The Polyjuice Potion
Nobody knew exactly how long Mr Weasley had been lying alone on the floor of the Department of Mysteries. They only knew that it was a miracle he had survived for more than a few minutes.
“Arthur would have drank an antidote to the venom and a blood replenisher before he passed out,” Sirius had told them confidently once Harry, Ron, Fred, George, and Ginny had arrived at Grimmauld Place via portkey. “All the Order members working alone carry a vial on them at all times because we know about Voldemort’s snake.”
But Sirius’s uncharacteristic optimism had done little to quell everyone’s fears. They knew Mr Weasley had been taken to St. Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries and that he was still alive, but nothing more.
Tempers had flared in their desperation for information and to do something other than staying put. Rather than it giving them a new appreciation for Sirius’s situation, the twins had lashed out at him for his refusal to let them rush off to St. Mungo’s in the middle of the night.
“Your father knew what he was getting into and he won’t thank you for messing things up for the Order!” Sirius had told them angrily. “This is how it is - This is why you’re not in the Order - you don’t understand - there are things worth dying for!”
“Easy for you to say, stuck here!” bellowed Fred. “I don’t see you risking your neck!”
The little colour remaining in Sirius’s face had vanished and Harry too felt like he had been punched in the stomach. Fred could hardly have chosen more burning words - he’d said exactly what Sirius had been incessantly telling himself ever since Voldemort’s return.
Sirius hadn’t been outside in nearly four months, and he was understandably desperate for fresh air and frustrated by his lack of use in the Order. So, Harry had been extremely proud to watch him remain calm and not rise to Fred’s bait. He’d insisted everyone have a seat and a drink while they waited and with no other option available, they all had obliged him.
For the rest of the night, Harry lay curled up, not sleeping, on one end of the sofa opposite Ron. Ron hadn’t spoken a word since Professor McGonagall had come into the Gryffindor boys’ dormitory to wake them and explain what had happened. Fred and George both sat with their heads in their hands and Ginny was trying hard not to doze off in the large recliner. The only sound in the room was of the clock ticking on the wall. Nobody moved or spoke and the wait was excruciating.
When a bright red flame suddenly shot out of the fireplace, just as the sun was beginning to rise in the sky, Harry almost thought it was a figment of his imagination.
He wasn’t the only one who did a double take while the flames transformed into a scroll of parchment. Then all the Weasleys jumped to their feet at the same time to grab for it. Ron's legs were the longest, but Fred was faster. He ran ahead of his siblings and held the short note barely an inch away from his face.
“It’s from Mum,” he told them, and Harry immediately felt overwhelmed by both hope and dread.
“Oh, read it aloud!” Ginny snapped at her brother impatiently. “C’mon!”
“Dad is going to be alright,” Fred read, and the collective breath they’d all been holding seemed to release at once. Harry’s heart, which had felt like it was stuck in his throat, was pumping painfully. He shared a look with Sirius, who had also stood for the news.
“He lost a lot of blood and the snake’s venom has proven resistant to most healing spells,” Fred continued. “Dad is going to have to stay at the hospital in the meantime, but he should make a full recovery. Stay at Headquarters and I will pick you up for a visit in a few days. Love, Mum.”
“A few days?” Ginny repeated. “That means Dad will be stuck in the hospital over Christmas.”
“Better than dead,” said Ron bluntly, wiping a bead of sweat off of his forehead.
“We’ll bring Christmas to him,” said George firmly. “Just think of all the nutter things people get up to around a holiday - I won’t mind a trip to St. Mungo’s, bound to be interesting.”
“We can brighten this old place up for Christmas as well,” Sirius suggested and Harry was quick to nod his head in agreement.
If there was one good thing to come from Mr Weasley’s ordeal, it would have to be ensuring that Sirius would have company during Christmas. Ron’s family wouldn’t all be travelling back to the Burrow when the hospital was in London and Harry had been feeling rather guilty about accepting the Weasleys’ invitation to Christmas when it meant leaving Sirius behind.
“I’ll help,” Harry said eagerly.
The old house might no longer be a breeding ground for pests and dark creatures, but it was still extremely gloomy. Perhaps if they made it more festive, it wouldn’t torture Sirius so much to stay there.
“We’ll need a Christmas tree,” Ginny said with a yawn, sinking back down on her chair.
“And some fireworks,” Fred grinned, as he folded up his mother’s note into a tiny square and pocketed it. “We’ll dedicate them to Dad, he’ll love it.”
“Sounds like a plan to me,” Sirius said cheerfully.
The tension in the house seemed to resolve itself as though they hadn't just been up all night in a state of panic and grief. Ron chugged the butterbeer he’d been clenching in his hand all night and then announced to them all that he was going upstairs to bed. This drew everyone else’s attention to how tired they all were as well.
