Hello, happy Friday! I just got back from a major tradition at my school. I missed school, it's good to be back...anyway, enjoy the chapter!
Chapter 47
An Unfamiliar Outlook
Severus Snape wouldn’t call himself a loving man, or a man worth loving, not since Lily died. There are a few people in his life that he deems worthy of his limited capacity for caring. One of those lucky people happened to be his godson, Draco, who was staying with him for a few weeks while Black and Lupin went on a treasure hunt of some kind. Severus thought that they were being absurd, but Draco assured him that what Black and Lupin were doing was important.
Severus figured that it had to do with Potter...someone he unintentionally began to care for. She acted just like her mother and was brilliant at potions just like her. But, when he saw her holding Barty Crouch at wand point, hair a complete mess and sticking up at the back, he was reminded of her father, a man he loathed even after his death.
After that day he couldn’t help but see even more similarities between her and her father. The shared talent for transfigurations and had an unbearably cocky attitude. Draco kept telling him that he was being pigheaded, but he didn’t-couldn’t-listen to him.
He had been told to watch her as she was dropped off at her Aunt and Uncle’s house. He was there to make sure that Black didn’t whisk her away. He saw them, Black and Potter, walk up to the doorstep with her suitcase. Severus could tell that she was holding back tears, but like her mother she wouldn’t show weakness. She hugged her godfather goodbye and walked into the house bravely and no one had seen her since...
The Order Members had been watching the house and no one had seen the girl come out all summer, but Black assured everyone that she was safe and sound. No doubt, she’d scared her muggle family into submission. The girl had a Slytherin streak in her and he wouldn’t be surprised if she had used it to her advantage during her stay at Lily’s sister’s house.
Then during the early weeks of the summer holidays Severus was left to deal with an angry Dark Lord, who had murdered Wormtail before calling the rest of the Death Eaters. They found the body in front of the deranged wizard. He the told them that the rat was an example for them all. He was showing them what happens when someone fails him. He had been torturing his following left and right for weeks, Severus had been his victim a few times already and wasn’t looking forward to the next Death Eater gathering.
It was a lovely Monday morning in late July when his godson came running down the stairs of his home and into the old kitchen he was currently sitting in, reading the Prophet. There was nothing in it, there was a distinct lack of Rita Skeeter recently, not that he was complaining. The woman was cruel and never wrote anything that was true, and yet people constantly believed and read her articles. Recently the articles in the prophet were slurs about Potter, Diggory and Dumbledore, but today there wasn’t much of anything in it to entertain him.
He looked up from the paper to see Draco with slightly flushed cheeks and a rather dazed look in his eyes. He looked somewhat ill and considering he was starting to sway it seemed that he may indeed be sick. Severus sat him down quickly. Draco had hit a growth spurt, he had grown nearly six inches over the summer and had started to fill out. Severus could remember a time when Draco’s head didn’t even reach his shoulder, now they were nearly looking each other in the eyes.
“Draco, is something wrong?” he asked slowly and Draco nodded, but then shook his head. There was obviously something bothering him.
“There’s something wrong with Harri,” he said quietly and Severus sighed and summoned some cups to make tea, he figured that this was going to be a long discussion.
Ten minutes later they were both sitting at the table, nursing cups of hot tea in their hands. “Draco, the Order is watching her. The Dark Lord isn’t going to hurt her,” Severus told him soothingly, but the haunted look in the teenager’s eyes didn’t leave.
“It’s not Voldemort I’m worried about. It’s those blasted muggles she’s been living with. Remember, Sev, she has veela blood in her and she’s living with muggle men,” the blonde replied quietly, an almost pleading look in his eyes.
“Draco, there is nothing wrong with her. How would you even know if something was going on? Her contact with the magical word has been severed for the summer,” Severus reminded him and Draco snorted.
The potions master raised an eyebrow at the response. “I’ve been talking to her all summer. She’s barricaded herself in her room because her uncle keeps trying to get her alone,” he muttered darkly, taking a small sip of tea.
“How have you been talking her?” Severus asked curiously. They had made sure that she didn’t have any magical objects besides her school books and her wand.
