Parselbrat 8 (HP)
Parselbrat - 8
"Feed me."
Harry woke to a grass snake's forked tongue in her ear.
"I'm hungry," it hissed.
She blinked, slowly, disjointedly. One eye was blind, that side of her face pressed into the dirt, her nose thick with the scent of churned soil. The world felt cavernous and far away, glimpsed through a curtain of dark hair that had come loose from her bandanna.
Harry lifted her head, just enough to shake the hair out of her eyes. Taking stock. Her legs and back were stiff, the consequence of sleeping on the ground. Her right hand was… outstretched, clutching at the air in front of her. She stared at it for a long moment before withdrawing it.
"Hungry!" the grass snake said again, echoed by a half-dozen other serpents this time.
" Fine. Give me a sec. "
She rose to a sitting position. The snakes draped over her fell away into a tangle, all hissing furiously as they tumbled into the others.
The sun had disappeared behind the towers entirely, and the courtyard was in full shade. She'd rolled into one of the cobble-less patches of earth during her nap, and had to brush the dirt off her clothes as she got to her feet.
Moving around got her thoughts going again, let her shake off the last vestiges of sleep. After one too many nightmares, the nap had been just what she needed. She ached from lying on the ground, but it was a good sort of tenderness, and her magic felt pleasant, almost relaxed after the earlier exertion of hatching the egg.
It was a wonder the thing hadn't exploded with the amount she'd pumped into it.
The newborn snake, still sleeping, got shifted into her shirt pocket. Harry picked up her robes, tucking the eggshell into a pocket before pulling them back on.
The crowd of snakes was watching her, scores of reptile eyes following her every move.
She checked her watch. "Geez. Okay- We slept through lunch. But it's almost time for dinner. You're all welcome to come."
They were after all, her guests. She'd pulled them away from their lives to join the birthing, and now she needed to reward their time.
Only… there was no way she was taking this lot into the Great Hall. One adder was bad enough already. Thirty snakes would cause a panic.
A few of the lazier serpents were already tugging at her pants or trying to climb her legs and catch a ride. Harry sighed, and bent down.
" All aboard."
XXX
She'd tried to play with Mrs. Figg's cats before. Once.
Dealing with forty-odd summoned snakes was a lot like that. Only, while she couldn't understand cats, the snakes all had very colorful vocabularies. Every one of them loathed the others, and were fiercely territorial of the few square inches of Harry they occupied.
The hatchling was in her pocket, and Blackscale had his spot around her neck, but the rest of her, shoulder to finger-tip, down her shirt, even a few around her waist like belts, was be-snaked.
They were heavy.
And squirmy.
She kept having to stop and catch her breath because the ones down her shirt were tickling her, and any snake touching her bare skin was trying to taste her sweat with equally ticklish tongues.
Her muffled, snorty giggles drowned out even the constant hissing that surrounded her.
"You said you- you- ha! Stop it! You smelled food down there?" she wheezed, speaking to a snake on the back of her wrist. It was a magical breed, with jewel-like, powder-blue scales, and brilliant red eyes, that Harry had uncreatively dubbed 'Sky.'
Sky scented the air. "That one," she said, jabbing her snout at the left hallway ahead.
They'd crossed most of the castle already, but they seemed to be getting close. The blue-snake's directions were getting more precise. Harry had mostly just played packmule and tried very hard to focus her intent on Hogwarts leading her to the kitchens.
She took the left hall. It sloped downward, and a stairwell at the far end led them two flights deeper. They'd been descending all the way so far. Were the kitchens in the dungeons or something? Was that sanitary?
They were just crossing the boundary where the castle architecture gave way to the rougher, older stone of the dungeons, when the shape in Harry's pocket stirred. It was minute, enough that she was half-sure it was just one of the snakes beneath her clothes shifting around until it happened again.
The hand that wasn't holding Sky rose to dip within.
The newborn serpent curled into a defensive knot in the center of her palm.
"Hullo," Harry said.
The baby flicked its tongue at her, but said nothing.
"She is too young to speak," Blackscale said. He nosed down to look more closely at it- her. "She will be hungry though."
Fine enough. They were headed to the kitchens anyway.
"How long until she speaks?" Harry asked.
The adder gave a lazy, catlike blink. "When she is ready."
"Oh."
"It depends on the snake," Sky interjected.
Both adults watched as a grass snake probed too close to the hatchling. She balled tighter, opening her mouth to reveal a set of tiny, needle teeth, and hissed warningly.
Harry nudged the offender back onto her arm. "Away." To the little snake, she added, "I'm Harry, and this is Blackscale. We're in a place called Hogwarts and..."
Just because she couldn't speak didn't mean she couldn't listen. And didn't children learn words by listening to adults anyway?
XXX
" And this is a hallway in the dungeons. Dungeons are like a stone burrow. And- we're almost there?"
"We're here," Sky corrected.
'Here,' in this case, meant a large painting of a fruit bowl. There was a palpable smell of food in the hallway; meat cooking over a fire, and a rich, oniony scent that she thought might be soup.
Harry stared at the picture. Looked for a knob or a door bell.
Nothing.
She knocked on the frame.
XXX
House. Elves.
Harry had known there were non-human species in the wizarding world. Goblins at the bank, and whatever Hagrid was, but she honestly hadn't given it much thought. She'd even known there were house elves at Hogwarts that cooked the meals.
But… these. They looked a bit like goblins. Though, if goblins were Dudley-equivalents, then house elves were the scrawny little Harriet Riddles that probably got beat up by goblins.
Small and kind of knobbly, with squeaky voices like something from a cartoon. Their magic was unlike any she'd seen thus far though. It was… restrained. They didn't radiate any at all. Instead, theirs was confined within their bodies, thick and warm like a second bloodstream beneath the skin.
They were also terrified of snakes. As evinced by the dozen squealing elves that recoiled the instant the portrait swung open.
Things degenerated for a long few minutes after that. Harry panicked over scaring the elves. The elves panicked over her snakes, and because they'd upset her. Both tried to explain that they were sorry, talking over the other to do so. Then the snakes started chiming in with their massively unhelpful suggestions.
Harry was halfway through deciding to just leave when one of the braver elves finally shouted an invitation to come in. Apparently, the house elves valued hospitality over fear, and Harry found herself escorted to a small table, one of the elves explaining that they were in fact, elves, on the way.
She found herself seated at a little round table on the side, out of the way of the kitchen bustle, and with a heaping bowl of onion soup. A moment later, an elf delivered a plate of chopped chicken.
"For Miss Riddle's snake friends!" they announced. The elf was wearing a little dress made from sewn-up potato sacks, and their voice was a bit higher than some of the others, so Harry thought they might be female.
"Thanks, uhm-" Harry paused. "Is it okay that we're here?"
She hadn't heard of anyone coming down to the kitchens, and they weren't exactly obvious, what with the concealed painting in a corner of the dungeons.
"Miss Riddle is very kind," the elf said. "We is not havings many students coming down here, and none with snake friends, but Lansy is happy to serve."
"Oh. Uhm. So… you're the cooks?"
"Oh no, Miss." Lansy shook her head, her large ears flapping about. "We is doing all the chores in the castle. Cooking, cleaning, lighting fires, sometimes it seems like Hogwarts is making new rooms just for us to scrub." The elf winked at that last, though Harry didn't understand why.
She filled the silence by nudging a few of the snakes down toward the plate of chicken. It took some squabbling, but eventually most of the snakes found a spot on Harry or the table that wasn't too objectionable. Even the hatchling got a very, very small piece of meat, with Blackscale hovering protectively nearby.
"So." Harry glanced around the kitchen. Two elves were turning an entire roast pig on a spit, while a third glazed it. Across from them, a whole line of elves were chopping and prepping salad ingredients, depositing them in large bowls, where other elves mixed them into the final product. The entire kitchen had an industrious air, a light, thrifty sort of energy.
They were all smiling.
"Uhm."
"Is Miss needing anything else?" Lansy asked.
One of the elves at the salad table snapped their fingers, and with a pop, a bowl of salad levitated across the room to settle on a shelf with dozens of others.
Wandless, nonverbal magic.
Harry opened her mouth.
Her eyes fell on Lansy. The elf was fidgeting, uncomfortable under her gaze. Or was it discomfort at Harry not saying anything?
A second glance around the kitchen. There was something off here, though she only realized what when an elf mopped up a spill with the edge of his… rag. That he was wearing. None of the elves had clothes. They wore towels and aprons and even sashes with the Hogwarts crest, but there were no actual garments. It was like they'd scrounged their outfits out of whatever cloth was at hand.
Lansy was wilting slightly, the tips of her ears drooping.
We is doing all the chores in the castle.
Suddenly, her mental comparison to herself felt a bit too accurate.
"Do- do you need any help with cooking?" Harry stammered.
The elf went very still, her eyes the only part of her moving. They went wide.
And then she blinked, seeming to regroup, and shook her head. "No, Miss, we is getting along very well, and it is not proper for a witch to be's helping us."
"You like doing all this?"
Lansy looked politely confused this time. Like Harry had just said the sky was blue.
"Of course, Miss. House elves is always happy when we is doing work." Lansy paused, checking over her shoulder at the other elves. "Miss, I is needing to get back. Is Miss wanting anything else?"
She had questions. So many questions.
And they all turned to ash in her mouth at the sight of a couple hundred elves scurrying about, a few literally whistling while they worked.
"No. Thanks, Lansy."
XXX
Harry didn't taste a drop of the onion soup. She ate. She was full. But it tasted like nothing.
And when she was done, forks down, and waving off the few elves offering her dessert, Lansy reappeared.
"Is Miss-"
"It was good," Harry said stiffly. Her voice was too high. Tight. "You- you lot did a good job."
Lansy beamed at her. "Miss is very kind. Is you wanting anything to take up with you?"
"No, thanks." Harry stood up, suddenly conscious of how the elves were like children beside even her small height. She reached out to begin gathering the snakes, when a thought hit her.
"Do you know how to return something summoned?" She gestured to the snakes, most gorged half-asleep on chicken. "Them, I mean."
Lansy, smiled, and then snapped her fingers.
XXX
She felt lighter without them. It was easier to climb back up through the castle. A burden had been lifted, replaced with another that had nothing to do with weight.
Lighter, yes, but also lesser. Ephemeral.
Like losing Blackscale all over again. Even if the adder was still wreathing her throat, keeping an eye on the baby in her breast pocket.
House elves.
They were… they were broken, weren't they? Broken enough to find happiness in servitude.
Unseen. Cleaning the castle, top to bottom. Secluded in a room, toiling away to feed everyone else.
She wanted to go back and talk to them. Question the elves until she knew the how and why of it, even though she knew they wouldn't answer her. Couldn't answer her.
Who had made them this way?
Was it Hogwarts? Wizards?
She had no answers.
She did not know how to feel.
XXX
The third floor corridor was marked off by a velvet rope, and the hallway itself ringed with a line of bright red paint. Dumbledore had made it very apparent that it was forbidden.
But that was for good reason.
It was actually really easy to wander up to. Two flights of revolving stairs in the main stairwell were enough to get from the Great Hall to Fluffy. The work of five minutes, tops.
But Harry was still lagging a bit from the summonings, and was a hair too slow to catch the second stair. One of the portraits jeered at her, and she hissed back in parseltongue.The painted monk blanched – somehow – and vanished into the depths of his canvas.
She was bouncing on her heels, waiting for the stairs to rotate back around, when Filch crossed one of the walkways over the passage. The custodian was muttering to himself, and to Harry's frustration, turned down the corridor leading to Fluffy.
Harry wilted where she stood.
" Now what?"
"Go outside?" Blackscale suggested.
She shook her head.
It was a holiday, and the weather was brisk, but sunny. The grounds would be thronging with other students. Too many eyes, too many questions, when all she wanted was quiet.
When the stairs rotated around to her next, Harry took them.
XXX
Her feet carried her at random. Just as she had earlier in the day, Harry walked aimlessly, letting the castle cycle convoluted, winding hallways and rooms that hadn't seen a class in decades. The exploration should have been enough- the curiosities churned up in forgotten cupboards enough to keep her occupied.
