Chapter Forty of 'Practicing Liars'- The Hunt Ends

[lomonaaeren]

Chapter Thirty-Nine.


Title: Practicing Liars (40/?)
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Summary: AU of HBP. Harry found out that he was Snape’s son two years ago, and he’s carefully concealed it. But now Snape is his Defense teacher, and Draco Malfoy is up to something, and Dumbledore is dying, and the final battle is coming up, and everything is getting very, very complicated.
Pairings: Background Ron/Hermione and Ron/Lavender. Harry and Draco have a ‘complicated friendship’ which will become a preslash relationship. For obvious reasons, Snape/Lily is mentioned.
Rating: R
Warnings: Violence (lots of violence), profanity, angst, character death (not Snape, Harry, or Draco), slash and het hints.
Author’s Notes: While I’m hoping to make this plot at least somewhat original, I know that I’m treading on well-covered ground. I don’t know yet how long the story will be, except that it will be novel-length. Practicing Liars is being written for my dear soft2smooth2000, who has helped me wonderfully with keeping track of and linking to my fics on LJ.

Chapter One.

Thank you again for all the reviews!

Chapter Forty—The Hunt Ends

“You’re here.” Granger folded her arms and glared at Draco as though he had done something to her personally by falling in love with Harry. “Talk to us. Harry said that you had a case to make.”

Draco lifted his head and tried to look as noble and pathetic as he possibly could. Gryffindors fell for that sort of thing all the time. He knew that Harry wouldn’t, but he considered Harry practically an honorary Slytherin since he’d spent so much time around Professor Snape and Draco himself. It ought to be an easy thing to trick his friends.

“I’ve changed my mind about blood,” Draco whispered. “I don’t think that it determines who you are. I’m not exactly the same as my mother or father, though they would probably want to think I was. That means that I have to reconsider whether other people are defined by their blood. And I’ve decided that they aren’t.”

It wasn’t as raw as the words that he had given Harry, but he thought it was more eloquent, which meant no one could possibly disapprove of it. Harry gave him a sweet smile as though confirming that thought.

Granger, of course, wasn’t impressed. She put her hands on her hips and stared at Draco. “Do you think I should die?” she asked.

“I told you, I’ve changed my mind about blood,” Draco said, annoyed to find that his words made less impression than he’d hoped. Of course, he should have remembered that another trait of Gryffindors was their indifference to or suspicion against Slytherin words. “And you’re Harry’s friend. I wouldn’t want you to die because your death would hurt him.”

Harry squeezed his shoulder in approval, but Weasley said, with the air of someone pouncing on a traitorous word, “So you don’t care about her as a person. You just care because she’s Harry’s friend!”

Idiot. There’s a simple counterargument to that. Draco turned his head. Granger had ventured nearer to him than Weasley had. The Weasel seemed content to stand in the back of the room and stare at him as if he were doing something wrong just by breathing.

“Do you care about me at all?” Draco asked. “As a person? Or do you only care because Harry’s dating me? Would you have given a thought to me otherwise, or cared when the Dark Lord killed my father?”

Weasley scowled. “You could call him by his name, you know, instead of the Dark Lord. It’s not like you should still be bloody loyal to him, with everyone he’s done to you.”

Draco turned away without speaking and fastened his attention on Granger. “Well? Do you care about me as an individual?”

“No,” Granger said, and had the sense to look uncomfortable and embarrassed about it, given Weasley’s argument. “But I still think you should realize that, if you’re really Harry’s boyfriend—”

“He really is,” Harry said, in a tone that brooked no argument.

“Then you should realize we care about each other deeply,” Granger finished. “And you’ll have to do the same thing.”

“Of course,” Draco said. “You first.”

Granger frowned. “I’m willing to do that. But you can’t expect me to start caring about you all at once, given our past.”

“Then you can’t expect the same thing out of me, either,” Draco said.

“Harry, do you have to date him?” Weasley asked suddenly, leaning forwards and speaking in a hoarse whisper as if he assumed that Draco would have to stop listening if he wanted him to. “I mean, there are plenty of other people you could have. Even other boys, if you’re really bent.”

