A silver and green lion

Chapter 11: The man with two faces

"You!" Harry gasped.

"Ah, Potter. I was wondering if I would be meeting you down here." He said gleefully.

"But... I thought it was Snape." He stuttered, more to himself than the professor. He really shouldn't bet with Theo if even Blaise and Hermione were on his side.

"Ah yes, Severus. He's the stereotype bad guy, isn't he? Greasy hair, house of Slytherin – where all the evil wizards come from – and that terrible, hooked nose. Who would suspect me, professor Qu... Qu... Quirrel, the poor stutterer over the big, bad, mean professor Snape?" He mocked.

"Well, Theo and Blaise guessed it was you." Harry said, swiping the smirk of his Defence against the Dark arts teachers face. "And I guess it was you who was trying to kill me, as well?" Thinking back to the conversation he heard between Quirrel and Snape.

"You take all the fun away when you quit being surprised." Quirrel grumbled. "But yes, it was me. Your friend, miss Granger, blocked my view when she put Severus cloak on fire. I was so close to throw you of that broom. And I would have succeeded even quicker if Severus wasn't muttering a counter spell." Quirrel grumbled. At that, Harry was surprised. Snape had tried to save him? But he was a Slytherin for a reason and kept his face blank. "That's why he wanted to referee so badly, he wanted to make sure I wouldn't do it again. Made himself quiet unpopular with that, although Minerva suspected there was more behind him than favouring the Slytherins. But what a waste of time because I'm going to kill you tonight." He snapped his fingers and robes sprang out of thin air, wrapping themselves around Harry. "You're too nosy to live, Potter." Quirrel complained. "With Halloween I really thought you had seen me looking after the stone. I had to be careful already because Snape suspected me to be behind the Troll."

"Yeah, you have a thing with Trolls, don't you?" Harry muttered. "Now I know why they seemed so familiar. You really see the resemblance."

"Shut up, you foolish boy." Quirrel spat, not finding Harry's joke funny at all. "Not only did my Troll fail to bash your skull in, that terrible dog failed top bit Severus' leg of properly as well."

"Luck certainly isn't on your side." Harry taunted. "Are you sure you don't want to quit already? It seems pretty useless to me."

"Shut up, Potter! I need to examine this mirror." Only then, Harry noticed what was standing behind Quirrel. It was the Mirror of Erised. "The mirror is the key in finding the stone – trust Dumbledore to come up with something like this – I see myself presenting the stone to my master but where is it?!"

Harry decided he would awake his inner Slytherin right then, he needed to keep him talking so he wouldn't find out how to use the mirror.

"I saw you and Snape in the forest." He blurted out. Alright, maybe he needed to dig a bit further for that inner Slytherin.

"Yeah? By that time he was after me, although he suspected me all the time." He had said that already, Harry thought sighing. Seriously, he was mad if he felt the need to tell him the same thing three times. "He wanted to know how far I had come. Tried to threaten me, as if he would succeed when I have Lord Voldemort on my side."

"Isn't that the Dark Lord for you?" Harry said dryly. He was surprised Quirrel dared to say Voldemort's name. He had to give Theo credits for guessing Quirrel was after everything, but he still couldn't wrap his head around the fact that the stuttering professor actually didn't stutter and wasn't afraid at all.

"It's only the Dark Lord for the weak ones." Quirrel spat back.

"Oh..." Harry didn't know what to say for a moment, so he gripped back to a safe subject.