AN/- Article in the chapter is not mine but Rowling's again—sorry I love the daily prophet articles a lot anyways hope you guys are reading and enjoying would really like some more feedback. =)
Chapter40
Neville was going down to the hospital wing that night to meet Harry and Audrey, it was true that he was out after curfew and it was true that those two might just have been sedated and put to sleep, but yet Neville made his way to the hospital wing. The splashes of stink sap were doing the job but the Gryffindors were certain that Neville Longbottom was going through a good dose of puberty; the usually scared and timid boy was now finding ways to defy the rules, he was getting himself detentions with Umbridge, he was finally becoming a Gryffindor or as Severus who put it "foolishly brave-utter dunderhead!"
Neville entered the hospital wing as he noticed his two friends asleep in their beds while Sirius was snoring away to glory on a chair near the foot of Harry's bed. Neville looked to see whether Madam Pomfrey had the light on in her office, but it seemed as if she too had gone away for the night. He was about to place the flowers into the flower pots near his friends beds when he heard audible clicks of someone's shoes, he pushed himself behind the large open oak doors of the hospital wing.
He was thankful that he had hidden himself quite well seeing that when the woman in the black robes stepped into the room, he saw Snape pull out his wand and take a stand. Neville knew who the woman was; Ms. Adams must have been visiting her aunt and uncle seeing that it was a weekend and must have rushed here to meet her daughter in the hospital wing. Why the hell was Snape here?
Neville noticed Snape lower his wand at the woman who gave him a glare that looked bitingly similar to the ones professor McGonagall gave when she was displeased.
"What happened?" asked Ms. Adams.
"Dementors attacked some student—she took the bout of it—and Potter of course pulled her into his heroic epics!" sneered Snape crossing his hands across his chest and shaking his head dismally.
"Why did she get into a herd of dementors she doesn't know how to produce a—," began Ms. Adams shocked, Neville frowned, so if she hadn't taught Audrey how to produce a patronus then who had? She couldn't have possibly picked that up from some book, he was certain of that.
"Yes—apparently she does," said Snape frowning at the door, Neville widened his eyes, had Snape spotted him, there were rumours that he could read people's minds, had he read his?
Neville was dead now, he could see Snape marching towards the door he was hiding behind and Neville closed his eyes and prayed for a miracle.
"Severus—I asked you a bloody question!" snarled Ms. Adams angrily, Snape turned around in a swift motion and then sprinted angrily towards the woman.
"Well what do you expect Rachel—after what happened to Potter last summer—it only seemed like a likely thing to teach her," snarled Snape angrily moving his hands over his head exasperated. Neville noticed Sirius grunted in his sleep, he wondered if their shouting woke them up but he wiped his nose and then shut his mouth and went back to sleep, snoring again after a few seconds as Snape shook his head at the man hopelessly.
"You cheated—you weren't supposed to teach them these things—it wasn't there in the curriculum—it wasn't," began Rachel pouting and whining as Snape who seemed to have gotten annoyed and cut her in mid sentence.
"Wait—you're telling me that you are not pleased that your daughter can produce a corporeal patronus?—or displeased of the fact that she can protect herself and doesn't need you anymore?" asked Snape angrily.
"I not saying it displeases me!" said Rachel offended a little.
"What do you want me to do about it?" asked Snape helplessly.
"Nothing—I just—I—," she shrugged a little sadly as Snape sighed and walked up to Audrey sleeping on the bed.
"I'm sorry!" muttered Rachel sighing.
"For what?" he asked sarcastically.
"Nothing," she said pushing her thoughts away, they looked at each other for a few minutes as Neville looked at Snape pitifully.
"What is it?" she asked him eagerly, as he looked at her.
"A stallion," he replied.
"Really—must be beautiful," she said sitting down on the bed next to her daughter.
"It is," he replied softly as she smiled at him and then something unthinkable happened, Neville saw it, Snape mouth twitched, it twitched and then was pushed upwards into a small awkward smile—it made him look a thousand times pleasant.
