No more lies (To Victory)

PROLOGUE along with CHAPTER 1

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~welcome to insanity, enjoy the ride~

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Up until now, Harry was content to just lie back and let it all play out.

It was amusing to a point, but mostly pathetic, how people fell for his Golden Boy persona. It was so easy to craft. Pretend to be clueless. Average. A nod here, a jinx there. Smile at someone.

So easy.

No one had any idea who the real Harry Potter was and what he was capable of.

But he was fourteen now, he had influence; if he wanted, he could make people listen to him and do his bidding. He was no longer looked at as a poor Harry who just got into this world and needs to be sheltered.

Or lied to.

But as fun as it was, his patience was snapping.

He knew for a fact that Voldemort was making his move - especially with the whole Death Eater fiasco during the summer.

It was about time too - he and Diary Tom theorized it would not take long.

Harry was only halfway surprised when his name came out of the goblet.

Thanks to his ironclad control, his magic didn’t lash out and he didn’t kill- maim anyone, no matter how much he wanted to.

But what ticked him off was Ronald.

Bloody insufferable Weasley.

Harry’s been putting up with him for the last three years, and while it turned to his favor up until now, he ignored the jealous outburst from the boy - they were quite amusing. But Ronald was supposed to be his friend, even if it was only to the golden boy Harry, not the real Harry. He was supposed to be loyal. And yet, the bastard turned on him the moment he realized Harry will get more attention because of this stupid tournament.

Harry didn’t do well with betrayal.

So when he was greeted with a knife in his back, Harry snapped.

Enough was enough. 

There will be no second chances now.

He was done .

As much fun this whole charade was, he was done pretending to be someone he was not.

The real game was just beginning, Harry grinned.

It’s time to let his Slytherin out, freely.

The world was in for a shock.

He couldn’t wait.

Harry smirked when he realized that everyone was ignoring him.

Finally, some peace.

He put on his uniform, making sure he looked immaculate before heading downstairs.

Most people turned to look at him, all of them whispered.

Most likely because Harry was walking with his head held high, with grace and confidence only seen in wealthy pureblood children, smirk on his lips.

Something was different and they all knew it, even if they had no idea what it was or what it meant.

Oh, did they expect him to sulk? To throw a fit? To look like absolute mess?

Well, they’re not getting that. Not ever.

He saw people giving him shrewd looks, and he continued smirking.

This was going to be so much fun.

Having his supposed friends ignore him gave Harry much time to read.

He still couldn’t get out the look on Granger’s face during the Transfiguration.

He knew all the material already - he’s been ahead of his peers from the get go; he just suppressed it and made himself look average - less questions and attention that way.

But to think of it, who was he hiding his brilliance from?

Dumbledore won’t try anything, not with so many people out of his control in school this year. Not with people from the Ministry rummaging around.

Quite frankly, this tournament gave him the perfect opportunity to drop his act.

So when he, after half-listening to McGonagall's lecture, and consistent pointy looks to take notes from Hermione, transfigured the object on the first try completely effortlessly, Hermione and those who saw were left gaping.

“Mr Potter, a wonderful job. Are you able to untransfigure it?”

Harry lazily waved his wand and it was back to its original form.

“Twenty points to Gryffindor. Now, could you try to put more details on it?”

Harry smirked and did so, this time hearing gasps coming from his fellow students, since everyone was paying attention now.

“Another ten points, Mr Potter. You may start your homework.”

Harry nodded his head in acknowledgement.

“How did you do that?” Hermione hissed at him, and Harry was a bit taken aback by the accusation and pure jealousy coming off the girl.

Every time someone did better than her, this ugly head of jealousy came out. One more reason why Harry decided to stay in the background.

He would’ve killed her in the first year if she had acted like that towards him, constantly.

Well, he doesn’t care anymore. Let her fume.

Harry shrugged, saying it was easy. For that, he heard an angry puff.

Just wait till she realizes it’s not a fluke and Harry’s not going to stop.

Same thing happened in Charms. History… well, he just continued reading a book on curses, glamoured to appear as an advanced DADA book.

He skipped lunch and headed towards Potions.

“Potter,” he heard and of course. Malfoy.

How could he forget his little blond school rival?

This ought to be entertaining. 

