Chapter Thirteen of 'Winged Victory'- From Unexpected Quarters

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Chapter Thirteen—From Unexpected Quarters

“I hate her.”

Theo adjusts himself in his pants as he listens to the dark passion in Harry’s voice. Harry is pacing around the classroom where they meet on a regular basis, his hands clenched in front of him. There’s a slight, metallic shimmer in the air around him that Theo thinks is his magic manifesting outside his control.

He’s such a vision.

“I know,” Theo says, called reluctantly back to the present as Harry pivots on one heel and stares at him. “But you know that we can’t just break into her office and take the Veritaserum. She’d only get more.”

“I’d like to break her head.”

Theo shivers. “It’s a good choice,” he says softly as Harry looks at him again. “Breaking a limb can be easily healed, of course. Even a broken spine or neck can, most of the time, as long as the person isn’t left for hours without a Healer. But a skull? I know Muggles can spend years in comas because of broken skulls. So can witches.”

Harry smiles at him. His eyes burn, and he takes a step towards Theo. Theo opens his arms to receive him.

Someone knocks on the door of their classroom.

Theo stifles a groan under his breath. But he knows that it must be important. Blaise, Luna, and Neville are the only other people who know where Theo and Harry meet on a regular basis, and both Blaise and Neville would disturb them because of serious news and nothing else.

Luna might disturb them for something else, but she would have wandered straight in without bothering to knock.

Theo casts a charm to deflate his erection, hissing a little in pain, and Harry smirks at him as he turns towards the door. “Yes?” he calls.

Neville steps inside, swallowing a little when he sees them. “I—I hope that I’m not interrupting anything,” he says, and although he doesn’t stutter every word, Theo can hear the sound of it around the edges of his voice.

“Of course not.” Theo smiles at him and watches Neville’s shoulders straighten with confidence. After a summer spent together, Theo knows exactly how to handle Neville. It’s a pity that the tactics don’t work as well on Harry’s other Gryffindor friends.

“Only my gran sent me a book, and—”

“Did you check it for curses?” Harry asks, surging forwards a step before he stops. He stares at Neville in concern. “Given what happened the last time you talked to her…”

“I know.” Neville gives Harry a smile that’s less complicated than the ones he tends to aim at Theo, which is all right with Theo. It’s right that Harry and Neville should have an easy friendship, especially since they’re in the same House. “But I did check it, and it doesn’t have anything like that on it. I think she sent it to me because she’s hoping to lure me back home.”

“Why? What’s the book about?”

Neville turns to Theo and takes the thick tome out of his shoulder bag. Theo squints. Yeah, it does look as though Neville would find interesting. The History of Cultivating Magical Plants: From Aconite to Zebra’s Magic.

“What did you find in it?” Harry asks.

“It was a passing mention, but I remembered what you said in the Prophet about the snake who was with You-Know-Who at the graveyard.” Neville takes a deep breath and sits down in the middle of the couch beside Theo, who is especially glad that he learned the charm to deflate his erection. “And one of the plants mentioned can make a potion that cures the venom of any snake.”

Theo raises his eyebrows. That would be useful when they face Voldemort again.

Or if they face another basilisk, although Theo intends to ensure that never happens, even if he has to tie Harry up and sit on him to keep him from running back into the Chamber of Secrets.

“Thanks, Neville!” Harry comes over to sit on the other side of Theo, leaning over so that he can see the page Neville is pointing to. “Can we borrow the book when you’re done with it?”

Neville abruptly looks nervous, enough that Theo considers reaching for his wand. But he just takes a scroll from his robe pocket and holds it shyly out. “I made a copy of everything the book says about the plant.”

Theo smiles and takes the scroll, then hands it to Harry. Harry promptly starts chattering to Neville about finding a place they can try to grow the plant, or whether Neville is familiar with any place it already grows, so that they can start harvesting it.

Theo leans back and watches his lover with half-lidded eyes. Harry flushes a little, showing that he’s aware of the gaze, but all he does is reach out and lay a seemingly casual hand on Theo’s knee.

That’s all right with Theo. He entwines his fingers with Harry’s and lets himself drift, secure in the company of Gryffindors as he could never be around Slytherins.

