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Act II - The Warlock of Hogwarts
Chapter 15 - Training
"Pathetic, Potter!" sneered Snape. "If that's all you can do, you might as well give up."
He was back to Snape's quarters, continuing with the training regimen. Snape had still not progressed to teaching him any spells, content to keep firing the projectile jinx over and over hundreds of times, while the targets kept zooming around him, taking note of the number and accuracy of successful hits. So far, he had been unable to hit the bullseye even once. A fact that was making him angrier by the minute as he kept throwing one spell after another. And naturally, the man's caustic commentary wasn't helping.
"I don't know what the Headmaster was thinking! It's clear you're still a boy. Maybe you're better off chasing skirts, leaving the actual work for others."
Harry barely concealed his scowl and glared at the potions professor. "I've been throwing spells for an hour straight. You haven't even given me a minute to rest."
"The Dark Lord isn't resting!" Snape snapped, walking up to him. "You can thank your lucky stars that the Dark Lord is occupied elsewhere, or else, you'd have been dead right now. Now stop your ridiculous excuses and keep casting!"
A sparkle of pure hate formed in Harry's eyes and he kept throwing more hits. The targets glowed green and blue and pink but he had yet to see a red β a dead center hit. Blasted things were moving faster than he could aim at them, and even though he did strike them, it was from a perfect shot.
"Weak, Boy! Weak!"
Harry was beginning to see why Snape had been so willing to be his trainer. After all these years of belittling him in potions, he had finally gotten a chance to belittle him in his strongest subject β DADA.
"Well? What are you waiting for? An invitation? If you are only going to wave that wand around instead of actually hitting targets, I'd rather know it now before I waste my time teaching you anything."
Fuck him. Harry scowled. He wants spells. I'll give him spells.
He stopped moving, stopping looking at anything but his targets. The projectile hex had average speed as far as spells went, but like all magics, could be altered by the willpower and magical capacity of the caster. If he couldn't keep up with the target's motions, he'd increase the speed of his projectiles. If he couldn't beat it through quality, he was going to overwhelm the targets with sheer quantity.
Waddiwasi.
After the hundreds of times he had cast the spell, he no longer needed to say the name aloud. The wand movement was only a single flick in a forty-five degree angle, aimed at the target. Snape's words were only a distraction that would make him angry, and being angry made him reckless. He'd need to ignore him. He'd need to focus.
He'd need to turn his anger into focus.
Lowering his body into a fighting stance, Harry kept shooting one spell after another, barely giving himself a split second to see where the spell hit while casting the second spell. Then the third. Then the fourth. And on and on.
Green. Green. Blue. Pink. Green. Blue. Blue. Greenβ
"How did it feel, Potter, standing all alone in the graveyard? Did you wish you had a parent to die for you?"
Harry heard the words Snape was saying, and it only got him angrier and angrier. His magic surged through him, and a coldness began to spread through him. One that took the flames of rage burning within and turning them into a blizzard of pure hate. He could feel his wand singing as he pushed more and more magic out of him.
Green. Blue. Pink. PInk. Blue. Green. Pinkβ
His magic wanted out. It wanted to hurt someone and wanted it badly. He remembered the helplessness he felt in the cemetery and how the Dark Lord had played with him. How he had tried to cast the killing curse.
"The Dark Lord will torture your loved ones, and he'll do it in front of youβ"
Pink. Blue. Blue. Pink. Pink. Pinkβ
"Maybe the mutt will be next. Perhaps He'll torture Greengrass before your very eyes."
No! Harry gnashed his teeth. He wouldn't be letting anyone die for him next. He had already lost his parents. He had finally gotten what he had always wanted. A life for himself. Family. People to love. People who loved him. Voldemort was not going to take it away. Voldemort was not going to take it awayβ
Pink. Pink. Blue. Pink. Blue. Pink. Redβ
The moment his spell hit the red portion, both targets shone a bright white and stopped moving.
"Enough!" said Snape, walking up to him, yawning. "It's about time. I was almost about to slow down the targets just to see if you were capable of hitting it right. Perhaps you are capable of something apart from cashing in on his fame. Though I suspect it was most likely a fluke."
Harry gritted his teeth, but Snape silenced him with a hand. "Settle yourself, Potter. That was just the basic test and your performance has been a hair shy of horrible. Your aim is basic and your power is variable. You need to work on your consistency. I'd suggest using that gold you have in your account to acquire a pair of these and get them installed in that private room of yours. As always, the Headmaster leaves no stone unturned to play favorites."
Harry was still mad, but he had grown weary. He was still calming down from the fury, but the words made sense to him.
"Where can I buy this stuff?"
