Felix Felicis
Harry is pacing the corridor on the seventh floor, hidden under his Invisibility Cloak, willing the Room of Requirement to open up for him by thinking hard about Malfoy and whatever the Room turned into for him. He’s tried a number of different versions, I need to see the place where Malfoy keeps coming, I need to see what Malfoy keeps doing in here, I need you to become the place you become for Draco Malfoy… but the wall remains as solid as ever.
Harry has been so caught up with trying to think of the right combination of words that would reveal the room Malfoy keeps sneaking into, that he completely loses track of time and it’s not until a horrified scream coming from a small herd of first years running round the corner, probably having mistaken Harry for a particularly rude ghost when he’d sworn loudly at the stubborn Room, that he realises he’s late for Defence Against the Dark Arts.
Swearing again, Harry starts running in the opposite direction and doesn’t stop until he’s right outside the classroom where he pauses to catch his breath and stuff the Cloak into his robes’ pocket before entering.
Severus dark eyes sweeps over to him as he trots down the aisle to slide into the seat next to Ron and Harry holds his breath, waiting for the professor to say something cold and taunting, but Severus’ gaze flits away again without a word. Harry feels himself deflate slightly, mostly from relief but also a little… disappointment. He glances round the classroom at his fellow students, realising that most are still on their feet, taking out books from their bags and organising things on their desks, so if Harry was late he wasn’t the only one, but still… He should have at least taken points, Harry thinks. The old Snape would have done.
”Before we start, I want your Dementor essays”, Severus says and waves his wand nonchalantly. causing twenty-five scrolls of parchment to immediately soar into the air and land in a neat pile upon his desk. ”I hope for your sakes that they’re better than the tripe I had to endure on resisting the Imperius Curse. Now, if you will all open your books to page — Yes, what is it, Finnigan?”
”Sir”, Seamus says eagerly, leaning forward in his desk. ”I was wondering if you could tell us the difference between a ghost and an Inferius, because I read this article in the Prophet this morning about an Inferius—”
”No, you didn’t”, Severus says in his most long-suffering, bored tone of voice.
”But, Sir, I heard people talking and—”
”If you had actually read the full article in question, mister Finnegan, you’d know that the so-called Inferius was nothing but a smelly sneak-thief by the name of Mundungus Fletcher.”
”I thought Snape and Mundungus were supposed to be on the same side”, Ron mutters under his breath.
”Yeah”, Harry mutters back, because he’d been thinking the exact same thing, not that it should surprise him that Severus would refuse to show any remorse for somene in the order being hurt or arrested, wouldn’t be the first time…
”But Potter seems to have something to say on the subject”, Severus cutting voice breaks through Harry’s train of thoughts. ”Let us ask Potter how we would tell the difference between an Inferius and a ghost.”
Every student in the room turns to stare at Harry, whose cheeks immediately heat up and he gives the professor an indignant look, because that was just not fair, even for Snape.Ron had been the one speaking, not Harry.
Ron gives him an apologetic look, but Harry shakes his head subtly to dismiss it. In fact, if he’s being completely honest with himself a small part of him is actually pleased to be in Severus crossfire once more. At least he isn’t ignoring me anymore, he thinks.
”Well, er, ghosts are transparent —” Harry starts.
”Oh, very good”, Severus interrupts with a sneer. ”Yes, it is easy to see that nearly six years of magical education have not been wasted on you, Potter. Ghosts are transparent.”
Pansy Parkinson lets out a shrill giggle, and the rest of the Slytherins are smirking at him. Harry just glares back, then returns his focus to Severus again.
”Yeah, ghosts are transparent”, he says with forced calm, thinking quickly, trying to remember everything he knows about Inferi, having been given a lecture on them and other Dark creatures by Hermoine earlier in the year during one of their revision sessions. ”But Inferi are dead bodies, aren’t they? So they’d be solid —”
”A five-year-old could have told us as much”, Severus says. ”The Inferius is a corpse that has been reanimated by a Dark wizard’s spell. It is not alive, merely used like a puppet to do the wizard’s bidding. A ghost, as I trust all of you are aware by now, is the imprint of a departed soul left upon the earth… and of course, as Potter so wisely tells us, they are transparent.”
