Defence
‘Severus.’
‘Lucius.’
Their pleasant greetings lie heavy atop the sharp tension below. Severus indicates to the comfortable seat he has placed for the Malfoy patriarch, and takes his own seat behind his desk.
‘So. Here we are again.’ Lucius drawls. ‘My son the victim not of mere incompetence this time, but a purposeful physical attack from a teacher.’ His voice is smooth as silk, but the words bitten out sharply.
‘Believe me, no one is more outraged than I.’ Severus responds. ‘Draco wished to make a formal complaint himself, with which I have assisted him, accompanied with witness statements from Petronella and two other students. My son included.’
‘Potter?’ Lucius frowns.
‘Harry saw the entire incident, and was quite appalled.’ Severus responds. ‘No doubt you shall have ample opportunity to discuss the complaint during the next board meeting. If the governors were to find it necessary to remove Professor Moody, you would certainly find no dispute from me.’
‘Hmm.’ Lucius squints. ‘Not enjoying the company of an ex-auror at the dinner table?’ He almost smiles.
Severus scoffs.
‘Not to mention our friend Crouch.’ Severus sneers.
‘Ah yes, I heard about that.’ Lucius lights up. ‘Accused of casting the Morsmordre no less. Tut tut Severus.’
Severus doesn’t respond, but summons the whiskey and two tumblers.
‘You were at the World Cup.’ He says as he pours the drinks. ‘I wondered if you recognised any… old friends.’
Lucius hisses through his teeth.
‘Bunch of imbecilic upstarts.’ He knocks back the whiskey and holds out his glass for another measure. ‘Brazenly causing chaos like that, with the gall to dress themselves like Death Eaters.’ He sneers.
‘I take it then you were not consulted…’
‘I’ve worked fucking hard Snape to get where I am after…’ Lucius grits his teeth. ‘I don’t need some jumped up little lunatics making a fucking scene.’ He blows out a harsh breath, as if the words themselves are distasteful. Then he looks at Severus carefully. ‘You neither?’
‘I have my own plans as you well know Lucius.’ Severus drawls.
‘It would help if I knew what they fucking were.’ Lucius slams down his glass. ‘Do you really care about him? The Potter boy? He’s not really your son, so what is it? Insurance? Contingency? Please don’t tell me you think you can actually go against him.’
‘All in good time my dear Lucius.’ Severus drawls. ‘My advice would be to hedge your bets. But then you always were rather good at that.’
~~~~
Petra groans, and pulls the covers over her head.
‘Come on. Up.’ A weighty voice intones.
‘Oh piss off you old bastard.’ She grumbles. It cannot be morning yet. It just can’t. Ok so, yes she might have agreed that early morning training was a good idea, but that was last night. This morning – if it was even morning – it seems like a terrible idea.
‘Charming.’ Severus drawls. ‘Now get that fat arse out of bed.’
‘Why don’t you come here and make me. Professor.’ Petra murmurs as seductively as her morning voice will allow. ‘I thought you liked my fat arse anyway.’ She pulls the covers up to her waist and wiggles said bottom.
‘Fucking hell, you really are a whore.’ Severus mutters, one hand sliding up her leg to squeeze the flesh in question.
‘Mmm. I know.’ Petra purrs and she feels his weight shift onto the bed above her, so she pushes up her hips to try and rub against his crotch. ‘I also happen to know how much you love me like that. So why don’t we just have a little warm up right here in bed.’ She says writhing up against him.
Severus sniffs at her hair and groans, then suddenly he is up and off her, pulling the duvet with him.
‘Hey! You utter arsehole!’ Petra protests, throwing a pillow at him, which he dodges.
‘And I happen to know that you like me like that.’ Severus bats back. ‘Coffee’s in the kitchen. Harry will be here in five.’
Petra groans again. Doesn’t she even get her coffee in bed? Something is going to have to be done with that man. Or to him. She scowls and hauls herself out of bed.
Training begins with a jog around the Quidditch stands, down to Petra’s cottage, then back up the hill. Petra hasn’t run this far in a very long time and is regretting agreeing to this more with every step. It is quite satisfying though to see that Severus is not as fit as he thought either, and Harry runs literal rings around both of them.
