Property of the Half-Blood Prince
2 September, 1996.
The sunlit castle halls and corridors were teeming with masses of students as they fought their way to classes on the first day of term. Harry and Ron were sitting upon a ledge. Their view — a spectacularly amusing show of the hustle and bustle below, complete with rather clueless First-Years trying to navigate their way through the castle. And in the midst of it all stood McGonagall, tall and stern.
“History of Magic is up, ladies, not down. Mr. Davies— that’s the girl’s toilet…”
One could have mistaken her for a traffic cop.
Unfortunately, their fun came to an end when the professor’s eyes fell on the both of them
“Potter!”
Harry’s smile drooped as McGonagall beckoned at them with a finger.
“This can’t be good…”
Ron merely grinned and patted him on the back, Harry hopping off the ledge and trudged his way ‘upstream’ to his Head of House.
“Enjoying ourselves, are we?” she said with a dry smirk.
“Well, you see, I’ve got an open period this morning, Professor”
“So I noticed. I would think you’d want to fill it with Potions. Or is it no longer your ambition to become an Auror?”
“It is. Or was. But I was told I had to get an Outstanding in my O.W.L….”
“And so you did when Professor Snape was teaching Potions. However, Professor Slughorn is perfectly happy to accept N.E.W.T. students with ‘Exceeds Expectations’,” she informed him matter of factly.
“Really? Well... brilliant. I’ll head there straight away.
McGonagall nodded her head, consulting her parchment. “Good. Oh, by the way — twenty hopefuls have already put down their names for the Gryffindor Quidditch team. I shall pass the list to you in due course and you can fix up trials at your leisure.”
Harry had almost forgotten that he’d been made Quidditch Captain, what with the rest of the excitement.
“Right. I’ll keep that in mind, Professor. Thank you.”
“Potter, wait. Take Weasley with you. He looks far too happy over there,” the witch added, shaking her head exasperatedly in Ron’s direction.
“So? What’d McGonagall want?” asked Ron. Now it was Harry’s turn to pat him encouragingly — on the shoulder.
“Looks like we’re taking Potions this year after all, mate” he informed with grim encouragement, still patting his shoulder. By the way Ron’s face fell, one would only think the poor bloke needed emotional support.
“You’re barking, Harry. Please tell me you are…”
“Slughorn accepts ‘E’s. C’mon.”
The entire way down to the dungeons was brimmed with occasional mumbles of weak protest and complaints that would slip past the redhead’s lips as he trailed sluggishly after Harry. Harry paid him no mind, though. He was too busy thanking his lucky stars that he was able to take NEWT Potions class.
“...attention to detail in the preparation is the prerequisite of all planning…”
The late-comers’ footsteps echoed loudly against the stone, at which Slughorn stopped mid-speech and turned. His eyes immediately fell upon Harry, then Ron.
“Harry, m’boy! I was beginning to worry! And I see we’ve brought someone with us…?”
“Ron Weasley, sir. But I’m dead awful at Potions, a menace actually, so I probably should just be going—”
Harry deftly stepped in his friend’s way to thwart his attempt to make a run for it.
“Nonsense, we’ll sort you out,” exclaimed Slughorn easily. “Any friend of Harry’s is a friend of mine. Right then, books out.”
“Um, sorry, sir,” said Harry, ”but I haven’t got my book yet — nor’s Ron.”
“Not to worry. You can get what you need from the cupboard,” the man replied dismissively. “Now, as I was saying, I’ve prepared a few concoctions this morning. Any ideas what these might be? Yes, Miss...?”
“Granger, sir. That one there is Veritaserum. And that would be Polyjuice Potion. And that…”
Over at the other end of the classroom, in a shabby old cupboard, a furious wrestling match ensued between two wizards, both hoping to land the newer and less shabby-looking textbook of Advanced Potion Making. The match was fierce. Elbows were shoved into ribs; bodies pushed—
And in the end, Harry was left with the shabby, worn, torn, and sad-looking textbook. His victor grinned at him. Harry smacked the flat side of his book against the redhead, and the two made their way over to the rest of the Slytherins and Gryffindors standing, listening intently to the lesson.