Draco ground his teeth so that he wouldn’t say something unfortunate, and Harry answered in the gap. “Draco is the one I want,” he said. “The one I’m in love with. I know that you don’t like him, Ron, but at least you’re making the effort to get along with him, and I’m happy that you are.”

Draco would have sniffed in incredulity, but he kept silent, because he saw the way Weasley’s face lit up, and he understood. Harry was using a very Slytherin tactic, praising Weasley for something he hadn’t actually done yet, and making him more likely to continue the pleasing behavior as a result. It worked, too. Draco’s father had used it on him when he was a child, until he learned to recognize it. Given Weasley’s level of mental development, it was a trick that would probably always work on him.

“All right, mate,” Weasley said. “If you’re sure.”

Granger still looked dubiously back and forth between them. “I don’t know,” she said. “Are you sure, Harry?”

Draco felt a tremor of irritation run through Harry, who seemed to think that Granger should accept Draco if her best friend and boyfriend had already accepted him, but he just nodded and smiled. “Yes, Hermione.”

Granger uttered a long-suffering sigh, then nodded at Draco and marched out of the room. Weasley followed her, with one apologetic glance at Harry and an ostentatious ignoring of Draco. Draco snorted as the door closed behind them. “You’re willing to take very little from them,” he said.

“They’ve been my friends for a long time,” Harry said. “And I did treat them badly earlier this year, when I practically ignored them because you were more interesting and training in Defense was more interesting, and I was trying to figure out how to hide the secrets about the bloodline curse and my heritage.” He sighed and leaned against the wall. “It’s not a lot, but then, I don’t think we can just begin with a lot. If we could, they would have been more accepting of you in the first place.”

Draco nodded reluctant concession to that, and then leaned in and kissed Harry. Harry became interested at once, and wrapped an arm around Draco’s shoulders, turning his head to the side so that he could control the kiss more easily.

Draco grinned, smug in the knowledge that he could command, and get, a lot more from Harry than his friends could.

*

“I haven’t been having problems, Professor.”

Zabini spoke with an almost charming eagerness in his voice, as though he wanted to spare Severus the burden of having to worry about him. Severus simply nodded, said, “I will be the judge of that,” and held out his hand expectantly.

Zabini placed his most recent essay for Transfiguration in it, with a slight scowl. It had always been his poorest subject. Severus read over it, frowning when he noticed several misspelled words and infelicitous sentences that he would have taken off points for. Minerva is too kind even to the Slytherin students. She will not scold them when they make mistakes, and then she has only herself to blame for the results.

“It seems to me as though you have problems here,” he remarked, and looked up sternly over the edge of the parchment into the boy’s eyes. “Do you call this a good essay, Mr. Zabini, in all seriousness?”

Zabini shifted back in his chair and looked defensive. In the meantime, Severus went smoothly into his head, voicing Legilimens mentally. Zabini was one of the few whom he had been worried about discovering his Legilimency, but with his mind focused on something else, he was less likely to sense it.

He discovered in two seconds that the boy had a Dark Mark, in imitation of his father—or the man he believed his father to have been, a minor Death Eater who had disappeared during the first war. Zabini believed he had died heroically. Severus himself was never sure if Hannibal Zabini had deserted, died on a raid, or been killed by his wife. He was not the sort of man that one spent much time noticing.

He also discovered that Zabini would as soon have thought of cutting the moon out of the sky as of hurting Draco.

Severus withdrew thoughtfully from the boy’s mind. Draco might have a more loyal friend in this one Slytherin than he had known existed, and the Dark Lord a less loyal soldier. I shall have to plant some doubts in Zabini’s mind and see if they sprout. Whether he realizes it or not, the living have more influence over him than the dead.

“Sir?” Zabini demanded. Severus knew that the boy had not said something or he would have heard the echoes of the words in his ears, but he appeared to think that the long silence, during which Severus peered at him, was still damning.

“I have asked your opinion,” Severus said, and held up the essay. “Is this a well-written piece of work?”

