[Songs of the Stormy Season]: Creatures of Pride, These Creatures series, PG-13, 2/3

[lomonaaeren]

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Part Two

“Mr. Potter, stay after class.”

Harry sighed a little, but shook his head when Michael gave him a concerned look. He wasn’t afraid of Snape. The man had had no choice but to give Harry good marks last year after Zacharias had started helping their group. And Harry was determined not to give Snape any cause to complain now.

“You may go, Mr. Corner.”

Michael winced and hurried out. Harry stood and waited as Snape paced towards him with his hands behind his back.

That isn’t the way he usually stands. Does he want to intimidate me? Well, it isn’t working.

“I want you to know ahead of time, Mr. Potter,” Snape breathed, “that I will not tolerate being shouted at by your harridan of a guardian.”

Harry spent a moment trying to figure out how Madam Marchbanks would feel about being called a “harridan.” Flattered, probably.

“All right, sir,” Harry said, when Snape made an impatient hiss and he realized this was the kind of statement that demanded an answer.

“That is all you care to say?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then you will tell your guardian I will not tolerate it?”

“Yes, sir.”

Snape waited, staring at him. Harry stared back, and wondered if this confrontation had gone differently in Snape’s mind.

“What will happen,” Snape asked, barely moving his lips, “if you tell her that and then I give you detention for what you consider unfair reasons, I wonder?”

“You’ll get shouted at. Sir.”

“I will not tolerate it!”

“Then don’t do anything that will make it happen.”

A dark, forbidding look settled on Snape’s face, but Harry refused to back down. Snape was either going to get respect or he was going to get obedience, but not both.

“You are the most spoiled child I have ever met,” Snape began, his words even, as if he had been waiting to speak them for a while.

Harry laughed, and the silence inside the classroom broke into what seemed to be glittering shards. Snape took a step back and then seemed to realize his mistake and narrowed his eyes, standing quite still.

“What was that for, Mr. Potter?”

“I assume you can read as well as anyone else, sir. You read the Daily Prophet, I hope? You know the way I grew up?”

“Whining about harmless tricks played by a Muggle boy—”

Harry’s stomach grew cold, and he didn’t hear the rest of Snape’s speech. He was too busy struggling against the temptation that Erik had warned him he would face, to cast the Entrail-Expelling Curse in a situation that wasn’t suited for it.

Harry managed to tamp down the temptation and tuned back in to Snape’s speech just as the professor said, “And I know that you are exaggerating and lying, and getting Smith to help you with your essays.”

“Sorry, sir, was that an accusation of cheating?” Harry asked, when Snape fell silent again and stared at him. “Because he just helps me. He doesn’t let me copy his work or anything like that.”

“I know he does!”

“Prove it,” Harry said, and met Snape’s eyes. “Sir.”

There was a moment when he thought Snape might start listing whatever proof he believed he had that Harry was copying Zarcharias’s work. Then Snape jerked his head oddly and whirled on his heel, robes flying behind him. “Get out,” he hissed.

Harry did.

*

“Are you going to tell Madam Marchbanks about him?”

Harry sighed a little, staring at the ceiling as he lay on his bed. He had told Michael about how Snape had acted because he’d asked, and because it would have been hard to hide from him, with how he knew Snape had demanded Harry stay after class.

And because he had learned one of Michael’s secrets this summer, about his father, and Harry understood the need to give a little in return, so Michael would feel he was trusted. It was one reason he had told Theo and no one else about the Invisibility Cloak last year.

“He hasn’t done anything as outrageous as trying to grab me or letting a troll into the school,” Harry said.

“But still.”

Harry eyed Michael. He was leaning forwards off the edge of his bed, and his eyes were both sharp and concerned in a way that Harry thought was curious. “You sound as though you think it’s important for me to get him punished.”

Michael winced. “Damn, you’re good.”

Harry waited.

“He’s accused me of cheating, too,” Michael admitted. “Off Zacharias. And letting you copy my work. He doesn’t seem to think it might be the other way around, which doesn’t make much sense to me, but, well. That’s Snape for you.”

It made sense to Harry. Snape hated him, to the point of completely discarding the Prophet stories about Harry growing up with abusive Muggles. He wouldn’t think Harry was smart enough for other people to want to copy his work.

“Theo said something about how Snape’s been this way for years. The Headmaster protects him.”