*

“There is a reason, I am sure, that you are remaining after class, Mr. Nott.”

“Yes, sir. I’d like the answer to a question.”

Snape turns to face Theo fully, his robes falling around him in soft waves, his eyes locked on Theo’s face. Theo ducks his head a little in what Snape can take as respect if he wants, but simply allows Theo to avoid any Legilimency the man is trying to use.

“What question is that, Mr. Nott?”

“Did you provide Umbridge with the Veritaserum that she’s using?”

Harry thought that asking Snape the question was a stupid idea. He told Theo that Snape wouldn’t give anything away one way or the other, or would just give a sarcastic answer that would confuse matters further. And, Harry argued, it didn’t matter much where Umbridge got the Veritaserum in the first place; it only matters that she tried to use it.

But Theo has something specific that he wants to look for, and he doesn’t think Snape will hide it from him the way he would have in front of Harry or another Gryffindor asking him the same question.

Snape grows even more still, his nostrils flaring for a second. Then he says, “Do not ask stupid questions, Mr. Nott.”

“I ask sincere ones. Sir.”

“Then you should know how many politics are at play, and how not even the Headmaster could prevent the Ministry from appointing Umbridge as a professor.”

“No,” Theo says softly. “He couldn’t.”

“Leave, Mr. Nott.”

Theo does, slipping out of the classroom and walking calmly towards Arithmancy, which he doesn’t share with Harry. Blaise gives him a concerned glance when Theo slips in, almost late, enough to make Vector look at him sternly. Theo ducks his head to their professor with a murmured apology and waits until they’re working on their individual equations to update Blaise on what Snape said.

“Snape told me that there were politics at play, and not even Dumbledore could stop Fudge from appointing Umbridge.”

“All right? That just sounds like confirmation of what you already knew.”

“But my asking the question does two things. First, it does give him knowledge of the Veritaserum if he didn’t know about it before. The professors will know Umbridge is using it, and it’ll be interesting to see if they do anything in response.”

“Fancy you thinking that they would,” Blaise murmurs, although he lowers his voice as Vector paces past their desks and pauses to help Ernie Macmillan with his equation. Honestly, Theo has no idea how a pompous arse like Macmillan even lasted this long in Arithmancy.

“I’d still like to see.”

“And the second thing the question does?”

“It allows Snape to suggest to me that Umbridge having Veritaserum or using the Blood Quill or assigning detentions or anything else like that ultimately doesn’t matter, because the professors will feel that their hands are tied by politics and not help.”

“Do you think he meant to suggest that to you?”

“Oh, not in a helpful way. He thinks that I’m hopeless for dating a Potter. But it does give a warning that we shouldn’t count on Dumbledore or McGonagall or the like to come sweeping in any time soon.”

“Then what’s the point of letting them know about Veritaserum? Why are you waiting to see if they act if you know they won’t act?”

“There’s a particular secret that both Harry and I are carrying which Dumbledore wants to keep protected. My mentioning Veritaserum suggests that Umbridge tried to use it on me or Harry, since Snape would know that Umbridge hasn’t assigned you or Neville or Luna detention and I don’t give much of a shit about anyone else. I want to see if this does change the way Dumbledore acts, even if it’s just the vanishing of Veritaserum from Umbridge’s office.”

“If he acts in a way that you can’t detect?”

“I think he would summon Harry to patronize him about how much we owe the all-wise Headmaster.”

Blaise laughs, and Vector turns around and frowns again. Blaise and Theo obediently bend over their parchment.

Theo does find Arithmancy academically interesting, if nothing else. It’s more than can be said for a lot of his classes now that he has a boyfriend to protect, Horcruxes to destroy, and a Dark Lord to fight.

*

Dumbledore does nothing.

Harry catches Theo’s eye over lunch the next day and shakes his head. So no warnings or secret visits or “unexpected” meetings in the corridors that Dumbledore might have managed to engineer with Harry when Theo wasn’t around.

There are no cryptic warnings, either, and none of the Heads of House say anything, from what Luna says and the casual questions that Theo manages to ask Ernie Macmillan, who will talk about anything because he thinks people are in breathless need of his wisdom.