“Malfoy” he turned to face the boy, enjoying the startled look on the Slytherin’s face that was covered up immediately. “Is there something you need?”

“Just wanted to see if you’re cowering in your boots, Potter. Looked pretty spooked yesterday. So much for that Gryffindor courage. Even Weasel is avoiding you.”

Harry smiled, which made the slytherins nervous for some reason.

“Say, how did you end up in Slytherin? Your lack of self preservation is astounding,” Harry’s eyes flashed dangerously, and he let his magic free for one brief moment. 

He knew for a fact his magic felt oppressive to others. Threatening.

Malicious .

It made him feel giddy just thinking about how all who looked down on him would cower just at the brief feel of his true magic. 

Some took a step back, looking at him with wide eyes. Harry smirked, before dropping his mask and a cold, somewhat terrifying expression took over his face, while his piercing gaze wandered over present sytherins - Malfoy, Zabini, Nott, Parkinson, and those near squibs Crab and Goyle. 

Harry stepped closer, eyes trained back on Draco, who seemed frozen in place, and tilted his head to the side.

“Continue annoying me, and you won’t like the consequences,” Harry’s voice held a promise.

He heard footsteps behind him, other gryffindoors' arriving.

“As for Weasley, he’s so wrapped up in his jealousy and unfairness of it all, his avoidance is a complete bliss compared to his constant annoying whining. How dare Harry Potter take away his fame and wealth. Boo-hoo,” Harry said loud enough, and from a few snickers he knew everyone heard.

His mocking tone didn’t go unnoticed either.

Harry turned from snickering slytherins to face his so-called friend.

Ronald was red in the face with embarrassment and anger.

“Would you look at that, a complete look. Weasel, now you really fit into Gryffindor, being red all over,” Malfoy said loudly, and Harry snorted.

Malfoy wasn’t wrong.

Why did he say no to being a slytherin again?

Oh right, flying under Dumbles radar and living in peace.

“Harry, that was uncalled for.” Hermione looked at him disappointedly.

“Wasn’t it?” Harry looked at her coldly. After all, Hermione’s friendship was also conditional. As long as he was worse than her and never argued, let her be right and first, it was fine. But only then. “What’s uncalled for is Ronald’s entitlement. He doesn’t want to lift a finger and then complains about unfairness. All he wants is the fame and money that being friends with me would give him. And any time he’s reminded of it or i better him, the poor Ronald can’t take it. Jealousy isn’t a nice look, Weasley. Backstabbing either.”

There was complete silence in the hall.

Everyone was shocked how Harry acted towards his friends.

Ron was shaking in anger. He whipped out his wand and pointed it at Harry, who looked bored and nonchalant, and sent a curse.

Harry waved his hand, putting up a shield wandlessly and wordlessly - making his classmates gawk at him - and then smirked. Ronald looked absolutely furious and lifted his wand to attack again.

“Some friends you have, Potter” he heard someone mutter behind him, seeing it was Theodore Nott, he winked at the boy.

“Twenty points from Gryffindor and a detention, Mr Weasley '' a cold voice of one Severus Snape said from behind the gryffindors, making them all jump. Nobody saw the professor arriving, apart from Harry who sensed professor's magic from around the corner.

“He started it!” Weasley screamed, pointing at Harry, who just raised his eyebrow elegantly, more mocking than anything else.

“Ten more points for lying, Mr Weasley. I saw with my own eyes how you raised your wand first and sent a curse. Mr Potter, if you noticed, doesn’t even have his wand out. Now, get inside.”

Ronald scowled and went in with the others.

Harry felt Snape stare at him, and he stared back. A light push of legilimency made him slam his occlumency walls down and he narrowed his eyes at the professor, who looked shocked.

Harry sent a mild glare, and turned to walk into the classroom, smirking, when he saw Snape's gobsmacked look.

It was obvious the professor was curious about his sudden ability to cast and wanted to dig around in his head.

Well, that was not happening.

He had things in there that must be hidden from everyone, especially the old coot. Harry’s been practicing mind arts ever since Tom told him about them, and even before. Apparently, he had mind shields already, just didn’t know about them. He indulged into meditating and rummaging around his own mind years before he came to Hogwarts, especially when he was locked in the cupboard with only his own thoughts for company, which naturally created mental shields. It wasn't hard from there.