‘That’s it.’ Petra stops halfway around. ‘I was not built for distance. I’ve got twice the fat to muscle ratio that you have.’ She pants.
Severus jogs on the spot for a moment while she catches her breath.
‘Bullshit Blishwick.’ Severus barks in a voice Petra knows is supposed to anger her. Anger leads to adrenaline, leads to energy. ‘You’ve got slow pigeon.’ He tries next.
‘Alright, half-blood. I’ll race you.’ Petra raises a brow.
A moment later the crow flies over Severus and Harry’s heads.
‘Oy! Cheater!’ Harry shouts.
Severus just smirks.
‘Come on then son.’ He calls over his shoulder as he sprints off, but Harry soon catches up and overtakes him.
‘What took you so long?’ Petra raises her brow, sitting with her legs swinging over the side of the stone bridge.
Severus leans over with his hands on his knees and spits into the grass.
‘I think dad needs this more than we do you know.’ Harry grins cheekily.
‘Oh I agree.’ Petra nods imperiously, standing up on the wide railing to tower over them. ‘Twenty push ups each.’
‘What about you?’ Harry protests.
Petra smirks and falls back over the edge.
‘Merlin!’ Harry gasps, his heart in his throat as the crow soars up out of the crevasse on shining black wings.
Severus mutters something about learning to fly, and then he’ll show her, before taking off at a sprint in the direction of the stone circle.
‘Wait up!’ Harry calls, chasing after him.
The training session ends with meditation in the stone circle, sitting on a conjured blanket with a candle floating between them.
‘Er, what am I supposed to be doing?’ Harry hazards after a minute. Severus and Petra are both sitting perfectly still, just staring at the candle.
‘Look at the candle. Focus all of your attention on it and do not think of anything else. We’ll try just a few minutes to start with.’ Petra explains.
Harry tries, he really does, but every few seconds he finds his mind wandering off thinking about what might be for breakfast, and if Oliver has organised those friendly Quidditch training sessions yet. Apparently Cedric had liked the idea, and they had agreed to share the pitch, which Harry was quite pleased about. Although he was almost certain Cedric had a girlfriend – he certainly seemed to have a bunch of girls hanging about almost everywhere he went, all smiles and…
‘Harry.’
Oh shit the candle. Right.
‘You must clear your mind.’ Severus intones.
‘I’m trying, but all these thoughts just keep popping in, and then one thought leads to another…’
‘Do not allow them…’
‘But how?!’ Harry huffs, as his father rubs his eyes in frustration.
‘Stare at the flame.’ Petra instructs. Harry takes a breath and listens. ‘Watch how it flickers in the breeze, how the colours undulate, let every detail of that tiny fire fill up your entire vision and all of your thoughts until nothing else in world exists. Only the flame.’
The pear shaped flame condenses down low, then stretches up tall and thin, then leans over to one side. It looks almost like a little creature doing it’s morning exercises, like a little yellow dollop man crouching and stretching…
The flame just the flame.
Actually it’s not just yellow, as Petra said there are lots of different tones from orange through to nearly white. Harry watches the colours and shapes change, and begins to think he might be getting the hang of this.
A minute later though he suddenly realises he is humming and looks up to see Petra looking slightly amused, but Severus looking more than slightly annoyed.
‘Sorry.’ Harry cringes.
‘This is important.’ Severus intones.
‘I know, I am trying.’ Harry grumbles, to which his father raises one of his “doesn’t look that way to me” brows.
‘Just keep practising, whenever you can.’ Petra tells Harry, while glaring at Severus.
After a moment of silent argument, Severus relents and they all stand up.
‘Well I suppose you two are hungry.’ He drawls as he banishes the blanket.
‘Starving.’ Harry and Petra say in unison.
‘Come along then.’ Severus says, slinging an arm around Harry’s shoulders. ‘I might need a crutch though, I think I may have pulled a muscle beating you here.’ He says, leaning some of his weight on his son and putting on an exaggerated hobble.
‘You did not beat me!’ Harry protests. ‘It was a draw, and that was only because you cheated.’
‘Sometimes cheating is required if one’s opponent has an advantage – in this case youthful energy and Gryffindor relentlessness.’
‘Was that a compliment?’ Harry grins.
‘Not likely.’ Severus responds.
