A/N: We managed to edit end beta 3 more chapters, so here they are.
Start of the Yule Break
On Sunday, most of the students had left the school to celebrate Yule or Christmas, but Harry, Hermione, and the Weasley kids stayed. There had been some commotion when, as soon as the train had left, a couple of Aurors had arrived at Hogwarts.
The Headmaster tried to divert them to his office, but much to his surprise, they wanted to visit Filius Flitwick and no, the Charms Master was not in any legal trouble and no, Headmaster Dumbledore wasn't needed for the meeting.
Some seventh-year Ravenclaws, who had decided to stay over the holidays to study for their N.E.W.T.s, overheard an Auror telling the Headmaster, "I know you're the Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot but at Hogwarts you're here in the capacity as the headmaster and this investigation has nothing to do with your school. Please let us do our jobs." The man said firmly, and he and his partner had left the frowning Headmaster standing in the Front Hall.
The students gossiped about the visit. But when the Aurors had left with no one the wiser, it was soon forgotten about.
The 'Golden Trio' had concluded the perfect timing for their investigation under Polyjuice had arrived. Hermione and her two co-conspirators decided thusly because Malfoy and his goons were staying at Hogwarts as well.
In the end, the whole 'operation' was a bust, much to their disappointment. Malfoy didn't know anything about Slytherin's heir and Hermione had cat-like features now and had to go to the Hospital Wing where Madame Pomfrey kept her.
On December 26th two things of note happened.
The first saw Harry moping around and mourning their failure. Because of that, he happened to come by Myrtle's bathroom, where he found a black and blank notebook. The Book stayed dry even after Myrtle had flooded the floor when the book had been thrown into a toilet, if Myrtle was to be believed.
Harry decided it was interesting enough regardless of the places the notebook had been at and took it. He had just put it in his trunk when Ron found him, and they decided to go and visit Hermione.
She told them she had to stay at the Hospital Wing for a few weeks much to her distress, but at least she could ask (badger) Madam Pomfrey all the questions about ghosts that Professor McGonagall hadn't deemed necessary to answer.
Harry promptly forgot about the little black notebook.
The second thing of note was Severus's second get-together with Unspeakable No. 15 and Narcissa.
They met in the same room they had been in on December 19th and Severus skipped the pleasantries, asking immediately, "Did you find the counter-curse?"
Unspeakable No. 15 chuckled and said, "I did. Problems?"
Severus huffed and answered, looking quite exasperated, "Just today, a seventh-year Hufflepuff fainted when I walked by, can you imagine? I'm close to walking around on school grounds with a paper bag over my head!"
Narcissa nearly snorted her tea through her nose.
"It must be quite the turnabout for a private man like you, Mr Snape. Now, why don't you take a seat, and I'll cast the counter. You shouldn't feel anything."
Severus hurried to the free chair and sat down, looking expectantly at the Unspeakable. He didn't care if he behaved like a first-year Gryffindor. He wanted the spell off!
"Redianormalis."
He blinked, "That was it? I didn't feel a thing. Wait, Redianormalis... redi ad normalis... Return to normal? That's it?"
The Unspeakable nodded, "Yes, rather underwhelming, isn't it?"
"Exceedingly so. So, please tell me that I'm not 'dreamy' anymore."
Narcissa tilted her head to the side and looked at him, "Well, you're still quite good-looking but not so artificially handsome as before."
"Thank God!" Severus's relief let his Muggle upbringing shine through.
The two other persons chuckled and Narcissa then asked, "May I cast the spell on myself now? No wand movement, right?"
"That's correct and yes, please do so," No. 15 said.
"Redianormalis."
Severus watched as Narcissa changed a little. She didn't look as ethereal as before, but she was still very beautiful.
He couldn't stop himself from commenting, "There's nearly no difference. The spell was rather unnecessary, in my opinion."
No. 15 nodded, "Indeed."