But it wasn't filling the silence.
It pressed in on her. And with it, thoughts of cringing, servile house elves.
Harry hissed a swear under her breath and slammed shut the moldering textbook she'd been leafing through.
She didn't need quiet. She needed a distraction.
XXX
Up and up through the castle. Ghostlike, from destination to destination, searching for something to focus on.
The room she'd found with Ron and Neville- the layered room that had called to her, was absent. The library was being slammed shut by a fuming Madame Pince just as Harry arrived. The Weasley Twins had done something and earned themselves another lifetime ban.
Ravenclaw Tower got a wide berth. If she went there, there would be questions. And she wouldn't be able to stop her own from spilling out.
What were house elves? Why were they (slaves) servants?
She had a vague inkling to go up the Astronomy Tower and watch the forest, only to remember halfway there that it was kept locked during the day. The better to prevent older students canoodling up there.
The next set of doors she opened led onto a spiral stair. It was no different from any of the others she'd climbed so far, but for the smell. An acrid, sour odor, cut through with the scent of open air.
Muffled hooting floated down to her.
Blackscale squirmed uncomfortably as she ascended. "Smells like hunting-birds."
" Yes. You don't have to come, if you don't want to."
"And leave you alone with hunters?" Blackscale snorted, then slid inside her robes, disappearing from view.
Harry emerged. Tiny bones crunched underfoot with every step. The owlery was chilly, airier than even Ravenclaw Tower, and filled with a constant rustle of feathers. The stink was stronger, almost overwhelming; rotting owl pellets mixing with stale bird spoor.
She'd never paid much attention to owls before, but they weren't like any of the other magical animals she'd encountered so far. Where others were more… undefined, owls were like cut gems. They had keenness and insight, honed sharp, stored not in the chest like wizards, but in the head.
Why, she wasn't sure. Were magic owls just naturally smarter? It didn't feel natural though. It was like they'd been refined into what they were. So-
A massive eagle-owl hooted, and then swept down at her.
Harry yelped, only for the owl to hover, flapping in front of her with a reproachful cry.
She held out an arm.
The weight that settled there was… not much. Barely more than Blackscale if he was gorged. The owl's talons wrapped around her wrist, biting into the cloth, but just missing breaking the skin.
Harry let out a long, whistling breath, and nodded to the bird.
"Hullo."
XXX
It wasn't Fluffy, but it was a start.
The owls were smart enough to understand her, and a few of the more emotive ones would actively respond to her.
Harry had taken a seat on a white-splattered bench along the wall of the owlery. The eagle-owl, still occupying her arm, was her main focus. A few probing questions had revealed that it was male, and rather proud in a way that had nothing to do with his arrogant, feathered brow, and everything to do with the way he pecked her if she annoyed him.
But he was gorgeous. The way his feathers layered, varying in shape and size depending on their function, reminded her of snake scales. His eyes were a brilliant, blood red, and bright with the intelligence she could read inside all of the letter-carriers.
Harry sat and simply studied him for a long while. The owl preened under her attention, casting smug looks at the other owls that had congregated to watch.
How come she could talk to Blackscale and not them? Why was parseltongue a specific talent? Seriously. There had to be a spell to speak to animals. That was about as classical as it got.
She squinted, focusing her magic on the owl.
Talking. Communication. Understanding. Translation.
Tendrils of her power brushed across the owl's core. Glimmers of it bled through, muted, emotions sharper, but also less complex than a human's.
Fraying. Splitting.
The connection was waning; focusing on it and the owl was too much, stretching her mind in ways it wasn't meant to go.
Fragmented flashes of imagery, a world seen through eyes infinitely superior to hers.
The link broke like glass. She drew back, clutching her head. The eagle-owl gave a grumpy squawk and pecked her on the shoulder.
"Right, right. I get it."
A dull throb had taken up residence behind her left eye.
Was that because she'd botched the connection, or because she'd been trying to understand an owl's thoughts with her human brain?
"Did you get anything from that?" she asked the owl.
He pecked her squarely in the forehead.
"Ouch!"
There were footsteps coming up the stairs. Harry turned awkwardly, balancing the bird, realizing as she did so that she tasted copper.
Her free hand rose to probe. Not her forehead, but her nose. A thin streamer sliding down to her lips.
A boy emerged from the stairwell.
He was blond and pale, cheeks already rosy in the chill. The blush did nothing to detract from a sharp, pointed face, and robes far nicer than the off the rack stuff she wore. The poised way he stood, eyebrow raised, looked strange on someone her age.
And then he spoke- "What do you think you're doing with my owl?" -smooth face furrowing, voice petulant, and the illusion was broken.
Harry pinched her nose shut. "Sowwy." She jiggled her arm, trying to urge the owl toward the boy, only for the bird to snap its beak at her. "Dibn't know 'e was yours."
"Stolas, come here." The boy waved a roll of parchment at the owl.
With a rush of wings, the owl took flight. He snatched the roll from the boy's hand and kept going, straight out the window.
"You're supposed to let me tie it on!" the boy yelled after him.
Harry found herself cradling her wrist as well now. Stolas' talons had dug in when he took off.
"Episkey. Episkey." Stopping her nosebleed took another four tries, finally ceasing when she combined the motion for relieving pressure with siphoning fluid. Hopefully the blood just went back to where it should be and… didn't cause an aneurysm or something, because she didn't think motions were supposed to be combined.
"Are you doing wandless healing?" the boy exclaimed. "Show me."
Harry cast a dour look at him, but it didn't stop him from leaning over her to watch.
Her wrist was easier. The owl's talons had cut five small gashes in her skin. She pinched each shut between ring finger and thumb, then drew her index over the cut. Rinse and repeat, finishing with rinsing the excess blood off with Aquamenti.
"Impressive." The boy made to offer her a hand, glanced down at her bloodied, dirt-stained palms, and withdrew it before bowing his head slightly. "Draco Malfoy."
"Harriet Riddle."
She rose from the bench so she wouldn't have to talk up to him. Stolas had left behind a few feathers on her robes, which she pocketed, noticing as she did that he'd done far more damage to her sleeve than her skin.
"Wonderful," she muttered, poking a finger through the rent cloth.
"You're that parselmouth, aren't you?"
She tensed. The boy had a green tie. Another Slytherin looking for a show?
"I am."
But Malfoy was rubbing his chin. "Riddle… I know I've heard that name before. Are you pureblood?"
"Orphan."
"Oh." He recovered quickly. "Where did you learn to heal like that?"
She shrugged. "Practiced."
Hunger flashed across his features before he covered it with a smile. There was definitely something too sharp, too sly about this boy.
"Show me how. I'm sure you know this, but the Malfoys have a lot of pull in Britain. And Father is a school governor. It wouldn't be hard to put in a good word for you in return."
Harry blinked slowly at him. What did that even mean? A good word for what?
"No thanks."
His brows knit together. "What do you want then?"
It took her a moment to find an answer. Malfoy was a pureblood. And if he was as important as he seemed to think he was, then he'd almost certainly grown up with magic.
"What spells do you know?"
"Oh. I see," Malfoy said, nodding. "Do you do trades in Ravenclaw too? Give and take?"
She nodded back.
His smile gave way to a look of concentration. "I know a lot of hexes and curses that don't get used much. Father showed me the Bone-Breaker once, if you want something really dark."
"What would I do with that?" Harry said. "Do you know anything… uhm… practical?"
"Curses are practical."
Were all Slytherins this creepy?
"Actually practical stuff. Like- I know how to make fire or water, heal wounds, find north, uh- unlock locks. Something usable every day."
Judging by the incredulous look Malfoy was giving her, he genuinely thought curses were that. But then he sighed, rubbing his eyes in exasperation. "Trust a girl to only want to learn domestic nonsense. That's what house elves are for."
An ugly jag of anger went through her. "Have a nice day, Malfoy."
Harry turned on her heel and headed for the stairwell.
"Wait! You- wait." Malfoy had his wand out. "Your robes. Do you know how to fix them?"
She stopped walking.
XXX
They traded.
Malfoy taught her Reparo, a spell of almost frightening utility. In return, Harry began showing him how to do wandless magic. It wasn't easy for him, Malfoy was very attached to his wand, and had to be coached gently or he'd start sniping at her.
It was a bit like what she imagined teaching Dudley to do something was. Both had a strongly developed sense of self-importance to tiptoe around. Malfoy was oilier, but at the very least, useful.
Reparo was, without a doubt, the most useful spell she'd learned thus far. It repaired things. There were limits on how many times something could be fixed, and it couldn't create 100% from whole cloth, but it worked on everything. It was the least Harry could do not to drool in front of Malfoy.
By the time the sun was touching the top of the forest, painting the grounds orange, Harry had gotten Draco (please, if I may call you Harry?), through the very basics of feeling his magic and having an intent.
"Same time on Wednesday?" Malfoy had said, and Harry had shrugged.
A trade was a trade.
She had no problem teaching him if he kept coming up with spells as good as Reparo. And teaching itself was helpful. Having to enunciate and explain the little details of wandless magic forced her to develop a more concrete understanding of exactly what she did, beyond vague feelings and thinking really hard to make things happen.
When Malfoy finally departed down the stairs to go to dinner (Harry declined his invitation. She wasn't in the mood for a boisterous Halloween feast), Harry found herself with a warm sense of fulfillment. It had been a very profitable meeting. Even the lingering sense of disquiet over house elves and her own impurity couldn't detract from the massive leap in survival magic she'd made today.
Harry ambled to one of the glassless windows, leaning on a relatively clean part of the sill. She'd give Malfoy a five-minute head start, and then go visit Fluffy. He'd be lonely, cooped up while everyone was at dinner.
XXX
Fluffy's door was locked.
She pressed a thumb to it, pushed her magic in like she was filling the keyhole with water, and then twisted.
Fluffy's door was unlocked.
She slipped in.
He knew her well enough by now that she didn't even have to sing for him. The cerberus sniffed her hands and licked her face, and Harry pressed her nose to his fur. He smelled like dog, scaled up by ten. A musky scent uniquely Fluffy.
"I missed you."
She examined him, meeting each set of dark eyes, one at a time. Fluffy wore his magic in his fur and hide. That wasn't the only spot it was- it suffused every inch of him, just as hers filled her body, but his core was more ill-defined. Branching, the magic of three, separate intelligences meeting at a loose nexus in his barreled chest.
Could she speak to him? Understand his thoughts and feelings?
Fluffy's left head turned to look at the pile of cow bones he kept in the corner. They were splintery and cracked, gnawed ragged by three sets of jaws. Left-head barked thunderously. A moment later, the other two barked back in agreement.
On the other hand… was there any need to?
Her head still ached from trying Stolas anyway.
Harry shot him a closed-lipped smile, using her voice to intone her excitement at the idea.
"Let's run around a bit."
XXX
Fluffy's room was another of those variable spaces Hogwarts had. Big some days, small on others. It was long and wide, a cathedral hall, today.
They played fetch until Fluffy crushed the last bone to powder. He was panting, his muzzle flecked with froth, but his tail hadn't stopped wagging. He padded back to her, bent to drink from his dish (big enough she could have swam in it), and then flopped over on the mound of hay that was his bed.
Fluffy gave a pleased sort of grumble as she came over and took a seat against one heaving flank.
"You've met Blackscale before. I made a new friend this morning. She doesn't have a name yet, but she just hatched."
She held up the baby snake for Fluffy to sniff. The hatchling bared her fangs at him, but Fluffy just snuffled thoughtfully and withdrew, laying his leftmost head down beside Harry.
"I've been telling her about all the stuff in the castle. This is Fluffy. He's a prisoner here."
Hogwarts seemed to have a lot of those.
"Uhm. What were we talking about last time I was here?" Fluffy's ears perked up. "Right. I was telling you a story. You can hear it too, if you want," she added to the little snake.
"Where were we? Had we gotten to the part with the mines yet?"
