wand, "that you might have answered yourself had you but spent two seconds pondering it before blurting it out. Think before you speak."

Harry nodded to the ground. "Right." Idiot, he scolded himself. "Okay, so there's way more to it than that. You said something about—about the bond between the, uh, the signifier"—Snape dipped his head slightly in confirmation—"and the signified, which is to say the magic called on, becoming permanent. So it's just figuring that out, really, not trying to find the right words. How does that even happen, then?"

Snape sighed, the hand returning to his temple. "That, Mr. Potter, is where the complexity of the theory begins. If we had the key to forming such a bond, any crackpot wizard could invent a dozen new spells in a given day. There are a dozen threads of thought, ranging from language latency to innate magical talent to gradual expansion. And no, I am not about to detail each of those. If you wish to gain a grasp of the subject, begin by re-reading—carefully, mind—Ramkin's theory, this time knowing that concepts such as grammatical and linguistic alignment are pure bunk. Then read Saussure's essay, 'The Application of Semiology in Spell Creation'. There is a translated copy in the library. Finally, read Castlecrack's 'Permanence of the Signifier: A Speculative Treatise'. Once you have carefully reviewed those three writings and have fodder for intelligent discussion, or at the very least a series of non-idiotic questions, you may return to further pester me. Agreed?"

"Um—can you—I need you to repeat those," Harry mumbled, dropping his bag and fumbling for a spare bit of parchment.

Snape sighed heavily, but obliged him.

Harry prepared to leave as soon as he had tucked the parchment away in a pocket of his bag, but paused at the door. Snape had already returned to his work, but Harry decided he would risk interrupting the professor.

"Sir… is there anything I can do to help you? I really appreciate you taking extra time to teach me, and I'd like to make up for it as best I can." There. Snape couldn't hate him too much for that, could he?

Snape lifted his head, quill pausing once more, his dark eyes piercing Harry with all the intensity one might devote to some grotesque, exotic species of insect. Seconds ticked by in oppressive silence. Finally, Snape replied evenly, "Yes."

Harry's heart leapt slightly. Another chance, then, more than a long list of indecipherable texts. Maybe something he could actually do.

"Stay out of trouble."

And just as quickly as it had risen Harry's heart sank. He didn't even have the heart for a verbal response. He just nodded his head and fled from the office, shouldering his book bag as he went.

XXXXX

Severus debated pouring himself a few fingers of Firewhiskey. It wasn't as though the girl weren't of age, now, was it? Surely she was old enough to conceive of her professors indulging in a few vices in their spare time.

Except this would not be his spare time. This was an official meeting with a student of his house, and he was the Deputy Headmaster. He could not afford to drop decorum. With Draco, yes; with Pansy, no.

But Merlin, Potter was a pill. He could still see those hopeful green eyes, her eyes, lingering on him, as though he might cave and invite and invite the boy to spend cozy evenings in his private chambers so that they might become the best of friends. He could still hear that disgustingly respectful tone, too, filled with pleading. Is there anything I can do to help you?

Yes, he wanted to snap. Leave me the hell alone, you badgering little twit. I don't need your pity.

Oh, yes, Minerva would love to hear about that. And inevitably Albus would hear about it one way or another, because every loathsome portrait in this place gossiped, and then Severus would be invited up for another heart-to-heart at the most inconvenient hour conceivable, out of consideration for dear Severus' privacy. Yes, an hour lecture starting at midnight all about how sweet and gentle and Lily-like good Harry was, and how Severus would do well to let the boy into his life so that he might begin to mend some of the wounds on his heart. Or some such nonsense. The same nonsense Albus had fed him time and time again over his tenure.

Well, he would wash the distaste of it all away a bit later, when he could nurse his scotch before his own hearth without fear of interruption.

The polite, tentative knock came precisely at eight, just as Severus knew it would.

"Enter," he commanded.

Pansy Parkinson came in, uninjured now from the looks of her but nearly unrecognizable for the absence of any pride from her posture. She was shrunk down now, her dark hair parted over her shoulders in protective curtains, her lips just a touch too pale. "Professor," she greeted him, not lifting her eyes.

"Miss Parkinson. Come, sit. I trust you've made a full recovery?"

Parkinson dropped into one of the hard visitor's chairs before his desk. "Yes, sir."

"And you are still unable to tell us anything about the attack?" Severus pressed, knowing full well that the girl's answer would remain unchanged.

"No, sir."

Severus leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers before him before fixing her with his cool stare. "Most unfortunate. I fear that without any knowledge we will merely have to assume that one or several individuals have it in for you. Clearly there is only one course of action."

The girl's panicked eyes darted up. "Sir?" she stuttered breathily, her hands fisting in her skirt.

"I'm afraid we will have to send you away, Miss Parkinson, until the culprit or culprits have been caught and dealt with. We cannot risk your life, you understand."