Narcissa didn't quite know how to react to that. On the one hand, she felt relieved she hadn't turned out to be an old hag according to them. On the other hand, casting The Spell on herself seemed so incredibly superficial, lazy, and hurtful now. She still wanted to see herself though and so asked the elf to bring a mirror.
Narcissa looked at herself critically and decided she could live with her appearance. There were other spells, light spells, she could use. It just took a little more effort.
Severus stepped in front of the mirror as eagerly as Narcissa had but with quite the opposite motive. He needed to look less handsome again! And he did. He didn't look as ugly as before the whole ordeal, but now he looked like a normal human being. He was a little too thin, his mouth a little too wide, his skin just a little too pale, and so on. But all in all, he felt like that was the look that did fit his current inner self quite well, much to his surprise.
After Narcissa and Severus had checked their appearances, they all settled down to talk again.
Narcissa asked, "May I teach the spell to Lucius? It's best when he casts it himself, correct?"
"Correct. You may teach it to anyone and tell anyone about it. Just not the spell that made it all necessary. That reminds me, I need the oath from you later, that you never will teach it to anyone or cast it again."
Narcissa had prepared the wording of this oath beforehand and gave the paper she had written it on to No. 15 for approval. After she received the go-ahead, she swore the oath on her magic then and there and looked quite elated afterwards.
"How will you assure everyone in the know has sworn that oath?" Severus asked.
"We cannot possibly assure that, but we'll make certain People will know the consequences, should they get discovered, as we do with all illegal spells."
Severus nodded.
"But we'll make as many people swear this oath as possible. We won't make the same mistake to trust society again with this issue. It's just too dangerous."
"Because we'll die out?"
"Yes. But also, you have to know that the spell doesn't only make the victims lose their looks, it can also make them sterile, or even go insane in some rare cases."
"Don't tell me the Dark Lord arose because of this spell!" Severus asked, looking incredulous and appalled.
"We don't know, but it might have been a factor leading him down this path. After the spell was invented the number of Dark Lords and Ladies quadrupled."
Severus nearly bit himself bloody to prevent himself from cursing loudly.
Narcissa looked like she had the same problem.
"Another quite common effect of the spell is stupidity. By now, we have concluded that some – let's say – not so magically apt women have cast the spell in front of their babies when they were unable to do the casting wandless and/or silent. A baby wouldn't have been able to remember, after all. That would explain the dramatic decline of grades within the pure-blood community."
Narcissa looked green by now, but Severus perked up, "Would that mean my house could become smarter overnight?"
"Yes, that's exactly what it means."
Severus looked quite gleeful at the thought.
"How will we inform everyone of the spell? The Daily Prophet?" Narcissa asked drolly.
"That's exactly what we plan to do. The article or articles will be released within the week. Oh, that reminds me. Narcissa said that a student took before-and-after photographs of Mr Lockhart and you, Mr Snape?"
"He did indeed. Fortunately, the student in question went home for the break and couldn't open a business selling them to the masses. I have nightmares of teenage girls hanging posters of stupidly-handsome me in their dormitories."
Narcissa and No. 15 both chuckled.
"I see. Would you mind visiting him and asking him for pictures of you and Lockhart before and after the spell? And maybe even one of you as you look now?"
Severus nodded thoughtfully, "I can do that. It probably would be best if people see for themselves what you're talking about. Even if I certainly will not enjoy my picture being published in the paper, it seems necessary. Maybe I'll ask Mr Creevey to take some pictures of the of-age students, too. Marcus Flint just turned seventeen, I believe. He might be a good example. But that would mean waiting with the article until term starts and the pictures can be taken and developed. Hm, no. The sooner the better, wouldn't you say?"
"Yes, you're right. The pictures of you and Lockhart should suffice."
" You can always send further pictures to the Prophet for a follow-up later," Narcissa added.
"That's a good idea. Thank you."
Severus nodded, then asked, "Talking about Lockhart, did you find him, and what happened to him?"
"Yes, we found him just in time. He's at Azkaban now."