“Why don’t we all get some sleep and then we can get started on plans for Christmas after lunch?’ Sirius suggested.
But a cloud of concern had crossed over George’s face.
“I just realized we left all our fireworks at Hogwarts, Fred - we weren’t planning to leave in the middle of the night.”
“We can ask Lee to owl them here,” Fred replied, and then he shot a nervous glance at Sirius and cleared his throat. “Anyway, I -”
“I hope Lee comes through,” Sirius said, patting Fred on the back and cutting through whatever he was about to say to show that no apology was necessary.
“We’ve added some improvements to them since the summer,” George told Sirius with a grin.
“Excellent,” said Sirius. “Now I want you all to go upstairs and get some sleep. I’ll wake you, if your mum messages again.”
“You coming up, Harry?” Ron asked, having noticed that Harry hadn’t made to move like the rest of them.
“In a bit,” Harry replied, nodding his head at Sirius who had begun collecting up their empty Butterbeer bottles.
“What a night, Harry,” Sirius sighed as he came to sit down beside him once the Weasleys' footsteps could no longer be heard going up the stairs.
“Will you tell me what Mr Weasley was guarding?” asked Harry boldly. Now that they could trust he was going to be alright, Harry’s thoughts had turned to the strange circumstances surrounding the attack.
“I don’t know exactly what he was guarding,” Sirius replied, “none of us do. Dumbledore’s been irritatingly vague on the subject - we actually argued a bit about it the last time it came up, but I was overruled - I still maintain that you should know more than you’re being told.”
“Agreed,” Harry said quickly, “so go ahead.”
“Well, I can’t say very much because I simply don’t know,” Sirius said honestly. “I do know that Voldemort really wants something stored at the Ministry of Magic and that the Order is guarding it round the clock…it has something to do with the reason why Voldemort targeted your family and why it went wrong for him the night he killed your parents and tried to kill you. I’m sure Dumbledore knows exactly what happened and why - but he’s not going to tell anyone else.”
“Not even Professor Snape?” asked Harry.
“I don’t think so,” Sirius shook his head. “Although if anyone was going to be the exception to Dumbledore’s secrecy, it would be Severus. You should ask him if he knows anything about it - I don’t think he’d lie to you.”
“I’ll ask him,” Harry agreed slowly.
He felt pretty confident that he could trust Snape to be completely honest with him, even if that sometimes entailed being truthfully told that it wasn’t something he was willing to share. But then a thought occurred to him….
“Did my parents know why?” he asked.
“No,” Sirius said confidently. “James always told me everything and we only were told that Dumbledore had been tipped off by some spy that your family was in danger. Even then, it took a lot to convince James to go into hiding. Your mother’s common sense and both their protectiveness of you finally convinced him to do as Dumbledore instructed. Everything would have been fine if I hadn’t convinced James to make Wormtail secret keeper, instead of me...”
“It’s not your fault that Wormtail decided to be a cowardly rat,” Harry said sharply.
He could understand his father’s choice because Harry would never hesitate to trust Ron or Hermione with his own life either.
“I hate that my Mum and Dad died knowing one of their best friends had betrayed them.”
“It still haunts me,” said Sirius. “None of us could have possibly seen that coming. Peter hero-worshiped James - it was a bit pathetic to be honest. What did you think of the memory I gave you by the way?”
“It made me both happier and sadder than I’ve ever felt before,” Harry said matter-of-factly. “I’m so relieved Ron isn’t going to have to learn what it’s like to lose a parent. It’s torture to think about what could have been, but that’s also better than never knowing. Do you know what I mean?”
“I think so,” said Sirius quietly. “It’s a gift to learn about James and to think about him - it’s one of things I am the most grateful about getting back since I escaped the dementors - but the sting of missing him is rough and we have to carry that for the rest of our lives.”
“I wish he was around to teach me some of his stunts on a broomstick,” Harry said, on a lighter subject.
“Even so, you’ve inherited his talent,” Sirius said affectionately. “You fly as well as he did.”
“You weren’t too bad yourself,” said Harry. “How come you didn’t tell me before that you played Beater?”
“Well, I got kicked off the team in fifth year,” Sirius said nonchalantly, “and after that I gravitated towards motorbikes instead of broomsticks. I never turned down a flight with James though, and I also was the one who got you your first broomstick.”
“You did?”
This was news to Harry, who had no recollection of ever flying in his life before he got to Hogwarts.
“Just a little toy one that only rose a few inches above the ground, but you loved it. You used to zoom around on that thing and laugh your head off when you crashed into our ankles and we pretended you knocked us over.”
“I didn’t know that,” Harry said wistfully, feeling that familiar twinge that he always experienced when he thought about the life he had lost. All he had ever known was the Dursleys.
“Why did you get kicked off the team?”
“Oh…well,” Sirius’s smile disappeared and his expression became very grave. “It was for the prank Remus and I told you about the night I met you in the Shrieking Shack.”
