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All Hallow's Eve (my second fanfic)
This is the second of a projected series of four stories exploring the relationship between Severus Snape and Albus Dumbledore. All credits are as for the first story below - in particular, all characters and settings are the intellectual property of J.K. Rowling, without whom this story would not exist. The treatment is my own, but was inspired in part by Jodel, June Diamanti and swythyv. My thanks to all of you.
The story follows the cut. It is probably pg, for minor language and non- graphic violence, and is about 5,000 words long.
All Hallow’s Eve
(a fanfic by Mary Johnson)
The young man had just bought a bottle of wine to celebrate Halloween with his wife. He was walking home from the pub when he saw his enemy. Another young man, someone he hadn’t seen or thought of in years, someone he’d never wanted to see again, standing on the road before him as if he’d just appeared out of thin air. This person had the look of a gaunt raven; he was dressed entirely in black, with long black hair and black eyes. He turned, peering as if he were half-blinded by the slight mist that had begun to rise from the roadway. “Potter?” he said. “Is that you?”
"What do you want, Snape?" the man called Potter said. He had pulled out a thin stick and was pointing it directly at Snape’s chest. In response, Snape raised both his hands to head height, palms out to show that they were empty. It was a gesture Potter would have recognized had he ever seen a war movie, or a police show on television. "Potter, listen to me," he said. "Just listen!"
"All right," Potter answered. "Say what you’ve got to say, but don’t move. If you do, I’ll hex you."
The young man called Snape began to lower his hands, but Potter thrust his wand forward, and sparks flew from the tip. Snape froze and drew in his breath with a sound like a hiss. In one breath, he blurted out, "Listen. Take Lily and the boy and get out of here. Go to Dumbledore. He is coming here - he’s coming now. Sirius Black betrayed you."
Potter laughed out loud. "Honestly, Snape, is that the best you can do? Sirius Black did not betray us."
"You arrogant fool!" Snape began. He was as white as paper, and actually stamped in baffled rage. "What do you think I’m doing . . . "
But Potter interrupted him. "All right, Snape, you’ve said your piece. Now leave before I stun you and hand you over to the Aurors. And you can count yourself lucky I’m letting you go."
Snape bared his teeth. "The Aurors don’t want me. They’ve had me already. You’re wasting time! Get them out of here!"
Potter stepped toward him, wand still pointed at his chest. "I told you . . ." he began, but before he could finish, Snape clutched at his left forearm and then spun on the spot, vanishing into the mist with a slight pop. “Good riddance,” Potter murmured. But he hesitated, frowning at the spot where the other man had stood, before moving on.
He walked home slowly, thinking hard. There had been something wrong about Snape. Well - more wrong than usual; he’d never thought Snape was particularly right. What was it? It wasn’t only that it was such an obvious trap, trying to flush them out of hiding with a false message. That seemed stupid, far too stupid for Snape, who was clever if he was anything. But there was something else. What was it?
He was still mulling it over when he turned the key in his door. Lily greeted him in the hallway, smiling and saying, “Happy Halloween! Where were you all this time? Talking in the pub?”
“No - well, not in the pub,” he answered. “Was I really so long?”
His wife smiled impishly. “No, not really. I was just hoping for help getting Harry settled down.”
“He’s asleep, then?”
“Yes, finally. He’s a real little night owl, that one. He wanted two stories, and then he was asking for his Daddy. No, don’t go up,” Lily added, seeing her husband’s expression. “You’d only wake him, and then he’d be up for hours.”
“Too right,” Potter said ruefully. “I suppose I can give him breakfast in the morning.”
“Good idea,” Lily said cheerfully. “I wonder if we’ll have any trick or treaters? Perhaps it’s too late. Of course they wouldn’t come here, but I wonder if we’ll see any.”
“Trick or treaters?”
“They do it in America - there was an American girl at my primary school. The children get dressed up as witches and warlocks and devils and so on, and go around to their neighbors asking for sweets. Only muggle children do it, of course.”
“And the neighbors give them sweets?”
“It seems so. If they don’t, the children play tricks on them. I shouldn’t think we’d see them here - it’s very late for children to be out, anyway. But it always sounded like such fun when my friend told me about it. I wanted to go round with her to all the neighbors, but we never did, after all.”
“Little extortionists! Trying to scare people into giving you things!” As he spoke, the penny dropped; he knew what had been wrong with Snape. “He was scared!” he exclaimed. “He was bloody terrified!”
“Who was?”
“Snape.”
“James! You saw Severus? Here?”
“Yes - on my way back from the pub. Lily, he said Sirius had betrayed us, and I just laughed. Told him to clear out. But -”
“But what was he doing here?” Lily finished for him. “How did he know? “ She had gone very pale. “James,” she said, “I’m going to wake Harry and get his things.”
“Right,” James Potter said. “Best go out through the back garden. I’ll follow you - I’ll hold them off as long as I can. Take this,” and he held out a cloak of thin, shimmering fabric. But Lily had already run up the stairs. James heard a brief cry from the baby as she wakened him. He dropped the cloak on a nearby chair and opened the door a crack to look out. The bottle of wine sat on the side table where they had left it, unopened.
As James looked out the door, a tall, spectral figure appeared on the path. James called as loudly as he could, “He’s here! Lily, take Harry and run."
Severus Snape heard the shout and stiffened in shock. They were still here! Why were they still here? They had had ten minutes, at least; it was the most he could give them, and he had risked his life to do it. The damn fools! They should have been at the gates of Hogwarts by now.
The Dark Lord had ordered him to come to Godric’s Hollow - a reward, he’d said, for telling him of the prophecy. Then, at the street corner, he had told him to wait. "I will bring the little mudblood out to you, if she agrees to come," he had said. Then he’d laughed - that cruel, high-pitched laugh that always set Severus’s teeth on edge. "Perhaps you young ones can fight for her. That would be amusing."
Severus had said nothing, He’d bowed low and kept his face as expressionless as he could, though his mind was racing. The Dark Lord had stalked forward, toward the house that should have been invisible to Severus. Now he was nearly at the front door. James Potter stepped out to fight him, and light flashed from two wands. Severus saw James crumple and fall. As if someone had shoved him in the back, Severus began to move. He was disobeying the Dark Lord’s direct order, but it had not been the first time tonight, and it wouldn’t be the last. He felt almost as if under compulsion; somehow he had to prevent what was happening. But how?
He reached the front door and stepped over James’s body. There was a silvery cloak on the chair in the hall; he grabbed it and flung it over his head. Then he took the stairs three at a time. He had no clear idea what he would do when he reached the top, but he knew he had to do something. It was too late for James, but maybe he could save the other two.