"She writes to me every week—never misses to tell me about you or Sirius," said Ms. Adams as Severus sat down on the chair he had previous occupied.
"She's a lot like me," he said using his hands as a table as Rachel caressed her daughter's hair.
"Yes, fifteen years of torture for me," muttered Rachel as Severus rolled his eyes. Rachel looked up at him and smiled as her lips parted to let out a small laugh.
"I wouldn't put it that way," he replied,
"I miss her a lot—Remus thinks I'm finally losing it," said Rachel, she had no idea where all this sudden bubbly conversation was coming from.
"Finally?" said Severus pushing his eye brow and smirking.
"Oh! Shut up!" she commented smiling to herself as she looked at her daughter and then stood
"I have to leave now—I suppose I'll see you at Christmas?" she asked him politely.
"Yes," nodded Snape curtly, as Rachel threw him a small smile.
"Rachel!" said Snape stopping the woman on her way out, he seemed like he was a loss for words.
"Yes?" she asked her face peaking in curiosity.
"Audrey—does she have nightmare?" asked Snape oddly as Rachel frowned.
"Doesn't everybody?" she asked him shrugging.
"No—I meant—you know mind wrenching ones?" asked Snape, as Rachel seemed to stand taller a small frown on her face.
"Normally—they're always about that Diggory boy!" said Rachel pitifully as Snape seemed to nod.
"Never anything about the dark lord?" asked Snape curiously, Rachel's expression changed—the dark lord? What did he mean by that? Why should her daughter have dreams of the dark lord-he stilled called that bastard the dark lord after what he did to their daughter—to Rachel he was no Lord, a blasted murdering lunatic is all.
"No! Never!" snarled Rachel, she glared at him and then suddenly stormed her way out of the room.
Neville found her behaviour curious, seeing that she was being friendly with Snape a few seconds ago and then suddenly changed her demeanour leaving even Snape baffled.
"Infernal Woman!" snarled Snape angrily as he watched her leave with a customary frown on his face that replaced his effortful smile. He sat back down next to Audrey as Neville decided to run for it.
He knew Snape's secret—the fact that he was treating Audrey like a commoner rather than a princess was because of the fact that it seemed normal—it seemed like he was the bad guy making Gryffindor welcome Audrey better if she rebelled against her own father. Neville did not know the physics of this but he did not real want to either. Seeing that he liked Audrey as a friend was reason enough to let it be. But then a thought struck Neville while he was running down the hallway, why did Snape not acknowledge her as his daughter openly, even if she did rebel, it didn't change the fact that she was his daughter.
"Professor Snape—the potions master—he's a spy—Dumbledore told me—spy for Dumbledore—at great personal risk too," thought Neville remembering what he had overheard his grandmother talking to someone in the floo over the summer, someone who had turned out to be no other than professor McGonagall
"Could it be true?" thought Neville.
"Could Snape be on our side?" chided his mind as Neville. Neville shrugged to himself; whatever side he was on didn't change the fact that he was an evil bastard.
Neville was making his way back to the common room as discreetly as he could manage; he was on the seventh floor corridor that led to the staircase to the common room.
"Shit!" he muttered as Mrs. Norris spotted him and went sprinting to get her master, who was around the corner.
"What is it my sweet?" asked Filch in his hoarse old man's voice as his cat purred and meowed. Neville made his way back towards the hospital wing stopping to catch his breath near the goblin war tapestry.
"I wish I had a place to hide!" he thought desperately as Filch's footsteps could be heard stronger. Suddenly out of no were the tapestry started to shake and split open, now the tapestry was covering a door with a knob, Neville looked around and saw Filch's shadow, which was all it took to make him fling open the door and lock it shut behind him. What Neville saw took his breath way, he had to tell the others—he had to tell them he had found them a perfect room to practice and start their defence classes.
"I wish I could hear him outside!" wished Neville as suddenly Filch's voice could be heard clearly.
"I think he's gone love—let's go greet Madam Prince shall we?" asked Filch happily as his footsteps died away with him.