“Tricking Snape to go into a werewolf’s den?” Harry asked quietly.
Well, James intervened and pulled him back before he got hurt,” Sirius said uncomfortably. “Obviously I regret my actions now - I probably would have been expelled if Dumbledore hadn’t been so concerned with hushing the entire thing up to protect Remus. All I got was detentions for the rest of the year and banned from playing Quidditch.”
“But why did you guys hate each other in the first place?” Harry pressed, “who started it?”
He didn’t know who he wanted to lay blame on. He just wanted to understand enough of it to lay it to rest.
“What, Severus hates me?” Sirius asked disbelievingly, as if this was news to him. “I hadn’t noticed….”
But when Harry didn’t smile, he just shrugged his shoulders.
“I don’t know, it was just one of those things,” he said, “sometimes kids are jerks - I don’t hate him though, at least not anymore…”
“Well, obviously I don’t hate him anymore either,” said Harry lightly.
Sirius ruffled Harry’s hair affectionately. “I’m glad that Severus is in your life and that means he’ll always have a place in mine too…did you know that he was the one who warned the Order about the snake and figured out how to combine the antidote with the Blood Replenisher to buy a victim some time?”
“I didn’t, but that doesn’t surprise me,” said Harry proudly.
He had come to appreciate the sight of Snape pouring over books and always making adjustments and improvements to the science that everyone else had accepted as good enough. He was creative and inventive, in a subtle way that could be so easily overlooked. Especially when Harry compared him to the fun and outgoing James he’d seen in pensieve. However, it was exactly Snape’s reservedness that made it possible for him to be there for Harry, and for the Order, without giving himself away. He didn’t want acknowledgement or riches, and it was so easy to miss all the things about him that Harry had come to admire most.
When Sirius insisted he go upstairs to bed a few minutes later, Harry knew he could count on a very deep sleep. Not only because he was tired and had been up all night but because of the sense of peace in his soul.
While he fully intended to ask Professor Snape for details on what Mr Weasley had been guarding at the Ministry of Magic next opportunity, right now Harry had temporarily paused those curiosities. Crawling into the bed across from the one where Ron lay snoring, Harry was appreciating the growing sense of simplicity he’d learned to enjoy when he could.
In the days that followed, Sirius appeared in the highest spirits that Harry had ever seen him in outside a pensieve. Grimmauld Place looked nothing like itself by Christmas Eve. After Sirius granted them all permission to do more undetectable magic, Harry and the Weasleys ran around the house pointing their wands at everything and anything, looking for ways to make it more festive. The house elf, Kreacher, popped his head around a corner every once in a while to scowl at them and mutter about their desecration of the most noble house of Black, but he was chased off when Sirius threatened to transfigure him a suit like Father Christmas and set him free.
“God Rest Ye Merry Hippogriffs,” Sirius sang at the top of his voice, making Ginny laugh as she helped him string popcorn to hang on the Christmas Tree that Bill had dropped off for them that morning on his way to work.
Harry and Ron were kneeling on either side of the coffee table with Ron’s battered chessboard between them. Harry’s pieces were mostly just broken shards of debris. He had long ago accepted that he would never be as good as Ron, but he enjoyed challenging him anyway. Fred and George sat huddled in a corner, no doubt something to do with their latest merchandise for their joke shop plans, and Mrs Weasley had been by a few times over the past few days with updates and a promise that they could visit Mr Weasley on Christmas day.
“Squash him - squash him, he’s only a pawn, you idiot!”
Harry was egging one of his castles on while it was engaged in a violent tussle with a pawn of Ron’s when Professor Snape walked into the room.
He looked a bit surprised by the elaborate decorations that had brightened the place up and evolved it into what could only be considered a home now. Hermione, who had followed Snape into the room, looked simply delighted.
“How come you’re here?” Ron asked curiously.
“Well, I told my parents that everyone who is serious about their exams was staying at Hogwarts,” Hermione said, as she joined them around the chessboard. “Considering what happened to Mr Weasley, I wanted to be here and Professor Snape offered to bring me when classes got out today.”
Snape had walked over to the tree and was now talking with Sirius, both men’s postures relaxed with no wands drawn - it made Harry happy to see.
“The only thing left to really do on the big day is prepare the feast,” Sirius was explaining cheerfully.
“Mum promised to handle most of the cooking,” Ginny chimed in, as she finished stringing the popcorn. “Fred and George offered to bake the treats, but after Ron bit into one and transformed into a giant canary this afternoon, we decided to let them take a break.”
“Probably wise,” Snape replied, just as a puff of green smoke spontaneously erupted from George’s wand in the corner.
“Accident, Professor,” George called, trying his best to look innocent while Fred roared with laughter. “Not trying to invent anything dangerous or nothing.”