“... is Amortentia! The most powerful love potion in the world. It’s rumored to smell differently to each person, according to what attracts them. For example, I smell freshly mown grass and new parchment and spearmint toothpaste— ” a fierce blush suddenly overcame Hermione, stopping herself in her tracks and taking a delicate step back.
Slughorn regarded her curiously before speaking.
“Now, Amortentia doesn’t create actual love, of course. That’s impossible. But it does cause a powerful infatuation or obsession. For that reason, it is probably the most dangerous potion in this room.” He turned to find several girls with dreamy expressions leaning into the vapors, having been slowly approaching the cauldron the entire time. Instantly, he clanged a cover onto the cauldron, bringing them round.
“Sir,” said Katie Bell, being one of those girls, “you haven’t told us what’s in that one,” she pointed.
“Ah yes…” Slughorn took a step back to a small black cauldron. With visible care and precision, he ladled a bit of the liquid in it — a beautiful golden color — into a tiny vial. “What you see before you, ladies and gentlemen, is a curious little potion known as Felix Felicis. But it is more commonly referred to as—”
“ —Liquid luck,” Hermione piped up. This stirred a buzz through the class. In Harry’s periphery, he saw even Malfoy perk up.
“Yes, Miss Granger. Desperately tricky to make, disastrous should you get it wrong. But brewed correctly, as this has been, it has remarkable powers. One sip and you will find that all your endeavors succeed... at least until the effects wear off.”
Silence befell the room.
“So. This is what I offer each of you today. One tiny vial of liquid luck... to the student who, in the hour that remains, manages to brew an acceptable Draught of Living Death, the recipe for which can be found on page ten of your textbook. Good luck.”
No sooner had he said this than quite literally every student seized their books, flipping through the pages vigorously.
For the next two hours, the students brewed. Tension was high, and every now and then, they would be either a small explosion or a frustrated string of colorful expletives.
To Harry’s initial dismay, his Potions textbook looked even worse on the inside than out. There were writings, notes, and scribblings filling the margins, sometimes even crossing out the printed text and providing hints or corrections right under them.
Apparently, this book had been the property of the ‘Half-Blood Prince’. Some eccentric bloke.
However, Harry’s said initial opinion quickly began to change once he’d had no choice but to listen to the mysterious writing’s advice, for the black ink covered the book text. The scribbled over text read:
“Crush two Sopophorous beans with edge of blade — releases juice better.”
It worked. Miraculously, it somehow worked. While everyone else's beans were flying about the room (the others were trying to cut them), Harry was already adding in his procured juice into his cauldron. The red drops sizzled upon hitting the potion’s surface, turning it a lilac color.
“How did you do that?” demanded Hermione out of nowhere, slightly breathless.
“Crush it. Don’t cut it.”
“No. The instructions specifically say to cut.”
“No. Really.”
The brewing continued. Everyone was struggling; a cauldron overflowed. Hermione was growing more and more frustrated, her hair turning bushier in the steam rising from her cauldron.
At long last, Harry was adding in his last ingredient and stepping back. He could feel Hermione, hair like Medea, glowering at him and that textbook of his as if they’d somehow deeply offended her. But Harry paid her no mind. His hands had a bit of a tremble to them in anticipation at the possibility of winning that vial of Felix Felicies. He held his breath, waiting for Slughorn to come round to judge his potion. The man was currently talking to Lavender Brown, whose cauldron was emitting light-lilac vapors. Judging by the looks on their faces, that wasn’t the Draught of the Living Death she’d meant to make.
“Ah, Harry, Harry! Finished, are we? Right on time, too,” greeted Slughorn. Harry scooched over to give the rotund man access to his small cauldron.
That was when Harry's eye caught sight of the old textbook still spread open on the workbench. He inconspicuously closed the cover and tried to push it out of the way a bit.
Meanwhile, Slughorn dropped a small, red leaf into Harry’s cauldron. A beat passed, and in the next it shriveled up.