Zabini shifted, gripped the edges of his chair, and ended up scowling at the floor instead of answering. Severus was pleased to see that one of his students, at least, recognized when it was useless to lie.

Another strike against his having been the one who injured Draco.

“No, sir,” Zabini said at last. “But I don’t do well in Transfiguration, and McGonagall isn’t going to help me.” He lifted his head, peered at Severus, and then sat up further, seeming to understand from Severus’s neutral expression that he wasn’t going to get into trouble for criticizing another professor. “I asked, sir. I did. I went to her office and talked to her about it, and she said that she couldn’t do anything about a lack of natural talent.”

Severus fought to keep his lips from twitching. He could hear the very tone in which Minerva would pronounce the words. And she had not meant it maliciously—she had said the same thing to others when Severus was a student at Hogwarts, mostly those who had wanted careers that involved Transfiguration in some capacity—but it could be heard that way by those who expected praise.

“You may not do well in Transfiguration,” said Severus. “Helping you with the practical work is beyond my purview.” Zabini nodded, his mouth tight, as if he had already guessed that but didn’t like to hear it confirmed. “But that is no reason to write less than perfect essays. I know that you can write, having had you in my classes. You will do Slytherin House proud with your performance in the parts of the classes that you can master, do you understand me?”

Zabini bowed his head and muttered something, but from the tone of his voice, Severus was sure it was agreement and not defiance.

He let the boy slide down from his chair and get almost to the door before he added, “And Mr. Zabini?”

Zabini turned back and looked at him. Severus gave him a look that would have many undertones when Zabini thought about it later, though what undertones he found most prominent and which ones he didn’t would depend on his individual preferences.

“Consider carefully,” Severus said, “whether you want to live all your life in the shadow of others’ accomplishments, or make your own. While you might do poorly at the practical work in Transfiguration, I know you have a talent for Charms.”

He paused, and when Zabini lingered to stare at him, he added, “Dismissed.”

Zabini swallowed, nodded, and went, his eyes large and dazed. Severus sincerely hoped it would at least give him an option to think about.

While he hadn’t yet found the poisoner, a rate of progress that displeased him, he had at least begun to reconnect with his House.

*

Harry stared at the piece of parchment that had come to him in his food, a part of the crust of the bread. He’d been damn lucky he hadn’t swallowed it, or choked when he was pulling it out of his mouth.

Or, for that matter, that he hadn’t attracted Hermione’s attention. She would have wanted to know what was written on the paper whether or not she’d seen the way it arrived; writing always fascinated her like that. Luckily, she was interrogating Ron down at the other end of the table and didn’t appear to notice.

Harry laid the square of paper on his knee and waited until he was sure that Hermione was deep in the midst of scolding Ron for chewing with his mouth open. Then he unfolded it.

Despite the spots of moisture from his mouth and a few traces of food, the words on the parchment were clear enough.

Harry, I would appreciate it if you would come to my office alone this evening. I have many things to say to you.

Albus Dumbledore.

Harry shivered and felt sweat break out on his palms. He kept from looking up at Dumbledore as he folded the piece of parchment with a few hard presses of his hands. Then he looked up at him. He found Dumbledore smiling and nodding, one hand stroking his beard as though he assumed Harry’s answer would be yes.

Harry bowed his head back to his plate and kept eating. The food didn’t taste that good, but the Dursleys had taught him not to waste it when he did get it. If he was really upset, he just avoided meals altogether.

When he stood, he kept his eyes carefully away from the high table and headed to his classes with a ringing head and a sore heart. How was he supposed to know what was best? Maybe Dumbledore did have information that was vital to the war, and Harry was being stupid and childish by not going to him. It seemed like that, sometimes.

But then Harry’s spine straightened, and he found himself remembering what Dumbledore had done to him, and almost done, and kept from him, and consented to.

No. If it was really important, then he would tell me straight out, and he wouldn’t say that I had to come alone. He’s already admitted that he knows I would tell everything to Draco, or at least my friends, so why does he have to put up this pretense of secrecy?