”Well, what Harry said is the most useful if we’re trying to tell them apart!” Ron blurts out. ”When we come face to face with one down a dark alley, we’re going to be having a shufti to see if it’s solid, aren’t we, we’re not going to be asking, ’Excuse me, are you the imprint of a departed soul?’…”
There’s a ripple of laughter, immediately quelled by death glare from Snape. But Harry can’t help the amused smile that still lingers even as Snape turns his glare on him. It seems to soften slightly though, when Harry just keeps smiling. And in the next moment, Severus has turned away completely.
”Ten points from Gryffindor”, he says. ”But I would expect nothing more sophisticated from you, mister Weasley, the boy so solid he cannot Apparate half an inch across the room… Now open your books to page two-hundred and thirteen.”
Ron is decidedly subdued after that, and at the end of the lesson, as he and Harry avoid Lavender by slipping into the nearest bathroom he voices his thoughts with Harry, ”Snape’s right, isn’t he. It’s not even worth me taking the test, I just can’t get the hang of Apparition…”
Harry gives him a sympathetic smile and pats him awkwardly on the shoulder, ”Hey, you might as well take those extra lessons in Hogsmeade and see where they get you. If you’re still not ready to take the test, you can take it with me in the summer— Myrtle, this is the boys’ bathroom!”
The ghost of a girl had popped out of one of the toilets and is now floating midair, staring at them through her thick, round glasses.
”Oh”, she says glumly. ”It’s you two…”
”Were you expecting someone else?” Ron asks sarcastically.
”No”, she mutters. ”He said he’d come back but I knew he was lying… Just like you were lying when you said you’d come and visit me…”
She gives Harry a reproachful look.
”But I thought he was different, I thought he liked me…” she continues with a wet sigh. ”We have lots in common, I’m sure he felt it too…”
”When you say you have lots in common”, Ron says, sounding rather amused now. ”You mean he lives in an S-bend too?”
”No”, Myrtle says sharply. ”I mean he’s sensitive! People bully him too, and he hasn’t got anyone to talk to about it! And he’s not afraid to show his feelings and cry!”
”There’s been a boy in here crying?” Harry asks curiously. ”What, a young boy?”
”Never you mind!” Myrtle roars in rage and with another shriek she dives back into the toilet and disappears again.
*
They’re having breakfast in the Great Hall when a girl walks up to Harry and delivers a letter from Hagrid. He quickly scans it, then hands it over to Hermione.
”Oh for heaven’s sake”, she says and passes it to Ron.
That huge pet spider of Hagrid’s — Aragog — has finally passed away and now the half-giant wants to hold a funeral for it. Which is fine, Harry supposes. But he also expects the three of them to attend, which is a little less than fine honestly.
”He’s mental!” Ron says. ”That thing told its mates to eat Harry and me! Told them to help themselves! And now Hagrid expects us to go over there and cry over its horrible hairy body, no way!”
”It’s not just that”, Hermione says. ”He’s asking us to leave the castle at night, and he knows security is a million times tighter and how much trouble we’d be in if we were caught.”
Harry takes the note back and stares down at the inky blotches where tears have clearly landed and he sighs.
”Harry, you can’t think of going!” Hermione says. ”It’s such a pointless thing to get detention for! Honestly!”
”Yeah, I suppose…” Harry says.
”It is”, Hermione says firmly. ”Now. With most of us taking our Apparition test this afternoon, Potions will be practically empty. Why don’t you try and persuade Slughorn to give you that memory—?”
”Oh, what, like I haven’t tried that already!” Harry protests, because he knows she thinks he’s been wasting his time and energy on Malfoy and whatever he’s doing in the Room of Requirement, but he has been trying to get Slughorn on his own; every Potions lesson he’s hung around afterwards but every time Slughorn has disappeared before he’s had a chance to speak to him, and every time Harry had gone to knock on the door of his private quarters he never answers. ”What, fifty-seventh time lucky, you reckon?”
”Lucky”, Ron says suddenly. ”Mate, that’s it!”
”What?”
”Use your lucky potion!”
”Ron that’s — that’s it”, Hermione gasps. ”Of course! Why didn’t I think of that?”