‘You’re not really injured are you?’ Harry asks after a moment. ‘I’d have seen if you pulled a muscle.’
‘Took you long enough.’ Severus mutters, giving up on the fake limp, though he doesn’t remove his arm from Harry’s shoulders. When his son doesn’t protest or try to pull away he gives his shoulder a squeeze, then reaches up to smooth down his messy hair.
‘You need a hairband.’ Severus says.
~~~~
Harry thought he knew what to expect in class today. Fred and George, along with quite a lot of the older kids had been going on about Moody’s lessons on the Unforgivable Curses all week. But hearing about it, and experiencing it were two different things entirely. Which, he supposes, was the point of the lesson.
They’ve had difficult lessons before. McGonagall is strict, and certainly doesn’t coddle them; Snape actively berates them at times. Binns is in danger of boring them all to death; and though Hagrid means well, attending a Care of Magical Creatures lesson is somewhat like visiting a zoo without any cages, when the lions haven’t been fed for a week. And that’s not even starting on the previous Defence Professors.
But the atmosphere in the classroom today is very different to any of those experiences.
It was exciting at first. The Unforgivable Curses. The worst of the worst. Darkest of the Dark Arts. Some of the students were eager, others nervous, all of them fascinated to witness that which was deemed so reprehensible that the use of this magic was classified as unforgivable. The reality is very different. Even the few animated Slytherins who had been joking and whispering at the start of the lesson are struck dumb.
Harry doesn’t know about anyone else, but the thing that hits him like a bludger to the chest, is how easy it is. He had expected an Unforgivable Curse to be more complicated somehow, or perhaps to require some immense amount of power, like when Petra casts a difficult spell and she seemed to draw the magic in around her, as though being pulled into a black hole.
Moody says that it requires a lot of power, but it just looks so effortless. He might as well have been casting a levitation charm, or a tripping jinx, not torturing a creature to insanity. Everyone is so utterly transfixed that it takes Hermione to speak up and bring to the Professor’s attention that certain members of the class are beginning to appear rather disturbed. Neville in particular.
After that Avada Kedavra seems almost merciful, but again, so simple.
Two cold words, and a flick of a wand. That’s all that had been required to take Harry’s parents from him.
He suddenly notices everyone’s eyes on him, and his brain catches up to the last few words the Professor had said; “only one person has ever survived it, and he’s sitting right here.” Harry tips his head forward slightly, glad of his longer hair which at least partly covers the ragged scar on his forehead, but his eyes flick upwards and for a moment lock with that roving false eye of Moody’s.
The Professor turns away and continues to lecture the class, but Harry doesn’t hear any of it, his heart is racing, his thoughts a blur. The fractured memory pulled forth by the dementors last year plays on repeat, alongside Moody killing the spider, his adoptive parents risking their lives for him, and the fear that he could lose everything all over again. His breaths are becoming fast and shallow, that panicked feeling rising in his chest.
Breathe.
He focuses on the blank page in front of him. Pictures the candle flame like Petra had taught him.
Eventually the classroom comes back into focus; the scratching of quills, and Moody’s gruff voice as he explains the punishment for casting an unforgivable – life in Azkaban – and how they must always maintain constant vigilance.
It is as though someone has dunked a bucket of ice water over the entire room. Nobody whispers a word. Not the same quiet as his father’s Potions Class after he has lost his rag and bade them to all work in silence. No, this was a silence created not by fear or respect, but rather of shock.
As the lesson ends a ripple of stilted chatter disrupts the tension, like footsteps cracking the ice of a frozen puddle. Some laugh nervously plastering over the discomfort with humour – or maybe they really don’t understand the weight of what they have witnessed. Maybe not everyone can, it’s too much, or too far removed still.
Harry leaves the class with Ron and Hermione, walking along only vaguely aware of his surroundings as if covered in a thick blanket. They come to a stop next to Neville, and Harry feels as though he could be looking in a mirror. Neville smiles and says something about dinner, but his face is pale, and his eyes have a far away look in them.
When Moody comes down the stairs after them, and invites Neville back to his office, Harry thinks perhaps he should do something. Neville looks terrified, and Moody seemed to have rather different ideas about how to treat the students than the other staff, but Harry can’t make any words form in his throat, nor can he lift the shroud of apathy he seemed to have laid upon himself. So he allows Neville to be led away and proceeds down to the hall with his friends.