Neville walked out of the room and dashed down to his dormitory as he fell asleep thinking excitedly about the next morning, only thing on his mind was whether the room would reappear for him.
"I can't just let you off like that!" argued Madam Pomfrey as Harry and Audrey groaned, it had been fifteen minutes since they had been arguing with madam Pomfrey assuring her that they were much better than they were last night and that she had no reason to keep them. It was only after they agreed to her demand to force feed them with two fried eggs and three bacon sandwiches and a large bar of Honeydukes chocolate each did she let them leave for their classes, unfortunately the first one turned out to be defence with the Slytherines.
"I think she gets too lonely in there!" commented Audrey a little cold as Harry laughed a little. They were slightly late for class but seeing that Umbridge hadn't come yet saved them from detention.
"Good morning class, please open page 55 and read chapter nine, there will be no need to talk!" said Umbridge as she paced around the class while everyone pulled out their books.
"No need to think is more like it!" said Hermione angrily as she slammed her book on her desk making Audrey jump and glare at her while Hermione blushed.
"Wands away!" snapped Umbridge sweetly at Neville who seemed to be practicing some movement under his desk, he threw her a bad look and then stared into his book.
A few minutes into the class, Umbridge went to sit down on her desk and grade some papers as she sorted them house wise and then read the Slytherine essays first.
Audrey was hit by a paper ball on the head, it fell discreetly on her open book, Audrey looked around to find the sender but everyone seemed to be reading, drawing or giggling with each other.
"Meet me after lunch—get HG, HP and RW, I will get FW, GW and GW—I think you need to see this!"
~ENVY"
Who in the bloody hell was 'ENVY', Audrey studied the sign again, and then again and then again as her head was almost touching the parchment.
"E-N-V-Y" she muttered to herself, repeating the spelling—it was an anagram she was sure, but who?
"NEVY!" she said out loud reading the parchment as Hermione looked at her frowning.
"What did you say Ms. Snape?" asked Umbridge a rather big frown on her head, Audrey shook her head as Umbridge got out of her seat and made her way to Audrey's seat, Audrey quickly hid the note.
"I said Navy—the muggle navy—umm...I was telling Hermione that my friends uncle works in the French navy!" said Audrey nodding her head as Umbridge glared at her but walked away.
"Really?" said Hermione frowning, she didn't realise what was going on.
"Shut it!" snarled Audrey under her breadth and then passed the note to her under the table; she knew Hermione was going to pass it behind to Harry and Ron.
Audrey turned around as Neville looked at her a few seconds later; Audrey nodded smiling as Neville beamed at her.
"I said no talking ten points from each off you Snape and Longbottom!" snarled Umbridge angrily.
They ate lunch in record time, said good bye to Sirius who had just come in and ran to the seventh floor corridor with Neville.
"I found us a room to practice!" smiled Neville at his friends.
"Where is it?" asked Ron curiously as Neville closed his eyes, wishing for the room to appear so that he could show his friends it existed—so that they could practice.
"Bloody wicked!" said Fred and George amazed as a door appeared from the wall and mixed in with the tapestry of the goblin revolt.
"Come on!"said Neville as they looked down the deserted corridor and opened the door and after everyone entered shut it behind them.
"Whoa!" said Ron looking at the empty room, it was as big as the great hall, the walls had cushions on them while one had a large fireplace with a crackling fire in it, suddenly wooden dummies sprung out of the ground and stood as if ready to duel.
"Brilliant, Neville! You've found the room of requirement!" said Hermione excitedly.
"Come again?" asked Audrey confused.
"The room of requirement more commonly known as the come and go room, appears to seekers when they are in dire need for the room—it is usually set according to the seekers needs—it's like Hogwarts wants us to fight back!" said Hermione excitedly.
"It's like Dumbledore telling us about his story on chamber pots?" asked Harry as Audrey chuckled, remembering her grandfather's odd taste in humour and toilet jokes, she wondered if her father would find them funny.
"Charming, but yes—" said Hermione disgustedly as Audrey laughed.