Fluffy's center head shook left-right.
"Okay. So the Fellowship couldn't make it over the mountains, so they had to go through these mines. Dwarven mines- where Gimli was from." Pause. "Are dwarves real?"
Center-head nodded.
"Huh. So these mines were sealed, and-"
XXX
She talked until the windows went dark.
The snakes were still, Blackscale silent, but she could tell they were listening. Fluffy's left and right heads were dozing, the latter snoring loudly, but the center was attentive enough for all three of them.
Harry was just getting into the segment with the Balrog- she hadn't understood most of the book, really, but it had been one of the few she'd smuggled into her cupboard – when the other two heads snapped up.
Fluffy came to his feet so suddenly that Harry was bowled over. He stood, limbs stiff, his heads cocked to listen. Left-head lifted his lip, a bass growl starting in Fluffy's chest.
"What's wrong?"
He was staring at the door.
Harry rose and crept toward it. Pressed her ear against the wood. It was too thick to hear anything, but she trusted his ears better than hers.
She twisted the knob and opened the door, hinges groaning.
Outside, the corridor was dark. The torches had all gone out. No- Harry glanced up and down the hall. All the torches were out. There was no light bleeding in from the central stair, or through any of the windows.
She crept out, letting the door creak closed behind her.
The darkness was unsettling; the castle more like a massive cave than a building. Her ears pricked for a sound, some indicator the disturbance had been noted, but the silence was all-encompassing.
Two steps away from the door. Her heart had started pounding at some point, loud enough to be audible in the quiet.
And then, far off in the castle, someone screamed. Shrill, muffled by distance, but still enough to make Harry jump and gasp, her back to the wall.
Part of her, a calm, rational, stereotypically Ravenclaw voice, was certain that this was just a Halloween prank. Some grand display for the feast, designed to scare everyone.
But it didn't feel like that.
It hadn't sounded like a fun scream. And why was every single light out?
Her fingers twitched. There were spells. Lumos. Incendio. Solas Realta. Lux Manum. Any of which would burn away the dark and give her a way to see where she was going.
And then what?
Descending the labyrinth of stairs to get to the Great Hall- assuming the stairs were even functioning. Seeking out a teacher.
Another scream. This one masculine, hoarse with agony.
Harry drew a shaky breath.
She turned on her heel and walked back to Fluffy's door. Fumbling in the dark for the knob. Her fingers had just touched metal when footsteps echoed down the corridor.
She looked up.
Someone was running down the hall, but it was too dark to see- her eyes flicked towards shadowy patches, trying to glimpse whoever it was.
Ragged breathing. The sound of robes dragging and swishing.
Harry raised a hand, preparing to cast. The first motes of Lumos flickered into being around her, suddenly, blindingly bright after so long in the night.
The figure- impossible to see through her ruined nightvision, but it was there, a dozen feet away.
"Reis!"
Magic hooked around her and pulled. The Lumos burst apart into nothing. Her shoes dragged across stone, rubber shrieking, and then she left the floor entirely to slam against the far wall.
Harry cried out as her head and back impacted, her vision rolling sickeningly under the pain. She tried to clutch her skull, but her hands were pressed flat, like gravity itself had turned against her.
Footsteps shuffled to a stop in front of her.
She blinked away tears, trying to make out the figure in the darkness.
There was an instant where she could see dark robes, and above them, the sallow face of Professor Snape, and then his wand was aimed squarely at her chest.
"Pr-professor?" She could taste blood again. A bitten tongue. "...why?"
He hesitated, determined expression falling away, replaced with a stunned blankness.
"Potter."
His wand hadn't faltered.
"What were you doing?"
Harry tried to shake her head- couldn't. The throb of pain even attempting it gave was nauseating. "Nothing."
At her throat, Blackscale was wriggling feebly, just as restrained as she was. Snape saw the snake and his face darkened. "Bullesco."
His magic slid in between them and jerked Blackscale away. A bubble, blue-green, formed around the snake, floating up to stick to the ceiling.
"No!" Harry shouted. "Bring him back!"
Snape's hand found the neck of her robes. He pulled, lifting her up to his level, stale breath in her face. Up-close, he looked dreadful. The skin around his mouth was raw and inflamed, and half the veins in his left eye had burst, red star-bursts on white. Even his robes were dirty, the front smeared with something foul, chunks of wet matter that stank of vomit.
"Tell me what you were doing."
"Nothing!" Her voice was hoarse, a shriek in her ears. "I was visiting Fluffy and you attacked me!"
"I have no time for your childish games, Potter," Snape said, grinding out the words. "Someone thought it would be amusing to poison the entire Halloween feast. Myself included. And here I find you. Not at dinner. Out of bounds, casting magic at the door to the most secure location in the castle. Almost as if the feast was nothing but a distraction. Who told you to come here?"
"I was visiting Fluffy!"
A muscle ticked in his cheek. "Liar. The beast is too vicious for anyone to approach. Were you supposed to find a way past it?"
The hot, impotent anger that filled her only hurt more when the tears started in. But he wasn't hearing her. No matter what she said, he just kept snarling at her. She just shook her head, throat and eyes burning.
"Tell me, you stupid, little girl," Snape said, sneering. "There is too much at stake here. If you won't tell the truth, you force my hand. Look at me."
His hand snapped up, catching her chin, turning her face toward his. Harry shut her eyes. She knew what was coming. She struggled, trying to summon her magic to push him away, to stop this, but the focus required was buried beneath terror.
"Look. At. Me!"
" No! Stop it!"
Rough, cold fingers on her cheeks, and then his thumbs pressed to her eyelids. Tears bubbled over.
Their eyes met.
She screamed.
XXX
Memory rushed up and devoured her. A roar of past days, flashes of images and scenes and sounds blurring into a cacophony.
"Not Har-" "-rriet." "Riddle!" "Useless girl." "Car crash." "cupboard." "Speaker?" "Ouro-" "Serpensortia!"
She was drowning. There was no reality outside the torrent in her head. Snape's magic was flowing in and tearing her apart, cutting to the very depths of Her.
His voice echoed through her skull. 'Show me who sent you. Who wants the stone?'
Snape was pulling up memories, sifting and discarding faster than she could comprehend them.
A park- climbing a stairwell- making dinner- the orphanage- catching a snake behind the chapel- Blackscale laughing at her- telling him stories- whispering in Parseltongue-
He was getting closer. She could sense it in the way his focus narrowed, refining toward a particular venue of thought. There was a memory drawing near. A bright, shining memory, the details sharpened by the times she'd revisited it.
Quirrel. Narrow face split with a thin smile. His praise. His words and his magic.
It was their secret.
It was not for Snape.
' Show me.'
No.
'Who sent you? Who gave you that name?! '
No.
There was no turning him away, no way to push him out. He was stronger in every conceivable way.
There was only one refuge.
Get out. Get out get out getoutgetoutget- § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε .
Snape's intrusion paused.
' What is this?'
Ƨǽ-ȿǐ , šƨ άѳ. § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε!
' What are you doing, Potter? I am trying to help you. You' ve been bewitched ! This will not-'
But his violation had stopped. He was recoiling, trying to regroup.
Harry kept repeating it, the parseltongue a mantra, a common thread overriding all thought.
§ el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε
Snape's fury poured through his magic. He was pushing, but there were no memories for him to grasp. She focused on the words and let everything else fall away. The sibilant noise. Vibration in her lips and tongue.
He swore and redoubled. There was pain now, a terrible wrenching in her head and in her magic.
And then there was something else.
Another magic. A thrum against hers. Far off, drawing rapidly nearer.
Her mantra faltered, and Snape nearly broke through into her thoughts again, but there was surprise tinging his mind now. Shock, and then- a different sort of anger.
He withdrew.
XXX
She was on the floor. That thought alone penetrated the haze of pain she returned to. There was more blood in her mouth and nose, clogging her sinuses. The nails-on-bone feeling of a migraine was in full force, and it was only as she curled up, clutching her head, that she realized she was able to move freely.
There was vibration in the stones beneath her.
Her eyelids split slowly, even the darkness of the hall too bright.
A blurred shape moved above her. Another, beyond it, gestured back. There was shouting, a vacuous roar that her brain couldn't even begin to interpret.
She shut her eyes again.
The noise and clamor faded into white noise.
Harry held her skull and waited for the pain to ease.
"Speaker." A scaled body brushed against her forearm. She jerked, unfolding just enough to grope blindly on the floor. Her hand found Blackscale's back, and she snatched him up, letting him slide back beneath her robes.
"You are safe," he whispered. "Your sire is here."
She barely heard him. A free hand patted the front of her robes- the hatchling was still there, wriggling in her pocket. Unharmed. Harry let out a breath.
"Harry." Quirrel's voice this time, so soft she could barely hear it. His hand pressed to her shoulder a moment later- she jerked, but it didn't draw away. The contact was like a rush of ice water- his presence washing away the worst of the pain, blunting the edges and soothing the heat.
"Hospital wing," he murmured, speaking English now. "Severus, what in the hell were you thinking? She's only a child!" His hand left her – Harry groaned in spite of herself – only to return. He slid an arm under her back, the other against her legs, and lifted.
The motion made the room spin even with her eyes closed, and she curled up tighter, thumbs jammed into her temples.
He walked.
Things blurred.
XXX
A heartbeat.
Soft and steady. The metronome that she set her breath by. The pain was a little less with each exhale.
He had his hand against the back of her neck, fingers contouring the skin, thumb rubbing gentle circles in her hair. It was more, this close to him, more than it had been. Something bone deep. Like sinking into sleep.
His heartbeat.
The unfamiliar warmth of another's body against hers. Pressed to his chest as he carried her.
Carried her away-
-away from-
She blinked. The world sharpened. Darkened corridors, dim silver in the moonlight.
" Professor?"
"Just a little bit further."
She shut her eyes again, letting his touch press fingers into her brain and wipe away the world.
It was only too soon before a door creaked open and interrupted her reverie. A sharp, chemical smell, and stones so steeped in a clean, clear magic that they were permanently whitened.
When she opened her eyes this time, everything was wavering. The hospital wing swam in and out of focus, patches of shadow smearing across her vision. Trying to interpret it made her skull ache, driving spikes into the backs of her eyes until she closed them.
"'fessor," she rasped. The parseltongue came out slurred. "I feel- feel terrible."
"I know." He hadn't stopped tracing patterns in her hair, but he'd stopped walking. "Go to sleep for me, Harry." His thumb stilled.
"Ad Morphea."
His magic pulsed through her once, lighting up nerves and curling toes, and then sinking into her, soft and insistent.
The sound of his heartbeat chased her all the way down.
XXX
A brush.
Something unfamiliar. Contact. Probing.
No.
It was- again.
No!
Someone was- their magic on her-
Her own power surged, forcing the intruder away, raw panic overriding conscious thought.
Harry shot up in bed, heart explosive, already trying to run. Hands caught at her, pressing her back, and she cried out, trying to break away.
"Miss Riddle! Calm yourself!" a woman shouted. The grip tightened, a man's hands holding her fast, drawing forth an animal whine from her throat.
"Speaker, they try to aid you!" Blackscale's voice, and the protective torque of him around her throat were enough to make her freeze. Her eyes finally caught up with her, the room slowly coming into focus, bringing with it the angry throb of her migraine.
Harry turned her head to see her attackers. Madame Pomfrey stood on the opposite side of the bed, looking uncharacteristically disheveled. The one holding her was an unfamiliar wizard. Baby-faced and blond, with emerald green robes. At second glance, the man had an odd bandoleer filled with glass potion vials, and a patch over his heart- a wand crossed with a bone.
"All with us, darling?" he asked.
After a moment, she nodded jerkily.
The man grinned and let go of her. Harry, after a glance at the two adults, slid back to the edge of her bed and sat down, stroking Blackscale. The comforting texture of his scales gave her something to focus on, her rapid breaths slowing little by little.
"I hope we didn't frighten you."
" I- That's- okay."
The wizard recoiled. "What in the- Pomfrey, I thought she was healed?"