As he came to the landing, he heard a girl scream, "No! Not Harry. Please, not Harry!" Then the Dark Lord’s voice, "Stand aside, you silly girl." They were in the room opposite the landing; as Severus reached the door, he saw the Dark Lord aiming his wand at a little boy - a baby, really - in a cot. As he pronounced the killing curse, Lily leapt in front of his wand. The beam of green light hit her square in the chest and she fell backward.
The little boy was standing up holding the bars of his cot; it would have been clear to anyone who knew babies that he was considering whether to cry, but he was not crying. The Dark Lord aimed again and spoke: "Avada Kedavra." At the same moment, Severus lurched forward and swung at his master’s arm.
The next thing he knew was that he was lying on his back just outside the bedroom door. He scrambled up, his feet tangling in the invisibility cloak which he pulled off and rolled as he stood. The baby was sitting in the cot and howling loudly; he was too young to talk clearly, but through his howls Severus could distinguish, "Mama! Mama!" The Dark Lord was simply gone. Nothing was left of him but his clothes and his wand in a heap on the floor. Severus’s head hurt - he must have struck something when he was knocked down - and his legs felt shaky. His ears were popping; the air pressure was shifting in a way that felt dangerous. He shoved the cloak into a pocket and strode over to the cot to grab the little boy, who wailed more loudly and squirmed in his arms, trying to bite as a panicked toddler will. "Shush. Stop that, now," Severus told him, and then, "Stop thy greeting." There was a sharp, chemical smell coming from somewhere, and the pressure was building in his ears. He hunched over the baby, cupping one hand round the small, dark head, and cried out wordlessly. Then he Disapparated on the spot as the house imploded around them.
They came out in Hogsmeade, not far from the Shrieking Shack. The back of Severus’s hand had been cut by flying glass; he sucked at it before realizing what a stupid thing that was to do. The little boy, Harry, seemed completely unharmed except for a strange red mark on his forehead. He was still crying frantically. Severus had no idea how to handle a child this small. If only the brat would stop crying! As if by instinct, he settled the little boy on one shoulder and began to sing to him. He sang "Dance to thy Daddy, oh" and "Green Grow the Rushes" and "Rockabye Baby" and even his hometown song, "On Ilka Moor Bar T’at" - anything and everything he could think of, all the old songs his own mam had sung to him twenty years ago, when he was hardly any older than this child who was sobbing into his cloak. Severus might be grim to look at, but his voice was clear and true, and the little boy eventually stopped crying and began to listen, finally falling asleep with his head on Severus’s shoulder. By that time they were at the gates of Hogwarts.
Severus had to shift the baby to get at his wand and unlock the gates, but fortunately he didn’t wake him. Where could he leave this child; did he have to take him up to Dumbledore’s office? Somehow that felt like a bad idea. He spotted the gamekeeper’s hut out of the corner of his eye and veered aside. Hagrid loved every sort of strange animal. A baby would be easy for him to deal with. Reaching the door, Severus began kicking at it and knocking with his free hand, hoping the racket wouldn’t start the child howling again. What was taking Hagrid so long?
After what seemed an eternity, the door swung open and Hagrid stood centered in the frame. "Ruddy Hell!" he grumbled. "It’s midnight! Wha’ do you want, Snape?"
"Professor Snape, to you," Severus hissed, because he had had just about enough. Why did the man have to stand there asking him questions when he needed help? He held out the little boy and said, "I want you to look after this child."
"You wha’?"
"Shh - don’t wake him! I’ve only just got him to sleep. Just take him, would you?" And Severus put the baby into Hagrid’s hands.
Hagrid’s huge hands closed gently round the little boy, almost hiding him completely. Relieved of his burden, Severus spun round and began sprinting toward the castle. He heard the gamekeeper’s voice behind him, calling in a sort of hushed bellow, "Snape! Come back ‘ere! Wha’ happened?" But he kept running.
He slowed to a fast walk once he got through the castle doors. His only thought now was to get to Dumbledore as quickly as he could, and preferably without being seen. So he felt quite unreasonably furious when he spotted a third year Hufflepuff girl in the corridor near the headmaster’s study. When she saw him, the girl froze; in her fluffy robe and slippers, she looked exactly like a rabbit caught in a car’s headlights. "Twenty five points from Hufflepuff!" Severus snarled at her. "Get back to your dormitory at once!"
"B-But - please, sir . . ., " the girl began, but Severus glared and lowered his voice. "At once," he whispered. "Or should you like me to take another twenty five points?" Tears in her eyes, the child turned and scurried away, looking more like a rabbit than ever.
When he reached the two gargoyles guarding the staircase to the headmaster’s study, Severus stopped, his mind suddenly blank. What was the damn password today? He knew he had been told, but it had been knocked right out of his head. He put one hand to his head and muttered, "Hell! What was it? Chocolate eclairs?"
"Wrong!" sang out the gargoyle to his right. "Shall we try for two out of three?"
"Shut up! I’m trying to think."
"Ooh! He’s trying to think! What’s he thinking about?"
"I am thinking," Severus answered coldly, "of how pleasant it would be to decapitate you."
"Ooh! Snarky! You’ll never get upstairs if we can’t hear you. We can’t hear without ears, you know."
Something stirred in Severus’s memory. Ears - heads - it was a sweet one could bite the heads off. "Jelly babies," he suggested cautiously. The gargoyles chorused, "Too bad," and let him through.
Albus Dumbledore heard the staircase grind into motion, and rose to greet his visitor. Severus, as he had expected; few others came to him this late. The boy was very pale, and his eyes were almost fever-bright; he had a smear of dried blood on the back of one hand and another on his face, near the mouth. Without speaking, he stepped toward the headmaster, pushed up his left sleeve, and held out his arm. The ugly scar on it - the skull with a snake emerging from its mouth - was very faint, so faint it would have been invisible to anyone who didn’t know it was there. Yet Dumbledore knew the mark had been black less than two hours ago. "Ah," he said. "So Voldemort has been defeated."
Severus cringed, then shook his head, still mute. Dumbledore gazed at him with concern and said gently, "And the Potters?"
Severus swallowed, then found his voice at last. "Dead. He killed them both."
The sorrow in Dumbledore’s eyes deepened. "And Harry?" he asked, "Did Voldemort kill him as well?"
"He - no. The Dark Lord did not - the child is alive. I left him with Hagrid."