Harry sat down in the one empty table at the front, receiving weird looks from others, since he usually sat at the very end.

"Weasley, you're too stupid to work alone, go sit with Longbottom," Snape instructed, then turned to Harry, who shot him a glare. "Mr Potter-"

"I'd prefer to work alone, professor. Working with certain company tends to… leave results unsatisfactory, at best."

Harry swore he saw Snape's mouth twitching and he nodded, leaving Harry be, much to his surprise.

All was well.

Harry managed the potion just fine - he wasn't incompetent. It looked exactly as it should, not like Weasleys, that was emitting dark green fumes, when it was supposed to be light blue.

Snape stared at his cauldron as if he wasn't sure what he was seeing was real, which just made Harry very smug.

Ronald getting a 3 feet extra homework also lifted up his spirits.

Either way, slytherins curious looks aside, he left the classroom a very satisfied man.

Harry felt slytherins watching him every time he was in their vicinity.

It gave him a sick sort of satisfaction that they had no idea what was going on. Perhaps they thought he went insane.

And maybe he did.

Its been a week now and he's been the best in every class. He saw Granger glaring at him in anger, seething to be bested. 

Harry only laughed.

It was perhaps the most fun he's had since entering this school.

The confrontation happened exactly a week later, after they were walking from DADA to Potions classroom.

"How the hell are you doing it?" Hermione stopped him and Harry raised an eyebrow in question.

"Doing what?"

"You are cheating! You can't be that good at lessons! I am studying more!"

Harry snorted and tried to push past her, but she grabbed his arm.

"Just because I'm better than you, Granger," he spit out, "Does not mean I'm cheating. It only means you are not that good and lack natural talent other than memorizing textbooks top to bottom."

Harry heard snickers behind him, while the girl went bright red and gaped at his audacity.

"You're- you're-"

"I'm what?" Harry mocked. "Now let go of my arm before I curse it off."

"I'll tell what you're doing to professor Dumbledore!" she hissed.

Well, that explained quite a few things if they went babbling to Dumbledore about every single thing he did.

"What I'm doing? And what is that? Being a student? Perhaps tell him about yourself assaulting students between lessons, hm?"

"Let him go, mudblood," Draco said from behind him, having heard most of the conversation. 

"No. I will be taking him to professor Dumbledore because he is cheating-"

"Don't act so high and mighty, Granger. Who will listen to someone like you?" Parkinson asked.

"I will tell headmaster how you're acting."

"Tell him I said hi," Harry smirked at her. "Now let-"

"Unhand him at once, Granger," a deep voice demanded from the corridor, and she jumped back as if scalded. "Tut-tut. Assaulting another student in the corridors? Twenty points from Gryffindor."

"But professor! Harry is cheating!"

"Spreading rumors, are we? Detention, Miss Granger. Your know-it-all attitude is sickening."

Granger gaped at Snape, her face turning deep red in anger, before turning into fury directed straight at Harry.

"It's all your fault!" she screeched, stepping closer. "I'm supposed to be the best! And you're ruining everything, you fucking-" she raised her hand to slap or hit Harry, but was met with four wands of Draco, Theodore, Blaise and Pansy pointing at her face. Harry just looked amused, if a bit shocked.

Granger did have a tendency to attack like a muggle more than not.

"Don't you even dare," Draco hissed at her.

"Fifty points from Gryffindor." Severus sounded all too pleased with himself because of the points he got to take away from Gryffindor, but apart from that, he looked furious. "Three weeks of detention and I will be writing to your parents, Miss Granger. Step another foot towards Mr Potter and I will make sure you are suspended."

Hermione paled at hearing all that, faltering a little.

It looked as if she was restraining herself from hitting Harry, but didn't do so.

She huffed, sneered at Harry, turned around and practically sprinted away.

Severus turned to look at his slytherins and Harry with a calculating gleam in his eyes.

Harry inclined his head to the man slightly, in thanks. The man did too, before striding away.

Surprisingly, without a word to Harry himself.

"Say, Potter, how come all of your friends are backstabbing traitors?" Blaise asked carefully.

"Well, they are gryffindors, common sense is not something they possess, let alone something like self preservation. I personally believe that all that red is slowly driving them to the point of insanity."

All Slytherins chuckled at that.