"... I have some sources," Snape said after a moment. "It is illegal to commercially sell these items, or acquire them without an Auror license."
Did Snape just profess to acquiring contraband? Would surprises ever cease?
"I'll⦠pay the gold."
Snape nodded curtly. "I've been told that Black has been working on developing your physical and magical reserves. Is that right?"
"...Yes," Harry panted.
"You will work on your casting speed and accuracy in your room every night from now on. I will be testing your performance every two weeks. If you can keep hitting at least five reds in a throw of ten, I might even leave you alone about being so pathetically weak. I might even call you Acceptable. I take it Black has been working on your spell selection? "
Harry nodded. "He told me to go for a balance. To use weak spells that can surprise the enemy so that I wouldn't deplete my reserves, and a limited number of strong spells to strike hard and fast."
Snape snorted. "How precious! Fifty years since Grindelwald's defeat, yet the DMLE insists on the same tripe. No wonder the Dark Lord nearly won the first time around."
Harry scowled. He did not like the insinuation Snape put in. Sirius had taught him how most magicals tended to ignore the possibilities of physical strength, choosing to work on their magical prowess instead. It didn't help that those with physical strengths fell under the Dark Creature category like werewolves, giants and trolls. That was why apart from Aurors, Hit-wizards and Quidditch players, barely anyone focussed on their physical development. Sirius had taught him that magic could be used to amplify one's physical strength, and on the other hand, could drain it upon exhaustion. It was why most people became physically weak after casting a lot of spells. That was the main reason why he had asked Harry to go for weaker, useful spells instead of fancier, stronger ones.
"Yes!" He sneered. "That same tripe that got Sirius his track record."
Snape's eyes glinted with something ugly. "Track record indeed. Landed him in Azkaban for twelve years. I wonder if your swine father used that before the Dark Lord put him down like a dog."
Harry saw red. Before Snape knew it, he had a wand right between his eyes. "Say that again?" Harry hissed. "Because I'm quite sure I can show you exactly what my godfather taught me. I don't know what I was expecting. I thought I'd learn something from you to fight against Voldemort" β he ignored Snape's hiss of pain, "βbut if all you're gonna do is belittle my godfather and my father's memory then I'm better off learning by myself."
Fuming, Harry turned and made his way to the door.
"Potter!"
Something about Snape's voice made him stop. There was no rage in his voice despite the fact that Harry had all but attacked him. When Harry looked back, he saw Snape's eyes drilling into him,like hard chunks of ice. He tried to rekindle the anger that had burned just moments earlier, but failed before those eyes.
"Weak spells and variety work against the common criminal, not a Death Eater force. And yes, force. Death Eaters did not strike singularly. They moved as a single machine, achieved their goals and got out. It is why a small force of the Dark Lord's Elite struck terror in the hearts of Wizarding Britain for the better part of two decades."
Harry thought back to the Quidditch World Cup and then back to the cemetery. For some reason, he was unable to meet Snape's eyes.
"Granted, several among them are dead, thanks to that fluke that happened recently. Unless you can safely perform that fluke over and over, you will not survive. And even if you do, I wouldn't bet on it too much. Do you know why?"
"Because I'm weak?"
Snape shook his head. "Because you lack control. Over the past four years, I have observed you. Every single time we have exchanged conversation, I have driven you to your emotional limits. Every single time, I have succeeded in kindling rage within your eyes, even with the most casual of statements. You may be lucky, or powerful, or both. But you lack mental discipline. And that is your greatest folly."
His words hit him like blasting curses. Harry tried to reach down memory lane, grasping at memory after memory, trying to think of some incident, something to prove him wrong. Dumbledore had told him right off the bat that Snape was one of the professors protecting the stone, and his words had been proved right by Voldemort himself. And yet, despite knowing that Snape was intentionally antagonistic to him, Harry never tried to get past it, happy to drop Snape in the 'enemy' category.
"Death Eaters taunt their victims. With your emotional turbulence, you wouldn't last ten seconds before them. You know how important this training is, and despite that, you were willing to let this opportunity go. Why? Because I said something about a dead man? The dead are dead, so let them be. Stop taking things personally and focus. Even should you feel rage, turn it into focus."
After a long pause, Harry asked. "How⦠how can I improve?"
Snape's expression changed into something that was almost but not quite a smile. "There is a magical discipline, known as Occlumency. Are you familiar with it?"
Harry slowly nodded. He had gotten a barebones explanation of it from Fleur. As it turns out, there was an entirely different cluster of magical disciplines that dealt with the mind and perception. Enthrallment was an extreme and offensive application of the mind art known as Legilimency. Another art, known as Occlumency, could be used to develop magical barriers within the mind against external intrusion. That said, Fleur told him that his Death magic was more than enough to counter any external penetration. At least, anything that was not above the power of a Veela's enthrallment.