“Yeah, I heard that. Do you think that means Madam Marchbanks wouldn’t get him sacked?”

“I think it means that it wouldn’t be effective. And I don’t want to look like the kind of bratty child who runs to my guardian for everything, you know? It was her idea to go after Lockhart the way she did, and the troll and the three-headed dog last year were genuine dangers, but I don’t want to summon her for every little thing.”

“Would she come, though?”

“Oh, yeah. She’d enjoy it, too.”

Michael smiled a little, and then his smile spluttered out. “So what do you want to do? You can’t just let him do that.”

Harry looked at Michael, and Michael looked away. “I know that,” Harry said. “I don’t enjoy being scolded.”

“Sorry.”

Harry lay back down on his bed and closed his eyes. It had to be something that would punish Snape, and in such a way that he would know Harry was responsible, but which wasn’t just getting Madam Marchbanks involved. Something effective, which meant probably trying to get him sacked wouldn’t—

Something humiliating. Something related to the accusations he had flung at Harry and Michael and Zacharias.

Harry opened his eyes and smiled.

*

Punishment for Snape would take a long time and need to be subtle, so Harry of course worked on other things. One of them was getting a real Defense education.

Lockhart’s classes would have been a joke even if Madam Marchbanks hadn’t cowed him out of looking at Harry. He pranced around the classroom and “reenacted” his “daring” escapades from his books. He at least never chose Harry for them, and after the few times that Michael stood there woodenly when Lockhart wanted him to act, he left Michael alone, too. But he spent far too much time telling tales and fluffing up his hair.

So Harry and Theodore and Zacharias and Michael practiced on their own. Parvati, too. It wasn’t that Harry didn’t feel he could trust her, but he hadn’t thought she would want to practice the harder spells.

Parvati’s mouth when small and pinched when Harry told her that. “Because I’m a girl?” she demanded in a hiss, leaning forwards. They were in the library, and Madam Pince was always looking for an excuse to kick students out.

“No. Because I thought you weren’t a violent person, and some of these spells are going to be violent.”

Parvati blinked and settled back in her chair. “I want to learn,” she said. “I’m never going to make marks as good as Padma’s, but I want to study. To still prove that I’m smart.”

“Why won’t you make marks as good as your sister’s?”

“She’s more talented.”

Harry studied Parvati and thought of saying something else, but the line her mouth had settled in made it clear she wouldn’t welcome it. He nodded. He could remember wanting do as well in school as Dudley, before he had been old enough to understand that his cousin was rather stupid. Parvati and Padma might never be equal, but at least they could come closer.

“All right.”

Theo expressed some silent doubts about including Parvati, simply conveyed with the direction of his eyes and the shape of his mouth, but he shut up the first time she destroyed one of the targets Harry had set up against the wall of their dueling corridor.

*

Harry and Michael were coming back from the Great Hall with the rest of their House on Halloween when they came across a dead cat hanging from a torch sconce and a bloody message on a wall that made Harry stare.

THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS HAS BEEN OPENED. ENEMIES OF THE HEIR, BEWARE.

Harry turned to Michael to ask him what the message meant, but then someone started shouting. “You’ll be next, Mudbloods!”

It was Malfoy, the only Slytherin Harry spent any time thinking about regularly besides Theo and Snape. And that was because he was annoying. He looked highly pleased with himself as he stood at the front of the crowd and glared around as if daring anyone to challenge him.

“What’s a Mudblood?” Harry asked Michael softly.

Michael shook his head, hissing a warning that they’d talk about it later, but Malfoy had heard Harry and turned around. “Your dear departed mother was one, Potty,” he said as loudly as possible. “Sound familiar? Dirty blood! Dirty mother, dirty son!”

It was similar to some of the things the Dursleys had said to him at times. Harry felt his face chill, and Malfoy abruptly fell silent and backed away from him, his eyes as wide as if he had surprised a Runespoor in his bed.

“Harry!”

Michael tugged at his arm, and Harry tucked his expression away.

It turned out to be a good thing he did. Snape came striding along the corridor, and he stopped in front of Harry, looking back and forth between him and Malfoy. “What is happening here?” he demanded in a low voice.

“Potty got upset when I spoke the truth, sir,” Malfoy said quickly.

“He called my mother a Mudblood,” Harry said, looking at Snape. “And claimed my blood was dirty. I just wondered if that was common here?”