"You don't sound like a gryffindor yourself, Potter,'' Theodore said carefully. "Something changed."

"Maybe I just got tired of this charade, ever thought of that?" Harry looked thoughtful for a moment.

"Or maybe that red got to you," Pansy snickered. “Red really isn't your colour."

"Oh, I know."

"I shudder to think of your common room," Draco looked slightly sick.

Harry snickered, much to their surprise.

"We can agree on that one. After all, I much prefer the Slytherin common room. All cozy and dark. And you have much more comfortable armchairs."

The slytherins stared at him wide eyed.

"H-how do you know what our common room looks like?" they stammered.

Harry chuckled, giving them a wide smirk and winked, swiftly turning away and almost skipping towards the classroom. 

"Potter! How do you know ?!" Draco screeched at him, and he laughed even more.

Much to his surprise, Theo flopped into the seat next to him. 

Harry looked at the boy in surprise.

Theo didn't say anything, just nodded, and continued pulling out things for the class.

Hm, interesting. 

Harry knew that slytherins were burning with questions, but he also knew they wouldn't ambush him with them either. They weren't brash gryffindors. They worked subtly.

Theo was here for information. 

Question was, should he give them any?

Or perhaps just do what amuses him the most?

The lesson went without a hitch, and Theo, surprisingly, kept quiet until the very end, when he asked:

"Potter. What is going on?" he whispered.

Harry didn't really expect it. Theo sounded slightly worried.

"Does finally snapping counts? I told you. I'm sick of this charade. I'm letting the real Harry out to play," he said in a somewhat childish voice, with a head lolled to the side and all, smiling at the poor slytherin with a slightly crazed look in his eyes.

Nott paled a little.

"What side are you on?"

Harry winked at him and left the table post haste.

He was having too much fun letting slytherins stew.

It was surprising how free Harry felt.

Sure. He was freaking people out, but he felt better than ever, apart from this bloody tournament hanging over his head.

He still hasn't figured out who put him there. Annoying, sure, but he'll find out eventually and that person will be sorry.

Weasel was still furious at him, which was funny, since he went beet red every time Harry even looked his way, or Merlin forbid, smiled.

He should've dumped him ages ago. Hermione too. Her jealousy knew no bounds. She complained to McGonagall and was told off, which only made her angrier, if murderous looks were anything to go by.

Harry was pretty sure they might try something.

Seamus and Dean were somewhat neutral, and Neville said he believed him.

Well, at least there was someone with a brain in his dorm.

And then there was the bane of his existence- Ginevra. He cursed himself from stopping Riddle from killing that bitch. She was outright stalking him more times than not, throwing herself at him when she wasn't busy snogging every guy in sight. Disgusting. 

And he was gay, thankyouverymuch. 

Going on, Dumbledore was eyeing him suspiciously, but Harry made a point to glare at the bastard from time to time.

Everything was his fault.

And while professors were pleased with his performance in classes, Snape's reaction was the most amusing.

He kept looking at Harry's cauldrons as if they were hallucinations. His homework came back with O's and EE's and Snape looked shocked and perhaps… he didn't even know how to call it, but the Potions' Master dropped his homework off as if they burned him. And he kept staring at Harry, whether in wonder or suspicion, Harry didn't know.

He wasn't the only one.

All slytherins regarded Harry with caution.

His confrontations with his ex friends spread wide and fast. While most people were quite unfriendly towards him, the rumors of his so-called friends attacking him put Granger and Weasley into a position of traitors. Funny how that worked.

The slytherins protecting him, however, didn't go unnoticed.

In Slytherin you'll find true friends.

He shouldn't have fought the bloody hat.

It seems that eventually it came back to bite him in the arse.

Now, Harry was just waiting for their confrontation. Which took only two weeks and 4 days to happen.

Snape asked him to stay after class, while Draco, Theo, Blaise and Pansy stayed as well.

Snape nodded to his slytherins and left, locking the door behind them.

Harry chuckled.

It seemed the slytherins had finally had enough of him slipping off.

"If you try anything funny I will hang you from the astronomy tower by your toes and then feed you to the basilisk, just so you know," Harry said casually, smirking at their paling faces. "What do you want?"

"I think we all can agree that there were certain changes and we'd like to know where you stand," Blaise said cordially.