It’s not—disappointing, exactly. Theo expected this. But it would have been easier to fight Umbridge’s Veritaserum if one adult stood behind them, or just warned their students that being targeted with a truth potion was a possibility.

Well, they tried, and nothing came of it. Theo puts the lost chance out of his mind, and launches into working on their next plan.

Disabling Umbridge in such a way that it’ll look like an accident, not only to their paranoid Minister, but to the Headmaster and Snape. It doesn’t matter that much if they really believe it is. The point is to make sure that they have no evidence to accuse Theo and Harry of anything.

*

“I suppose, if we can’t locate Horcruxes yet, we can at least think about things that he might have turned into one.”

“His diary. So objects that are important to him.”

“But we don’t know much about those. His wand?”

Theo snorts. “We were close to his wand in the graveyard. I think that, no matter what, we would have felt the miasma that that sort of thing puts out.”

“Miasma? I was around the diary a little in my second year, and I don’t remember it stinking or anything like that.”

Theo has to pause and reconsider. It does seem as if they might have to choose a different tactic if Harry can’t recognize the drape of Dark magic that Theo was taught to. “It’s—a sense of power. Danger. I only call it a miasma because that’s a name I’ve read in books. You can sense that an object is aware of you, that it wants to be used.”

“Yes. All right. I know what you mean with the diary.” Harry’s voice is subdued. “It was a lot more interesting than I would have expected a random book someone threw away in a bathroom to be.”

Theo reaches out and takes Harry’s hand. They’re sitting beside each other on the couch in their classroom, a forgotten book on soul magic balanced between their knees, Harry’s head on his shoulder. “It’s not your fault. You were never taught to defend yourself against anything like that. Of course you didn’t recognize it when you ran into it.”

Harry takes a breath as though he’s going to argue with Theo about this, but in the end, he just shakes his head and leans a little harder on his shoulder. “Fine. Then can you teach me to do it in case we find another Horcrux?”

“Of course. But there’s something else we need. It would be best to know exactly what the possession feels like, and the diary never possessed you.”

“What do you think we should—Ginny.”

Harry’s tensed. Theo smooths a thumb down his shoulder. “Yes. There’s a spell that can pull memories from someone else, an adaptation of the one that puts your own memories in a Pensieve. Talk to her long enough, lure her close, and I can cast it. She won’t notice or be hurt.”

“It just feels—slimy—to use her that way.”

“She has a crush on you. It’ll be easy.”

“She does? But she’s dating Michael Corner, and she never turns red or stammers around me anymore, the way she used to.”

“Trust me,” Theo says darkly, thinking of the way that the Weasley girl’s eyes linger on Harry during meals and when the Gryffindors are traveling anywhere in a pack that includes both the fourth- and fifth-years. “She does.”

“You know that I would never betray you and you have nothing to be jealous of, right?”

“Of course. But it doesn’t mean I like the way she reacts to you.”

“So it would reassure you that I don’t feel anything romantic for her if I used her crush so we can get her memories of being possessed by the diary.”

“You said it, not me.”

Harry gives a long, long sigh, and Theo wonders if they’ve found a line that Harry won’t cross. It’s not like this involves Voldemort, Death Eaters, or someone like Dumbledore or Ron Weasley who’ve acted like idiots to Harry.

But Harry finally says, “I’ll do it.”

Theo rewards him with a kiss for his trouble, and then a little something else that will ensure Harry isn’t thinking of a soft smile and melting eyes at all when he talks to Weasley. Because Theo knows his own weaknesses, but that doesn’t mean missing all the chances to indulge them.

*

“Why do you want to know what it was like for me to be possessed?”

“Because, frankly, I encountered the diary, too. And I think if Voldemort made one artifact that could do that, he could make more. I want to know what it feels like in case I find another one.”

Theo, who’s standing around the corner from the fifth-floor corridor where Harry asked Weasley to meet with him, grimaces a little. He thinks that Harry could have chosen wording and an explanation that didn’t match so closely with what a Horcrux actually is. Weasley isn’t stupid, even if Theo despises her a little for her crush on Harry. She might start thinking and remembering—

But from the way Weasley breathes out, “Oh,” she’s just thinking about Harry being in danger or something. Theo risks a glance around the corner.