For some reason, Snape turned pale. Harry narrowed his eyes. He didn’t have the impression that it had much to do with him or Malfoy. Something else, he thought, something private. But he didn’t know what.

“I’m sure Mr. Malfoy didn’t mean that the way it sounded,” Snape said, and turned away. “Now, what has been happening here?”

A babble of voices tried to tell Snape, along with Dumbledore and Lockhart and Professor McGonagall when they showed up. Harry fell to the back of the crowd with Michael, who looked resigned to having to explain what “Mudblood” meant now.

“It’s a word for Muggleborns,” Michael murmured. “A really nasty one. Basically saying that they have dirty blood, instead of other wizards and witches having pure blood. Clean blood, you know?”

Harry did know. He could envision the Dursleys saying it all too easily. Aunt Marge had said much the same thing several times when she’d visited, claiming that a bad bitch would produce a bad pup.

It meant something different, now that Harry knew his mum had died for him.

He looked back at the dead cat and the bloody message. He didn’t know if that meant anything yet, really, but Malfoy’s words sure did.

And Harry had another person he would have to protect himself against.

*

Harry glanced around. He had decided that he would find a place completely away from the library and the dungeon corridor where he and his friends practiced spells in order to look up for what he needed for his punishment of Snape. This looked like it should do, honestly. It was an alcove not far from a girl’s bathroom, but Harry had watched for a few days and seen that no girls used the bathroom.

He wasn’t sure why. It wasn’t like the bathroom didn’t work or was flooded all the time like the one where they’d found the cat and the Heir of Slytherin’s message.

Harry walked into the small alcove and cast a few spells that would muffle the sounds he made, and a few more that would alert him of people’s approach. He’d mastered those over the summer, with Erik’s help. Then he sat down and spread out the books on Potions he’d picked up.

He had to learn as much as he could about the recent history of Potions, or what he was planning wouldn’t work.

Harry lost himself so much in reading, frowning, and making notes that he jumped when someone spoke to him. Well, and then he whipped himself to his feet and aimed his wand, his pulse thundering as he tried to grasp why his charms to warn him of someone approaching had failed.

“Oh! You’re Harry Potter.”

Harry stared at the slight, transparent figure hovering in front of him. He hadn’t met many of the castle’s ghosts, but there could be no mistaking this one. She was the ghost form of Hermione Granger, the girl who had been killed by the troll last year.

He swallowed and lowered his wand. “Yes. I, er, we spoke once before your death.”

Granger’s face fell. “I remember. You didn’t want to study together. No one wanted to study with me.”

She stared at the wall for a moment. Harry watched her warily. It made sense that no one wanted to use the bathroom now, of course, if it was where Granger had died. Since Harry wasn’t usually on the third floor except for classes and wasn’t a girl, he hadn’t known where it had been.

“Are you—are you bound to haunt your bathroom?” he asked.

Granger blinked at him, then shook her head and gave a snort that sounded like she was a living person. “No. I can go wherever I want in the castle. But not outside that. I don’t know what my parents think happened,” she whispered suddenly, her eyes distant. “There’s not enough magic outside of Hogwarts for me to travel all the distance back home or manifest there to find out.”

Harry just watched her. He didn’t know what Granger’s parents thought, either, or if they had even been told the truth about what happened. If they were Muggles and Dumbledore thought their knowing could endanger Hogwarts, maybe not.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m not sure I should tell you,” Harry said, and rolled his eyes when Granger’s face crumpled. He didn’t even know ghosts could do that. “Come on, it’s not because I hate you or something. It’s because you could still tell someone, and I don’t want anyone to know.”

Granger looked a little happier. Harry supposed it was because he had included her among other people. “Can I at least help you with it? You don’t have to tell me the whole thing that way.”

Harry ended up slowly nodding. He couldn’t see much harm that would come from that, actually, and there was more material here than he could ever read by himself, while still keeping up with his schoolwork. Both Madam Marchbanks and his ability to lie to his Housemates meant he had to do that. “Can you—I know you can’t write anything down.”

“No, but there’s a charm to turn the pages of books! You could cast it for me, and I can remember what I read! My memory is much better now that I don’t have other things distracting me anymore.”

Harry swallowed. He found himself regretting Granger’s death. Not because he’d had anything to do with it—he hadn’t—but because he could see glimpses of what she might have become if she’d lived, and she might have been one of his friends.