"Good. That was well done," Dumbledore told him. He fetched a bottle and a glass out of a cupboard and said, "Sit down, Severus, and drink this."
"But I must tell you - " Severus began, but Dumbledore interrupted him. "Severus. Take this, sit down, and drink. That is an order." To his relief, the boy obeyed without further argument, and Dumbledore saw some color begin to come back into his face as he sipped at the brandy. He asked him, "Are you injured? There is blood on your face."
"What?" Severus raised a free hand to his cheek and swiped at it.
"Near your mouth," Dumbledore told him, and held out a handkerchief.
Severus scrubbed around his mouth with it, looking in bewilderment at the rusty stain that resulted. "No, Headmaster," he answered, "I am not hurt. I don’t know what happened. Well - I do know. The house exploded. There was glass everywhere. I must have got cut then, when I was getting the child out." He laughed rather bitterly. "I don’t know why I bothered; I should have left him in the Forbidden Forest for the Acromantulas."
Dumbledore’s expression darkened. "You do not mean that," he said.
"I do, sir!" And Severus looked straight at him, his eyes blazing. "There is something wrong about him. How can you be sure he is not a dark wizard?"
Dumbledore sighed. "I cannot, of course. Every one of us is capable of darkness, and Harry is too young for anyone to say for certain what he may or may not become. I will say this, however. Considering his parentage -" at this, Severus snorted, his expression scornful, and the older man knew at once he was thinking of James, whom he had hated. "Considering who his parents were," Dumbledore repeated firmly, "I think it unlikely. Still, he will need to be watched - and to be kept safe. I do not think we can keep him here. I wonder-" and then he paused for a second or two, gazing into space. "Severus," he said finally. "You said there was something wrong about Harry. What did you mean? Tell me exactly what happened tonight."
"Sirius Black betrayed them. I overheard - I could not make out the voices; they were whispering, but I heard the words. They did not know I was there. I disapparated and went to where the Potters were to warn them. Potter laughed in my face." At that, Severus gritted his teeth in fury. After taking a breath that sounded almost like a gasp, he went on, "The Dark Lord ordered me to come with him, and then to wait. I saw him kill Potter. Then- “"he paused as if collecting his thoughts, while the headmaster regarded him gravely. "Go on, my son," Dumbledore said.
"I went into the house and up the stairs. Potter had left his invisiblity cloak on a chair in the hall, and I took it. I heard Lily screaming," and Severus paused again, looking rather sick. "She was begging for her son’s life. The Dark Lord ordered her to stand aside, but she did not. When he cursed the child, she leapt in front of his wand." His voice had dropped to a whisper. "Then the Dark Lord aimed at the child again. And then - there was no body left. Blown apart, maybe. I don’t know. And the child was crying in the cot. And then the house exploded around us."
"So Voldemort is gone," Dumbledore said. Seeing the young man flinch, he said, "Severus, it is only a word. Why be afraid of a word?"
"You know, sir. You know it is more than that. And also -" Severus paused and fixed his eyes on the headmaster’s face. "Also - there is something left. He is not gone - not entirely."
"How do you mean?"
Once again, Severus pushed up his left sleeve and showed the scar of the dark mark. "Can you see it, Headmaster? It is still there. I can still feel it. If he were gone, it would be gone as well, wouldn’t it? I should be free of it. But I am not." The whole time, his eyes had not left Dumbledore’s; to the old man, those dark eyes had a pleading look, as though the boy wanted reassurance that his fears were imaginary. But Dumbledore could give him no such assurance.
"I see," he responded. "And Harry? Why does he worry you?"
Severus Snape dropped his eyes and sighed, then looked straight at Dumbledore again. “He is alive. How did he survive the Avada Kedavra? And then he has a scar,” and he raised one hand to his forehead and traced a zigzag there, “here, where the curse hit him. I am certain there is something wrong about it. The Dark Lord will use that child to come back. He will come back; I am sure of it, and that child will make it possible." His voice had all the certainty of true prophecy, yet Severus was no diviner; he was a pragmatic Slytherin to the core. But for all that, Dumbledore could not discount his prediction. The older man knew Severus had strong intuition, and he certainly knew Voldemort as well as anyone living, except, perhaps, for Dumbledore himself. If Severus said Voldemort would return, chances were good that he would. Perhaps a second battle would be necessary, perhaps - heavens forbid - even a second war.
“Severus, my dear son,” he responded, “I cannot deny it is possible. Voldemort may indeed make use of Harry, but, if he does return, Harry will also have the means to defeat him. We must not be afraid; we must fear nothing except the failure to love. Your rescue of Harry was no such failure. Do you understand?”
“No, sir. You know I do not.” The young man’s mouth closed in a straight line, his eyebrows drawn down. Dumbledore sighed inwardly. He knew Severus hated to be left in the dark, but he could not make his thoughts any plainer. If only the boy understood his own tremendous power! But he remained unconscious of the fires that burned within him. Love - it was an easy word to say, but young people did not truly comprehend it; they confused it too easily with obsession. Lily, though - she had understood. “You will understand, in time,” he told Severus. “You did well tonight. But you should finish that brandy. It’s quite good; it would be a shame to waste it.”
The young man looked down at his glass as if surprised to find it still half full, and raised it to his mouth. Dumbledore in the meantime sat down at his desk and picked up a quill, then held it in the air as if considering. “Lily had a sister, did she not?” he murmured.
“Petunia,” Severus answered promptly. "I think she married that idiot Dursley."
“Ah, yes. Petunia. And I believe she has a son Harry’s age.”
Severus shrugged. “Possible,” he answered.
“Yes. It is possible. It might be the best thing,” Dumbledore said, then noticed his young Potions Master looking at him in astonishment. “What is it, Severus?” he asked.
“You are not thinking of giving the child to her, Headmaster?”
“Well, yes. I am.”
“Petunia!” Severus said, and snorted. “She’ll either ignore that child completely or spoil him rotten. Spoil him rotten, most likely. You don’t know her, Headmaster; she is nothing like Lily.”
“Nevertheless, she is Lily’s sister. And Harry’s only surviving relative. Yes, I think he needs to be with family.” As he spoke, Dumbledore noticed Severus grimace; it was clear he did not approve. All the same, he did not argue further. What he said was, “Would you like me to take him there, sir?”
“No, Severus. That will not be necessary. However, there is one thing I must ask of you.”
“What is it, sir?” Dumbledore noted that the young man, who had just begun to relax a little, had again gone tense and pale.
“If you are correct, as I believe you may be, and Voldemort finds a means to return, the memory of this night will be a danger to you. I should like you to give me this memory, if you will.”