"When do we start class?" asked Ginny excitedly.
"Soon—very soon!" smiled Hermione.
Just like Hermione had promised the DA lessons began soon, students were divided into two groups, the younger lot who needed more help this obviously included Neville, he was just pathetic and then there was the older lot who just needed some practice and need to learn new spells—Harry and Audrey would be teaching each batch alternatively.
"Alright—so umm...well I suppose we should begin with basic defence spells" said Audrey addressing Neville and the other students younger than him.
"Right—so there are three main defence spells—the Expelliarmus—this is used to disarm people, the protego, is used to protect you from the opponents spells or sometimes if cast strongly it rebounds the spells back towards the opponent making his spell a liability for him and the third one is the confundus—it isn't really a defence technique but you could use it as a defence spell seeing that it confuses your opponent.
"Alright—so who wants to go first?" asked Audrey, no one really came forth.
"We don't know how to really do any," said Neville timidly as Audrey looked at them a little dumbfound—they didn't know how to do defence spells—what were they teaching them at Hogwarts? Knitting patterns?
"You're joking right?" asked Audrey refusing to believe them as Nigel the third year boy shook his head slightly.
"Right—ok—then—I suppose I'll show it to you one by one and then you guys can practice in pairs," said Audrey.
"Okay so the Expelliarmus is pretty easy—any volunteers?" asked Audrey as Neville stepped forth, she smiled at him and asked him to stand with his wand high in his hand as if ready for attack.
"Alright watch me now—Expelliarmus!" shouted Audrey as the jet of red light blasted from her wand and hit Neville whose wand instantly flung out of his wand and into the air.
"Accio wand!" shouted Audrey pointing it at the wand in the air as it flew into her hands.
"Does everyone get that?" asked Audrey as everybody nodded and split themselves into pairs. Neville teamed up with Nigel while Ginny and Luna decided to pair up.
"Great job—maybe you guys should go into that side—you seem to have your basics right," said Audrey as Ginny and Luna smiled at her and obeyed, they went and spoke to Harry as he beamed and let them join his batch. Not everyone was as lucky as them Nigel was picking up but Neville's wand was not working at all.
"A bit higher!" said Audrey pushing his hands up but something even worse happened, when Neville shouted his spell his wand flung out of his own hand and landed coyly next to Nigel's feet. He came back to give Neville his wand as then gave him a pitiful smile. Audrey glared at the boy whose smiled dropped instantly.
"Why don't you practice on your own Nigel I'll take care of Neville here," said Audrey as Nigel nodded like he was listening to one of his teachers or worse Professor Snape himself.
"I'm hopeless," said Neville shaking his head as Audrey handed him his wand.
"No—No—listen Neville—don't think that way!" said Audrey shaking her head her hand rested calmly on his shoulder.
"But I am—stupid—pathetic!" he said kicking the air.
"No, you're just flourishing your wand too much—here try this—Expelliarmus!" said Audrey doing the charm as Neville's wand was once again in her hands.
"Expelliarmus!" said Neville again as nothing happened.
"Maybe I just can't—" began Neville.
"No! Shut up! You are better than demeaning yourself like that Neville—if you could find us this room! You can do anything!" said Audrey trying to build up his squished morale.
"Listen—I'll give you an easy way to do it, provided you promise me that you won't give up!" said Audrey as Neville brightened a little and nodded.
"Alright-my mum taught me this trick when I was seven, she used to say that any spell works in the movement of its first letter, for example if you move your wand to make a small 'e' in the air and say the spell out loud it still works," said Audrey as Neville frowned.
"Try it!" she said picking up her wand and standing opposite him. Neville did what he was told, his wand brought out some movement as a few red sparks flew out of his wand and then disappeared; Neville finally had a smile on his face.
"Brilliant—keep practicing—and you'll get it!" smiled Audrey patting his shoulder as she went over the others to check out their work.
