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"It's 9:32 now. You three have until 9:40 to return to the fifth-year boys' dorm in the shortest possible time without any distractions. One stroke for every minute you are late. Grounded in your room until tomorrow morning. No access to any other areas, including the common room. Five strokes for taking one step out of your room until 7:30 tomorrow. Report to the Deputy Head's office at 8:00 a.m."
"...Yes, Professor." "Yes, sir." "Understood, sir."
All three boys nodded, unable to think of any other answers. Professor Peverell's footsteps receded with the girl in the hallway, and the three of them headed for the dungeon, their heads drooping in silence.
"...Do you think he really counts to the minute? Think he'll know if we're going in 9:40 or 9:41?"
"Why don't you test it if you're so curious, Avery."
"...Well, no."
"...Hey, Snape. Are you sulking?"
"..."
"Well, you can feel that way, since you came halfway through and didn't get to have any fun."
"Besides, Snape, you were caught with that mudblood's wand, the rookie 'fessor probably thinks you're the ringleader, and we're just bystanders."
"That's enough!"
Severus suddenly shouted and stormed off towards his dormitory room.
Mulciber was about to snarl at the uncharacteristic ferocity of the lowest ranking half-blood roommate, but was subdued by Avery's soothing words.
Severus didn't even look back as he reached his room and went straight to his bed.
He could hear Wilkins, the other pureblood who shared the room with them, chattering away with Mulciber and Avery.
"What the hell, did you get caught, when it's not even ten o'clock?"
"Yeah. We picked up a mudblood bitch and was just about to play with her, but got caught big, while trying to spook her with her wand. Bloody fucking luck."
Wilkins clicked his tongue. "That's why you gotta time your pranks right, or at least have Sevvy over there watch your back. And what the hell is Sluggy the Snail doing out on patrol this early anyway?"
"No, not Sluggy, the new Potions Professor."
Wilkins paused, blinked, then broke into a snicker. "Pfft. My condolences to your arse, he's got some strong arms."
"What do you know?"
"My little cousin got a taste of it at the end of the last term. The Flint kid got seven strokes from Sluggy, my cousin's got twelve from Peverell, and wow, he says he'd rather get thirty from Sluggy."
Avery and Mulciber let out a few forced chuckles out of bravado, but soon fell silent. Severus curled up in bed, listening to the sounds outside the curtains.
In his four years at Hogwarts, he had never he'd never once gotten to the point of receiving the "real detention," that is, corporal punishment.
He knew his place in Slytherin as a poor half-blood, and had managed to keep himself appropriately humble, but not overtly groveling. He didn't have the temperament to be a teacher's pet, currying favor with the professors, but he didn't skip homework or get into trouble in class. He'd had his run-ins with the Gryffindork gang, but they had such a notorious presence in the school that he had never been called to the detention office as a legitimate member of a brawl, being regarded as just another unlucky victim #3. Thus his past records were just a few instances of point deductions.
And so he went on for four years and became an upper-year. And tomorrow, that record will be broken.
For not being able to ignore that mudblood girl's voice. For not coming back to the dorm, paying no mind to what the fuck his pureblood roommates were doing and with whom.
No. It didn't matter, for all he cared.
Severus bit his lip. Professor Henry Peverell's cold green eyes. That was all he could think of.
If only he'd been caught by another professor. Of course he'd still have been handed over to him, the Deputy Head of Slytherin, and receive detention, but that was better. Better than for him to see yesterday's scene as it was.
Outside his bed, it was now time for the usual teenage bragging session, about how Avery hadn't been able to sit down for a couple of days after Slughorn's caning, and how, on Wilkins' part, the marks from his father's beating three years ago stung whenever it rained outside.
Severus snorted softly.
The one and only advantage of having a muggle father was that he'd not been spanked even at home. Tobias had reprimanded his son's misbehavior with appropriate beatings, as any men did in his neighborhood, when he was a little kid (Severus had little memory of that time), but he hadn't laid a hand on him since he first witnessed his son's accidental magic at the age of five.
When drunk, Tobias would lash out at him as well as his wife, unrelentingly, but with the last remnant of his reason, he never used violence, and usually avoided literally all contact, merely glaring at him with fear and disgust.
Severus reached out and gently stroked over his own buttocks.
He wondered how many lashes he would get. By a paddle, or a cane, perhaps?
He knew that from fifth year onward, the student was classified as an upper year, and that the senior tools of discipline were to be used, sized nothing like the thin switches or paddles that the professors usually carried in the classroom to install fear in first and second years' mind.