“While you’re staying here, any harebrained schemes you come up with are his problem anyway,” Snape said disinterestedly, pointing a finger over at Sirius who had joined in laughing.
“How come you’re not gone skiing, Hermione?” Ginny asked, as she walked over to join them.
The mention of skiing set Ron off in another round of laughter - he found the idea of muggles strapping boards to their feet to ride down mountains hysterical.
“I had to wait until the term officially got out before I could come here,” Hermione explained. “Umbridge is furious that you all left without her permission. How’s your Dad doing, by the way?”
“A lot better,” Ron replied, after he finished giving a directive to the board.
“We get to see him tomorrow,” Ginny added.
After Harry finished losing his fifth consecutive game of chess to Ron, he got Ginny to take his place and went over to find out what Snape and Sirius were still talking about by the Christmas tree.
“We’ll probably have a big breakfast and open gifts before they set out to see Arthur,” Sirius was saying. “Moody is going to escort them, and then I know Tonks is planning to stop by for supper. Maybe Remus if he can get away - but he said not to count on him. ”
“Are you going to stay?” Harry asked Snape hopefully. “There’s lots of bedrooms now. We cleaned them all out.”
“There are students in my house who stayed back at school for Christmas, so I can’t stay,” Snape replied calmly, leaving Harry to wonder if he would have actually considered the prospect of spending Christmas all together at Grimmauld Place in different circumstances.
“You really just have to be at Hogwarts for the feast,” Sirius told him. “There’s lots of time until then.”
“I just wanted to drop this off,” Snape said, avoiding the subject of him staying as he reached a hand into the pocket of his black cloak and pulled out a small brown paper bag. “Harry, I was trying to decide on a present to get you for Christmas and came to the conclusion that I’ve spoiled you enough for this year.”
“I’m not sure that’s how this is supposed to work around Christmas,” Harry protested playfully.
“Well, this is a bit different,” Snape replied, handing him the small bag. “You can open it but it’s for both you and Sirius.”
Sirius was watching closely as Harry took the bag from Snape and peered inside it. He then pulled out a large bottle of a mud like substance and held it up in front of him.
“Can you tell me what that is?” Snape prompted, but Hermione, who had been watching from across the room, could no longer contain herself.
“That’s Polyjuice Potion,” she exclaimed excitedly, making a muscle in Snape’s cheek twitch.
“I made an extra large batch and it’s also highly concentrated,” Snape said, glancing over at Sirius who was staring longingly at the bottle in Harry’s hand. “More difficult to choke down, but the transformation will last longer. You can go out for a full day or your other option would be to drink it gradually, and go outside for shorter and more frequent durations.”
“Outside?” Sirius looked up at him, confusion compounding his features. “Is that what you said?"
“That’s what I said,” Snape repeated softly, while Harry looked incredulously back and forth between them. “Just don’t make me regret caving to the whims of a fifteen year old who seems to believe I can come up with a solution for nearly any problem of his in my lab.”
“Well, this kinda proves that you can, sir,” Harry grinned, as he handed over the bottle to Sirius. “You couldn’t just call it a Christmas present, could you? You know what you’re doing there.”
“Just a word of advice, do not attempt to visit the hospital with everyone tomorrow,” Snape said, not acknowledging Harry’s commentary, “and do not attempt to visit Hogwarts, or Hogsmeade, or do anything stupid. I might consider it your given right to foolishly risk your life again, but I’m not sure I could persuade Dumbledore to agree.”
“I guess I can live with that,” Sirius said, his eyes full of emotion as he continued to stare at the bottle in his hand, blinking rapidly.
"Snowball fight in the street, Sirius?" Fred asked loudly.
"Let's go," Sirius called back enthusiastically, but with an odd crack in his voice. He seemed simply beside himself suddenly with nervous energy as he rocked on the balls of his feet, and even Snape seemed amused by him right now.
The lateness of the evening and the frigid cold that rattled the windows seemed to deter nobody as they rushed out of the room to go get dressed. Eager to celebrate Sirius finally gaining a bit of freedom.
“Won’t you stay?” Harry tried again, a pleading note in his voice as he turned to Snape.
The olive branch just intentionally or otherwise offered to Sirius changed everything in Harry’s perception. He knew that he wasn’t going to settle for not spending the holiday with either of these two significant figures in his life, and he savoured the realization that he wouldn’t have to choose between them anymore if he stood his ground. “Please, sir?”
Snape hesitated, but there was a softness in his eyes and he seemed so pleased that his gift had been so well received. He sank down in a chair and watched Sirius using some of Fred’s hair to turn into a replica of the Weasley twins.
“I’ll go grab you a firewhiskey,” Harry grinned, embracing Snape quickly before he sped off to the kitchen with a fullness in his heart that he was experiencing with more and more regularity these days in this family that he had found.