Practices went on for the month; soon December came in with snow storms and hot chocolate breakfasts. Still every opportunity they got the DA was gathered and set into a good practice, even Neville was improving he hadn't really been able to bring out a spell yet but Audrey was certain it would be soon enough. Then one morning he got a large bad dose of news.
MASS BREAKOUT FROM AZKABAN
The Ministry of Magic announced late last night that there has been a mass breakout from Azkaban. Speaking to reporters in his private office, Cornelius Fudge, Minister of Magic, confirmed that ten high-security prisoners escaped in the early hours of yesterday evening, and that he has already informed the Muggle Prime Minister of the dangerous nature of these individuals."We find ourselves, most unfortunately, in a position we faced before, but Mr. Black's escape was different" said Fudge last night. We do not think that the two breakouts are related but an escape of this magnitude suggests outside help. We are, however, doing all we can to round up the criminals and beg the magical community to remain alert and cautious. On no account should any of these individuals be approached."
"This is ridiculous! I can't believe we've still got dementors positioned outside the hall!" exclaimed Hermione disgustedly.
"I wonder how Neville's taking this?" said Audrey as softly as she could whisper into Harry's ears. They both looked at Neville, who seemed to extremely disturbed. Only Harry and Audrey knew what had happened to his parents after they had been tortured by Bellatrix Lestrange whose picture was the most deranged from all the others possibly even more than Sirius's had been two years ago.
"Not very well obviously," said Harry a little sadly as Neville crushed the paper into his chest got up and ran out of the hall, Audrey's eyes followed him out of the hall and she was sure she could see his eyes go wet.
"Neville, wait!" shouted Seamus and Dean as they got out of their seats and ran till where Harry and Audrey were sitting. Audrey and Seamus's eyes meet, but she glared at him and looked away.
"Harry—Audrey—I just wanted to say—," began Seamus as Audrey and Harry turned together to look at him.
"I am sorry—and I believe you—now even my mum believes the daily prophet is full of rubbish!" said Seamus stretching his arm out to Audrey and throwing her a true Scottish smile. Audrey smiled back at him and shook his hand with equal vigour.
They walked together to the class as Seamus began talking about something, their care of magical creatures class went well and so did history of magic, transfiguration was alright as well but poor Neville who had already been disturbed since that morning didn't enjoy any of these classes but something broke in him that Potions class.
It had been half an hour into the class and everyone had been set into making the wolfsbane potion in its quarterly stage. Audrey and Harry had already been through the process and thankfully their process was going quite well but not so much for Neville and Dean, seeing Neville added salamder blood after a pinch of moonstone which was not a component in the recipe at all and well everyone knew the effect of that.
"Longbottom!" snarled Snape angrily as the potion had flopped all over his robes.
"You daft boy! Why Longbottom! Why are you so stupid? Why can you not once, not ever follow simple instructions? Why must you insist to blow up your potion and make Thomas take your grade—why can you not improve?—you are incompetent are you trying to make the others as incompetent as you?" finished Snape, it wasn't like it had been the first time Severus had scolded Neville for something like this and talking to him like he had, there had always been a thing with the Gryffindors especially Longbottom and Potter.
Neville didn't move he'd gone rigid, the class so quite they could hear Neville sob, Severus was surprised of the boys reaction too but never had thought that Longbottom would start brawling like a child and run out of his class. The Slytherines began to laugh as the Gryffindors glared at him. Severus just continued to glare at the door dumfound, he had half a mind to go after the boy, to console him, he didn't want him to cry because of him after the news he'd gotten the morning Severus was sure Longbottom had been affected most drastically.
"Your father is a douche bag!" said Seamus to Audrey loudly; Severus snapped his head to look at her as she glared at him angrily.
"Tell me about it!" she said as she turned away while Severus hushed the laughing class.
"Class dismissed!" announced Snape as everyone shut their text books and packed their bags for tea time and left the class.
"I'll catch you later," said Audrey as Hermione nodded and pulled Ron and Harry out of the class.
"Can we talk?" asked Audrey shutting the class door slowly as Severus turned around to see his daughter still standing there her bag hanging off her shoulder.