By the time he got to Defense, Harry had made his decision. He wasn’t going to Dumbledore.

And when he could, he would go to Snape and tell him about the note.

He would tell Draco, too, but at the moment he wanted an adult who would tell him whether he was acting childish, or whether it was Dumbledore. He knew Draco was on his side no matter what, but he trusted Snape to give him the truth.

*

Severus sighed and motioned Monica Cravens to take a seat in front of him. So far, his investigations had produced nothing except the possible chance to influence other minds like those of Blaise Zabini. He had found other Death Eaters among those he had not thought were Marked, but no one who had been ordered to poison Draco. He was beginning to wonder if he must look for the poisoner among the teachers, who would also have the skills necessary to prepare the Acromantula’s Bite, or perhaps in a Ravenclaw who was jealous of Draco’s Potions skills.

Miss Cravens took a chair in front of him and peered at him once before shyly ducking her head. Severus kept from rolling his eyes with a monumental effort. He had long thought that Miss Cravens should have been Sorted into Hufflepuff instead. She had her share of cunning and ambition, but they were both low—the sort of cunning required to get out from under a teacher’s scolding, but unlikely to help her succeed later in life.

“I haven’t been able to bring any essays with poor marks the way you asked me to, Professor,” she said timidly. “I don’t have any with poor marks. All my professors say I’m doing extremely well.”

And perhaps she was, Severus thought. At least Cravens was able to memorize information when she knew it was vital, as for an exam—thought she often let it sift out again afterwards. “Then why not decide what you wish to tell me about your recent performance in class,” he suggested, while he picked up one of the papers that lay in front of him, “while I mark these essays by students less gifted than yourself.”

Cravens didn’t seem to notice the sarcasm. She smiled at him, and then bit her lip and stared vaguely at the far wall, thinking.

“Well, let’s see,” she murmured, and her fingers moved over each other as if she had to count off the days on which exciting things had happened to her.

Severus muffled his snort and drew his wand under his desk. A non-verbal Legilimens, and he was moving into the depths of Miss Cravens’s mind.

Nothing, nothing, and nothing, again. It seemed the girl never thought of anything from one end of the day to the other but dress robes, marks, her giggling friends, and whether she would be married two or three years after she left Hogwarts. Severus started to draw back in disgust.

Something sizzled past his shoulder.

Long years of being in battle situations, or being likely to be in a battle situation at any moment, made Severus react the right way. He dropped to the floor, behind the shelter of the desk, and locked the door so that Cravens could not retreat. Then he assessed his wound. It amounted to nothing in the end but a singe along his shoulder, which his robes had mostly protected him from.

Then he understood what had happened. Cravens had been maintaining Occlumency walls against him, and they were good enough that the casual probe that was all Severus dared risk would have found nothing. But she had also sensed his Legilimency, and she had reacted with panic. Severus might never have known anything if she had managed to cling to her temper and common sense.

He rose from behind the desk and saw Cravens standing in the center of the room, staring at him with frank appraisal. That made her look very different from the mindless, giggling little girl he had thought her.

“I didn’t think you would find out,” Cravens said simply, and then lashed her arm forwards and said two short, low words that he didn’t recognize, moving so fast he couldn’t think of a counter.

The room turned inside-out. Patches of black and golden light swam in front of Severus’s eyes, and he felt himself tumble away from his feet. He thought he had lost his grip on his wand, but he didn’t know that for certain because he could no longer feel his hand. Sick pain ran through his body, and he choked, his arms striking out uselessly at the air.

Cravens laughed. He could still hear that sound, though the rest of his senses were entirely consumed by the strange vision she had thrown him into. “I hope you have fun,” she said. “The spell lasts for several hours, and then all I’ll need to tell anyone is that I found you like this.” Severus heard the sound of her footsteps as she turned towards the door.

Fool. Severus had been confident he could handle any threat. He had never once considered what would happen if the Dark Lord had entrusted his young Death Eaters with the knowledge of Dark Arts spells that Severus did not possess and did not know how to counter.