Madame Pomfrey tapped her nail against her clipboard. "She's fine, Mister Sedgewick. Miss Riddle, please return to English so we can finish your exam."
It took her a moment to understand. And another to force her speech back, replacing smooth, sliding words with rough and glottal.
"I said I'm fine."
"Zounds." Sedgewick was blinking, somewhere between surprised and bemused. "That's certainly-"
"Very good." Pomfrey stepped forward, cutting off any more. "Secondary diagnostics, please." She waved her wand at Harry, who flinched at the invasive magic and had to make a conscious effort not to force it away again. A second later, Sedgewick mimicked her, generating a scroll of parchment from his wand tip that he handed to the older woman.
The matron examined it, her face tight, before returning her attention to Harry."I healed the worst of the bruising in your back and head while you slept. Any pain you're experiencing right now should resolve with bed rest. No strenuous casting for at least 3 days, your reserves will be needed to help keep you healthy."
"Okay." As long as there wouldn't be any more casting on her.
"Miss Riddle, I-" Pomfrey hesitated, glancing at the parchment again, before her face softened. "I need to move on. There are others I need to see to. But, if you are able, I'd like to meet with you as soon as this matter is resolved. It would be confidential. Just you and I, healer to patient."
Harry curled in on herself. Teachers never wanted to speak to you alone unless it was bad. She was in trouble. Snape could have spun any number of stories already. And there was no denying that she had been in the forbidden corridor. Or perhaps Pomfrey would leave punishment to Flitwick, and this was just to examine her parseltongue ability like a particularly interesting medical specimen?
She didn't know the woman well enough to answer, but Pomfrey seemed to take her stiff silence as answer enough. She nodded and swept away, moving on to the next bed.
"Get some rest, yeah?" Sedgewick shot her a wink before scurrying along after Pomfrey. Harry turned to watch them go, only to realize for the first time the state of the infirmary.
Every bed was filled.
The hospital wing had been deserted when she came in. The room now stretched on far longer than it had in the past, with many, many more beds, every one filled. As she watched, Professor McGonagall summoned three more into existence. The beds had no sooner skidded to a halt than they were occupied- injured students popping into them like bizarre fireworks.
Other teachers, it looked like most of them, minus, to her relief, Snape, had been drafted into service as well. A few beds away, Professor Sinistra was drawing signs in the air over a retching, wheezing Slytherin. There were a number of strangers among them, more adults in green robes like Sedgewick, who Harry supposed were wizarding doctors.
Her eye fell on the nearest bed. The occupant was sleeping uneasily, tossing and turning under the sheets. They rolled over, and Harry shivered, unable to stifle a gasp. She knew this girl. Not by name. But her face was familiar. A Gryffindor girl that she had Herbology with. A real know-it-all who Harry tried to avoid because she got a lot of attention from professors. Her face, normally so proud, so keen, was now puffy, her eyes swollen, cheeks shiny with fever sweat.
Without thought, Harry reached out, spreading her awareness to the girl. It- she drew back instantly, hissing. It was like reaching her hand into scalding water. The Gryffindor's magic was on full-alert, mobilized to fight off whatever ailment she had, and was fiercely defensive of anything that might be a threat. How did the healers even work when their patients' bodies were fighting off all-comers? The textbooks she'd read hadn't covered that.
Across the room, someone moaned, their voice thick with pain. The sound seemed to kick off a chorus. Or perhaps Harry had simply been numb, trying to ignore the sounds. A groan. A low, keening wail. Someone screeching, far down the ward. A hurk, and then the unmistakable sound of splattering vomit. The Gryffindor girl, silent, but for hands balling in sheets hard enough to make the cloth creak.
Harry listened, nausea and fear intertwined and surging in her throat, her head still throbbing. Snape had said the whole school was poisoned. But they weren't all here. Had… were the ones who weren't- were they dead? Or were the ones here going to die?
Across from the Gryffindor, an older boy sat up in bed. Another face. Robbie Celtran. A fifth year in her house who liked to make flashcards in return for spare change. He was shuddering under the sheets, his limbs quivering and spasming uncontrollably, even as his face grew red with the effort of trying to still himself.
And down the line. Was that the white-blond hair of Malfoy?
Was Su somewhere in here? Or Ron? Neville?
Her eyes burned. How many times did that make today? More than the last year combined. But… if she walked down the ward and saw one of her friends, it felt like the tears would just turn on and never stop. Like something would break, and she already felt so brittle.
She couldn't stay here. Not in this- this sickbed.
She waited until Sinistra moved on to the next patient, her attention elsewhere.
Harry didn't run. People looked at running things.
She walked briskly out of the hospital wing on legs like rubber.
XXX
The walk back to Ravenclaw was deathly silent, and Harry kept glancing over her shoulder. But the halls were empty, the torches relit. Whatever commotion had occurred seemed to be over.
The tower was the barest relief. There was no murmur of talk in the dorms, and even the fires were extinguished. The normally airy common room felt stagnant, the desks not so empty as deserted. The handful of magical signatures she could feel were subdued, either sleeping or laying unhappily awake. But they were there, and they were alive. Her fears that Hogwarts had turned into some kind of charnel house were soothed.
She found her room, locking the door behind her. Then she checked the dorm for anything out of the ordinary. Inch by inch, running her magic over the surfaces and furniture. Anything that might indicate an intruder. It was an impulse she didn't quite understand, only that she needed to know that she was alone. That she was safe.
There was more she wanted to do- to bathe and scrub away the infirmary and Snape's magic on her, but the idea of straying out again was paralyzing.
There was too much of magic unknown. Snape had been an unknown.
Only when the room was secured did she set Blackscale down beside her pillow. The hatchling, who hissed grumpily at Harry when she pulled her free, was set beside the adder. It hadn't been the ideal first day, and she was too exhausted at this point to put any thought into what to do with her.
Then she turned and, wand in hand for once, cast at the door. It was a crude transfiguration- the edges of the door melted into the frame, the wood taking on the properties of stone. If she was better at it, the entire door would have become indistinguishable from the wall, but the skill and knowledge were beyond her.
She did the same for the windows before firmly drawing the curtains. Only then did she shuck her robes and change into her night clothes.
For a while, she sniffled, staring blindly at the ceiling, too tired to even cry, and too numb to do more than wipe her cheeks once in a while.
Her thoughts, dragged down by exhaustion, became more and more confused, and when she finally drifted off, her dreams were such violent, chaotic messes that she woke at once, shivering.
Odd, out of sorts memories kept floating to the surface, like Snape had ripped them loose from their moorings. Flashes of horrible things she'd done her best to forget. Embarrassments and humiliations at the Dursleys, and worse- some shadowy, formless memories that seemed to contain only flashes of green light and screaming. Men and women whose faces she didn't know, contorting and twisting in agony before finally being snuffed out with that hellish corpse-light. And then it was faces she did know. Ron and Su and the Gryffindor girl, cheeks hollowed by sickness, withering and wasting before her eyes.
She woke from the dream. It was a long time before she could breathe.
XXX
The idea of returning to the nightmares was enough to make her sit up in bed and kick off the blankets.
"Blackscale." He lifted his head at once. Not sleeping either. "Can you- can you just talk for a little bit?"
The adder came and coiled in her lap, his weight just enough to hold her from getting up and pacing. An anchor against the fear.
"Have I told you where snakes come from?" He paused, not because he expected her to answer, but because it was more dramatic. "The first serpent was the Ouroboros. Not your sire. The real thing. He bit his tail and formed the boundaries of the universe. From there..."
He talked.
Harry let it wash over her.
She did not try to sleep again.
XXX
Blackscale finally lost his voice, having grown hoarser and hoarser through his many, many stories about why snakes were perfect. He rasped to a halt, and she put a hand on his head, nodding to him.
The far horizon had grown slightly brighter, sunrise still far off. She slipped out of bed, and pulling on Blackscale like a scarf, departed her room.
The stone floors were chilly, making her birdstep her way to the bathroom. Normally, she'd worry about having to shower with someone else in the room, but it was uncomfortably the opposite today. Even early, there was usually some sense of life in the dorms. This morning, she felt like a ghost, haunting empty rooms in a dark tower.
The shower noise helped a bit.
She stayed under until her skin was lobster red, taking her time to get every trace of Halloween off. The blood dried under her nails was familiar. The grime from Fluffy's room, expected. But the dingy, purpling bruise in the shape of a hand on her upper arm… that, she didn't remember.
It wasn't something she could scrub away, and, somehow, in the timeless, too-still of the early morning, she couldn't recall a single thing she'd learned about healing.
Harry stood, shower pattering against the top of her head, studying the mark. Was she supposed to just go to class with him? Pretend it never happened?
Was she just supposed to let it keep happening?
XXX
The shower refreshed her just a little. It was something normal. The kind of thing she always did in the morning. Harry continued her routine by dressing, tying her hair back, and then grabbing her bag and the two snakes.
But the dorms were still too quiet, and she was still awake. Her brain was packed full of everything that had happened on Halloween, and without the buffer of sleep it was like living a single, endless day. Memories were piling up. The migraine had faded, less shooting or throbbing than just droning, a constant, low-level ache.
A notice had appeared on the common room bulletin board. Classes were canceled for the day. Harry stared at it blankly for a few moments before the words made sense. Of course they were.
She rubbed her eyes and headed for the door.
The walk down from the tower was more of the same. Eerie silence, with hallways too big and too empty. She felt strangely outside of herself. Different. Off. Her body felt somehow similar; too big and too small, like it was crushing down on her, but also as if she was apart from it, nothing more than a pair of eyes inhabiting a shell.
The thought it would take to plan a route was beyond her, so she wandered, taking stairs as they came. Little by little, descending. When her destination finally appeared around a corner, Harry found herself standing outside the door, unsure of what to even do.
Twice, she nearly turned on her heel and left. Both times, it was the soreness, the bruise on her arm that turned her back.
Finally, she gulped, swallowing her spit, thick and uneasy on an empty stomach, and knocked.
For a long moment there was silence.
And then a flickering, quavering spirit entered her field. A click, the lock sliding open, and then the door.
Quirinus Quirrel peered down at her, his face stubbly, his eyes sunken and heavy.
" Sir. Please, I need- I need your help."
XXX
XXX
This went through a FUCK TON of drafts. Like, there's at least 50 pages of drafts in my in-progress doc. Initial goals were to have this be the chapter where Harry and Quirrel finally get that sit-down talk, but it kept diverging too much. The backbone of this- Harry getting bummed over house elves and exploring, was a really early draft.
Most of the middle ones were a lot more out there, mostly centered around Harry returning all those snakes she summoned by hand, ending up in the forbidden forest just in time for the school's Samhain celebration, with that Quirrel conversation finally happening.
That conversation was the original final segment to this chapter, following her into his office. But on my final pass on this draft, I realized it was already 9500 words, and I didn't want to make two chapters, so you get it cut off here we so we spend more time with Quirrel next time.
If you're wondering why it took me so long... I wanted this chapter to be perfect. It was meant to be the moment where Harry finally falls under Quirrel's snares. An almost climactic moment in the story, and where things finally get started. So I wanted it to be flawless. What we ended up with... it's not perfect, but I'm fairly happy with what it is. I'll probably reuse most of the creepier Quirrel and Harry conversation material next chapter so it doesn't go to waste. He is such a fucking creepazoid...
My one real disappointment here is that I'd been playing with having the troll show up somehow, with Fluffy busting out of his cell to defend Harry, papa wolf style. Almost ended up having him be the one to save Harry from Snape, not Quirrel. I'll probably keep Fluffy for later...
If you're wondering why Snape was such a nutter-butter? Dude just jammed a bezoar down his throat and made a beeline for the third floor corridor, and he's STILL shaking off the effects of poison. He's not thinking too rationally, and Harry is pretty goddamn suspicious. Not particularly a spoiler, as it's going to be the beginning of next chapter anyway, but he was fairly sure that Harry's weird behavior was the result of a Confundus or Imperious, and that's why he Legilimized her.