As soon as his eyes pick out the black silhouette of his father stalking up form the dungeons however, it is as though a light snaps on.
‘Dad!’ Harry calls out, hurrying over, ignoring the odd looks he gets.
‘Alright Harry?’ Severus frowns, accepting the rather gangly teenage boy into his arms somewhat awkwardly.
Then he leads them off to a quiet corner, where Harry explains the DADA lesson, to an increasingly irate Snape.
‘Nothing is going to happen to us.’ Severus insists, holding those green eyes with his black ones.
‘But there’s no counter for the killing curse, Moody said…’ Harry insists.
‘No. But you have survived it once. Your mother Lily’s sacrifice, along with the blood bond and Petra’s own powerful magic…’ Severus trails off. Petra would not approve of him giving the boy empty promises. Thankfully Harry looks much reassured without him needing to continue.
‘He made it look so easy.’ Harry murmurs.
‘It is not.’ Severus states. ‘You have to mean it – intent as your mother always says.’ He tries to smile but the muscles simple won’t work. ‘Killing is never easy, nor should it be.’ Severus goes very still, his eyes cold and dark.
‘He showed us crucio too.’ Harry shivers, then suddenly remembers. ‘Neville! He was really… upset. Moody took him to his office, but…’
Severus tenses, his lips pressed together in a thin line.
‘Alone?’ He asks.
Harry nods.
~~
Neville wouldn’t have imagined he would ever be relieved to see Professor Snape.
He was no longer quite so terrified of the Potions Master; it was rather difficult to remain terrified when one had been in his house and seen that it was not in fact a vampire’s den, or a cave full of torture devices, but actually rather normal, with mismatched furniture, faded curtains, and washing up in the sink. He had seen Snape without his teacher’s robe, smiling at his son opening his birthday presents (albeit from the shadow of a nearby tree). Neville had even managed to hold a somewhat short and stilted conversation with the Professor without sweating out every drop of liquid from his body.
Still he might not have been sure that his boggart would have changed from last year, if not for the sight he witnessed in DADA class that afternoon.
What had happened to his parents was a tragedy which he had always felt somewhat disconnected from. He knew what had happened to them because he had been told about it, first in vague euphemisms, and as he got older in more precise terms. He saw the results of it every time he went to visit his parents, but he had no memory of them from before, so it didn’t feel like a loss exactly. Like an invisible creature that clung to his back, he could never escape that tragedy, but neither could he see it nor touch it.
However, the sight of that spider, twisting, screaming, legs twitching at unnatural angles; that spider had shown him in acute visceral detail what Bellatrix Lestrange had done to his parents. How much they had suffered. The utter torture which had stripped them of everything, leaving only two empty shells. Ghosts with bodies, hair, teeth, hands, eyes, but only a fleeting awareness of anything – their own son included. It was the brain’s defence mechanism against the pain, someone had once told him. Not a very good one he had thought at the time. But now he understood.
He had left the classroom when everyone else did, but stopped at a window halfway down the stairs, just staring, not really seeing. Someone spoke to him and he responded, but he didn’t really communicate, or at least he had no idea what he had said. Professor Moody came, and he didn’t want to go with him, but he couldn’t protest. When he looked to Harry to help him, all he saw was a reflection of his own numbness.
When the door of the office closed behind him, Neville had a sudden stab of irrational fear that Professor Moody was going to do it to him, leave him twisting and writhing on the floor like the spider, like his parents.
Instead the Professor gives him tea, and talks about plants of all things, and gives him a book on Herbology. That was a relief, but he still felt shaky and uncomfortable.
A sharp knock precedes the menacing form of the Potions Master as he strides into the room uninvited. Moody doesn’t look surprised to see him.
‘Snape.’ He growls.
‘Harry was concerned about you Mr Longbottom.’ Snape intones, looking directly at Neville without even giving Moody the time of day.
‘Oh, um, thank you sir.’ Neville mutters, not really sure what to say. Good old Harry though. He’d clearly been as disturbed as Neville himself had been, yet he’d thought to send his father – the most terrifying wizard in the school – to check on him. ‘I… I’m alright.’ He manages. It was rather odd to feel like the Potions Master cared at all about him – even if it was just for Harry.