He heard Cravens struggling with the locking spells on the door, but he doubted that they would delay her for long. He tried to orient himself by the sounds, focusing on the shelves where he kept potions that might, possibly, counter spells like this one.

Then he heard a knock from the outside, and froze. No one was supposed to intrude on him for at least another hour, the amount of time that he was giving to these interviews with his students.

He did the only thing he could, the only thing that might help him, taking advantage of Cravens’s small pause as she had taken advantage of his, and cried out a warning.

*

Harry knocked again on Snape’s door, impatient. He should at least have said something, even if it was just a warning to leave because he was engaged in a detention or intense marking. Keeping the door shut like this almost made Harry wonder if he was asleep.

Then Snape shouted. Harry thought the word was “Danger!” but it didn’t really matter. He had already stepped back from the door and had his wand in his hand.

Part of the door turned bright golden in a circle, and then lashed out at him in a thin line of fire. Harry squeaked and ducked. He thought his hair was on fire, but he rolled on the stone floor, and the flames went out.

“For Merlin’s sake,” said someone through the hole that now occupied the center of the door, and Harry saw a wand realigning itself to point at him.

He didn’t think that would be Snape, unless Snape had been possessed by Voldemort or something like that. Harry surged back to his feet, pointed his own wand, and shouted, “Condocefacio!”

The wand vanished. Harry heard the snap of ropes, or at least what should be ropes if the spell was working the right way, before someone began to yelp.

Good. She’s at least distracted. Harry charged the door and rammed his shoulder into it, casting a few Finites at the same time. The door popped open.

In the center of the room was a girl in Slytherin robes whom he didn’t know, her arms and her ankles tied together in the middle of her back, her wand lying on the floor next to her. Harry smiled grimly. He’d found the Learning by Example spell in an old Defense textbook in the Hogwarts library, one not used any longer. The idea was to tie someone in such complicated knots that they couldn’t be undone by cutting and to take their wand away at the same time, until they learned by sheer necessity to use wandless magic to free themselves.

Snape was stumbling around near the girl.

Harry stepped up next to him and said, “Finite Incantatem.” Snape didn’t stop stumbling, so Harry knew the spell he was under must be worse than usual. He told himself not to panic and said, “What do you need, sir?”

Snape stiffened a moment, as if he hated that it was Harry who had come to rescue him instead of someone else, and then reached out a trembling hand. Harry took it and placed it firmly on his shoulder, then led him towards a shelf and put a certain potion in his hand at Snape’s whispered instructions. He probably didn’t want the student who’d hurt him to hear, Harry thought.

Or maybe he was just humiliated. Harry made sure to be looking away when Snape swallowed the potion and came back to normal, just in case having someone meet his eyes would embarrass him even more.

Snape coughed several times, then intoned a sleeping spell. Harry saw the girl in Slytherin robes slump down and start snoring. He sighed and looked up at his father (it made his insides squirm sometimes to think about that name, but he thought it all the same). “Are you all right, sir?”

Snape nodded with a grunt. He was still staring at the girl, and there was an expression on his face that made Harry shudder. He’d thought Snape got angry at him, but clearly, that was nothing but practice.

Then Snape said, “I have found, at the very least, a Death Eater in the school, and from her desperation to protect her secrets, she may be the one who poisoned Draco as well.” He looked at Harry, and the hand that he still had on his shoulder, which he’d been using for support so far, tightened. “Why did you happen to be here just at this time?”

“Because I had something I wanted to talk to you about,” Harry said. He kept his voice low, like Snape’s. Someone could come along the corridor and listen at the door. “And this happened to me because things like this happen to me. That’s just how it is,” he added, a bit defensively, when Snape went on looking at him.

Snape finally shut his eyes, nodded, and said, “As long as you were not hurt.”

“No,” Harry said, and helped Snape sit down and then went to firecall Professor McGonagall on his instructions, trying not to think about how hard Snape had held him for a moment.

Or the way his arms had twitched, as if he wanted to hug Harry close to him, but didn’t quite dare.