There was no changing the past, though. Only the future.

“Sure. What’s the charm?”

Now Granger looked almost insanely happy as she waved her hand through the air to shove him the wand movements. Harry repeated them carefully.

He would give her a purpose, and maybe that would make her happy. He still wouldn’t entrust her with the whole of Snape’s punishment, though, because he didn’t fully trust anyone.

It was nothing personal.

*

“I heard something interesting.”

Harry raised his eyebrows at Theo. They were practicing spells in the corridor by themselves. Sometimes they liked to come here alone, because Parvati and even Michael would probably object to some of the spells Theo wanted to learn and Harry had no objection to learning. “What is it?”

“Malfoy is afraid of snakes.”

Harry smiled. “Is that so?”

“He might be afraid of you, smiling like that.”

“Not long enough to leave a lasting impression,” Harry said. “Do you know how he reacts to the painted or carved ones you said are all over the Slytherin common room?”

“He avoided looking directly at them for the first week that I remember.” Theo shook his right hand out, shedding the charm Harry had cast at him that made all the bones feel like they were breaking. Harry didn’t have it strong enough to cause much more damage than a Stinging Hex at the moment. “But he seems fine with them since then.”

“So it’ll have to be a live one. Not hard to obtain. How did you learn that he was afraid?”

“Blaise was showing me a spell that he said conjured a snake. Malfoy started shrieking before Blaise could cast it.”

“And the spell?”

“Serpensortia.”

Harry smiled more widely. Perfect.

*

It wasn’t actually that hard to catch Malfoy alone, for all that he had the reputation of going around with Crabbe and Goyle always following him everywhere. They stayed late at meals most of the time, and Malfoy would saunter through the corridors, secure in his pure blood and his Slytherin status, believing nothing would ever harm him.

It was a feeling Harry couldn’t remember experiencing. Most of the time, he took no particular pleasure in making other people feel as wary as he did. His main goal was to make them leave him alone.

But now he would get to make Malfoy feel a touch of it in the service of making Malfoy shut up about the word Mudblood.

He followed Malfoy under his Invisibility Cloak—he didn’t use it that often, but it was perfect for short-term use like this—down a dungeon corridor after lunch on a Saturday near the end of November. Malfoy was strutting as usual, muttering something about Mudbloods under his breath.

Harry couldn’t have asked for a better setup.

“Serpensortia,” he whispered, and smiled down at the black snake with bandings of gold the spell had conjured. “Go and scare that one,” he said, tilting his head at Malfoy.

Harry had asked Theo whether anyone could command the snakes from the spell, Theo had asked what he meant, and Harry had revealed, inadvertently, that he could speak to snakes. Theo’s round eyes and subsequent, careful explanation of Parseltongue meant that Harry didn’t intend to reveal this talent to many other people if he could help it.

He was learning the Memory Charm. Just in case Theo decided that telling someone else was wise at some point.

The snake slid after Malfoy, its scales creating a slight rasping noise on the stone. Malfoy turned around, saw it, and screamed aloud, falling on his arse.

Harry cast a spell Granger had looked up for him that would make his voice thin and eerie, rather like a ghost’s, and called from beneath the Cloak, “Do you want it to bite you, Malfoy?”

“Who’s there?”

“Someone who doesn’t like you using the term Mudbloods. Do you want it to bite you? Do you want to die in pain?”

The snake reared up in front of Malfoy, showing its fangs, but true to Harry’s command, didn’t bite, only scared him. Malfoy shrieked, flinging a hand across his face.

As if that ever helps.

“You haven’t answered my question, Draco.”

“No! No, please! I don’t want it to bite me!”

“Then are you ever going to say the term Mudbloods again? Ever going to call a Muggleborn that?”

“I—you want me to stop calling them that?”

“Oh, of course,” Harry said, his voice bouncing from corner to corner of the corridor. Malfoy was staring wildly around. “Unless you want to die in pain. Then that can be arranged.” The snake hissed, right on cue.

“All—all right. I’ll stop calling them that! I’ll stop! Promise!” Malfoy’s voice went up in a hysterical shriek as the snake lunged, even though it was still obeying Harry and the lunge didn’t come anywhere near the little bastard.

“Good,” Harry said. “Remember that I’ll be watching, and if you break your promise…”

“I won’t break it! I promise!”