"Oh, that's harsh. Was that necessary? I'm sure Albus will try to speak up on his behalf."
"Hm, yes. It was necessary. Maybe we should let the Prophet print a picture of how he looks now..."
"He looks uglier than he did a week ago? Is that possible?"
"Yes, it is."
Narcissa turned green again, "Don't tell me he turned into a ... No!"
Severus frowned and then paled considerably, as well. "Azkaban," he whispered.
No. 15 nodded and said, "You now understand the other reason we are doing our best to eradicate this spell, don't you?"
"No one deserves that," Severus agreed. "So, all of them were human once?"
"Yes. The ultimate punishment for thoughtless vanity, at least if the spell had been used on oneself first."
"Please excuse me," Narcissa murmured and hastily left the room, to get a hold of herself.
Severus sat there quietly, thinking of all the repercussions the spell had.
"How can one single spell have such an impact on a whole society? It's inconceivable."
"That's why we made it a standard procedure for the DMLE to always cast the counter-curse three centuries ago, but they haven't done so in over a century… It seems we have flooded them with standard procedure for centuries and never retracted any. So, after unsuccessfully pleading with us to do so, they decided to use their best guess and the counter fell to the wayside."
Severus scoffed and suggested, "Maybe your department needs a standard procedure to regularly check the DMLE standard procedures for their ongoing validity."
"Ha! Yes, I'll inform No. 1 that that's what we'll do. We cannot blame the other departments if we are not willing and prepared to better ourselves too!"
Severus decided he quite liked No. 15. They had a good head on their shoulders.
Narcissa quietly returned and Severus asked, "Another question that occurred to me, what happens if someone casts the counter on themselves, when they were the casualty, not the instigator? After all, they'll have the price returned to them. And no gift is without a price in dark magic."
"You're quite right. When a victim of the curse takes back what was theirs in the first place, the good looks gained will be lost by the caster of the spell. So, even if the caster never casts the counter on themselves as Mrs Malfoy did, they'll still look like their base self if all their victims take back what was theirs."
"Hm, but you said I'll forever look better than my base self would have. How's that possible?"
"Well, you're retaining all the looks Lockhart gifted to you by casting the spell. Only from his basic looks, though."
Severus choked, "Bugger me!"
Narcissa giggled.
"Sorry."
Narcissa waved him off. "Oh, I just thought of all the students who lent their looks to Severus unwittingly. You're saying that they got everything back?"
"Exactly."
"That's a relief."
"I'll call a house meeting on the first day of the term and have everyone cast the spell onto themselves, I promise you that, Narcissa."
She nodded gratefully as Draco had decided to stay at Hogwarts with his father visiting business partners on the European mainland and the colonies overseas. She missed her darling and worried about him so very much!
Severus in the meantime tried to learn everything possible about the counter-spell, "So, the students will mostly be informed when they come back. Some will have cast the counter on themselves some will not, and some will have had a family member do the casting. I would like them all to cast it once again. Is it safe?"
No. 15 nodded, "Yes. The counter cannot do any harm. Remember what it essentially does. It allows the body to go back into its natural form. It can be cast as many times on a person as necessary and beyond. Furthermore, you'll remember, I told you that other people can do the casting as well, but it's not as effective. What I didn't tell you yet, is that this is not entirely true. Past research has shown that when a person is hit by the counter more than six times at once, it'll fully break the spell as well. The result of such a spellcasting is that the person cannot use the spell anymore. They are immune to it then."
Severus looked at them in question and got the answer immediately, "No, your case is the exception. The person casting the spell on another pays the ultimate price and it's not entirely reversible. Why that is, we don't know and can and will not study. Even we do have some ethics and morals."
Severus nodded, resigned. He could live with his current appearance. He even liked it, which was strange as he had cultivated his awful looks before that, thinking he deserved them. This made him wonder, "I have a personal question. I would like it to stay between the three of us. Is that possible?"
Narcissa nodded and No. 15 said, "As long as it doesn't go against magic and the more important laws, sure, go ahead."