"I'm standing right here," Harry pointed at the ground, eyes glinting madly with delight.

They groaned.

"You know what we mean, Potter!" Pansy shouted.

"I do, but it doesn't mean I'm going to make it easy for you."

He could do this all night.

"We can see you're not acting like Dumbledore’s Golden boy and blindly following the fool. We saw you excel in all classes, perform magic without breaking a sweat and your whole attitude changed. So, Potter, want to elaborate?"

Harry kept quiet, just to annoy them.

When he saw their nerves starting to crack, he sighed and waved his hand around, erecting wards wandlessly.

Slytherins stared wide eyed at this.

It was one thing to see him perform well in classes and another to see him do difficult magic such as wards with no wand at all.

"Well, Dumbles forcing me into this bloody tournament made me realize I really want to see him hanged by his beard from the Astronomy tower, even more than usually, which is quite often, mind you. And honestly, this whole 'light savior' bullshit was really started to grate on my nerves, just like Weasley and Granger. I decided to savor what little sanity I have left and tell them all to fuck off, thus saving myself in the process. I dropped the act and ta-da! You're speaking with the real Harry Potter. Charmed to meet you all." Harry did a mock bow.

Their gobsmacked faces were worth it.

"Are you saying you aren't light? Were you pretending?"

Harry raised his brow.

"Interesting question, is it? It was more like a masterful performance on my part and if any of this gets out, mind you-" Harry's eyes suddenly turned ice cold, the temperature in the room dropping instantly. "Nobody will find enough of your bodies to bury, am I clear?"

"You wouldn't hurt a fly, Potty" Parkinson snorted, and immediately froze when Harry turned to stare at her.

The room filled with a suffocating, dark, malicious aura, seemingly all targeted at the girl, but they could still feel it.

"You have no idea what I'd do, so I'd keep that mouth shut, Parkinson. I’m not above making sure it sticks, if you know what I mean.”

All four slytherins were pale, most likely because of his magic and not the threat, but Harry enjoyed the fear on their faces nonetheless. 

He wondered if Voldemort did this too just to terrify his minions.

“There’s no way you’re light with a magic like this,” Theo whispered. “No way.”

Harry smiled at the boy, letting his magic disappear slowly.

He rather liked Theo. He seemed to be the most high headed of them all.

“Perhaps there’s still some hope for you all.”

“Why did you enter into the tournament?” Blaise asked.

“I didn’t.” That seemed to erect shocked faces. “What? Why would I compete in a tournament that could kill me? I don’t need any more fame, nor money. And whoever entered me will regret it, make no mistake of that.”

Yes, he was still looking into it, but he had no concrete evidence.

It could be anyone.

His usual suspect would be the Defense teacher, seeing as it was a trend of sorts since he came to Hogwarts, but this year they had outsiders in school from all over. For all he knew it could’ve been Karkaroff.

Well, it was doubtful, seeing as he was a traitor and was very fond of Krum, but he was suspicious of everyone.

“Well, he’s not exactly wrong,” Blaise said slowly, while they all eyed him with caution. 

“He’s in Gryffindor,” Pansy said, much more quietly, as if afraid to anger Harry.

“He’s not acting like one,” Theodore spoke up. “In fact, he’s acting like a slytherin.”

Their eyes snapped to smirking Harry.

He wondered if they’d figure it out. They were so close.

“Merlin’s pants, Potter, will you say something or just continue smiling like a creep?” Malfoy finally snapped.

Harry chuckled.

“It’s just so fun watching you struggle and try to find out things about me. Please, do continue.”

Theodore snorted.

“Yeah, you’re no gryffindor, Potter. Tell me, how did you get sorted into the house of stupid and reckless when you’re anything but?”

Harry wondered if to tell them the whole truth.

Who would they tell?

Who would believe them?

Dumbledore, perhaps, but he was the one trying to hide anything dark related to him from the public eye. It was obvious nobody even knew about his parseltongue abilities. He often wondered why.

“Well?” Malfoy said impatiently. “We are all curious about your sorting, Potty.”

His eyes narrowed at the insult and he sent a stinging jinx directly to Malfoy’s ass, who jumped slightly and squeaked, holding the hurting place.

“What the hell?!”

Harry chuckled, along with Theodore when he realized what happened.