“Yes sir,” Severus answered, and stood up and took out his wand.
“Not immediately, Severus,” Dumbledore told him. “There is something I should like you to do first, if you are willing. It will not take long.”
So it was that Severus Snape found himself back in Godric’s Hollow on the first of November, shortly before sunrise. The headmaster had asked him to apparate there with Harry and to leave the little boy at the Potter’s house, or what was left of it. Severus had understood at once; if Harry were not officially found at the house and taken directly to his aunt and uncle, it would be obvious that someone had removed him at the time of the explosion. And the list of possible rescuers was quite small. Severus’s name was near the top, and no one must ever know that he had been there. Still, it felt very strange to go back, and to see James’s and Lily’s bodies lying so peacefully among the wreckage. If it were not for the scorch marks on their robes and their open eyes, they might have been sleeping. The baby’s cot had been reduced to matchwood, and at first Severus was at a loss as to where he could put him down. Finally, he found a part of a mattress near Lily’s body and laid the little boy on it. As he turned to leave, he knelt and kissed the dead girl on her forehead. The sound of a motor was cutting through the still, damp air just as he Disapparated.
He arrived back near the school gates, closer than he had managed the previous night. A fine rain was starting to fall, and he felt chilled and exhausted, even though the headmaster had insisted he get a few hours of sleep before this expedition. He went at once to Dumbledore’s office, where the headmaster was waiting for him. He had a small flask ready, and when Severus was able to calm himself and locate the memories of this past evening, he and Dumbledore abstracted them one by one and put them into the flask. It was oddly unsettling to see the mists of his own thoughts going into such a small container. The events had seemed so huge; how was it possible that his memories of them took up so little space? Once they had finished, the headmaster took the flask from him and sealed it. “Thank you, Severus,” he said gravely, and the two of them went down to the high table to breakfast.
Severus no longer had any clear images in his mind of what he had just experienced; the sights, sounds, smells and emotions were all locked in the headmaster’s little flask. But a couple of things that happened at breakfast irked him, all the same. First, Pomona Sprout, who was normally extraordinarily helpful and courteous to him, let it be known that she was annoyed with him. “Honestly, Severus,” she said, “did you have to be so hard on the poor Blake child? You terrified her practically out of her wits, and she was only trying to get her friend to the infirmary. You know, Jenny Fletcher got appendicitis in the night. You might at least have given her a chance to explain.” Not knowing what to say - and only remembering vaguely what she was talking about - Severus said nothing, which caused Pomona to sniff in irritation and turn to Professor Trelawney, of all people, to start chattering with. Not that he was at all inclined to chatter - he wished Professor Sprout joy of Trelawney, and was actually somewhat relieved that she was distracting her - but Severus felt, as he so often did among these people, that he was being blamed for something he couldn’t help.
The second irritant was the headmaster’s cheerfulness. He declared a general holiday to celebrate Lord Voldemort’s defeat, which caused enthusiastic cheering and stamping and whistling from practically the whole school, even Severus’s Slytherins. Severus knew in his bones there was nothing to celebrate. If these people were thinking at all, they would be mourning. Hadn’t people died last night? He didn’t know how he knew, nor who exactly had died, but he knew he was right. Besides, it was premature to say the Dark Lord was defeated, and premature celebration wasn’t just disrespectful, it was idiotic. He expected better from the headmaster.
Minerva McGonagall was not at the high table, and Hagrid, too, was absent. Severus assumed without thinking about it that they were doing something about the Potter baby, and then wondered why on earth the Potter baby had come to mind. Then he opened the Daily Prophet that a school owl had just dropped near his coffee cup. The headline screamed, “He-Who-Must-Not-be-Named Defeated at Godric’s Hollow”, and below, in smaller letters, “Potters dead - their son survives.” So that was the explanation. He must have come across an earlier edition of the paper, and that was how he had been so certain of innocent deaths and an orphaned child. But this did not explain his simmering anger, nor his certainty that there was nothing yet to celebrate.
It soon became clear that he was the only person in the school who was not in a celebratory mood. All of the older students were making plans to go to Hogsmeade, and the owlery was packed. The younger pupils were running and yelling and throwing things at each other, and no one was bothering to call them to order. On the contrary, all their Heads of House were smiling at them indulgently, something that drove Severus especially wild. Didn’t these people have any idea what sort of damage a gang of unruly children could do? He chivvied all his Slytherins back to their common room, told the first and second years that he would be holding an extra study hall for all who desired to attend, and insisted that the older students find and show him their permission slips for a Hogsmeade visit. That calmed all of them down.
At nine o’clock promptly, he went to Professor Flitwick’s Charms classroom to hold the promised study hall. Naturally, it was sparsely attended, and the few students who were there engaged in a good deal of whispering and note passing, with one exception he noticed with some interest - a girl who sat quietly in a corner with her head down. At the end of the hour, the children all poured out of the door at once, bursting into chatter like a gang of starlings. The solitary girl got up rather more slowly than the rest, and had not reached the door when Severus called to her. “Miss Blake. A word, if you will.”
The girl turned, looking apprehensive. “Sir?” she whispered.
“You are not going to Hogsmeade?” It was not what Severus had intended to ask, but he was genuinely curious. Also, he felt this question from him would throw the girl off balance, and in this he guessed he was right. She did indeed look surprised.
“Yes, sir - later - I’m meeting Mum for lunch,” she stammered.
“And you will also be visiting your friend in the hospital wing?”
“Yes, sir,” Sally Blake answered, looking even more astonished.
“I have spoken to Professor Sprout, and at her request I have reinstated your house points.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“Do not thank me, and do not interrupt. I have not finished.” After a moment of total silence, Severus continued, “Did you wake Professor Sprout when your friend fell ill?”
“I - no sir. I didn’t think - I just wanted to get Madame Pomfrey and get Jenny to the infirmary.”
“You didn’t think. Exactly,” Severus said, and then, after a brief pause, “The Muggles have a concept - in their military, I believe - called chain of command. Do you know what this means?”
“No, sir,” the Blake child whispered.
“In an emergency, you are not to attempt to deal with it alone. You are to wake your prefects, and if it is beyond them, you are to wake your Head of House. Had a member of Slytherin house failed to wake me in similar circumstances, I should have been very angry. Do you understand me? “
“Yes, sir.”
“Very well. You may go.”