"Feed me."
Harry woke to a grass snake's forked tongue in her ear.
"I'm hungry," it hissed.
She blinked, slowly, disjointedly. One eye was blind, that side of her face pressed into the dirt, her nose thick with the scent of churned soil. The world felt cavernous and far away, glimpsed through a curtain of dark hair that had come loose from her bandanna.
Harry lifted her head, just enough to shake the hair out of her eyes. Taking stock. Her legs and back were stiff, the consequence of sleeping on the ground. Her right hand was… outstretched, clutching at the air in front of her. She stared at it for a long moment before withdrawing it.
"Hungry!" the grass snake said again, echoed by a half-dozen other serpents this time.
" Fine. Give me a sec. "
She rose to a sitting position. The snakes draped over her fell away into a tangle, all hissing furiously as they tumbled into the others.
The sun had disappeared behind the towers entirely, and the courtyard was in full shade. She'd rolled into one of the cobble-less patches of earth during her nap, and had to brush the dirt off her clothes as she got to her feet.
Moving around got her thoughts going again, let her shake off the last vestiges of sleep. After one too many nightmares, the nap had been just what she needed. She ached from lying on the ground, but it was a good sort of tenderness, and her magic felt pleasant, almost relaxed after the earlier exertion of hatching the egg.
It was a wonder the thing hadn't exploded with the amount she'd pumped into it.
The newborn snake, still sleeping, got shifted into her shirt pocket. Harry picked up her robes, tucking the eggshell into a pocket before pulling them back on.
The crowd of snakes was watching her, scores of reptile eyes following her every move.
She checked her watch. "Geez. Okay- We slept through lunch. But it's almost time for dinner. You're all welcome to come."
They were after all, her guests. She'd pulled them away from their lives to join the birthing, and now she needed to reward their time.
Only… there was no way she was taking this lot into the Great Hall. One adder was bad enough already. Thirty snakes would cause a panic.
A few of the lazier serpents were already tugging at her pants or trying to climb her legs and catch a ride. Harry sighed, and bent down.
" All aboard."
XXX
She'd tried to play with Mrs. Figg's cats before. Once.
Dealing with forty-odd summoned snakes was a lot like that. Only, while she couldn't understand cats, the snakes all had very colorful vocabularies. Every one of them loathed the others, and were fiercely territorial of the few square inches of Harry they occupied.
The hatchling was in her pocket, and Blackscale had his spot around her neck, but the rest of her, shoulder to finger-tip, down her shirt, even a few around her waist like belts, was be-snaked.
They were heavy.
And squirmy.
She kept having to stop and catch her breath because the ones down her shirt were tickling her, and any snake touching her bare skin was trying to taste her sweat with equally ticklish tongues.
Her muffled, snorty giggles drowned out even the constant hissing that surrounded her.
"You said you- you- ha! Stop it! You smelled food down there?" she wheezed, speaking to a snake on the back of her wrist. It was a magical breed, with jewel-like, powder-blue scales, and brilliant red eyes, that Harry had uncreatively dubbed 'Sky.'
Sky scented the air. "That one," she said, jabbing her snout at the left hallway ahead.
They'd crossed most of the castle already, but they seemed to be getting close. The blue-snake's directions were getting more precise. Harry had mostly just played packmule and tried very hard to focus her intent on Hogwarts leading her to the kitchens.
She took the left hall. It sloped downward, and a stairwell at the far end led them two flights deeper. They'd been descending all the way so far. Were the kitchens in the dungeons or something? Was that sanitary?
They were just crossing the boundary where the castle architecture gave way to the rougher, older stone of the dungeons, when the shape in Harry's pocket stirred. It was minute, enough that she was half-sure it was just one of the snakes beneath her clothes shifting around until it happened again.
The hand that wasn't holding Sky rose to dip within.
The newborn serpent curled into a defensive knot in the center of her palm.
"Hullo," Harry said.
The baby flicked its tongue at her, but said nothing.
"She is too young to speak," Blackscale said. He nosed down to look more closely at it- her. "She will be hungry though."
Fine enough. They were headed to the kitchens anyway.
"How long until she speaks?" Harry asked.
The adder gave a lazy, catlike blink. "When she is ready."
"Oh."
"It depends on the snake," Sky interjected.
Both adults watched as a grass snake probed too close to the hatchling. She balled tighter, opening her mouth to reveal a set of tiny, needle teeth, and hissed warningly.
Harry nudged the offender back onto her arm. "Away." To the little snake, she added, "I'm Harry, and this is Blackscale. We're in a place called Hogwarts and..."
Just because she couldn't speak didn't mean she couldn't listen. And didn't children learn words by listening to adults anyway?
XXX
" And this is a hallway in the dungeons. Dungeons are like a stone burrow. And- we're almost there?"
"We're here," Sky corrected.
'Here,' in this case, meant a large painting of a fruit bowl. There was a palpable smell of food in the hallway; meat cooking over a fire, and a rich, oniony scent that she thought might be soup.
Harry stared at the picture. Looked for a knob or a door bell.
Nothing.
She knocked on the frame.
XXX
House. Elves.
Harry had known there were non-human species in the wizarding world. Goblins at the bank, and whatever Hagrid was, but she honestly hadn't given it much thought. She'd even known there were house elves at Hogwarts that cooked the meals.
But… these. They looked a bit like goblins. Though, if goblins were Dudley-equivalents, then house elves were the scrawny little Harriet Riddles that probably got beat up by goblins.
Small and kind of knobbly, with squeaky voices like something from a cartoon. Their magic was unlike any she'd seen thus far though. It was… restrained. They didn't radiate any at all. Instead, theirs was confined within their bodies, thick and warm like a second bloodstream beneath the skin.
They were also terrified of snakes. As evinced by the dozen squealing elves that recoiled the instant the portrait swung open.
Things degenerated for a long few minutes after that. Harry panicked over scaring the elves. The elves panicked over her snakes, and because they'd upset her. Both tried to explain that they were sorry, talking over the other to do so. Then the snakes started chiming in with their massively unhelpful suggestions.
Harry was halfway through deciding to just leave when one of the braver elves finally shouted an invitation to come in. Apparently, the house elves valued hospitality over fear, and Harry found herself escorted to a small table, one of the elves explaining that they were in fact, elves, on the way.
She found herself seated at a little round table on the side, out of the way of the kitchen bustle, and with a heaping bowl of onion soup. A moment later, an elf delivered a plate of chopped chicken.
"For Miss Riddle's snake friends!" they announced. The elf was wearing a little dress made from sewn-up potato sacks, and their voice was a bit higher than some of the others, so Harry thought they might be female.
"Thanks, uhm-" Harry paused. "Is it okay that we're here?"
She hadn't heard of anyone coming down to the kitchens, and they weren't exactly obvious, what with the concealed painting in a corner of the dungeons.
"Miss Riddle is very kind," the elf said. "We is not havings many students coming down here, and none with snake friends, but Lansy is happy to serve."
"Oh. Uhm. So… you're the cooks?"
"Oh no, Miss." Lansy shook her head, her large ears flapping about. "We is doing all the chores in the castle. Cooking, cleaning, lighting fires, sometimes it seems like Hogwarts is making new rooms just for us to scrub." The elf winked at that last, though Harry didn't understand why.
She filled the silence by nudging a few of the snakes down toward the plate of chicken. It took some squabbling, but eventually most of the snakes found a spot on Harry or the table that wasn't too objectionable. Even the hatchling got a very, very small piece of meat, with Blackscale hovering protectively nearby.
"So." Harry glanced around the kitchen. Two elves were turning an entire roast pig on a spit, while a third glazed it. Across from them, a whole line of elves were chopping and prepping salad ingredients, depositing them in large bowls, where other elves mixed them into the final product. The entire kitchen had an industrious air, a light, thrifty sort of energy.
They were all smiling.
"Uhm."
"Is Miss needing anything else?" Lansy asked.
One of the elves at the salad table snapped their fingers, and with a pop, a bowl of salad levitated across the room to settle on a shelf with dozens of others.
Wandless, nonverbal magic.
Harry opened her mouth.
Her eyes fell on Lansy. The elf was fidgeting, uncomfortable under her gaze. Or was it discomfort at Harry not saying anything?
A second glance around the kitchen. There was something off here, though she only realized what when an elf mopped up a spill with the edge of his… rag. That he was wearing. None of the elves had clothes. They wore towels and aprons and even sashes with the Hogwarts crest, but there were no actual garments. It was like they'd scrounged their outfits out of whatever cloth was at hand.
Lansy was wilting slightly, the tips of her ears drooping.
We is doing all the chores in the castle.
Suddenly, her mental comparison to herself felt a bit too accurate.
"Do- do you need any help with cooking?" Harry stammered.
The elf went very still, her eyes the only part of her moving. They went wide.
And then she blinked, seeming to regroup, and shook her head. "No, Miss, we is getting along very well, and it is not proper for a witch to be's helping us."
"You like doing all this?"
Lansy looked politely confused this time. Like Harry had just said the sky was blue.
"Of course, Miss. House elves is always happy when we is doing work." Lansy paused, checking over her shoulder at the other elves. "Miss, I is needing to get back. Is Miss wanting anything else?"
She had questions. So many questions.
And they all turned to ash in her mouth at the sight of a couple hundred elves scurrying about, a few literally whistling while they worked.
"No. Thanks, Lansy."
XXX
Harry didn't taste a drop of the onion soup. She ate. She was full. But it tasted like nothing.
And when she was done, forks down, and waving off the few elves offering her dessert, Lansy reappeared.
"Is Miss-"
"It was good," Harry said stiffly. Her voice was too high. Tight. "You- you lot did a good job."
Lansy beamed at her. "Miss is very kind. Is you wanting anything to take up with you?"
"No, thanks." Harry stood up, suddenly conscious of how the elves were like children beside even her small height. She reached out to begin gathering the snakes, when a thought hit her.
"Do you know how to return something summoned?" She gestured to the snakes, most gorged half-asleep on chicken. "Them, I mean."
Lansy, smiled, and then snapped her fingers.
XXX
She felt lighter without them. It was easier to climb back up through the castle. A burden had been lifted, replaced with another that had nothing to do with weight.
Lighter, yes, but also lesser. Ephemeral.
Like losing Blackscale all over again. Even if the adder was still wreathing her throat, keeping an eye on the baby in her breast pocket.
House elves.
They were… they were broken, weren't they? Broken enough to find happiness in servitude.
Unseen. Cleaning the castle, top to bottom. Secluded in a room, toiling away to feed everyone else.
She wanted to go back and talk to them. Question the elves until she knew the how and why of it, even though she knew they wouldn't answer her. Couldn't answer her.
Who had made them this way?
Was it Hogwarts? Wizards?
She had no answers.
She did not know how to feel.
XXX
The third floor corridor was marked off by a velvet rope, and the hallway itself ringed with a line of bright red paint. Dumbledore had made it very apparent that it was forbidden.
But that was for good reason.
It was actually really easy to wander up to. Two flights of revolving stairs in the main stairwell were enough to get from the Great Hall to Fluffy. The work of five minutes, tops.
But Harry was still lagging a bit from the summonings, and was a hair too slow to catch the second stair. One of the portraits jeered at her, and she hissed back in parseltongue.The painted monk blanched – somehow – and vanished into the depths of his canvas.
She was bouncing on her heels, waiting for the stairs to rotate back around, when Filch crossed one of the walkways over the passage. The custodian was muttering to himself, and to Harry's frustration, turned down the corridor leading to Fluffy.
Harry wilted where she stood.
" Now what?"
"Go outside?" Blackscale suggested.
She shook her head.
It was a holiday, and the weather was brisk, but sunny. The grounds would be thronging with other students. Too many eyes, too many questions, when all she wanted was quiet.
When the stairs rotated around to her next, Harry took them.
XXX
Her feet carried her at random. Just as she had earlier in the day, Harry walked aimlessly, letting the castle cycle convoluted, winding hallways and rooms that hadn't seen a class in decades. The exploration should have been enough- the curiosities churned up in forgotten cupboards enough to keep her occupied.