“Promise you won’t take the object in question when I tell you about it?” Draco questioned his godfather and Severus sighed.
“No, I won’t,” he answered, nearly rolling his eyes at his godson’s behavior.
“Well, Sirius, Remus and Harri’s dad made these two way mirrors when they were still at Hogwarts, and if you say the name of another person with the mirror their face will appear...Sirius, Hermione and I have been checking in with her all summer and I just have this really bad feeling that something-” Draco stopped suddenly and Severus heard glass shattering. Draco had slumped over in his chair, it had appeared that he had fainted.
He was over to his godson’s side in seconds and felt his forehead, it didn’t feel warm, but his cheeks were flushed. A few seconds later Draco’s grey eyes fluttered open. “I have to tell Harri to leave, now!” he nearly shouted, as he tried to get up from the chair, nearly knocking his godfather over in the process.
Severus grabbed his arm and sat him back down. “Draco, you just fainted. You aren’t going anywhere and how do you know that she’s in trouble?” he asked the young man in front of him.
Draco sighed. “I have active seer blood. I used to just get bad feelings when something was going to happen, but recently I have been having small visions. Sev, you have to trust me, Harri is in trouble and she has to leave that house,” Draco pleaded and Severus pinched his nose, knowing he couldn’t say no to him.
“Fine, where’s the mirror you were talking about earlier?” he asked hesitantly.
“On the table next to the bed,” Draco replied with a tired, yet victorious, smile on his face.
Once his back was turned, the potions master rolled his eyes. He got to his godson’s room which was clean and organized, books in a small pile on his desk, quill and ink stored neatly next to a rolled up piece of parchment. His bed was neatly made and no clothing was on the ground. He saw the silver mirror sitting on the bedside table and picked it up.
“Show me Harriet Potter,” he said to the mirror feeling utterly ridiculous. A few seconds later the mirror blurred and the back of Potter’s head appeared. Her hair was still very short, it seem like it wasn’t growing at a very fast rate. It was sticking up slightly in the back and if he hadn’t heard her voice a few moments later he would have sworn that it was her father on the other end.
“It’s Draco, something must be wrong,” he heard her say. Was someone in the room with her?
She turned around and Lily’s bright green eyes greeted him. “Professor, what’s going on? What happened to Draco?” she asked, genuinely concerned, a frown adorning her face.
“Nothing you should be overly concerned about. He said that he had a feeling something bad was going to happen to you and said you should leave your Aunt and Uncle’s house,” he sneered, but Potter’s eyes showed panic. It was obvious that she believed Draco’s premonitions.
“George, we’re packing everything up!” She shouted to someone behind her and Severus heard a muffled reply. He could see various things moving in the background. Weasley was with her? How the bloody hell did he get into the house?
“Thank Draco for me. His vision are hard to control, but they’re accurate. I don’t want to know what he saw. I’ll tell you where I am after I arrive in my desired destination,” she told him quickly.
“Harri, I need to store the mirror away for travel. Tell Professor Snape you’ll see him soon,” Weasley said in the background and Potter nodded. Even when the twins weren’t in the room with him they made his blood boil.
There was a loud bang from Potter’s end of the mirror and various curses could be heard from the raven haired girl’s end. The mirror went completely dark seconds later. Severus was honestly worried about her wellbeing...damn her.
Minutes went by and luckily Draco was asleep on the couch in the sitting room and didn’t know that his friend could be dead. Severus debated whether or not to go to Petunia’s house and in the end he decided that it was better if he did. He might as well cover all his bases and make sure that Potter wasn’t dead.
He left a note right next to Draco’s head and apperated straight to the house. He didn’t even bother knocking on the door. He walked straight in and went up the stairs to where Potter’s bedroom should have been. He saw a rather large hole in the wall next to the door, it looked like it had been cut out. There seemed to be blood on the shredded fragments of the walls. On the far side of the wall was a large man with a very furry mustache. He was out cold and bleeding form various spots on his body.
Severus hesitantly entered the room. His blood ran cold when he saw runes covering the room. Most of them extremely complex warding runes. It seemed that her Uncle had been trying to get her alone after all. Snape felt compelled to hex him further, but refrained himself.