“Thank you, sir,” Sally Blake said, and quailed at his resulting grimace. He watched the child scuttle out the door, breaking into a run once she had reached the hallway. Then he sighed and sat down again, both hands at his temples. He was starting to have a headache, and besides this he had a strong feeling he had forgetten something important. It was something to do with the previous night, and he was sure he would have no peace until he was able to remember it.
Then it came to him. He had no pictures in his head, but he knew, just as he knew the times tables or the periodic table of elements (a gift from a favorite teacher at his Muggle primary school), that he had warned James Potter about the coming attack. And Potter had laughed in his face. The arrogant bastard! If Potter had listened to him, he and his wife and child would all be alive today. It was his fault Lily was dead. Severus clenched his teeth and pounded the desk in front of him. He would never forgive Potter for that. No, never, not if he lived to be two hundred years old. Not in eternity, if there was such a thing. Never.
Mary Johnson, March 2006
All characters and settings are the intellectual property of J.K. Rowling, without whose work this story would not exist.
The story follows the cut. It is probably pg, for minor language and non- graphic violence, and is about 5,000 words long.
All Hallow’s Eve
(a fanfic by Mary Johnson)
The young man had just bought a bottle of wine to celebrate Halloween with his wife. He was walking home from the pub when he saw his enemy. Another young man, someone he hadn’t seen or thought of in years, someone he’d never wanted to see again, standing on the road before him as if he’d just appeared out of thin air. This person had the look of a gaunt raven; he was dressed entirely in black, with long black hair and black eyes. He turned, peering as if he were half-blinded by the slight mist that had begun to rise from the roadway. “Potter?” he said. “Is that you?”
"What do you want, Snape?" the man called Potter said. He had pulled out a thin stick and was pointing it directly at Snape’s chest. In response, Snape raised both his hands to head height, palms out to show that they were empty. It was a gesture Potter would have recognized had he ever seen a war movie, or a police show on television. "Potter, listen to me," he said. "Just listen!"
"All right," Potter answered. "Say what you’ve got to say, but don’t move. If you do, I’ll hex you."
The young man called Snape began to lower his hands, but Potter thrust his wand forward, and sparks flew from the tip. Snape froze and drew in his breath with a sound like a hiss. In one breath, he blurted out, "Listen. Take Lily and the boy and get out of here. Go to Dumbledore. He is coming here - he’s coming now. Sirius Black betrayed you."
Potter laughed out loud. "Honestly, Snape, is that the best you can do? Sirius Black did not betray us."
"You arrogant fool!" Snape began. He was as white as paper, and actually stamped in baffled rage. "What do you think I’m doing . . . "
But Potter interrupted him. "All right, Snape, you’ve said your piece. Now leave before I stun you and hand you over to the Aurors. And you can count yourself lucky I’m letting you go."
Snape bared his teeth. "The Aurors don’t want me. They’ve had me already. You’re wasting time! Get them out of here!"
Potter stepped toward him, wand still pointed at his chest. "I told you . . ." he began, but before he could finish, Snape clutched at his left forearm and then spun on the spot, vanishing into the mist with a slight pop. “Good riddance,” Potter murmured. But he hesitated, frowning at the spot where the other man had stood, before moving on.
He walked home slowly, thinking hard. There had been something wrong about Snape. Well - more wrong than usual; he’d never thought Snape was particularly right. What was it? It wasn’t only that it was such an obvious trap, trying to flush them out of hiding with a false message. That seemed stupid, far too stupid for Snape, who was clever if he was anything. But there was something else. What was it?
He was still mulling it over when he turned the key in his door. Lily greeted him in the hallway, smiling and saying, “Happy Halloween! Where were you all this time? Talking in the pub?”
“No - well, not in the pub,” he answered. “Was I really so long?”
His wife smiled impishly. “No, not really. I was just hoping for help getting Harry settled down.”
“He’s asleep, then?”
“Yes, finally. He’s a real little night owl, that one. He wanted two stories, and then he was asking for his Daddy. No, don’t go up,” Lily added, seeing her husband’s expression. “You’d only wake him, and then he’d be up for hours.”
“Too right,” Potter said ruefully. “I suppose I can give him breakfast in the morning.”
“Good idea,” Lily said cheerfully. “I wonder if we’ll have any trick or treaters? Perhaps it’s too late. Of course they wouldn’t come here, but I wonder if we’ll see any.”
“Trick or treaters?”
“They do it in America - there was an American girl at my primary school. The children get dressed up as witches and warlocks and devils and so on, and go around to their neighbors asking for sweets. Only muggle children do it, of course.”
“And the neighbors give them sweets?”
“It seems so. If they don’t, the children play tricks on them. I shouldn’t think we’d see them here - it’s very late for children to be out, anyway. But it always sounded like such fun when my friend told me about it. I wanted to go round with her to all the neighbors, but we never did, after all.”
“Little extortionists! Trying to scare people into giving you things!” As he spoke, the penny dropped; he knew what had been wrong with Snape. “He was scared!” he exclaimed. “He was bloody terrified!”
“Who was?”
“Snape.”
“James! You saw Severus? Here?”
“Yes - on my way back from the pub. Lily, he said Sirius had betrayed us, and I just laughed. Told him to clear out. But -”
“But what was he doing here?” Lily finished for him. “How did he know? “ She had gone very pale. “James,” she said, “I’m going to wake Harry and get his things.”
“Right,” James Potter said. “Best go out through the back garden. I’ll follow you - I’ll hold them off as long as I can. Take this,” and he held out a cloak of thin, shimmering fabric. But Lily had already run up the stairs. James heard a brief cry from the baby as she wakened him. He dropped the cloak on a nearby chair and opened the door a crack to look out. The bottle of wine sat on the side table where they had left it, unopened.
As James looked out the door, a tall, spectral figure appeared on the path. James called as loudly as he could, “He’s here! Lily, take Harry and run."
Severus Snape heard the shout and stiffened in shock. They were still here! Why were they still here? They had had ten minutes, at least; it was the most he could give them, and he had risked his life to do it. The damn fools! They should have been at the gates of Hogwarts by now.
The Dark Lord had ordered him to come to Godric’s Hollow - a reward, he’d said, for telling him of the prophecy. Then, at the street corner, he had told him to wait. "I will bring the little mudblood out to you, if she agrees to come," he had said. Then he’d laughed - that cruel, high-pitched laugh that always set Severus’s teeth on edge. "Perhaps you young ones can fight for her. That would be amusing."