"Sure," he said nonchalantly.
"What was that?" asked Audrey softly.
"What was what?" he asked back.
"You know what I am talking about!" she frowned angrily.
"Look, I've been worse to Longbottom, I don't know what got into him today" he said shrugging.
"Would you be alright if someone called you incompetent on the day when the people who were responsible for your parents' mental instability escaped?" asked Audrey all in one breath, Severus flinched and the resemblance of her speech to his own, he wasn't used to having his own children fight with him. Heck, in his entire teaching career no one but Potter had been bold enough to stand up to him of course that resulted in to several detentions.
"If I hadn't scolded him, he'd do the same thing tomorrow, not that he doesn't but there is always some hope for him," said Severus shrugging.
"No! You don't have hope for him, you don't have hope for anybody from my house!" she snarled at him.
"Fine, maybe I was a bit short with Longbottom today," he said finally agreeing, he didn't want to fight with her, but his temper rose when she brought up her 'house' she sounded like one of the marauders.
"Your short with everybody everyday!" she nagged.
"What are we going to do about it?" he asked frowning as he crossed his hands and towered over her, not that she was too short another trait from her beloved father.
"I don't see any solution to your bullying!" she said angrily.
"What did you say—you infernal girl—how dare you!" he snarled pulling her cuff. Audrey froze as she shrunk back her eyes bore into his possible tears threatening to fall.
"Get out!" he shouted angrily letting go off her as the air around her got colder. She didn't move, she couldn't really, she seemed frozen, his reaction to her tantrum had not been very pleasant, she want excepting him to apologize to Neville but she hadn't expected this either. She knew he was looking at her, realizing his mistake, his reaction had been wrong.
"Audrey," he said softly reaching his arm out, but she backed away, she backed away like a scared rabbit, she was frightened of him, frightened of the man she had admired till yesterday.
"Audrey—I—Audrey wait—I'm—" he began but she didn't let him complete his statement she opened the door and ran away, just like Longbottom had an hour ago.
Severus could only look at the open door, as he shamefully thought of his past, his wretched childhood.
"You're a freak boy!" one slap
"Freak!" another slap and two kicks in the back
"You're both freaks you and that bloody bitch" slaps back to back followed by kicks and whippings with a leather belt.
Everything else was just scars and bruises, everything except his time at Hogwarts his real friends who he had lost, gained and lost again and now his daughter. What was happening to him, he could be becoming Tobias? He couldn't!
He had never believed in brutality seeing what he had with his father had been nothing but that and look how he turned out to be. So what had gone wrong then? Why had he, the master of emotions and sentiments fallen to her words, because they came from his daughter? But hadn't he known that children said the most awful things sometimes and hadn't he too said some heartbreaking things to his own mother when he had been fifteen.
Severus sat down. He did not know how he was supposed to approach this it became worse when he thought of the days ahead. What if Audrey wrote to Rachel and Remus about it, they'd take her away from him, they'd take the last thing he wanted to give away, what if Audrey never spoke to him ever again. What if she told Sirius and he told everybody else, no it did not matter, he just wanted her to look at him again because he if that girl was what Lucius had claimed "just like her father" then she'd clearly ignore him, she'd push all her feelings into her heart and staple them together painfully ignoring everything else and then maybe when she grew up, she'd grow up to be "just like her father" too—the dungeons were suddenly very cold for Severus, he wished he could pull her into a hug again just once feel her and kiss her head, hear her call him 'pappa' but she wasn't coming back. Only the bottle of fire whiskey in his quarters could offer him solace, but that too seemed very cold right now. For the first time in his entire life Severus understood that however brooding and snarky he was, he was still very lonely and it seemed as if the only light left in his life had started to flicker, he had better change it before it was too late, but he didn't want to be electrocuted buy the emotional shocks they would provide while changing, how, how was he supposed to pull together the courage to face his girl after this. He might be brave, but he was no Gryffindor.
AN/- hey hope you'll leave a review—it really helps with future thinking.