"But—Professor! I have to finish this year, I have to…."

Find a post. Establish an income to support my impoverished family. Begin the long crawl back into wizarding society's good graces.

"It is most unfortunate," Severus agreed in what was, for him, a gentle tone. "However, we cannot continue to risk your life when the threat is, as of yet, completely unknown. You will be removed until we have gathered more information and have at least managed to develop a plan to protect you."

"They won't kill me," Parkinson pleaded, twisting her skirts further. "Please, I can't fall behind, I can't…."

"How can you possibly know that they will not kill you?" Severus inquired, arching a brow. Good. The girl was slipping at long last.

"I…." Her eyes fell again, back to her lap. "It's… Professor, all I know are rumors and what I heard when… when they attacked me."

"Ah, but Miss Parkinson, did you not repeatedly insist that you knew nothing? I cannot have you making up false information merely because you hope to remain here. Now, I will contact your parents this evening and arrange for you to Floo home—"

"Professor, please, I'm not making it up. I didn't want to say before. I—I was threatened. I don't know who, they disguised their voices, but they said that it would be worse for us if we tried to fight—"

" 'Us', who?" Severus inquired.

"D-death Eaters," she breathed, and Severus was not surprised to see the prickle of tears in her eyes. "They've already attacked Draco twice, but he fought them off."

Draco. Severus clenched his teeth, his hand automatically gripping the edge of his desk. He would need to have another little chat with the boy, it seemed. "Miss Parkinson, there are no Death Eaters in this school. Am I to understand that this little group of whomever has taken it upon itself to punish Slytherins with connections to the Dark Lord and the last war?"

The girl nodded into her lap. Normally Severus would admonish a student for such a response, but he could tell that the girl was already fragile and on the verge of a true breakdown, so he restrained himself.

"And am I to also understand that my Slytherins are aware of this vigilante group, and yet have not had the sense to report anything to myself or the headmistress?"

Parkinson's hands flexed nervously against the fabric of her skirt. "Daphne went to Professor Slughorn, but he said there wasn't any proof, and that there was nothing he could do. The rest of us agreed that we could only watch out for each other. That we couldn't fight back because they'd expel us for hurting any other student, even in self-defense, and none of us needed that."

Of course Slughorn was useless. When had he been anything but? He was even a mediocre Potions Master. Not that Severus would say as much, because he certainly didn't want the post back.

"Miss Parkinson, I am once more your Head of House, and I certainly intend to do something about this. While I understand your concerns—and I know that they are well-founded—I cannot condone you and your peers' decision to keep this hidden. You are a Prefect, are you not?"

The girl's head dropped even lower. "Yes, sir."

"You have a duty to support and protect your fellow students. You cannot uphold that duty if you hide critical information such as this from your Professors. You must trust us to handle things, is that clear?"

"I trust you, Professor," the girl mumbled. How he detested mumbling. "But—the others? The Headmistress would never believe us, and the other professors despise us—"

"I quite assure you that the Headmistress will jump at any chance to defend Slytherin. In fact, just yesterday she seemed ready to expel Harry Potter himself for an infraction against Mr. Malfoy."

Parkinson's head lifted a fraction, her eyes narrowed with suspicion. "Draco wasn't lying?" Her lips pressed together thoughtfully for a moment, then she shook her head to herself. "It doesn't matter. They're clever, whoever they are. They never show their faces and they disguise their voices. Draco thinks they're just trying to provoke us into attacking so that we can be painted as belligerent and bloodthirsty. He thinks that they have backing in the Ministry, and that those people are waiting for any excuse to pass an act to have us all expelled."

Oh, yes, he was definitely going to have a nice, long chat with Draco about these interesting "suspicions".

"That may be the case. However, simply ignoring the problem will not make it go away. Careful investigation and observation on our part, however, might allow us to gather enough evidence to have the students responsible for these acts disciplined or removed."

Parkinson shook her head to herself again. "It's not worth it, Professor. There'll be an outcry. They'll say we're lying, that we made it all up because we're mad that—that we lost the war…." The girl's voice hitched noticeably. "They might change their minds about the pardons. They might—they might take everything from us, instead of almost everything. They might send our parents to Azkaban! If we just keep our heads down—"

"Miss Parkinson," Severus interrupted, working to keep his voice level. Damn it, if he ever found out who had put these thoughts in his students' heads, he would see to it that they paid for their crimes tenfold. Parkinson, he knew, had young siblings at home. For all the girl's many flaws, she was likely picturing them every day bereft of her parents. Likely picturing herself dropping out of school to care for them, or seeing them adopted into families who'd lost members in the war, who would hate everything those small children represented and take it out on them.

Didn't he know firsthand how easy it was to make children pay for the sins of their parents?