Severus had said nothing, He’d bowed low and kept his face as expressionless as he could, though his mind was racing. The Dark Lord had stalked forward, toward the house that should have been invisible to Severus. Now he was nearly at the front door. James Potter stepped out to fight him, and light flashed from two wands. Severus saw James crumple and fall. As if someone had shoved him in the back, Severus began to move. He was disobeying the Dark Lord’s direct order, but it had not been the first time tonight, and it wouldn’t be the last. He felt almost as if under compulsion; somehow he had to prevent what was happening. But how?
He reached the front door and stepped over James’s body. There was a silvery cloak on the chair in the hall; he grabbed it and flung it over his head. Then he took the stairs three at a time. He had no clear idea what he would do when he reached the top, but he knew he had to do something. It was too late for James, but maybe he could save the other two.
As he came to the landing, he heard a girl scream, "No! Not Harry. Please, not Harry!" Then the Dark Lord’s voice, "Stand aside, you silly girl." They were in the room opposite the landing; as Severus reached the door, he saw the Dark Lord aiming his wand at a little boy - a baby, really - in a cot. As he pronounced the killing curse, Lily leapt in front of his wand. The beam of green light hit her square in the chest and she fell backward.
The little boy was standing up holding the bars of his cot; it would have been clear to anyone who knew babies that he was considering whether to cry, but he was not crying. The Dark Lord aimed again and spoke: "Avada Kedavra." At the same moment, Severus lurched forward and swung at his master’s arm.
The next thing he knew was that he was lying on his back just outside the bedroom door. He scrambled up, his feet tangling in the invisibility cloak which he pulled off and rolled as he stood. The baby was sitting in the cot and howling loudly; he was too young to talk clearly, but through his howls Severus could distinguish, "Mama! Mama!" The Dark Lord was simply gone. Nothing was left of him but his clothes and his wand in a heap on the floor. Severus’s head hurt - he must have struck something when he was knocked down - and his legs felt shaky. His ears were popping; the air pressure was shifting in a way that felt dangerous. He shoved the cloak into a pocket and strode over to the cot to grab the little boy, who wailed more loudly and squirmed in his arms, trying to bite as a panicked toddler will. "Shush. Stop that, now," Severus told him, and then, "Stop thy greeting." There was a sharp, chemical smell coming from somewhere, and the pressure was building in his ears. He hunched over the baby, cupping one hand round the small, dark head, and cried out wordlessly. Then he Disapparated on the spot as the house imploded around them.
They came out in Hogsmeade, not far from the Shrieking Shack. The back of Severus’s hand had been cut by flying glass; he sucked at it before realizing what a stupid thing that was to do. The little boy, Harry, seemed completely unharmed except for a strange red mark on his forehead. He was still crying frantically. Severus had no idea how to handle a child this small. If only the brat would stop crying! As if by instinct, he settled the little boy on one shoulder and began to sing to him. He sang "Dance to thy Daddy, oh" and "Green Grow the Rushes" and "Rockabye Baby" and even his hometown song, "On Ilka Moor Bar T’at" - anything and everything he could think of, all the old songs his own mam had sung to him twenty years ago, when he was hardly any older than this child who was sobbing into his cloak. Severus might be grim to look at, but his voice was clear and true, and the little boy eventually stopped crying and began to listen, finally falling asleep with his head on Severus’s shoulder. By that time they were at the gates of Hogwarts.
Severus had to shift the baby to get at his wand and unlock the gates, but fortunately he didn’t wake him. Where could he leave this child; did he have to take him up to Dumbledore’s office? Somehow that felt like a bad idea. He spotted the gamekeeper’s hut out of the corner of his eye and veered aside. Hagrid loved every sort of strange animal. A baby would be easy for him to deal with. Reaching the door, Severus began kicking at it and knocking with his free hand, hoping the racket wouldn’t start the child howling again. What was taking Hagrid so long?
After what seemed an eternity, the door swung open and Hagrid stood centered in the frame. "Ruddy Hell!" he grumbled. "It’s midnight! Wha’ do you want, Snape?"
"Professor Snape, to you," Severus hissed, because he had had just about enough. Why did the man have to stand there asking him questions when he needed help? He held out the little boy and said, "I want you to look after this child."
"You wha’?"
"Shh - don’t wake him! I’ve only just got him to sleep. Just take him, would you?" And Severus put the baby into Hagrid’s hands.
Hagrid’s huge hands closed gently round the little boy, almost hiding him completely. Relieved of his burden, Severus spun round and began sprinting toward the castle. He heard the gamekeeper’s voice behind him, calling in a sort of hushed bellow, "Snape! Come back ‘ere! Wha’ happened?" But he kept running.
He slowed to a fast walk once he got through the castle doors. His only thought now was to get to Dumbledore as quickly as he could, and preferably without being seen. So he felt quite unreasonably furious when he spotted a third year Hufflepuff girl in the corridor near the headmaster’s study. When she saw him, the girl froze; in her fluffy robe and slippers, she looked exactly like a rabbit caught in a car’s headlights. "Twenty five points from Hufflepuff!" Severus snarled at her. "Get back to your dormitory at once!"
"B-But - please, sir . . ., " the girl began, but Severus glared and lowered his voice. "At once," he whispered. "Or should you like me to take another twenty five points?" Tears in her eyes, the child turned and scurried away, looking more like a rabbit than ever.
When he reached the two gargoyles guarding the staircase to the headmaster’s study, Severus stopped, his mind suddenly blank. What was the damn password today? He knew he had been told, but it had been knocked right out of his head. He put one hand to his head and muttered, "Hell! What was it? Chocolate eclairs?"
"Wrong!" sang out the gargoyle to his right. "Shall we try for two out of three?"
"Shut up! I’m trying to think."
"Ooh! He’s trying to think! What’s he thinking about?"
"I am thinking," Severus answered coldly, "of how pleasant it would be to decapitate you."
"Ooh! Snarky! You’ll never get upstairs if we can’t hear you. We can’t hear without ears, you know."
Something stirred in Severus’s memory. Ears - heads - it was a sweet one could bite the heads off. "Jelly babies," he suggested cautiously. The gargoyles chorused, "Too bad," and let him through.
Albus Dumbledore heard the staircase grind into motion, and rose to greet his visitor. Severus, as he had expected; few others came to him this late. The boy was very pale, and his eyes were almost fever-bright; he had a smear of dried blood on the back of one hand and another on his face, near the mouth. Without speaking, he stepped toward the headmaster, pushed up his left sleeve, and held out his arm. The ugly scar on it - the skull with a snake emerging from its mouth - was very faint, so faint it would have been invisible to anyone who didn’t know it was there. Yet Dumbledore knew the mark had been black less than two hours ago. "Ah," he said. "So Voldemort has been defeated."