But it wasn't filling the silence.
It pressed in on her. And with it, thoughts of cringing, servile house elves.
Harry hissed a swear under her breath and slammed shut the moldering textbook she'd been leafing through.
She didn't need quiet. She needed a distraction.
XXX
Up and up through the castle. Ghostlike, from destination to destination, searching for something to focus on.
The room she'd found with Ron and Neville- the layered room that had called to her, was absent. The library was being slammed shut by a fuming Madame Pince just as Harry arrived. The Weasley Twins had done something and earned themselves another lifetime ban.
Ravenclaw Tower got a wide berth. If she went there, there would be questions. And she wouldn't be able to stop her own from spilling out.
What were house elves? Why were they (slaves) servants?
She had a vague inkling to go up the Astronomy Tower and watch the forest, only to remember halfway there that it was kept locked during the day. The better to prevent older students canoodling up there.
The next set of doors she opened led onto a spiral stair. It was no different from any of the others she'd climbed so far, but for the smell. An acrid, sour odor, cut through with the scent of open air.
Muffled hooting floated down to her.
Blackscale squirmed uncomfortably as she ascended. "Smells like hunting-birds."
" Yes. You don't have to come, if you don't want to."
"And leave you alone with hunters?" Blackscale snorted, then slid inside her robes, disappearing from view.
Harry emerged. Tiny bones crunched underfoot with every step. The owlery was chilly, airier than even Ravenclaw Tower, and filled with a constant rustle of feathers. The stink was stronger, almost overwhelming; rotting owl pellets mixing with stale bird spoor.
She'd never paid much attention to owls before, but they weren't like any of the other magical animals she'd encountered so far. Where others were more… undefined, owls were like cut gems. They had keenness and insight, honed sharp, stored not in the chest like wizards, but in the head.
Why, she wasn't sure. Were magic owls just naturally smarter? It didn't feel natural though. It was like they'd been refined into what they were. So-
A massive eagle-owl hooted, and then swept down at her.
Harry yelped, only for the owl to hover, flapping in front of her with a reproachful cry.
She held out an arm.
The weight that settled there was… not much. Barely more than Blackscale if he was gorged. The owl's talons wrapped around her wrist, biting into the cloth, but just missing breaking the skin.
Harry let out a long, whistling breath, and nodded to the bird.
"Hullo."
XXX
It wasn't Fluffy, but it was a start.
The owls were smart enough to understand her, and a few of the more emotive ones would actively respond to her.
Harry had taken a seat on a white-splattered bench along the wall of the owlery. The eagle-owl, still occupying her arm, was her main focus. A few probing questions had revealed that it was male, and rather proud in a way that had nothing to do with his arrogant, feathered brow, and everything to do with the way he pecked her if she annoyed him.
But he was gorgeous. The way his feathers layered, varying in shape and size depending on their function, reminded her of snake scales. His eyes were a brilliant, blood red, and bright with the intelligence she could read inside all of the letter-carriers.
Harry sat and simply studied him for a long while. The owl preened under her attention, casting smug looks at the other owls that had congregated to watch.
How come she could talk to Blackscale and not them? Why was parseltongue a specific talent? Seriously. There had to be a spell to speak to animals. That was about as classical as it got.
She squinted, focusing her magic on the owl.
Talking. Communication. Understanding. Translation.
Tendrils of her power brushed across the owl's core. Glimmers of it bled through, muted, emotions sharper, but also less complex than a human's.
Fraying. Splitting.
The connection was waning; focusing on it and the owl was too much, stretching her mind in ways it wasn't meant to go.
Fragmented flashes of imagery, a world seen through eyes infinitely superior to hers.
The link broke like glass. She drew back, clutching her head. The eagle-owl gave a grumpy squawk and pecked her on the shoulder.
"Right, right. I get it."
A dull throb had taken up residence behind her left eye.
Was that because she'd botched the connection, or because she'd been trying to understand an owl's thoughts with her human brain?
"Did you get anything from that?" she asked the owl.
He pecked her squarely in the forehead.
"Ouch!"
There were footsteps coming up the stairs. Harry turned awkwardly, balancing the bird, realizing as she did so that she tasted copper.
Her free hand rose to probe. Not her forehead, but her nose. A thin streamer sliding down to her lips.
A boy emerged from the stairwell.
He was blond and pale, cheeks already rosy in the chill. The blush did nothing to detract from a sharp, pointed face, and robes far nicer than the off the rack stuff she wore. The poised way he stood, eyebrow raised, looked strange on someone her age.
And then he spoke- "What do you think you're doing with my owl?" -smooth face furrowing, voice petulant, and the illusion was broken.
Harry pinched her nose shut. "Sowwy." She jiggled her arm, trying to urge the owl toward the boy, only for the bird to snap its beak at her. "Dibn't know 'e was yours."
"Stolas, come here." The boy waved a roll of parchment at the owl.
With a rush of wings, the owl took flight. He snatched the roll from the boy's hand and kept going, straight out the window.
"You're supposed to let me tie it on!" the boy yelled after him.
Harry found herself cradling her wrist as well now. Stolas' talons had dug in when he took off.
"Episkey. Episkey." Stopping her nosebleed took another four tries, finally ceasing when she combined the motion for relieving pressure with siphoning fluid. Hopefully the blood just went back to where it should be and… didn't cause an aneurysm or something, because she didn't think motions were supposed to be combined.
"Are you doing wandless healing?" the boy exclaimed. "Show me."
Harry cast a dour look at him, but it didn't stop him from leaning over her to watch.
Her wrist was easier. The owl's talons had cut five small gashes in her skin. She pinched each shut between ring finger and thumb, then drew her index over the cut. Rinse and repeat, finishing with rinsing the excess blood off with Aquamenti.
"Impressive." The boy made to offer her a hand, glanced down at her bloodied, dirt-stained palms, and withdrew it before bowing his head slightly. "Draco Malfoy."
"Harriet Riddle."
She rose from the bench so she wouldn't have to talk up to him. Stolas had left behind a few feathers on her robes, which she pocketed, noticing as she did that he'd done far more damage to her sleeve than her skin.
"Wonderful," she muttered, poking a finger through the rent cloth.
"You're that parselmouth, aren't you?"
She tensed. The boy had a green tie. Another Slytherin looking for a show?
"I am."
But Malfoy was rubbing his chin. "Riddle… I know I've heard that name before. Are you pureblood?"
"Orphan."
"Oh." He recovered quickly. "Where did you learn to heal like that?"
She shrugged. "Practiced."
Hunger flashed across his features before he covered it with a smile. There was definitely something too sharp, too sly about this boy.
"Show me how. I'm sure you know this, but the Malfoys have a lot of pull in Britain. And Father is a school governor. It wouldn't be hard to put in a good word for you in return."
Harry blinked slowly at him. What did that even mean? A good word for what?
"No thanks."
His brows knit together. "What do you want then?"
It took her a moment to find an answer. Malfoy was a pureblood. And if he was as important as he seemed to think he was, then he'd almost certainly grown up with magic.
"What spells do you know?"
"Oh. I see," Malfoy said, nodding. "Do you do trades in Ravenclaw too? Give and take?"
She nodded back.
His smile gave way to a look of concentration. "I know a lot of hexes and curses that don't get used much. Father showed me the Bone-Breaker once, if you want something really dark."
"What would I do with that?" Harry said. "Do you know anything… uhm… practical?"
"Curses are practical."
Were all Slytherins this creepy?
"Actually practical stuff. Like- I know how to make fire or water, heal wounds, find north, uh- unlock locks. Something usable every day."
Judging by the incredulous look Malfoy was giving her, he genuinely thought curses were that. But then he sighed, rubbing his eyes in exasperation. "Trust a girl to only want to learn domestic nonsense. That's what house elves are for."
An ugly jag of anger went through her. "Have a nice day, Malfoy."
Harry turned on her heel and headed for the stairwell.
"Wait! You- wait." Malfoy had his wand out. "Your robes. Do you know how to fix them?"
She stopped walking.
XXX
They traded.
Malfoy taught her Reparo, a spell of almost frightening utility. In return, Harry began showing him how to do wandless magic. It wasn't easy for him, Malfoy was very attached to his wand, and had to be coached gently or he'd start sniping at her.
It was a bit like what she imagined teaching Dudley to do something was. Both had a strongly developed sense of self-importance to tiptoe around. Malfoy was oilier, but at the very least, useful.
Reparo was, without a doubt, the most useful spell she'd learned thus far. It repaired things. There were limits on how many times something could be fixed, and it couldn't create 100% from whole cloth, but it worked on everything. It was the least Harry could do not to drool in front of Malfoy.
By the time the sun was touching the top of the forest, painting the grounds orange, Harry had gotten Draco (please, if I may call you Harry?), through the very basics of feeling his magic and having an intent.
"Same time on Wednesday?" Malfoy had said, and Harry had shrugged.
A trade was a trade.
She had no problem teaching him if he kept coming up with spells as good as Reparo. And teaching itself was helpful. Having to enunciate and explain the little details of wandless magic forced her to develop a more concrete understanding of exactly what she did, beyond vague feelings and thinking really hard to make things happen.
When Malfoy finally departed down the stairs to go to dinner (Harry declined his invitation. She wasn't in the mood for a boisterous Halloween feast), Harry found herself with a warm sense of fulfillment. It had been a very profitable meeting. Even the lingering sense of disquiet over house elves and her own impurity couldn't detract from the massive leap in survival magic she'd made today.
Harry ambled to one of the glassless windows, leaning on a relatively clean part of the sill. She'd give Malfoy a five-minute head start, and then go visit Fluffy. He'd be lonely, cooped up while everyone was at dinner.
XXX
Fluffy's door was locked.
She pressed a thumb to it, pushed her magic in like she was filling the keyhole with water, and then twisted.
Fluffy's door was unlocked.
She slipped in.
He knew her well enough by now that she didn't even have to sing for him. The cerberus sniffed her hands and licked her face, and Harry pressed her nose to his fur. He smelled like dog, scaled up by ten. A musky scent uniquely Fluffy.
"I missed you."
She examined him, meeting each set of dark eyes, one at a time. Fluffy wore his magic in his fur and hide. That wasn't the only spot it was- it suffused every inch of him, just as hers filled her body, but his core was more ill-defined. Branching, the magic of three, separate intelligences meeting at a loose nexus in his barreled chest.
Could she speak to him? Understand his thoughts and feelings?
Fluffy's left head turned to look at the pile of cow bones he kept in the corner. They were splintery and cracked, gnawed ragged by three sets of jaws. Left-head barked thunderously. A moment later, the other two barked back in agreement.
On the other hand… was there any need to?
Her head still ached from trying Stolas anyway.
Harry shot him a closed-lipped smile, using her voice to intone her excitement at the idea.
"Let's run around a bit."
XXX
Fluffy's room was another of those variable spaces Hogwarts had. Big some days, small on others. It was long and wide, a cathedral hall, today.
They played fetch until Fluffy crushed the last bone to powder. He was panting, his muzzle flecked with froth, but his tail hadn't stopped wagging. He padded back to her, bent to drink from his dish (big enough she could have swam in it), and then flopped over on the mound of hay that was his bed.
Fluffy gave a pleased sort of grumble as she came over and took a seat against one heaving flank.
"You've met Blackscale before. I made a new friend this morning. She doesn't have a name yet, but she just hatched."
She held up the baby snake for Fluffy to sniff. The hatchling bared her fangs at him, but Fluffy just snuffled thoughtfully and withdrew, laying his leftmost head down beside Harry.
"I've been telling her about all the stuff in the castle. This is Fluffy. He's a prisoner here."
Hogwarts seemed to have a lot of those.
"Uhm. What were we talking about last time I was here?" Fluffy's ears perked up. "Right. I was telling you a story. You can hear it too, if you want," she added to the little snake.
"Where were we? Had we gotten to the part with the mines yet?"
Fluffy's center head shook left-right.