‘I was just giving Mr Longbottom a book on Herbology.’ Moody says. ‘Sprout tells me he’s quite gifted.’
Snape glances at the book and arches a brow. Neville blushes and bites his lip, looking down at the book.
‘Er, I was just about to say Professor…’ He glances at Moody nervously. ‘It’s just I… I already have this…’ He almost squeaks.
Snape is looking so smug Neville can’t help but feel pleased. For once he is on the inside of the joke.
‘P-Professor Snape lent me some books over the summer.’ He manages to say without too much of a tremor.
‘Did he now?’ Moody sneers, his prosthetic eye swivelling in it’s socket.
‘Yes Longbottom and my son get on quite well.’ Snape crosses his arms and smirks at the other Professor.
They stare at each other for a long moment, before Snape speaks again.
‘Dinner has begun. Get along Longbottom.’ Snape intones.
Neville hops up, placing the tome on Moody’s desk, and hurrying out of the room, not sure if the Professors aren’t going to start firing unforgivable curses at each other.
~~
When Severus follows Longbottom out of the office a few moments later the boy has gone, but Petra is leaning against the opposite wall.
‘Harry told me you’d come up here.’ She says with a slight smirk. ‘I thought you might need help burying the body.’
Severus snorts slightly and pulls her into his arms.
‘I have better control than that love. You know that.’ He murmurs into her ear, while taking a deep breath of her scent.
‘It was very sweet of you to go running to Longbottom’s rescue.’ Petra teases as they walk down the stairs.
‘Piss off.’ Severus grumbles.
‘Alright love. I’ll see you later.’ She winks and heads for the front door to get in a quick fly before retreating to their quarters for a nice quiet dinner alone.
Severus takes his own meal in the hall, noting that Harry looks much better, and is surrounded by his friends. Afterwards he finds Petra in his office, and she offers to come help out with his students, so they make their way to the common room together.
~~
Just like any snake, Slytherins have to be handled very carefully. None will admit to being upset by Moody’s lesson, there is a lot of bravado being thrown about, including some pretty nasty comments, and the atmosphere is fractious to say the least.
Severus and Petra make their presence known, helping out with minor complaints, and dampening caustic tempers. Twice Severus has to deduct points for use of the M word. He never takes points outside of the Slytherin common room, and even inside never more than five at a time, but they all know he means business when he does do it.
Petra simply threatens to cool their tempers with a cold bath of lake water.
‘She’ll do it.’ One of Prefects tells the younger years.
‘Yeah, you weren’t here for the great flood of ‘86.’ Another nods knowingly.
‘Neither were you.’ Someone argues.
‘My brother was. They were picking kelp out of the chimney for weeks.
‘Rubbish!’
~~~~
Harry had been relieved when Neville came to the hall for dinner, and he made room for Nev to sit next to him.
‘Thanks for sending your dad.’ He whispered in Harry’s ear as he sat down.
They had a bit of a chat and Neville told Harry to thank his dad too.
‘Not quite so scared of him now then?’ Harry had teased.
‘Not quite.’ Neville grinned back.
After dinner Harry went down to Snape’s quarters, but his parents weren’t there. He tried to do some of his homework, then went to look in Sev’s office, but all he finds is a rather sullen looking Draco Malfoy.
‘They’re in Slytherin.’ Draco comments, glancing up.
‘Oh.’ Harry says, not sure what to do now. ‘Do you want to come in?’ He asks after a moment, nodding back towards the door in the corner.
Draco raises one brow slightly, then shrugs and stands up.
‘Alright.’
‘Er… turn around.’ Harry says, not sure if he should show Draco how to open the door – even though he wouldn’t be able to open it himself without being keyed into the wards. But Severus is teaching him to be cautious. Or paranoid, depending on one’s perspective.
Draco huffs and crosses his arms.
‘I have been in before you know.’ He grumbles, though he does as requested and turns his back.
Harry places his wand to the notch and the bookcase swings open.
‘Come on then.’ He says, leading the way in. ‘Shoes.’ Harry instructs, kicking his own off. Draco unlaces his own smart black shoes and places them neatly by the wall, whilst somewhat subtly looking around. Harry gets the distinct impression that Malfoy has not in fact been in here before.