Malfoy’s eyes were wide, darting everywhere. Harry nodded, although Malfoy couldn’t see him, and cast “Finite Incantatem” in as low a whisper as possible, which made the snake vanish.

Then he turned and left the dungeons. He had a feeling that Malfoy would probably go for Snape as soon as possible, and Harry was going to be safely tucked back in Ravenclaw Tower by then.

*

“I take it that’s not what you wanted to happen.”

Harry winced and sighed a little as he heard the people at the nearest table chattering about the Heir of Slytherin and how he or she or it or they had set a snake on Malfoy. “No,” he admitted. “Neither that nor the Petrification of Finch-Fletchley yesterday.”

“You wrote to your guardian, I take it?”

Harry looked at Zacharias out of the corner of his eye. “You just enjoy seeing Madam Marchbanks yelling at people.”

Zacharias smiled at him. “My grandmother is an angel and would never be so crass. I enjoy my crassness where I can get it.”

“Yeah, your grandmother’s an angel with a flaming sword,” Harry muttered, which made Zacharias smile more widely. He looked at Parvati, who asked him about the Heir of Slytherin. “I didn’t mean to stir up the rumors,” he said. “I just wanted him to leave me alone.”

“If that was the case, why did you ask him to stop saying that word? It applies to more people than just you.” Parvati was watching him intently, tapping her nails on the table, a sign that she was thinking.

“Stop looking for some sign of compassion,” Harry said, and Parvati sat back a little. “I couldn’t tell him to stop using the word to me without revealing my identity, of course. That’s the only reason I told him to stop using it in general.”

“Of course.”

“I mean it, Parvati. Stop looking for compassion.”

“It’s all right, Harry,” Michael said consolingly. “It happens to the best of us.”

Harry glared at him, but said nothing of the many things he was thinking, because it was true that they would drive his friends away, and—

It turned out that he enjoyed having friends who could and would joke with him.

*

“WHERE IS THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS?”

Harry jumped despite himself when Madam Marchbanks strode into the Great Hall. She hadn’t told him she was coming, this time, although she had sent a letter saying that she was looking into the myth of the Chamber of Secrets. She wanted to be sure who was responsible before she came to Hogwarts.

Apparently, she was placing the blame on the Heir of Slytherin. Harry had to agree with her. It wasn’t the fault of Muggleborns or Malfoy, as much as Harry would have enjoyed the idea that it was him.

Madam Marchbanks came to a halt in front of the head table, her hearing charms shimmering around her ears, and glared at all the professors impartially. Lockhart went dead white as he met her eyes.

“Don’t worry,” Madam Marchbanks said with something between a snort and a growl. “Know you don’t know where it is, you prancing fraud.”

“Madam, I will have you know that I conquered the most dangerous werewolf the country of Romania has ever seen with only one twitch of my wand!”

“Yeah, to Apparate.”

More than one person giggled or snorted at that. Harry saw Dumbledore sitting back, apparently keeping well out of it.

Well, if he’s going to abandon Lockhart to his fate, maybe he shouldn’t have hired him in the first place.

“There have been several incidents involving the Heir of Slytherin,” Dumbledore said, probably to make Madam Marchbanks focus on him instead. “Someone set a snake on young Mr. Malfoy, and there have now been one young Muggleborn and one cat Petrified.”

Madam Marchbanks narrowed her eyes. She was facing away from Harry, but he still knew she did it, because it was what she would do. “And what are you doing to wake the Muggleborn up, Albus?”

“The cat as well, my dear Griselda.”

“What use would it be as a witness?”

“No wonder you’re the way you are,” Michael whispered to Harry.

Harry smiled at him. “Thank you.”

Michael rolled his eyes.

“We are brewing a Mandrake Draught to restore them,” Dumbledore continued. “But it will not be ready for months. The mandrakes need to reach—”

“Go buy fresh ones! Did your brain wither up along with your bollocks, Albus?”

Dumbledore went bright red, and another wave of laughter swept the Great Hall. With some dignity—difficult to do—the Headmaster stood, sighing. “If you will come with me, Griselda, I will explain some of the problems with doing that.”

“I have the Galleons if you don’t.”

“There are other matters…”

Madam Marchbanks nodded at Harry before she followed Dumbledore out of the Great Hall. Harry settled back with a thin smile. He didn’t think this would solve the problem of the Petrifications overnight, but things were looking up.