"Okay. So the Fellowship couldn't make it over the mountains, so they had to go through these mines. Dwarven mines- where Gimli was from." Pause. "Are dwarves real?"
Center-head nodded.
"Huh. So these mines were sealed, and-"
XXX
She talked until the windows went dark.
The snakes were still, Blackscale silent, but she could tell they were listening. Fluffy's left and right heads were dozing, the latter snoring loudly, but the center was attentive enough for all three of them.
Harry was just getting into the segment with the Balrog- she hadn't understood most of the book, really, but it had been one of the few she'd smuggled into her cupboard – when the other two heads snapped up.
Fluffy came to his feet so suddenly that Harry was bowled over. He stood, limbs stiff, his heads cocked to listen. Left-head lifted his lip, a bass growl starting in Fluffy's chest.
"What's wrong?"
He was staring at the door.
Harry rose and crept toward it. Pressed her ear against the wood. It was too thick to hear anything, but she trusted his ears better than hers.
She twisted the knob and opened the door, hinges groaning.
Outside, the corridor was dark. The torches had all gone out. No- Harry glanced up and down the hall. All the torches were out. There was no light bleeding in from the central stair, or through any of the windows.
She crept out, letting the door creak closed behind her.
The darkness was unsettling; the castle more like a massive cave than a building. Her ears pricked for a sound, some indicator the disturbance had been noted, but the silence was all-encompassing.
Two steps away from the door. Her heart had started pounding at some point, loud enough to be audible in the quiet.
And then, far off in the castle, someone screamed. Shrill, muffled by distance, but still enough to make Harry jump and gasp, her back to the wall.
Part of her, a calm, rational, stereotypically Ravenclaw voice, was certain that this was just a Halloween prank. Some grand display for the feast, designed to scare everyone.
But it didn't feel like that.
It hadn't sounded like a fun scream. And why was every single light out?
Her fingers twitched. There were spells. Lumos. Incendio. Solas Realta. Lux Manum. Any of which would burn away the dark and give her a way to see where she was going.
And then what?
Descending the labyrinth of stairs to get to the Great Hall- assuming the stairs were even functioning. Seeking out a teacher.
Another scream. This one masculine, hoarse with agony.
Harry drew a shaky breath.
She turned on her heel and walked back to Fluffy's door. Fumbling in the dark for the knob. Her fingers had just touched metal when footsteps echoed down the corridor.
She looked up.
Someone was running down the hall, but it was too dark to see- her eyes flicked towards shadowy patches, trying to glimpse whoever it was.
Ragged breathing. The sound of robes dragging and swishing.
Harry raised a hand, preparing to cast. The first motes of Lumos flickered into being around her, suddenly, blindingly bright after so long in the night.
The figure- impossible to see through her ruined nightvision, but it was there, a dozen feet away.
"Reis!"
Magic hooked around her and pulled. The Lumos burst apart into nothing. Her shoes dragged across stone, rubber shrieking, and then she left the floor entirely to slam against the far wall.
Harry cried out as her head and back impacted, her vision rolling sickeningly under the pain. She tried to clutch her skull, but her hands were pressed flat, like gravity itself had turned against her.
Footsteps shuffled to a stop in front of her.
She blinked away tears, trying to make out the figure in the darkness.
There was an instant where she could see dark robes, and above them, the sallow face of Professor Snape, and then his wand was aimed squarely at her chest.
"Pr-professor?" She could taste blood again. A bitten tongue. "...why?"
He hesitated, determined expression falling away, replaced with a stunned blankness.
"Potter."
His wand hadn't faltered.
"What were you doing?"
Harry tried to shake her head- couldn't. The throb of pain even attempting it gave was nauseating. "Nothing."
At her throat, Blackscale was wriggling feebly, just as restrained as she was. Snape saw the snake and his face darkened. "Bullesco."
His magic slid in between them and jerked Blackscale away. A bubble, blue-green, formed around the snake, floating up to stick to the ceiling.
"No!" Harry shouted. "Bring him back!"
Snape's hand found the neck of her robes. He pulled, lifting her up to his level, stale breath in her face. Up-close, he looked dreadful. The skin around his mouth was raw and inflamed, and half the veins in his left eye had burst, red star-bursts on white. Even his robes were dirty, the front smeared with something foul, chunks of wet matter that stank of vomit.
"Tell me what you were doing."
"Nothing!" Her voice was hoarse, a shriek in her ears. "I was visiting Fluffy and you attacked me!"
"I have no time for your childish games, Potter," Snape said, grinding out the words. "Someone thought it would be amusing to poison the entire Halloween feast. Myself included. And here I find you. Not at dinner. Out of bounds, casting magic at the door to the most secure location in the castle. Almost as if the feast was nothing but a distraction. Who told you to come here?"
"I was visiting Fluffy!"
A muscle ticked in his cheek. "Liar. The beast is too vicious for anyone to approach. Were you supposed to find a way past it?"
The hot, impotent anger that filled her only hurt more when the tears started in. But he wasn't hearing her. No matter what she said, he just kept snarling at her. She just shook her head, throat and eyes burning.
"Tell me, you stupid, little girl," Snape said, sneering. "There is too much at stake here. If you won't tell the truth, you force my hand. Look at me."
His hand snapped up, catching her chin, turning her face toward his. Harry shut her eyes. She knew what was coming. She struggled, trying to summon her magic to push him away, to stop this, but the focus required was buried beneath terror.
"Look. At. Me!"
" No! Stop it!"
Rough, cold fingers on her cheeks, and then his thumbs pressed to her eyelids. Tears bubbled over.
Their eyes met.
She screamed.
XXX
Memory rushed up and devoured her. A roar of past days, flashes of images and scenes and sounds blurring into a cacophony.
"Not Har-" "-rriet." "Riddle!" "Useless girl." "Car crash." "cupboard." "Speaker?" "Ouro-" "Serpensortia!"
She was drowning. There was no reality outside the torrent in her head. Snape's magic was flowing in and tearing her apart, cutting to the very depths of Her.
His voice echoed through her skull. 'Show me who sent you. Who wants the stone?'
Snape was pulling up memories, sifting and discarding faster than she could comprehend them.
A park- climbing a stairwell- making dinner- the orphanage- catching a snake behind the chapel- Blackscale laughing at her- telling him stories- whispering in Parseltongue-
He was getting closer. She could sense it in the way his focus narrowed, refining toward a particular venue of thought. There was a memory drawing near. A bright, shining memory, the details sharpened by the times she'd revisited it.
Quirrel. Narrow face split with a thin smile. His praise. His words and his magic.
It was their secret.
It was not for Snape.
' Show me.'
No.
'Who sent you? Who gave you that name?! '
No.
There was no turning him away, no way to push him out. He was stronger in every conceivable way.
There was only one refuge.
Get out. Get out get out getoutgetoutget- § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε .
Snape's intrusion paused.
' What is this?'
Ƨǽ-ȿǐ , šƨ άѳ. § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε!
' What are you doing, Potter? I am trying to help you. You' ve been bewitched ! This will not-'
But his violation had stopped. He was recoiling, trying to regroup.
Harry kept repeating it, the parseltongue a mantra, a common thread overriding all thought.
§ el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε § el ǐ s ǐ m- ȿǐε
Snape's fury poured through his magic. He was pushing, but there were no memories for him to grasp. She focused on the words and let everything else fall away. The sibilant noise. Vibration in her lips and tongue.
He swore and redoubled. There was pain now, a terrible wrenching in her head and in her magic.
And then there was something else.
Another magic. A thrum against hers. Far off, drawing rapidly nearer.
Her mantra faltered, and Snape nearly broke through into her thoughts again, but there was surprise tinging his mind now. Shock, and then- a different sort of anger.
He withdrew.
XXX
She was on the floor. That thought alone penetrated the haze of pain she returned to. There was more blood in her mouth and nose, clogging her sinuses. The nails-on-bone feeling of a migraine was in full force, and it was only as she curled up, clutching her head, that she realized she was able to move freely.
There was vibration in the stones beneath her.
Her eyelids split slowly, even the darkness of the hall too bright.
A blurred shape moved above her. Another, beyond it, gestured back. There was shouting, a vacuous roar that her brain couldn't even begin to interpret.
She shut her eyes again.
The noise and clamor faded into white noise.
Harry held her skull and waited for the pain to ease.
"Speaker." A scaled body brushed against her forearm. She jerked, unfolding just enough to grope blindly on the floor. Her hand found Blackscale's back, and she snatched him up, letting him slide back beneath her robes.
"You are safe," he whispered. "Your sire is here."
She barely heard him. A free hand patted the front of her robes- the hatchling was still there, wriggling in her pocket. Unharmed. Harry let out a breath.
"Harry." Quirrel's voice this time, so soft she could barely hear it. His hand pressed to her shoulder a moment later- she jerked, but it didn't draw away. The contact was like a rush of ice water- his presence washing away the worst of the pain, blunting the edges and soothing the heat.
"Hospital wing," he murmured, speaking English now. "Severus, what in the hell were you thinking? She's only a child!" His hand left her – Harry groaned in spite of herself – only to return. He slid an arm under her back, the other against her legs, and lifted.
The motion made the room spin even with her eyes closed, and she curled up tighter, thumbs jammed into her temples.
He walked.
Things blurred.
XXX
A heartbeat.
Soft and steady. The metronome that she set her breath by. The pain was a little less with each exhale.
He had his hand against the back of her neck, fingers contouring the skin, thumb rubbing gentle circles in her hair. It was more, this close to him, more than it had been. Something bone deep. Like sinking into sleep.
His heartbeat.
The unfamiliar warmth of another's body against hers. Pressed to his chest as he carried her.
Carried her away-
-away from-
She blinked. The world sharpened. Darkened corridors, dim silver in the moonlight.
" Professor?"
"Just a little bit further."
She shut her eyes again, letting his touch press fingers into her brain and wipe away the world.
It was only too soon before a door creaked open and interrupted her reverie. A sharp, chemical smell, and stones so steeped in a clean, clear magic that they were permanently whitened.
When she opened her eyes this time, everything was wavering. The hospital wing swam in and out of focus, patches of shadow smearing across her vision. Trying to interpret it made her skull ache, driving spikes into the backs of her eyes until she closed them.
"'fessor," she rasped. The parseltongue came out slurred. "I feel- feel terrible."
"I know." He hadn't stopped tracing patterns in her hair, but he'd stopped walking. "Go to sleep for me, Harry." His thumb stilled.
"Ad Morphea."
His magic pulsed through her once, lighting up nerves and curling toes, and then sinking into her, soft and insistent.
The sound of his heartbeat chased her all the way down.
XXX
A brush.
Something unfamiliar. Contact. Probing.
No.
It was- again.
No!
Someone was- their magic on her-
Her own power surged, forcing the intruder away, raw panic overriding conscious thought.
Harry shot up in bed, heart explosive, already trying to run. Hands caught at her, pressing her back, and she cried out, trying to break away.
"Miss Riddle! Calm yourself!" a woman shouted. The grip tightened, a man's hands holding her fast, drawing forth an animal whine from her throat.
"Speaker, they try to aid you!" Blackscale's voice, and the protective torque of him around her throat were enough to make her freeze. Her eyes finally caught up with her, the room slowly coming into focus, bringing with it the angry throb of her migraine.
Harry turned her head to see her attackers. Madame Pomfrey stood on the opposite side of the bed, looking uncharacteristically disheveled. The one holding her was an unfamiliar wizard. Baby-faced and blond, with emerald green robes. At second glance, the man had an odd bandoleer filled with glass potion vials, and a patch over his heart- a wand crossed with a bone.
"All with us, darling?" he asked.
After a moment, she nodded jerkily.
The man grinned and let go of her. Harry, after a glance at the two adults, slid back to the edge of her bed and sat down, stroking Blackscale. The comforting texture of his scales gave her something to focus on, her rapid breaths slowing little by little.
"I hope we didn't frighten you."
" I- That's- okay."
The wizard recoiled. "What in the- Pomfrey, I thought she was healed?"