Severus cringed, then shook his head, still mute. Dumbledore gazed at him with concern and said gently, "And the Potters?"
Severus swallowed, then found his voice at last. "Dead. He killed them both."
The sorrow in Dumbledore’s eyes deepened. "And Harry?" he asked, "Did Voldemort kill him as well?"
"He - no. The Dark Lord did not - the child is alive. I left him with Hagrid."
"Good. That was well done," Dumbledore told him. He fetched a bottle and a glass out of a cupboard and said, "Sit down, Severus, and drink this."
"But I must tell you - " Severus began, but Dumbledore interrupted him. "Severus. Take this, sit down, and drink. That is an order." To his relief, the boy obeyed without further argument, and Dumbledore saw some color begin to come back into his face as he sipped at the brandy. He asked him, "Are you injured? There is blood on your face."
"What?" Severus raised a free hand to his cheek and swiped at it.
"Near your mouth," Dumbledore told him, and held out a handkerchief.
Severus scrubbed around his mouth with it, looking in bewilderment at the rusty stain that resulted. "No, Headmaster," he answered, "I am not hurt. I don’t know what happened. Well - I do know. The house exploded. There was glass everywhere. I must have got cut then, when I was getting the child out." He laughed rather bitterly. "I don’t know why I bothered; I should have left him in the Forbidden Forest for the Acromantulas."
Dumbledore’s expression darkened. "You do not mean that," he said.
"I do, sir!" And Severus looked straight at him, his eyes blazing. "There is something wrong about him. How can you be sure he is not a dark wizard?"
Dumbledore sighed. "I cannot, of course. Every one of us is capable of darkness, and Harry is too young for anyone to say for certain what he may or may not become. I will say this, however. Considering his parentage -" at this, Severus snorted, his expression scornful, and the older man knew at once he was thinking of James, whom he had hated. "Considering who his parents were," Dumbledore repeated firmly, "I think it unlikely. Still, he will need to be watched - and to be kept safe. I do not think we can keep him here. I wonder-" and then he paused for a second or two, gazing into space. "Severus," he said finally. "You said there was something wrong about Harry. What did you mean? Tell me exactly what happened tonight."
"Sirius Black betrayed them. I overheard - I could not make out the voices; they were whispering, but I heard the words. They did not know I was there. I disapparated and went to where the Potters were to warn them. Potter laughed in my face." At that, Severus gritted his teeth in fury. After taking a breath that sounded almost like a gasp, he went on, "The Dark Lord ordered me to come with him, and then to wait. I saw him kill Potter. Then- “"he paused as if collecting his thoughts, while the headmaster regarded him gravely. "Go on, my son," Dumbledore said.
"I went into the house and up the stairs. Potter had left his invisiblity cloak on a chair in the hall, and I took it. I heard Lily screaming," and Severus paused again, looking rather sick. "She was begging for her son’s life. The Dark Lord ordered her to stand aside, but she did not. When he cursed the child, she leapt in front of his wand." His voice had dropped to a whisper. "Then the Dark Lord aimed at the child again. And then - there was no body left. Blown apart, maybe. I don’t know. And the child was crying in the cot. And then the house exploded around us."
"So Voldemort is gone," Dumbledore said. Seeing the young man flinch, he said, "Severus, it is only a word. Why be afraid of a word?"
"You know, sir. You know it is more than that. And also -" Severus paused and fixed his eyes on the headmaster’s face. "Also - there is something left. He is not gone - not entirely."
"How do you mean?"
Once again, Severus pushed up his left sleeve and showed the scar of the dark mark. "Can you see it, Headmaster? It is still there. I can still feel it. If he were gone, it would be gone as well, wouldn’t it? I should be free of it. But I am not." The whole time, his eyes had not left Dumbledore’s; to the old man, those dark eyes had a pleading look, as though the boy wanted reassurance that his fears were imaginary. But Dumbledore could give him no such assurance.
"I see," he responded. "And Harry? Why does he worry you?"
Severus Snape dropped his eyes and sighed, then looked straight at Dumbledore again. “He is alive. How did he survive the Avada Kedavra? And then he has a scar,” and he raised one hand to his forehead and traced a zigzag there, “here, where the curse hit him. I am certain there is something wrong about it. The Dark Lord will use that child to come back. He will come back; I am sure of it, and that child will make it possible." His voice had all the certainty of true prophecy, yet Severus was no diviner; he was a pragmatic Slytherin to the core. But for all that, Dumbledore could not discount his prediction. The older man knew Severus had strong intuition, and he certainly knew Voldemort as well as anyone living, except, perhaps, for Dumbledore himself. If Severus said Voldemort would return, chances were good that he would. Perhaps a second battle would be necessary, perhaps - heavens forbid - even a second war.
“Severus, my dear son,” he responded, “I cannot deny it is possible. Voldemort may indeed make use of Harry, but, if he does return, Harry will also have the means to defeat him. We must not be afraid; we must fear nothing except the failure to love. Your rescue of Harry was no such failure. Do you understand?”
“No, sir. You know I do not.” The young man’s mouth closed in a straight line, his eyebrows drawn down. Dumbledore sighed inwardly. He knew Severus hated to be left in the dark, but he could not make his thoughts any plainer. If only the boy understood his own tremendous power! But he remained unconscious of the fires that burned within him. Love - it was an easy word to say, but young people did not truly comprehend it; they confused it too easily with obsession. Lily, though - she had understood. “You will understand, in time,” he told Severus. “You did well tonight. But you should finish that brandy. It’s quite good; it would be a shame to waste it.”
The young man looked down at his glass as if surprised to find it still half full, and raised it to his mouth. Dumbledore in the meantime sat down at his desk and picked up a quill, then held it in the air as if considering. “Lily had a sister, did she not?” he murmured.
“Petunia,” Severus answered promptly. "I think she married that idiot Dursley."
“Ah, yes. Petunia. And I believe she has a son Harry’s age.”
Severus shrugged. “Possible,” he answered.
“Yes. It is possible. It might be the best thing,” Dumbledore said, then noticed his young Potions Master looking at him in astonishment. “What is it, Severus?” he asked.
“You are not thinking of giving the child to her, Headmaster?”
“Well, yes. I am.”
“Petunia!” Severus said, and snorted. “She’ll either ignore that child completely or spoil him rotten. Spoil him rotten, most likely. You don’t know her, Headmaster; she is nothing like Lily.”