"It's used to prevent Legilimency attacks."
Snape frowned. "And do you know what a Legilimency attack is?"
Harry pursed his lip, wondering how much to reveal. "Um, not very much. But Sirius told me that the Imperius is based on it. And I have experience resisting that. And enthrallment. I can completely resist it."
Snape narrowed his eyes for a moment before the light of recognition hit him. "I see. Theβ¦. Miss Delacour. That explains a lot of things. Very well. Tell me, Potter. Do you think you have in you to try putting up a resistance against my Legilimency?
Harry cocked his head. "I can try."
"Are you certain? Unlike Miss Delacour, I will not be considerate of your feelings. A sudden Legilimency intrusion could be⦠damaging to the mind."
Harry almost snorted at the idea. Snape being considerate? That would be something.
He nodded.
The man tilted his head to one side and looked Harry in the eyes. Harry felt him scrutinize him, dissect him with his eyes as he searched through him. Then he acted.
"LEGILIMENS!"
It came without warning. No tells whatsoever. So fast that Harry wasn't sure if it was even happening. In less than a fraction of a second, a psychic lance of pure power came hurling before Harry could even realize what was happening.
He didn't look away, or instinctively try to dodge. Hell, he didn't even try to grab his wand. He didn't need to. Not for this.
It was incinerated the moment it touched his mind.
"What⦠what was that, Potter?" Snape asked, flummoxed. "That was not Occlumency, I think."
Harry shook his head. "That is my Family Magic. I have tested it against Flβ Professor Delacour's enthrallment, and now against you. So far, I'm not disappointed."
"I'll admit it's formidable," Snape muttered, "However, the fruits of Occlumency lie beyond protecting from such intrusions. To begin with, it will aid you in sharpening your recall abilities. There are many that have taken that to the point of developing Perfect Recall, or as the muggles call it, Eidetic Memory. But more than that, Occlumency can aid one to master one's emotions, suppress it, heighten it and, I don't advocate this, ignore it. In time, a master Occlumens is able to amplify his perception and thinking capabilities to exponential levels. It is what separates the rest of us witches and wizards from people like Albus Dumbledore and the Dark Lord."
Harry frowned. If McGonagall's theory was right, then he was able to perform almost any magic that focussed on altering his body instead of the outside. Occlumency definitely seemed to fit within that box. Legilimency on the other hand, was something he should stay away from. It'd be a nightmare if he ended up pushing a little 'Death' into a person's mind while intruding for information.
"And⦠How can I learn this Occlumency?"
Snape looked away. "Ordinarily, it is possible to develop a rudimentary form of mental defense upon exposure to Legilimency attacks, much like the one I just attempted upon you. Obviously, this should only be attempted between people that have a certain level of trust between them, because the caster would gain access to the victim's mind and memories."
"Well, that's obviously not happeningβ" Harry began.
"... Yes, which does present a problem. There have been instances in history of witches and wizards developing Occlumency through the classic techniques of meditation, but it is too time-consuming to be of any effective use. Even if you're lucky, it would take several years, if not decades."
Harry suppressed the urge to whistle. Years? Decades? With Voldemort around, he couldn't guarantee if he'd be alive by the next six months.
"No shortcuts and all?"
Snape looked conflicted. "There is an alternative. Granted, it's rather risky. I'd never recommend it to anyone, but given your specific condition, I shall have to consult the Headmaster on this."
Harry nodded. That was more than anything he had ever expected.
"Until then, you will have to learn to recognize the hard way when someone is trying to manipulate your emotions. While your family magic seems protective enough to magical manipulation, you crumble when you hear something you don't like. The way you dealt with Draco Malfoy and Professor Umbridge shows promise, but it is clear you have miles to go."
Harry inwardly grinned. He had heard how Dumbledore had suspended Draco for two weeks, despite Lucius Malfoy's thinly veiled threats. Apparently, Dumbledore had even brought in the Minister, and used the situation to demonstrate how Umbridge might be failing to keep up to 'Hogwarts standards'. Regardless of their blood status or mental capabilities, no other teacher had failed at stopping one student from cursing another in open class. Minister Fudge, in an attempt to save face, had put Umbridge on temporary probation, which meant that one more event like that would ensure she'd be removed and someone else installed in her place.
In Daphne's words, it was a scheme worthy of a Slytherin. Even though it did cost her her private dinner. You gain some, you lose some β and all that.
"That's all for today. You may leave." Snape ended abruptly, as usual.
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