‘You want some cocoa?’ Harry asks over his shoulder.
‘Cocoa? What are we babies?’ Draco sneers. ‘Isn’t there some firewhiskey around here?’
‘You want to nick some of Snape’s whiskey?!’ Harry scoffs. ‘Are you mad?!’
‘Oh fine.’ Draco slumps down on the sofa, though his eyes are still skipping around the room taking in every detail. ‘I suppose cocoa will have to do.’ He drawls.
Harry chuckles to himself as he heats a pan of milk and summons two mugs from the cupboard. Then he decides to get a plate of biscuits too, using his wand instead of doing it by hand as Petra has been encouraging him.
‘That was an… interesting Defence lesson today huh?’ Harry says having carefully levitated the biscuits and drinks over to the living room.
Draco says nothing, but frowns at the trickle of hot chocolate spilling down the side of the mug. Harry places everything carefully on the table, then grabs one of the cups along with a chocolate digestive. After a moment Draco copies him, dunking and crunching the biscuit as if it has personally offended him.
‘It’s her favourite spell.’ He mutters after a minute of near silence. ‘My aunt, Bellatrix. Crucio.’
‘Oh.’ Harry says, staring at Draco as part of his soggy biscuit drops into the mug. ‘She didn’t ever do that to you did she?’
‘No, my mum would have hit the roof! I think.’ Draco frowns. ‘But… well it runs in the family doesn’t it? Madness. Cruelty. Sometimes I wonder if I… never mind.’
‘They’re not all bad. The Black family.’ Harry says. ‘Look at Andy, and Sirius.’
‘Your godfather spent 12 years in Azkaban!’ Draco retorts.
‘He was exonerated.’ Harry protests. ‘Ok maybe he’s a bad example. But Andy’s really nice, and relatively normal.’
‘Yeah, but I’m not am I? I got the bad gene.’ Draco scowls. ‘I’ll never be nice like Andromeda.’
‘Neither is Petra.’ Harry argues. ‘She thinks niceness is way over rated. But she’s good too. Like, she does good things.’
‘She’s not a Black.’ Draco argues.
‘She’s as much a Black as you are.’ Harry insists.
‘No she isn’t, she’s a whole generation removed…’ Draco trails off. ‘But I get your point.’
‘Sev’s done some pretty bad stuff too, and he’s a bastard of a teacher, but they both helped me. It’s not like if you do a few bad things, and you’re not always perfect and nice, that makes you a terrible irredeemable person.’ Harry presses his point.
‘Tell that to Moody.’ Draco mutters. ‘All that about Azkaban, and showing us the curses, he thinks all us Slytherins are headed straight there when we leave school – or he hopes we are.’
‘You do know the world doesn’t revolve around you don’t you?’ Harry scoffs. ‘How do you think I felt seeing the curse that… you know.’
‘That was rather insensitive of him.’ Draco says. ‘And for the record, no I don’t think the world revolves around me. But he was trying to warn you lot. He was threatening us. As far as Moody’s concerned you might as well just portkey every Slytherin straight to Azkaban, cause we’re all rotten to the core.’
‘You’re not though. Are you. My dad’s not.’ Harry asserts.
Draco stares at him for a long time, then looks away again.
‘Sorry for nearly hexing you in the back the other day.’ He says into his cocoa.
‘It’s alright, you missed.’ Harry grins.
‘You know I was trying to show you the story in the paper right?’ Draco says.
‘Well you didn’t have to do that in such a public place.’ Harry huffs.
‘Yes I did – we’re supposed to hate each other remember? And I put all the attention on Weasley.’ Draco insists.
‘How is that better?’
‘To take the attention off the story about Snape.’ Draco huffs.
‘Oh. Well, thanks I guess, but maybe next time you could be slightly less of an arsehole to Ron. I don’t really want my friends to suffer just to take the heat off myself.’
‘Suffer? Weasley’s lucky to be your friend. First day on the train he just happens to be sitting in the same carriage as you and bam – best friend of the boy-who-lived.’
‘You’re not still sulking about that are you?’ Harry laughs. ‘Maybe if you’d been a bit friendlier…’
‘I was perfectly friendly! I practically rolled out the red carpet!’ Draco protests.