“Merlin’s beard — It’s perfect!” exclaimed Slughorn. “So perfect I daresay one sip would kill us all! Your mother was a dab hand at potions, but this... My, my, what can’t you do, m’boy?”
And that was how Harry, feeling his cheeks red and chest funny with giddiness, found himself standing with the professor in front of the rest of the class, about to receive the vial of potion everyone was sullenly eyeing with poorly-contained envy, particularly Malfoy.
And Hermione. She was sporting quite a sour look as well, her eyes occasionally darting to the battered textbook she somehow knew Harry was clutching behind his back.
But all that was beside the point.
“Here you are then, as promised,” announced Slughorn proudly, handing Harry the grand prize. “One bottle of Felix Felicis. Use it well.”
~***~
The rest of the week passed, as Luna Lovegood had said at lunch one day, exceptionally ordinarily. Classes had only just started, and yet they (the sixth-years) were already being snowed under with homework assignments. So far, they’d had Transfiguration, Charms, and Herbology, Potions… All except for Defense. There were two Defense periods on Monday and two on Friday, but seeing as Classes had started only on Tuesday, they had yet to have DADA.
And it just so happened that today was a Friday morning.
Harry was sitting at the Gryffindor table, picking at his toast and bacon with little enthusiasm while his eyes were glued to his class schedule. Defense — a double period first thing in the morning. Beside the class name was also the corresponding professor’s.
It was ridiculous. Why was Harry nervous? Why on earth? He had no reason to be. Snape would be his same old, bastard self — nothing had changed.
Except so much had.
Harry didn’t want to see that coldness in the man’s eyes directed at him, nor hear his scathing remarks and unfair jibes. But what made it worse was the following thoughts:
Would Snape be acting coldly towards Harry only for the sake of appearances, or because that was how he actually felt? Exactly how much had changed over those two weeks? They’d established somewhat of a tacit truce then, but this was now, a whole month later…
Maybe Snape had abandoned his idea of helping Harry with the whole Voldemort thing…
Voldemort. Soul fragment.
Tainted. Contaminated. Unworthy…
Harry set his toast down onto his plate, all appetite having diminished into thin air. He muttered something to Ron and Hermione about going to the bathroom, snatched up his satchel, and left the Great Hall in somewhat of a haste.
His and Snape’s last interaction wouldn’t stop springing to his mind. Harry hated this… this uncomfortable feeling of… something heavy weighing on his conscience that he couldn’t quite pinpoint. It was like the aftertaste on the tongue after getting into a quarrel with someone.
But it wasn’t as if they’d had a row. Just… Snape had been visibly pissed to find Harry late to the Feast with a bloodied, broken-nosed face — so he had plausible reasons to be annoyed with Harry.
But that didn’t change that it had left Harry with an ugly, gnawing feeling ever since.
Harry was so far-gone in his thoughts that on rounding a corner, foreign footsteps and chatter somehow hadn’t registered with him. His body came into contact with something solid, and the next moment he was falling on his backside with a surprised grunt.
“Harry!”
Once the stars in his vision had diminished, Harry looked up to find Ginny with Dean Thomas. For the split of a second, his green eyes involuntarily darted to their interlocked hands, which dislodged when Dean made to offer Harry a hand up.
“Sorry,” apologized Harry, on his feet now and dusting himself off. “Didn’t see you there.”
“Catching flies, huh?” commented Dean jokingly. “You’re gonna need to be more awake for Snape’s class, you are…”
“Alright, Harry? The floor isn’t exactly made of pillows, you know,” said Ginny. Harry caught her eyes, but then quickly averted them to Dean as well, on whom he locked them and refused to look at the girl again.
“Uh, yeah, thanks. Sorry. I gotta go…”
“Wait. Here, you dropped a book.”
He turned around to find Ginny proffering his old Potions textbook to him. Harry felt his cheeks reddening at the sight of the old thing a bit, and accepted it with a mumbled word of gratitude.
“See you guys around,” he bade them and took off once again, fumbling with his satchel to fit the tattered old thing inside.