Fear. Frustration. Regret. Anxiety.
And above all, an inexplicable sense of mortification crept into his heart.
He tossed and turned, not sure when he fell asleep.
...
.
Severus sprinted down the hallway toward the Deputy Head's office.
Stupid, stupid, stupid!
He deserved to be called a dunderhead about three times as much as a Gryffindor.
8:15. It was already late.
This morning, since he hadn't stopped by their potions lab on the second floor last night, and as it wasn't Lily's shift this week, he had to check it out.
As soon as the ban was lifted at 7:30, he skipped breakfast and headed straight to the lab. There, he checked in on his long-term brewing potion, which was already on its fourth day, recorded its progress, added new ingredients, got excited, planned other experiments, and...
...So, there he was, his head in the world of potions, and lost touch with his sanity. For twenty minutes.
When he snapped out of it and cast a Tempus spell, the time was 8:05. Already well past the time for the Peverell's summons to the Deputy Head's office.
Severus felt faint, rushed out of the lab and headed straight for the Deputy Head's office, but he knew he was too late. He ran, panting for breath, but he was at least fifteen minutes late.
Stupid, moronic, idiot!
The code of corporal punishment at Hogwarts were very strict, and it was a serious crime to fail to report by a professor's designated disciplinary summon time. If you were a first year, the excuse of getting lost in school might get you off with a couple of extra strokes, but it certainly wouldn't work by the second year.
Two years ago, a Ravenclaw sixth-year, now a graduate, had been summoned by Professor Flitwick for blowing a huge, six-foot-diameter hole in the wall of the Ravenclaw library, in an attempt to combine the transfiguration and the explosion charm.
The student was late for his summons by nearly an hour, as he kept staring into the hole and studied his gigantic failure. In a truly Ravenclaw-esque series of misadventures, Flitwick got furious, and gave ten strokes of the cane to the boy for vandalizing the study and another ten strokes for being late for his summons, making him limping for a couple of days.
When Severus heard the rumors, he snickered with his housemates about how stupid the Ravenclaw was. Looking back, his lips quivered, not with laughter, but with trepidation.
Still, it's a lenient case if the professor let you get away with extra punishment only. If the professor decided that you were habitually tardy, or that you had willfully disobeyed the summon as a sign of defiance, you would be taken to the Headmaster's office to be reviewed by a formal disciplinary committee.
The Disciplinary Committee. The object of terror for every student.
At that stage, the mildest punishment was a caning in front of all the professors on the committee. More severe were suspension and expulsion.
8:19 AM. The door to the Deputy Head's office came into view at the end of the hallway.
Not surprisingly, there was no sign of Avery or Mulciber at the door. It eliminated the slim possibility that Professor Peverell had gone on some sort of errand, making them still waiting outside the office.
Severus's pace slowed slightly. He knew the strokes would be added for every minute he was late, but the thought of the fate that awaited him on the other side of that door made him weak on the knees.
When he reached the end of the hallway, he saw the office door slightly ajar. That meant there were students inside. Voices were heard, too.
With a hesitant hand, Severus pushed the door further open and stepped into the Deputy Head's office.
He saw a short, dark corridor in it, with a sliding door at one end.
"-Uhhhh!"
From beyond the door came the faint, but unmistakable sound of Mulciber, like the howl of a dying pig.
Severus felt his heart clench in his throat. He reached out a trembling hand and knocked.
"...Come in."
He knocked quietly, half-hoping he wouldn't be heard inside, but Peverell's ears were keen. Severus stepped into the disciplinary office, forcing his cramped steps.
In the center of the office was Mulciber, bent over an old desk, squirming, a faint sob low in his throat. Beside him, Professor Henry Peverell, stripped of his professor robes and clad in a shirt and thin vest, stood with a thick, black stick in one hand.
So, a cane. One of those dreaded senior canes, no less.
The professor glanced at Severus. "8:22. You're late, Mr. Snape."
"S...sorry, sir."
The professor pointed impassively to one side of the room with his cane.
"Stand there. Next to Avery, in the same position."
Severus looked around. In the corner of the professor's office, Avery stood motionless facing the wall, his hands clasped behind his head. With slow steps, he moved to his roommate's side.
The professor raised his cane again. Before looking at the wall, Severus glanced back in his direction.
Bent over the desk, Mulciber's trousers and underwear were down to the floor, his clothes hanging around his ankles. Even from this distance, he could see his mate wincing in pain.
.
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