The room itself was a mess. It seemed when her uncle cut through the wall all her warding runes went off, sending debris everywhere, the bed at the far end of the room was on fire and everything else had exploded. The brilliant thing about this was that the ministry couldn’t even question this because runes have nothing to do with wand wielding magic. He doubted that the ministry even knew that something had happened in the house.
There was one thing that hadn’t been touched in the room and that was a small table near the window. There was a small note with the name “Professor Snape” written in elegant script on it. Severus walked over to it and opened the small piece of paper.
Dear Professor Snape,
In here is the address (it’s coded, you’ll need Draco to tell you want it means). I sent it as soon as I arrived at my destination. I figured you would check the house. Draco would kill you if you didn’t.
Sincerely,
Harriet Jane Potter
His eye twitched in annoyance. He crumpled the note in his hand and apperated back to his home. Draco was still sleeping, so he decided to try to figure out what the code meant himself.
Three hours later Draco walked into the kitchen to see his godfather glaring at a note so angrily that he thought he would set it on fire.
“Sev, what did that note ever do to you?” Draco asked rubbing the sleep from his eyes.
“This note is supposed to tell me where Potter is...” he grumbled and handed the note to his godson who plucked it out of the potion mater’s hands.
“Ah, it’s in code. Oh, I know exactly where she is. Harri hasn’t shut up about this place all summer. She’s staying at a friend’s house, she just moved here and she has a small flat in Diagon Alley. Harri should be fine,” Draco replied with a small smile.
“Draco,” Severus began, trying to get the teens attention. The blonde’s head turned to face him rather quickly in his godfather’s general direction and looked at him confused. “Did you know that George Weasley was staying with Potter this summer?”
“Yea, we all know that he was there. Well, except Sirius and Remus. They would have killed him, but there’s nothing too serious going on. Harri is a veela and needs to be by George or her magical core will burn out. So, George snuck out and then snuck into her Aunt and Uncle’s house. They seem generally happy so I’m not telling them to do anything differently,” Draco explained, not making direct eye contact with his godfather.
“How did Molly Weasley not notice that one of her kids was missing?” Severus asked, suddenly feeling older than he really was.
“Fred would just pretend to be George and get two meals at breakfast, lunch and dinner. No one in his family noticed. It’s really sad...” Draco answered.
“Yes, it’s sad. Now, let’s get to your friend’s location and make sure that she isn’t hurt or dying,” Severus said getting his wand out and taking them both to Diagon Alley.
They were in the apartment district of the Alley, where young witches and wizards tried to make it on their own in cheap flats. Draco was leading the way, muttering to himself as he read different signs till they finally reached the appropriate set of flats. They were higher class and built for about fifty people. Draco pressed a buzzer and a light French voice answered. “Who iz thiz?”
“Draco, Harri sent us,” he replied and the door swung open moments later.
His godson motioned for him to follow him into the building. Four flights of stairs and three hallways later, they found the number they were looking for. Draco knocked three times and waited for someone to answer.
When the door opened Potter’s face greeted them. She was leaning on the doorframe, arms crossed, a picture of ease. Potter, like her godson, had grown and matured over the summer. She had grown and her face had thinned out, giving her an aristocratic look, making her look even more like her father. Her short hair was framing her face, and her sharp green eyes watching them both. There were a few partially healed cuts on her face and arms, but they wouldn’t close on their own. Her veela inheritance was starting to show through, giving her almost an inhuman sense of beauty to her. Severus wondered how she had managed to keep her Uncle away from her as long as she had. “Fleur said that you could come in if you wanted,” she told them walking back through the entryway’s hall and into the flat.
So, book five has started! =D I hope you enjoy the different perspective for the next few chapters. I enjoyed writing these scenes. Snape is such a complex character.
Anyway, I won't be updating twice a week anymore. I'll only be uploading on Fridays. I don't actually have time to do it more than that. Between my Spanish lab, Anthropology lab, my job at admissions, and my assortment of other classes, I don't have time to post on Tuesdays...sorry.
Thanks for all the comments. They make me smile! =)
~Animerocker
PS
I don't own Harry Potter