“I coerced the hat to put me into Gryffindor. For one, you were annoying and I didn’t want to be anywhere near your constant whining." Draco had the gall to look insulted. "Two, it was obvious Dumbles sent the Weasleys and Hagrid to tell me all about evil Slytherins and good Gryffindors. It wasn’t hard to put two and two together, especially since they praised Dumbledore from the moment I met them. It might have worked if I was the naïve fool they all expected, but instead, I was suspicious. And if I let the hat sort me into Slytherin, that old coot would’ve probably potioned me or at least would’ve stalked me since day one. I would rather have peace and quiet than be stalked and have my privacy taken away.”

The slytherins gaped at him.

“That makes so much sense now,” Theodore was the first to speak.

“You seriously didn’t want to go to Slytherin because of me?” Malfoy whined, clearly shocked and still slightly insulted.

“Well, the way you were stomping around like a peacock and being ‘my father this, my father that’ was really grating on my nerves, so I decided to avoid future headaches if I can,” Harry answered honestly and was shocked when the Blaise, Theo and Pansy burst into laughter.

Malfoy went beet red.

“He- he- a peacock!” Blaise shocked, doubling over.

Harry was confused.

“Oh, you don’t know, do you?” Theo seemed to take pity on him. “Malfoys-”

“Shut up, Theo,” Draco said through clenched teeth.

“Yeah, no. Malfoys have dozens of peacocks strutting around the Malfoy Manor.”

“Are you implying it’s a learned  behavior?” Harry asked slyly, receiving yet another round of laughter from the others.

Harry shot Malfoy a charming smile, letting know he was only teasing and meant nothing malicious.

After all, an embarrassed Malfoy was not a sight often seen.

They all calmed down after a minute.

“But… do you think Dumbledore would have..?” Pansy looked antsy and the atmosphere was suddenly serious again. “Potioned you, I mean.”

Harry nodded.

“Definitely. He’s been pushing me towards dangerous shit since I stepped foot in this castle. First year he did all he could so the Dark Lord and I would have a confrontation. Everything was so convenient and the second year? There is no way in hell he didn’t know it was a basilisk petrifying mudbloods when he was there the last time it happened too.”

“Merlin's pants, Potter,” Zabini was staring at him in horror. “How are you even alive ? A basilisk? ”

Harry smirked.

“Self preservation is a thing.”

“But- but then how… the rumors said you killed the beast and saved the Weaselette! Were they true?”

Harry snorted.

“Trust me, I would've let her rot, but if I did, they would’ve closed the school and I couldn't have that.”

He would’ve been shipped off to Dursleys and he’d do anything to avoid it.

“Then what truly happened down there?”

They all looked intrigued, eyes glittering and Harry was somehow reminded of sitting around the fire and listening to ghost stories, except this was real.

“Why would I tell you, hm? For all I know you’ll go running around and telling this to everyone until it reaches Dumbledore.”

“Why would we tell the coot anything? Are you bloody mad?” Draco looked insulted, as did all of them.

“Perhaps,” he said vaguely, and really, it was so easy to rile them up.

At least slytherins could pick up his subtleties and insults, something gryffindors were never able to. 

“We’re not snitches, Potter,” Theodore said eventually, smirking himself when he caught on to what Harry was doing. “We genuinely want to know what happened in the Chamber of Secrets and more importantly, how did you get there?”

Harry sighed. He didn’t fancy telling them the whole story. He'll be there all night if he did. 

“I’ll tell you this. Did I go there on my own free will to save Weaselette? No. As for what happened, the Dark Lord was involved, but I will not tell you how. Dumbledore’s version was I defeated him and killed the basilisk, right?” They nodded. “Well, it was more like, I struck a deal with the Dark Lord and the basilisk is fine. She’s a sweetheart and if anything about the Dark Lord and I gets out, I'm sure she’d love to snack on a few naughty slytherins.”

Harry outright laughed at the pale, horrified faces of his classmates.

This really was funny.

He’s going to have to tell Tom.

“Anyway, this is fun and all, but I'm hungry. See you all later on, alright? And don’t look so petrified, Snape will think I’ve done something to his precious godson and then will try to poison me.”

They continued to gape at him and Harry laughed again.

“Call me Harry, will you? Toodles!” Harry waved his wand, dismantling the wards and skittered out of the classroom, feeling incredibly amused.