Madame Pomfrey tapped her nail against her clipboard. "She's fine, Mister Sedgewick. Miss Riddle, please return to English so we can finish your exam."
It took her a moment to understand. And another to force her speech back, replacing smooth, sliding words with rough and glottal.
"I said I'm fine."
"Zounds." Sedgewick was blinking, somewhere between surprised and bemused. "That's certainly-"
"Very good." Pomfrey stepped forward, cutting off any more. "Secondary diagnostics, please." She waved her wand at Harry, who flinched at the invasive magic and had to make a conscious effort not to force it away again. A second later, Sedgewick mimicked her, generating a scroll of parchment from his wand tip that he handed to the older woman.
The matron examined it, her face tight, before returning her attention to Harry."I healed the worst of the bruising in your back and head while you slept. Any pain you're experiencing right now should resolve with bed rest. No strenuous casting for at least 3 days, your reserves will be needed to help keep you healthy."
"Okay." As long as there wouldn't be any more casting on her.
"Miss Riddle, I-" Pomfrey hesitated, glancing at the parchment again, before her face softened. "I need to move on. There are others I need to see to. But, if you are able, I'd like to meet with you as soon as this matter is resolved. It would be confidential. Just you and I, healer to patient."
Harry curled in on herself. Teachers never wanted to speak to you alone unless it was bad. She was in trouble. Snape could have spun any number of stories already. And there was no denying that she had been in the forbidden corridor. Or perhaps Pomfrey would leave punishment to Flitwick, and this was just to examine her parseltongue ability like a particularly interesting medical specimen?
She didn't know the woman well enough to answer, but Pomfrey seemed to take her stiff silence as answer enough. She nodded and swept away, moving on to the next bed.
"Get some rest, yeah?" Sedgewick shot her a wink before scurrying along after Pomfrey. Harry turned to watch them go, only to realize for the first time the state of the infirmary.
Every bed was filled.
The hospital wing had been deserted when she came in. The room now stretched on far longer than it had in the past, with many, many more beds, every one filled. As she watched, Professor McGonagall summoned three more into existence. The beds had no sooner skidded to a halt than they were occupied- injured students popping into them like bizarre fireworks.
Other teachers, it looked like most of them, minus, to her relief, Snape, had been drafted into service as well. A few beds away, Professor Sinistra was drawing signs in the air over a retching, wheezing Slytherin. There were a number of strangers among them, more adults in green robes like Sedgewick, who Harry supposed were wizarding doctors.
Her eye fell on the nearest bed. The occupant was sleeping uneasily, tossing and turning under the sheets. They rolled over, and Harry shivered, unable to stifle a gasp. She knew this girl. Not by name. But her face was familiar. A Gryffindor girl that she had Herbology with. A real know-it-all who Harry tried to avoid because she got a lot of attention from professors. Her face, normally so proud, so keen, was now puffy, her eyes swollen, cheeks shiny with fever sweat.
Without thought, Harry reached out, spreading her awareness to the girl. It- she drew back instantly, hissing. It was like reaching her hand into scalding water. The Gryffindor's magic was on full-alert, mobilized to fight off whatever ailment she had, and was fiercely defensive of anything that might be a threat. How did the healers even work when their patients' bodies were fighting off all-comers? The textbooks she'd read hadn't covered that.
Across the room, someone moaned, their voice thick with pain. The sound seemed to kick off a chorus. Or perhaps Harry had simply been numb, trying to ignore the sounds. A groan. A low, keening wail. Someone screeching, far down the ward. A hurk, and then the unmistakable sound of splattering vomit. The Gryffindor girl, silent, but for hands balling in sheets hard enough to make the cloth creak.
Harry listened, nausea and fear intertwined and surging in her throat, her head still throbbing. Snape had said the whole school was poisoned. But they weren't all here. Had… were the ones who weren't- were they dead? Or were the ones here going to die?
Across from the Gryffindor, an older boy sat up in bed. Another face. Robbie Celtran. A fifth year in her house who liked to make flashcards in return for spare change. He was shuddering under the sheets, his limbs quivering and spasming uncontrollably, even as his face grew red with the effort of trying to still himself.
And down the line. Was that the white-blond hair of Malfoy?
Was Su somewhere in here? Or Ron? Neville?
Her eyes burned. How many times did that make today? More than the last year combined. But… if she walked down the ward and saw one of her friends, it felt like the tears would just turn on and never stop. Like something would break, and she already felt so brittle.
She couldn't stay here. Not in this- this sickbed.
She waited until Sinistra moved on to the next patient, her attention elsewhere.
Harry didn't run. People looked at running things.
She walked briskly out of the hospital wing on legs like rubber.
XXX
The walk back to Ravenclaw was deathly silent, and Harry kept glancing over her shoulder. But the halls were empty, the torches relit. Whatever commotion had occurred seemed to be over.
The tower was the barest relief. There was no murmur of talk in the dorms, and even the fires were extinguished. The normally airy common room felt stagnant, the desks not so empty as deserted. The handful of magical signatures she could feel were subdued, either sleeping or laying unhappily awake. But they were there, and they were alive. Her fears that Hogwarts had turned into some kind of charnel house were soothed.
She found her room, locking the door behind her. Then she checked the dorm for anything out of the ordinary. Inch by inch, running her magic over the surfaces and furniture. Anything that might indicate an intruder. It was an impulse she didn't quite understand, only that she needed to know that she was alone. That she was safe.
There was more she wanted to do- to bathe and scrub away the infirmary and Snape's magic on her, but the idea of straying out again was paralyzing.
There was too much of magic unknown. Snape had been an unknown.
Only when the room was secured did she set Blackscale down beside her pillow. The hatchling, who hissed grumpily at Harry when she pulled her free, was set beside the adder. It hadn't been the ideal first day, and she was too exhausted at this point to put any thought into what to do with her.
Then she turned and, wand in hand for once, cast at the door. It was a crude transfiguration- the edges of the door melted into the frame, the wood taking on the properties of stone. If she was better at it, the entire door would have become indistinguishable from the wall, but the skill and knowledge were beyond her.
She did the same for the windows before firmly drawing the curtains. Only then did she shuck her robes and change into her night clothes.
For a while, she sniffled, staring blindly at the ceiling, too tired to even cry, and too numb to do more than wipe her cheeks once in a while.
Her thoughts, dragged down by exhaustion, became more and more confused, and when she finally drifted off, her dreams were such violent, chaotic messes that she woke at once, shivering.
Odd, out of sorts memories kept floating to the surface, like Snape had ripped them loose from their moorings. Flashes of horrible things she'd done her best to forget. Embarrassments and humiliations at the Dursleys, and worse- some shadowy, formless memories that seemed to contain only flashes of green light and screaming. Men and women whose faces she didn't know, contorting and twisting in agony before finally being snuffed out with that hellish corpse-light. And then it was faces she did know. Ron and Su and the Gryffindor girl, cheeks hollowed by sickness, withering and wasting before her eyes.
She woke from the dream. It was a long time before she could breathe.
XXX
The idea of returning to the nightmares was enough to make her sit up in bed and kick off the blankets.
"Blackscale." He lifted his head at once. Not sleeping either. "Can you- can you just talk for a little bit?"
The adder came and coiled in her lap, his weight just enough to hold her from getting up and pacing. An anchor against the fear.
"Have I told you where snakes come from?" He paused, not because he expected her to answer, but because it was more dramatic. "The first serpent was the Ouroboros. Not your sire. The real thing. He bit his tail and formed the boundaries of the universe. From there..."
He talked.
Harry let it wash over her.
She did not try to sleep again.
XXX
Blackscale finally lost his voice, having grown hoarser and hoarser through his many, many stories about why snakes were perfect. He rasped to a halt, and she put a hand on his head, nodding to him.
The far horizon had grown slightly brighter, sunrise still far off. She slipped out of bed, and pulling on Blackscale like a scarf, departed her room.
The stone floors were chilly, making her birdstep her way to the bathroom. Normally, she'd worry about having to shower with someone else in the room, but it was uncomfortably the opposite today. Even early, there was usually some sense of life in the dorms. This morning, she felt like a ghost, haunting empty rooms in a dark tower.
The shower noise helped a bit.
She stayed under until her skin was lobster red, taking her time to get every trace of Halloween off. The blood dried under her nails was familiar. The grime from Fluffy's room, expected. But the dingy, purpling bruise in the shape of a hand on her upper arm… that, she didn't remember.
It wasn't something she could scrub away, and, somehow, in the timeless, too-still of the early morning, she couldn't recall a single thing she'd learned about healing.
Harry stood, shower pattering against the top of her head, studying the mark. Was she supposed to just go to class with him? Pretend it never happened?
Was she just supposed to let it keep happening?
XXX
The shower refreshed her just a little. It was something normal. The kind of thing she always did in the morning. Harry continued her routine by dressing, tying her hair back, and then grabbing her bag and the two snakes.
But the dorms were still too quiet, and she was still awake. Her brain was packed full of everything that had happened on Halloween, and without the buffer of sleep it was like living a single, endless day. Memories were piling up. The migraine had faded, less shooting or throbbing than just droning, a constant, low-level ache.
A notice had appeared on the common room bulletin board. Classes were canceled for the day. Harry stared at it blankly for a few moments before the words made sense. Of course they were.
She rubbed her eyes and headed for the door.
The walk down from the tower was more of the same. Eerie silence, with hallways too big and too empty. She felt strangely outside of herself. Different. Off. Her body felt somehow similar; too big and too small, like it was crushing down on her, but also as if she was apart from it, nothing more than a pair of eyes inhabiting a shell.
The thought it would take to plan a route was beyond her, so she wandered, taking stairs as they came. Little by little, descending. When her destination finally appeared around a corner, Harry found herself standing outside the door, unsure of what to even do.
Twice, she nearly turned on her heel and left. Both times, it was the soreness, the bruise on her arm that turned her back.
Finally, she gulped, swallowing her spit, thick and uneasy on an empty stomach, and knocked.
For a long moment there was silence.
And then a flickering, quavering spirit entered her field. A click, the lock sliding open, and then the door.
Quirinus Quirrel peered down at her, his face stubbly, his eyes sunken and heavy.
" Sir. Please, I need- I need your help."
XXX
XXX
This went through a FUCK TON of drafts. Like, there's at least 50 pages of drafts in my in-progress doc. Initial goals were to have this be the chapter where Harry and Quirrel finally get that sit-down talk, but it kept diverging too much. The backbone of this- Harry getting bummed over house elves and exploring, was a really early draft.
Most of the middle ones were a lot more out there, mostly centered around Harry returning all those snakes she summoned by hand, ending up in the forbidden forest just in time for the school's Samhain celebration, with that Quirrel conversation finally happening.
That conversation was the original final segment to this chapter, following her into his office. But on my final pass on this draft, I realized it was already 9500 words, and I didn't want to make two chapters, so you get it cut off here we so we spend more time with Quirrel next time.
If you're wondering why it took me so long... I wanted this chapter to be perfect. It was meant to be the moment where Harry finally falls under Quirrel's snares. An almost climactic moment in the story, and where things finally get started. So I wanted it to be flawless. What we ended up with... it's not perfect, but I'm fairly happy with what it is. I'll probably reuse most of the creepier Quirrel and Harry conversation material next chapter so it doesn't go to waste. He is such a fucking creepazoid...
My one real disappointment here is that I'd been playing with having the troll show up somehow, with Fluffy busting out of his cell to defend Harry, papa wolf style. Almost ended up having him be the one to save Harry from Snape, not Quirrel. I'll probably keep Fluffy for later...
If you're wondering why Snape was such a nutter-butter? Dude just jammed a bezoar down his throat and made a beeline for the third floor corridor, and he's STILL shaking off the effects of poison. He's not thinking too rationally, and Harry is pretty goddamn suspicious. Not particularly a spoiler, as it's going to be the beginning of next chapter anyway, but he was fairly sure that Harry's weird behavior was the result of a Confundus or Imperious, and that's why he Legilimized her.
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