He almost wishes he hadn’t. Because Weasley is standing close to Harry and staring up at him from beneath her eyelashes and even though of course Theo knows that nothing would happen and he trusts Harry completely—

He still wants to march down there and show her some of the spells Father made him learn.

“Yeah.” Harry rubs the back of his neck, looking a little embarrassed. “I hate to ask you to relive that experience, but you’re the only one I know who would have anything like it—”

“I’m happy to help, Harry.” Weasley steps a little closer to him, but Harry avoids her touch without seeming to notice her hand reaching out. Weasley hides her disappointment well, if she feels it. “Okay. So you just want me to tell you what I can remember of the possession?”

“Your memories aren’t that clear, right?”

“No.” Weasley shivers and glances away from Harry, her eyes so distant that Theo knows she isn’t seeing anything in the corridor with them. “Not even the Chamber. You’d think I would remember the place I almost died, but—” She bites her lip and falls silent.

“It’s okay, Ginny. You were undergoing some pretty bloody traumatic things.”

“Yeah.” Weasley exhales and faces Harry again. “All right. Before I came to Hogwarts, writing in the diary just felt like it was an ordinary book, honestly. I was happy that Tom was responding to me. It felt like a special gift just for me. Someone who was interested in who I was, Ginny, not just the youngest Weasley daughter.”

Theo begins the long spells that will remove a copy of the memory from her brain without her noticing it, rolling his eyes as he does. Yes, of course a book magical and powerful enough to write back to its owner would be interested in a random eleven-year-old witch. That alone ought to have been enough for Weasley to take the book to her parents.

“And when I got to Hogwarts, it started to change.”

A thin stream of milky light forms in the air between Theo and Weasley. It’s one of those things that someone would have to be looking very closely to see, and even then, it would probably just look like drifting dust. Harry, focused on listening to Weasley, doesn’t seem to see it himself. Theo guides his wand back and forth, incanting the spell again and again in his head. Technically, it’s a charm to summon a small portion of a memory. It has to be repeated many times to build up the whole thing.

“Tom seemed—a lot more vehement about things. He started telling me that he knew secrets about the history of the school, secrets he would share with me if I just did what he said.”

“What did he want you to do?”

“First it was to go to this girls’ bathroom on the second floor and look around. And then when I found the sink with the snake, he seemed happy, and told me that it related to the secret of why Salazar Slytherin was driven out of the school by Gryffindor.”

Yes, that knowledge would be totally worth risking your life and sanity for.

“Did he ever actually tell you?”

“No.” Weasley tosses her hair. “I don’t think there even is a secret. I think it was just Slytherin feuding with Gryffindor about admitting Muggleborns, the way history says.”

She can learn!

“All right. And what was it like when he started telling you to kill the roosters and go down into the Chamber?”

Weasley speaks in a halting voice, but Theo has to let the sense of the words blur past him. He’s reached the delicate stage of the spell, and has to swish his wand and recite the incantation constantly in his mind. His wrist is aching with the repetitive movements by the time that Weasley stumbles to a stop and says, “That’s—there’s nothing that’s really different.”

The blurred shapes forming in the air in front of Theo have become a series of about ten memories, connected with thin bridges of silvery light. Theo studies them and nods. He knows that Weasley might know more, but they should have everything they need now.

“Thank you for sharing that with me, Ginny.” Harry’s voice is earnest, and Theo leans around the corner again to watch Harry put a hand on Weasley’s shoulder. “I know it can’t have been easy.”

“I would do a lot more for you, Harry.”

Harry just looks hilariously uncomfortable with the worship in Weasley’s eyes, and he manages to extricate himself from the conversation with a platitude. Theo slips away, taking his own secret passage route back to their classroom in case Weasley comes around the corner where he stood.

When Harry shows up at the classroom door, he says, “Where did you get that Pensieve?’

“Had Cassie owl it to me.” Theo dumps the memories he’s gathered from Weasley into the stone basin and glances back at Harry. “Do you want to watch this now, or do you want to wait a while? I don’t know how much the conversation unsettled you.”

“Most of it was pretty familiar. Yeah, let’s go.”

Theo takes Harry’s hand, and together, they lower their faces and plunge into Weasley’s memories of the diary Horcrux.