‘Oh right, yeah – what was it… something about me “not making friends with the wrong sort”, whilst looking down your nose at Ron.’
‘Exactly. That was excellent advice.’ Draco insists. ‘All he’s done so far is get you in a load of trouble, and moan that you’re more popular than him. I mean what did he expect?’
‘Uh huh. And how would you have made a better friend?’ Harry raises a brow.
‘Well I’d have got you into Slytherin for a start, then Snape probably would have noticed you were being abused sooner. And I certainly would not have let you go gallivanting around stealing cars and chasing bloody basilisks.’
‘Let me?!’ Harry scoffs. ‘And the car thing was your bloody elf’s fault!’
‘Well exactly. I could have made Dobby stop his shenanigans, and got him to apparate us to Hogsmeade.’
‘Right.’ Harry huffs.
‘And I taught you how to kiss. How’s that going by the way? Managed to bag anyone good yet?’
‘You make it sound like picking a book off the shelf.’ Harry huffs.
‘I’ll take that as a no.’ Draco rolls his eyes.
Harry chucks the rest of his biscuit at the git.
‘Hey Potter!’ Draco clunks his mug down and stands up, brushing off the crumbs with a scowl.
‘There you are.’ A voice intones from the door. ‘It’s nearly curfew Mr Malfoy.’
‘Sorry sir.’ Draco says. ‘Harry invited me in.’ He adds somewhere between innocent and accusatory.
‘Oh Draco, good. Bridget was about ready to muster a search party.’ Petra says, coming in behind Severus.
‘Would you like to talk?’ Severus indicates back to his office. Draco says he’s fine, but Snape follows the boy anyway, nodding to Petra, who stays to talk to Harry.
‘Sorry to keep you waiting.’ Severus tells Draco, pointing to one of the comfortable chairs by the fire in his office.
‘That’s alright sir.’ Draco responds. ‘I’m ok now.’
Severus looks down at him, then takes his shoulders firmly in his hands and fixes him with a piercing look.
‘Professor Moody is neither judge nor jury. You are not your father, nor is your life’s trajectory set in stone.’ Severus tells the boy.
‘Thank you sir. Harry was actually…’
‘The two of you are getting along?’ Severus releases his grip and raises his brows. ‘Good. I realise this is difficult, but I believe your father may change his position in this matter soon. He has given his permission for you to participate in the Mabon ritual.’
‘He has?’ Draco sits up looking much brighter.
‘Yes.’ Severus tells him with a quirk of his lip. ‘Now off to the common room before your fan club comes knocking on my door.’
Severus sighs heavily as he comes back into his quarters. Harry is spread out on one sofa, and Petra on the other, both reading. He allows himself a small smile at the scene, before walking over and summoning a bottle of firewhiskey. Then he pushes Petra’s legs out of the way and sits down. She looks up and holds out a hand to him, then pulls him down to lay his head on her chest.
‘What a bloody day.’ He mutters while Petra strokes his hair.
‘Neville said to say thanks for rescuing him.’ Harry says.
‘Not much rescuing was required.’ Severus huffs.
‘Yeah he said, but he was glad anyway. He said Moody gave him the creeps, and he looked pretty disturbed after class.’ Harry responds.
‘Mmm. He would be.’ Severus mutters.
‘Why?’ Harry asks, sitting up.
‘You do not know what happened to his parents?’ Severus lifts his head slightly, and Harry shakes his head. He hadn’t known how to ask, and Neville hadn’t volunteered anything.
Severus tenses. He did not wish to go down this particular rabbit hole, not tonight.
‘Alice and Frank Longbottom were subjected to extended torture under the cruciatis curse.’ Petra states, closing her book and resting it on Severus’ shoulder.
‘Shit.’ Harry whispers. ‘Er sorry dad, I mean… that’s awful.’
‘It’s alright Harry. It is shit.’ Severus responds, looking at his son carefully. He waits for the question, but it doesn’t come, so he rests his head back down, listening to the steady beat of Petra’s heart. Either Harry is as reluctant as he is to confront his past, or it simply hasn’t occurred to him to ask whether his father has ever cast that curse – or any of the unforgivable curses.
They are going to have to talk about it at some point, but for now Severus is happy to let those particular skeletons remain in the closet.
~~~~