Not much to Harry’s pleasure, he was the first student outside the Defense classroom. He leaned against the wall and took out the Potions textbook, examining to see if it had sustained any more damage from the fall. To his fortune, it hadn’t. He sighed in relief.
This… This book was officially his favorite book now. This passing week, he’d spent most of his evenings flipping through the battered pages. There were inscriptions, notes, markings, and writings everywhere. But not just of potion-making tips, oh no. There were even spells, such as ‘Levicorpus’, and evident attempts at new spell creation. He’d never heard of the spells he’d found so far.
Not that Harry was intent on trying them out… yet.
He had no way of knowing if they were ‘friendly’ spells or not.
Then again, this Prince bloke didn’t strike him as someone who’d invent murder curses… but that was just his guess.
By now, the bustle of students was slowly starting to invade the corridor. Harry stared out of one of the tall windows on the other side. Trepidation was still squirming in his stomach.
His magic had improved only slightly since his last lesson with Mad-Eye at the Burrow, as he’d discovered in this first week of classes. In Transfiguration, where they’d started the conjuration module (creating objects out of thin air), he’d managed to create a feather only on his twentieth attempt. This was considered an average amount. Though it had even taken Hermione only about fifteen.
But now, a horrible feeling of deja vu was squirming in Harry. He still vividly remembered those few dueling lessons with Snape; how his magic had been slowly deteriorating then…
Snape’s sneering and jeers, how Harry had never been able to get the upper hand, his wand malfunctioning…
He couldn’t help the premonition that history was about to repeat itself again. Only this time in front of a classroom full of Slytherins and Gryffindors.
Again.
One by one, students from his year started lining up outside the classroom. Whispers passed, some expressing their rotten luck — those who had been hoping never to see Snape’s face again, having not scored an ‘O’ in their Potions O.W.L.
Hermione and Ron arrived with the majority from breakfast. But before the trio could exchange a word, the classroom door suddenly flung open, and Snape stepped into the corridor. Silence fell over the queue immediately.
“Inside,” he said curtly.
Entering the classroom, Harry looked around the classroom. He could see that Snape had already imposed his personality upon the space. The room looked a lot gloomier than usual, for the curtains were drawn over the tall windows — it was lit by candle light —, and new paintings adorned the walls. Many of the people there, moving, appeared to be in pain; one painting even depicted only a pair of hands, blood-stained, manacled together by some invisible force and being controlled like a puppet.
Nobody spoke as they settled down, including Harry, who had chosen to share a desk with Ron. Everyone seemed morbidly captured by the gruesome paintings.
“I have not asked you to take out your books,” Snape’s smooth voice drawled as he let the door swing shut. A loud banged resounded. It coincided with Hermione hastily dropping her copy of Confronting the Faceless back into her bag… Snape strode to the front of the classroom, his dark cloak flapping at his ankles, and stopped sharply to face the students. In the contrasting light and shadows, Harry noticed that the man’s facial features looked gaunter, more exhausted and lined…
“I wish to speak to you, and I want your fullest attention.” His black eyes roved over their upturned faces, lingering for a fraction of a second longer on Harry’s than anyone else’s.
“You have had five teachers in this subject so far, I believe. Naturally, these teachers will all have had their own methods and priorities. Given this confusion I am surprised so many of you scraped an O.W.L. in this subject. I shall be even more surprised if all of you manage to keep up with the N.E.W.T. work, which will be much more advanced.”
Snape set off around the edge of the room now, speaking now in a lower voice; the class craned their necks to keep him in view.
“The Dark Arts,” continued Snape, “are many, varied, ever-changing, and eternal. Fighting them is like fighting a many-headed monster, which, each time a neck is severed, sprouts a head even fiercer and cleverer than before. You are fighting that which is unfixed, mutating, indestructible… Your defenses,” he then said, a little louder, “must therefore be as flexible and inventive as the arts you seek to undo. These pictures” — he indicated a few of them as he swept past — “give a fair representation of what happens to those who suffer, for instance, the Cruciatus Curse” — he waved a hand toward a witch who was clearly shrieking in agony — “feel the Dementor’s Kiss” — a wizard lying huddled and blank-eyed, slumped against a wall — “or provoke the aggression of the Inferius” — a bloody mass upon the ground.