He'd fed the slytherins' curiosity, and now it'll be just a matter of time until they snap.

He couldn’t wait to see what happens next.

The slytherins didn’t know what to think.

“He’s insane,” Draco muttered, after they all somehow got themselves together.

“No way,” Blaise retorted in a sarcastic tone. “What gave it away? His casual threats or him calling the basilisk a sweetheart?”

They all shifted uncomfortably at the reminder.

“If I didn’t know better, I’d say someone replaced him,” Pansy said.

“Or he just snapped.” Theo was sure this was true. He, like many slytherins, have watched Potter over the years and there were times he noticed the Golden Boy glaring at his friends or the head table, his eye twitching at things Granger was boasting about, but he never thought it went so deep.

That there were so many layers of lies and deceit.

“But to hide himself so completely? He’s lucky his mind is still intact.” Blaise was right, of course, but maybe, just maybe, Harry’s mind was a little off. “Well, he did look a bit unhinged…”

Theo snorted.

Wasn’t that right.

“Are we going to do something?”

“Like what? Who would even believe us? Harry Potter in possible allegiance with the Dark Lord? And obviously dark himself? They would think we’re crazy.”

At that moment, the door slammed open and Snape walked in, looking around suspiciously.

“Where’s Potter? Don’t tell me you killed him.”

Theodore snorted, along with Blaise.

“I think it would’ve been the other way around, professor,” Nott said, receiving a surprised and questioning gaze from the wizard. “He left.”

Snape frowned.

“I warded the room.”

“Well, apparently, he put up his own wards after you left, then got rid of them too when leaving. And he did it all wordlessly and wandlessly.”

Potions Master’s eyes widened.

“You must be confused, Mr Nott, Potter is not capable of such things, especially getting rid of my wards.”

“No, Sev, he’s not lying. Potter didn’t even break a sweat. His magic was dark, suffocating . The Potter we knew so far was only a façade he put up, and the real Harry Potter, as he liked to call himself, is completely different.”

Severus stared at his students, not knowing what to say. Or what to believe.

Sure, he noticed changes in the young boy, but to such extent that his slytherins were shocked and, dare he say, in awe?

“Speak of this to no one and continue observing. Now get out.”

Severus didn’t know what to think.

Harry Potter was grating on his nerves more than ever, and the worst part? It wasn't because he was annoying- oh, no. Because he was like a completely different person and Snape suddenly didn’t know where he stood.

His slytherins swore up and down that Harry Potter was not light, but how could he not be?

His family was light. The boy fought against the injustice, was set up against the Dark Lord more than once and was friends with only light families.

Or… was he?

The rumors about the break up of the Golden Trio reached even him, and he witnessed both of them getting roasted by Harry, even if subtly.

Both, Weasley and Granger attacked Potter one way or the other and Potter very sneakily retaliated.

Like a true slytherin, Snape shuddered.

Got others to do his work for him, while he stood there and smirked.

It seemed that Potter lost both his friends in one night, and Snape wondered how the boy was truly coping.

He was sure, with the whole school whispering and feeling the slight over Potter being another champion, the boy would be crushed, but he just… snapped. Did a complete 180.

He cut off Weasley, after his jealous outburst like it was nothing, same with Granger.

He walked with his head held high, with all the graces and airs of a pureblood heir he lacked before, smirk on his lips, eyes glinting in amusement. As if he knew something others didn’t.

His performance in classes was outstanding, even in potions. 

There was one instance where he witnessed Potter doing a non-verbal shield, and he had to admit, it was impressive.

That spoke of power and control.

Something Potter seemed to have lacked up until now.

Question was, what else was the boy hiding?

Snape saw him converse with his slytherins, which was a surprise. Whatever interactions Potter had with his snakes usually ended up in fights and petty insults, but they were being cordial. 

Whatever tibids of information Potter had fed them before seemed to have only put fuel into the fire that was curiosity, and when Draco asked him to get Potter to stay after class for an impromptu questionnaire, Severus obliged.

He wanted answers too.

What he didn’t expect was to come back to his wards dismantled, Potter gone and his snakes white as ghosts, claiming Potter was dark and more importantly, powerful.

He must speak with the boy himself and find out what in the name of Merlin is Potter scheming this time.