Felix Felicis, Harry thinks. Of course.
”Okay”, he says. ”If I can’t get Slughorn on his own today after Potions, I’ll drink some of Felix tonight!”
The bell rings overhead in the castle and both Ron and Hermione jump to their feet, looking terrified, and Hermione starts muttering the three Ds under her breath, ”Destination, determination, deliberaton…”
”You’ll do fine”, Harry tells them both before they separate from him in the Entrance Hall to join the other students old enough to take the test. ”Good luck!”
Harry waves at them, then continues down to the dungeons on his own. There are only three of them in Potions, Harry, Malfoy and a boy named Ernie.
”All too young to Apparate just yet?” Slughorn says with wink. ”Not seventeen yet?”
They all shake their heads, and Harry catches Malfoy roll his eyes slightly. But Slughorn doesn’t seem to have noticed. He claps his hands together cheerfully and grins at the three of them.
”Well”, he says. ”Since we’re so few today, we’ll do something fun! I want you all to brew me up something amusing!”
”What do you mean something ’amusing’?” Malfoy says irritably.
”Oh, surprise me”, Slughorn says with another wink.
Malfoy opens up his copy of Advanced Potion-Making with a bit more force than necessary and glares sullenly at its pages, clearly thinking the lesson to be a waste of his time. Harry supposes he’d rather be in the Room of Requirement.
And is it his imagination, or does Malfoy look a lot thinner? He certainly looks paler, probably due to the fact that he rarely sees sunlight nowadays, Harry figures. The task, whatever it is, must be going badly.
*
Harry feels the Felix Felicis wearing off as he creeps back into the castle. The front doors remain unlocked for him, but on the third floor he runs into Peeves and only narrowly avoids detection by diving sideways through one of the hidden short-cuts. By the time he stops in front of the portrait of the Fat Lady and pulls the Invisibility Cloak off, it’s not surprising that she’s in a rather unhelpful mood.
”What time do you call this?” she says.
”I’m really sorry — I had to go out for an emergency —”
”Well, the password changed at midnight so you’ll just have to sleep in the corridor, won’t you.”
”What! You’re joking!”
”If you’re angry, go and take it up with the Headmaster…”
”Fantastic! Really brilliant! Oh yeah, I’ll go and take it up with him, but oh wait, he’s not here is he—”
”He is here”, a voice interrupts him and Harry spins around to see Nearly-Headless Nick floating in midair. ”Professor Dumbledore returned to the school an hour ago.”
”He’s back!” Harry exclaims, feeling his heart leap. ”Where is he?”
”Oh, in his office no doubt…”
”Great!” Harry pulls the Invisibility Cloak back on and starts sprinting down the stairs again, ignoring the voice of the Fat Lady calling after him.
Harry hurtles round the corner, the password toffee eclairs already on the tip of his tongue as he unexpectedly crashes into something, or rather someone and topples over backwards ungracefully and lands hard on his backside. Peering up through his messy fringe, his heart stutters to a stop at the sight of Severus Snape towering over him — looking as stoic as ever — the glint of surprise in his eyes the only sign that he’d in fact just collided with an over-excited student.
”Potter! What—”
”Harry”, Harry corrects under his breath and scrambles to his feet again. ”Sorry, didn’t mean to… do that…”
”Harry”, Severus says sharply. ”What on earth do you think you’re doing out of bed at this hour—?”
”I need to see Dumbledore—”
”It’s nearly three in the morning—”
”It’s important—”
”I can’t just let you—!”
”Please. It’s really important.”
Severus takes a deep, and one might even say long-suffering, breath and pinches the bridge of his nose.
Dramaqueen, Harry thinks fondly, but is careful to keep his face neutral.
”Please”, he says again and risks a small step closer to the older man. ”You can come with if you want, and you can walk me to my dorm after if you’re worried about m—”
”I am not worried about you, mister Potter”, Severus says sharply. ”And I will not accompany you to the Headmaster’s office nor Gryffindor tower, because I am going to bed… Good night.”
With a swirl of robes as dramatic as ever, Severus spins on his heel and stalks down the corridor without another glance in Harry’s direction.
”Good night”, Harry calls after him, then adds quietly ”Severus…”