Reading up on general house rules
SS
People are dunderheads according to Severus Snape. It includes Severus Snape as well, in case you were wondering. This fact has been proven many times throughout his life. One of those instances was when he threw away years of friendship, another was when he joined the Death Eaters. The last time had been when he made a vow on Dumbledore's orders, it had been a rash of a decision with not enough thought on his part. At least that had been the last time he had proved himself to be no exception to the rule ‘people are dunderheads’.
The new evidence was currently sitting in his living room reading. While he had gone to his laboratory to brew. It had all started with him making a rash decision (just like the other times) and had ended with him not knowing how to take care of a guest. He never had any guests. (Willingly! Dumbledore had turned up unannounced once, resulting in him having to upgrade his wards.)
In other words, Severus had apparated them both to Spinners End and then excused himself as quickly as possible.
If the child had been a normal nine-year-old, his house would have been in chaos by now, maybe even on fire. There would have been a lot of noise. But there wasn't.
He'd gone back upstairs (Severus doesn't run) to check if anything was broken the moment he realised he'd left a child unsupervised in his house. Everything was fine, though. The boy was kneeling in his chair, a book on his lap and his shoes on the floor. No mess, no noise. Severus slipped back into his lab, there was no need to interact with anyone after all.
And he was still a Dunderhead. It hadn't occurred to him yet that he hadn't decided how long he was going to keep him (as long as possible to make sure he was safe) and where he was going to sleep, but that was a problem for later. Now he was brewing.
* H *
It was… nice? Small? Harry didn’t know, he knew the place was nothing like the Dursleys. It was dark with walls full of books. What windows were in the room, were small and hidden behind potted plants and more books. There were no curtains, but a look through Ares eyes told them, that no one would be able to look inside anyway. Aunt Petunia would probably still carefully look out for the neighbours in case they looked her way. Some people just liked living in misery, Ares had said once, they preferred to feed and sew Wrathspurts and become Nargels. Harry still didn’t know what either word meant, he understood the sentiment though.
Ares had realised he didn’t fully understand her, but other then telling him, that he can ask her everything and she will give him an answer, even if it would be ‘I don’t know how to answer that.’ Or ‘Eh…’. She hadn’t answered his unasked question. Harry had been angry first, but after some thinking realised, that if he can’t even ask his sister about the meaning of a word, then how is he to ask anyone anything. Asking question might be forbitten at the Dursleys and Dudley made sure the rule would be continued in school, but at some point, he would get a letter to a magical school. Most likely Hogwarts, as it was the only school in Britain. And there would be no Dudley and no Dursleys. He could finally be as good as his homework implied. The homework he prepared mentally before writing it down with the added mistakes to make him seem more stupid than Dudley. It was getting harder, and he couldn’t wait until he would finally be able to at least be average. Thankfully Ares had found out about his schoolwork room in his mind. They had connected it to their mind palace and Ares would write his first attempt out and ask a teacher to correct it for her. As she was constantly moving places, she was used to having homework finished, which hadn’t been asked by her current teacher. Not to forget that she knew how to ask people something. Not everything, but something. He was such a freak. He couldn’t even ask her what Wrathspurts were…
"You are not a freak Hades." A voice in his head said, which sounded a lot like his sister. "That’s because I told you. Why are you spiralling, by the way. Shouldn’t you be focused on Mister Snape? I know I said you could trust him to keep his word and that he wouldn’t intentionally injure a child, but to wander is much more than I thought you would be able to do for now."
‘He’s not here at the moment.’
Mister Snape had left him almost immediately to brew. Despite him saying before, he had lots of the potions stored. Harry was left in what seems to be a living room, confused. With no clue what where the house rules and no idea, what Mister Snape even wanted from him, because obviously it was not getting rid of old, stored potions.
‘He just said that he would brew and to not disturb him.’
"Okay. And now you’re wondering what you are allowed to do. Am I right?"
‘Yes, you are right. I don’t even know where I am. How should I know what the rules are….’ It was official, he was pathetic. The last sentence sounded even in his mind like it was ending in a childish wine.
"Use the standard rules for being invited in a new environment.
Where there are shoes, I place mine,
where there are jackets, mine should be.
No jumping, running or load noise
if you would like to be left in peace.
Just find a seat and read a book
for knowledge is power and you can’t be misunderstood."
‘Why does that rhyme?’ Harry asked absently while going to the nearest bookcase.
"Rhymes are easier to remember. Also, it’s better to not just take any book. It should be something simple or general. If it is something you’re interested in it’s even better. People tent to ask questions like ~What are reading? ~ afterwards they not only expect an answer including the title, even when they can read the title or know the book. They also want to start a conversation. If you picked a book on a subject where you can talk at least for a minute than you have more control over the conversation topic. And therefore, no questions you don’t want to talk about come up."
‘Wow, I should have known you have a license in conversation.’
"I just have lots of experience with being left in a new place and meeting new people who want to get to know you. Then, when you finally give them a chance to get to know you or you show yourself accidental, they throw you out and the whole game resets. Lots of work has made it possible for me to not be thrown out before one month’s stay, sometimes more. Sadly, no matter how much experience and work I put in it, sometimes it ends up being less, but I wasn’t responsible for that happening for a few years now. So, I don’t count those times."
There was a pause in conversation. Ares was still nearby, even though she had mentioned earlier, that her morning break was over and she had to go back to classes. The moment when he had asked to look through her eyes for a moment, to get a better feel for the room he had been left in was only as long as had been necessary. Until Harry had his mental spiral and Ares pulled him out. Before Harry could think much more about why Ares was still nearby instead of focusing on her lesson, he read a word on one of the books he recalled from their conversation on how their mind-connection worked, ‘Occlumency was one of those words for mind-magic, right?’
"Yes, Occlumency is the magical art to protect one’s mind. Some consider mind-palaces, and therefore the training to remember details as Occlumency as well, I personally believe them to be different mind-arts. Like Boxing and Judo, both are sports in which you learn to fight, but the techniques are vastly different."
Harry pulled the book out it merely read ‘The Art of Occlumency’ on the cover.
"It’s a good choice. Personally, I wouldn’t have chosen this book, but as you already told him about our mental connection it should give you something to talk about. I would’ve probably chosen something about plants or ingredients preparation. He is a Professor for Potions so he should have several books on the topic."
‘While I do like to tend to the garden, that has nothing to do with the plants and all to do with escaping out of view for a few hours as well as being able to sneak some water on hot days.’ Harry smiled. He sent the feeling to Ares over the bond, so the atmosphere between them wouldn’t crash. ‘Now what? I don’t see any shoes or jackets anywhere.’
"But there was an armchair. Just place your shoes on the floor below the armchair in sit down. If he gets angry, and that’s a big if, then you can apologise for assuming and asking were you should have sat down instead. Same for the book, if he gets angry, apologise and asked which books you are allowed to read. I don’t think he will mind though, so just read, relax - oh shoot, the teacher asked me up to the board because he believe I haven’t paid her enough attention. Can’t she see that I’m busy?!"
Harry could feel the eye roll as well as the giggle over their bond. Knowing Ares, only the eye roll would have been visible, or if she considered the teacher acceptable, neither.
Either way she was not nearby anymore. Harry knew he could easily travel the connection to her, but her classes were quite boring as she was a year below him and he had a book to read.