"Miss Parkinson, I am fully aware of the… delicate… political climate. But things are nowhere near as dire as you make them out to be, and I assure you, you have many champions beyond the walls of our House. Did you not receive a card and a visit from the Savior himself while you were laid up?"

Parkinson snorted derisively, though instead of the sound being filled with arrogance, it rang hollow with hopelessness. "Covering his tracks," she muttered, brushing a non-existent piece of lint from her skirt. "Him and his merry little band. I—I bet he's enjoying it. It's probably his little brigade—"

"It is not," Severus assured her, his words growing sharp. "First of all, Potter lacks the wits to be so subtle. There is a reason the Hat placed him in the House of the brash, arrogant, and foolish. Secondly, the boy has asked after you ever since this incident—"

"To cover his tracks, Professor!" Parkinson insisted. "He wants to know if you suspect—"

"No, you fool, he does not! This is the boy who, upon having the Dark Lord cornered at wandpoint—his parents' murderer, the source of all the misery in his short life, the very monster who'd tried to kill him twice—implored the man to feel remorse for his many sins, knowing full well that there was literally less than a shred of the man's soul left. The boy who did not cast the Killing Curse, or the Cruciatus, or even a painful hex, but rather attempted to disarm one of the most powerful wizards this world has ever seen. That boy is guileless and brimming over with generosity and forgiveness, and his sense of justice is carved in his very bones. And he will, Miss Parkinson, assist however he can in putting a stop to this rash of assaults. Do you doubt me? Do you doubt my judgment?"

At least the girl was sensible enough to say, "no, professor", even if her words lacked conviction.

Severus sighed, his headache returning. A Painkilling Potion before the firewhiskey, then. "In the future, you and all of your peers will come to me directly with any information they have related to this incident. Any, Miss Parkinson. You and your fellow Prefects will call a House Meeting this evening in order to inform everyone of this. Additionally, you will tell them that they will henceforth travel in pairs, and that all first and second years are to be escorted by a member of the upper forms at all times. Failure to obey this new policy will result in detention with me. Is that clear?"

"Yes, sir," the girl agreed quietly. "Does—does this mean—"

"I will not send you home. Yet. If I feel you are failing to take my directives seriously, or are withholding information, you and anyone I feel is in danger will be removed until we have gotten to the bottom of this." Because this administration, unlike the previous one, will be proactive about protecting the lives of students. We will not wait until a bloody Basilisk has petrified a handful of students before we consider the necessary measures to keep the rest of the student body safe. "Do we have an understanding, Miss Parkinson?"

"Yes, Professor."

"Good. You are dismissed. And ten points from Slytherin for your poor judgment."

A bright blush heated the girl's face. She mumbled another, "yes, professor" before fleeing his office.

Severus eased back in his chair for a moment, allowing himself to rest. God, what an absolute mess.

Of course it was only natural that there remained students who felt the losses of the last year so keenly, who remembered the weight of the injustices heaped upon them by the last regime, that they would be compelled to seek revenge. Severus could even sympathize with them. He'd expected a spike in the number of impromptu duels and nasty pranks against members of his house. But this?

Oh, why in the blessed name of Merlin did they have to organize into a cohesive unit? Why did they have to know how to threaten and blackmail? Why could this not be a case of adolescent rage, hot and irrational until it was burnt out, instead of this cold, calculated fury?

Draco, he thought, had better have some good plans for approaching Potter and forming some kind of alliance. He and his friends were likely going to need it in the coming weeks.

Deciding that his quarters were too far away, even by Floo, Severus summoned his scotch from an inconspicuous cabinet beneath one of his bookshelves and poured himself a good tumbler full. Then, because he knew that it would not be wholly appropriate for a student to walk in on this scene, he drew his wand and closed and locked his office door.

Thank God Minerva had bought him this bottle before the start of term. Though at the rate he was going, he would need another before long.

A/N: Dear lovely amazing readers, This story is not abandoned. I offer my humblest apologies for the long delay (wow, oops, over a year). I will continue to forge ahead as I am able, though I have the terrible tendency of jumping between incomplete fics, and then starting new ones, without actually finishing the ones I've already started. The good news is that I have two other unpublished fics of about 30k and 63k that I plan to complete and post (well, this might actually be bad news for some, as they represent two more distractions for me...). If you want to blame someone, blame the awesome community at Potions and Snitches and all of the tantalizing challenges they post. Also probably me for my lack of discipline. And I suppose all the other HP fanfic authors out there and their amazing and inspiring works. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this chapter, and as always, I hope to get another out soon. My current plan is to refocus my attentions on this, Snape's Promise, and For Lily's Sake. Thank you all for your continued readership, and feel free to feed my ever-starving ego with your lovely comments. I appreciate every single one, and will do my best to respond to questions and suggestions in future A/N. Cheers! ~Mel