Someone tentatively raised their hand. “Has an Inferius been seen, then?” asked Parvati Patil in a high pitched voice. “Is it definite, is he using them?”
“The Dark Lord has used Inferi in the past,” answered Snape, “which means you would be well-advised to assume he might use them again. Now . . .” He set off again around the other side of the classroom toward his desk, and again, the class watched him as he walked, his dark robes billowing behind him. “. . . you are, I believe, complete novices in the use of nonverbal spells. What is the advantage of a nonverbal spell?”
Hermione’s hand shot into the air. Snape took his time looking around at everybody else, making sure he had no choice, before saying curtly, “Very well — Miss Granger?”
“Your adversary has no warning about what kind of magic you’re about to perform,” said Hermione, “which gives you a split-second advantage.”
“An answer copied almost word for word from The Standard Book of Spells, Grade Six,” said Snape dismissively (over in the corner, Malfoy sniggered), “but correct in essentials. Yes, those who progress to using magic without shouting incantations gain an element of surprise in their spell-casting. Not all wizards can do this, of course; it is a question of concentration and mind power which some” — his gaze lingered upon Harry for a moment, before moving on — “lack.”
Oh, and Harry knew Snape was thinking of their disastrous Occlumency lessons of the previous year, and their little dueling lessons over the summer. He shifted a bit in his seat, narrowing his eyes at his cuticles.
“You will now divide,” Snape went on, “into pairs. One partner will attempt to jinx the other without speaking. The other will attempt to repel the jinx in equal silence. Carry on.”
The silence was broken with the scraping of chairs and low tones of discussion. Some, as Harry could tell, were a bit relieved. Although Snape did not know it, Harry had taught at least half the class (everyone who had been a member of the D.A.) how to perform a Shield Charm the previous year.
However, none of them had ever cast the charm without speaking. So it was only understandable that a reasonable amount of cheating ensued. Many people were merely whispering the incantation instead of saying it aloud. Typically, ten minutes into the lesson Hermione managed to repel Neville’s muttered Jelly Legs Jinx without uttering a single word, a feat that would surely have earned her twenty points for Gryffindor from any reasonable teacher, but which Snape ignored.
He swept between them as they practiced, looking just as much like an overgrown bat as ever. When the level of whispering got a margin louder, he hissed in warning… He lingered to watch the pairs work. Eventually, he reached Harry and Ron struggling with the task.
Harry felt himself growing tense. Beads of sweat were popping up on his forehead.
It was still his turn. He’d been at it for over seven minutes, and yet he couldn’t seem to get his wand to comply. He’d always been rubbish at non-verbal spells to begin with, and with his magic not having been restored completely…
He was growing more tired with every effort.
“Let’s switch, Harry.” mumbled Ron. Harry didn’t argue, and the roles were now reversed.
But apparently, nonverbal spell-casting wasn’t Ron’s forte either. Three minutes in trying had the Gryffindor purple in the face, his lips tightly compressed to save himself from the temptation of muttering the incantation with Snape so nearby. Seeing all this, Harry’s defensive stance was growing more and more languid.
“Pathetic, Weasley,” sneered Snape after a while. “Here — let me show you —” He turned his wand on Harry so fast that Harry reacted instinctively; all thought of nonverbal spells fled from Harry’s mind.
“Protego!”
By some miracle, it worked.
His Shield Charm was so strong Snape was knocked off-balance and hit a desk. The whole class had looked around and now watched as Snape righted himself, scowling. His black eyes met those of Harry’s.
“Do you remember me telling you we are practicing nonverbal spells, Potter?”
“Yes,” he said stiffly.
“Yes, sir.”
“There’s no need to call me ‘sir,’ Professor.” The words had escaped him before he knew what he was saying, those same ones he’d uttered on his first night in Spinner’s End. Harry’s mouth was dry. Several people gasped, including Hermione. Behind Snape, however, Ron, Dean, and Seamus grinned appreciatively.
Snape’s eyes narrowed, but Harry also thought there was an inkling of triumph and satisfaction in them.
“Detention, Saturday night, seven o’ clock, my office,” he said silkily. “I do not take cheek from anyone, Potter . . . not even ‘the Chosen One.’”
Several beats of deafening silence followed. But then Snape whipped his head around (his greasy locks flying in the momentum) and glared icily at the rest of the class.
“Well? This is a lesson, not a spectacle. Get back to work.”
The rest of the lesson passed like a blur to Harry. For the next twenty minutes, he felt as if he were in a trance of some sort. He wasn’t exactly sure why, he just was. For the most of it, he was lost in his thoughts, wondering why Snape had pulled that move. It almost felt… deliberate in some way…
Before he knew it, class was dismissed.
“That was brilliant, Harry!” chortled Ron, once they were safely on their way to break.
“You really shouldn’t have said it,” said Hermione, catching up to them and flanking Harry’s left, frowning at Ron. “What made you?”
“He tried to jinx me, in case you didn’t notice,” said Harry. “I had enough of that during those Occlumency lessons. Why doesn’t he use another guinea pig for a change?”
Ron piped up here. “Sure makes you wonder what Dumbledore’s playing at, letting him teach Defense. Did you hear him talking about the Dark Arts? I once heard Mum talking about her favorite cooking spells like that! All that unfixed, indestructible stuff —”
“Well,” interposed Hermione, “I thought he sounded a bit like Harry.”
“Like me?” Harry goggled at her in surprise.
“Yes, when you were telling us what it’s like to face Voldemort. You said it wasn’t just memorizing a bunch of spells, you said it was just you and your brains and your guts — well, wasn’t that what Snape was saying? That it really comes down to being brave and quick-thinking?”
Harry was so disarmed that she had thought his words as well worth memorizing as The Standard Book of Spells that he did not argue.
“Harry! Hey, Harry!”
Harry looked around; Jack Sloper, one of the Beaters on last year’s Gryffindor Quidditch team, was hurrying toward him holding a roll of parchment.
“For you,” panted Sloper. “Listen, I heard you’re the new Captain. When’re you holding trials?”
“Um, I’m not sure yet,” said Harry, a tad awkwardly, as he accepted the paper. Privately, he was thinking that Sloper would be very lucky to get back on the team. “I’ll, umm… I’ll let you know.”
“Oh, right. I was hoping it’d be this weekend —”
But the rest of Sloper’s rant fell on deaf ears. Harry had just recognized the thin, slanting writing on the parchment. Leaving Sloper in mid-sentence, he hurried away with Ron and Hermione, unrolling the parchment as he went.
Dear Harry, I would like to see you in my office this Saturday. Kindly come along to my office at 8 P.M. I hope you are enjoying your first day back at school. Yours sincerely, Albus Dumbledore
P.S. I enjoy Acid Pops.
~***~
Later that evening, Harry lay in bed pouring over his Potions textbook. Admittedly, he hadn’t really touched it since Tuesday, the matter having somehow slipped his mind… The fall the book had sustained earlier today hadn’t damaged it much. Harry thought it was a miracle (Merlin knew how much the old thing had already been through over the years).
Under his wandlight, Harry was silently flipping through its stained, yellowed pages. He kept finding new inscriptions, notes, markings, and writings everywhere.
There was something… strange about the book.Harry frowned to himself again. He couldn’t shake this strange feeling of deja vu. Not that he understood it, but something about it felt so… uncannily familiar. He couldn’t quite pinpoint it, though it felt as if it were just on the tip of his tongue, begging for the right brain cells to connect to figure it out…
Something about the handwriting… Where had he seen it before?
Then a wild thought struck him. Could it possibly have been his father’s?
No. Harry immediately dismissed that concept from his head. His father had been a pureblood.
With a twinge of disappointment, Harry shut the book, dropping it into his bag beside his bed, took off his rounded rims, and sought sleep.