“Nevertheless, she is Lily’s sister. And Harry’s only surviving relative. Yes, I think he needs to be with family.” As he spoke, Dumbledore noticed Severus grimace; it was clear he did not approve. All the same, he did not argue further. What he said was, “Would you like me to take him there, sir?”
“No, Severus. That will not be necessary. However, there is one thing I must ask of you.”
“What is it, sir?” Dumbledore noted that the young man, who had just begun to relax a little, had again gone tense and pale.
“If you are correct, as I believe you may be, and Voldemort finds a means to return, the memory of this night will be a danger to you. I should like you to give me this memory, if you will.”
“Yes sir,” Severus answered, and stood up and took out his wand.
“Not immediately, Severus,” Dumbledore told him. “There is something I should like you to do first, if you are willing. It will not take long.”
So it was that Severus Snape found himself back in Godric’s Hollow on the first of November, shortly before sunrise. The headmaster had asked him to apparate there with Harry and to leave the little boy at the Potter’s house, or what was left of it. Severus had understood at once; if Harry were not officially found at the house and taken directly to his aunt and uncle, it would be obvious that someone had removed him at the time of the explosion. And the list of possible rescuers was quite small. Severus’s name was near the top, and no one must ever know that he had been there. Still, it felt very strange to go back, and to see James’s and Lily’s bodies lying so peacefully among the wreckage. If it were not for the scorch marks on their robes and their open eyes, they might have been sleeping. The baby’s cot had been reduced to matchwood, and at first Severus was at a loss as to where he could put him down. Finally, he found a part of a mattress near Lily’s body and laid the little boy on it. As he turned to leave, he knelt and kissed the dead girl on her forehead. The sound of a motor was cutting through the still, damp air just as he Disapparated.
He arrived back near the school gates, closer than he had managed the previous night. A fine rain was starting to fall, and he felt chilled and exhausted, even though the headmaster had insisted he get a few hours of sleep before this expedition. He went at once to Dumbledore’s office, where the headmaster was waiting for him. He had a small flask ready, and when Severus was able to calm himself and locate the memories of this past evening, he and Dumbledore abstracted them one by one and put them into the flask. It was oddly unsettling to see the mists of his own thoughts going into such a small container. The events had seemed so huge; how was it possible that his memories of them took up so little space? Once they had finished, the headmaster took the flask from him and sealed it. “Thank you, Severus,” he said gravely, and the two of them went down to the high table to breakfast.
Severus no longer had any clear images in his mind of what he had just experienced; the sights, sounds, smells and emotions were all locked in the headmaster’s little flask. But a couple of things that happened at breakfast irked him, all the same. First, Pomona Sprout, who was normally extraordinarily helpful and courteous to him, let it be known that she was annoyed with him. “Honestly, Severus,” she said, “did you have to be so hard on the poor Blake child? You terrified her practically out of her wits, and she was only trying to get her friend to the infirmary. You know, Jenny Fletcher got appendicitis in the night. You might at least have given her a chance to explain.” Not knowing what to say - and only remembering vaguely what she was talking about - Severus said nothing, which caused Pomona to sniff in irritation and turn to Professor Trelawney, of all people, to start chattering with. Not that he was at all inclined to chatter - he wished Professor Sprout joy of Trelawney, and was actually somewhat relieved that she was distracting her - but Severus felt, as he so often did among these people, that he was being blamed for something he couldn’t help.
The second irritant was the headmaster’s cheerfulness. He declared a general holiday to celebrate Lord Voldemort’s defeat, which caused enthusiastic cheering and stamping and whistling from practically the whole school, even Severus’s Slytherins. Severus knew in his bones there was nothing to celebrate. If these people were thinking at all, they would be mourning. Hadn’t people died last night? He didn’t know how he knew, nor who exactly had died, but he knew he was right. Besides, it was premature to say the Dark Lord was defeated, and premature celebration wasn’t just disrespectful, it was idiotic. He expected better from the headmaster.
Minerva McGonagall was not at the high table, and Hagrid, too, was absent. Severus assumed without thinking about it that they were doing something about the Potter baby, and then wondered why on earth the Potter baby had come to mind. Then he opened the Daily Prophet that a school owl had just dropped near his coffee cup. The headline screamed, “He-Who-Must-Not-be-Named Defeated at Godric’s Hollow”, and below, in smaller letters, “Potters dead - their son survives.” So that was the explanation. He must have come across an earlier edition of the paper, and that was how he had been so certain of innocent deaths and an orphaned child. But this did not explain his simmering anger, nor his certainty that there was nothing yet to celebrate.
It soon became clear that he was the only person in the school who was not in a celebratory mood. All of the older students were making plans to go to Hogsmeade, and the owlery was packed. The younger pupils were running and yelling and throwing things at each other, and no one was bothering to call them to order. On the contrary, all their Heads of House were smiling at them indulgently, something that drove Severus especially wild. Didn’t these people have any idea what sort of damage a gang of unruly children could do? He chivvied all his Slytherins back to their common room, told the first and second years that he would be holding an extra study hall for all who desired to attend, and insisted that the older students find and show him their permission slips for a Hogsmeade visit. That calmed all of them down.
At nine o’clock promptly, he went to Professor Flitwick’s Charms classroom to hold the promised study hall. Naturally, it was sparsely attended, and the few students who were there engaged in a good deal of whispering and note passing, with one exception he noticed with some interest - a girl who sat quietly in a corner with her head down. At the end of the hour, the children all poured out of the door at once, bursting into chatter like a gang of starlings. The solitary girl got up rather more slowly than the rest, and had not reached the door when Severus called to her. “Miss Blake. A word, if you will.”
The girl turned, looking apprehensive. “Sir?” she whispered.
“You are not going to Hogsmeade?” It was not what Severus had intended to ask, but he was genuinely curious. Also, he felt this question from him would throw the girl off balance, and in this he guessed he was right. She did indeed look surprised.
“Yes, sir - later - I’m meeting Mum for lunch,” she stammered.
“And you will also be visiting your friend in the hospital wing?”
“Yes, sir,” Sally Blake answered, looking even more astonished.
“I have spoken to Professor Sprout, and at her request I have reinstated your house points.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“Do not thank me, and do not interrupt. I have not finished.” After a moment of total silence, Severus continued, “Did you wake Professor Sprout when your friend fell ill?”
“I - no sir. I didn’t think - I just wanted to get Madame Pomfrey and get Jenny to the infirmary.”
“You didn’t think. Exactly,” Severus said, and then, after a brief pause, “The Muggles have a concept - in their military, I believe - called chain of command. Do you know what this means?”
“No, sir,” the Blake child whispered.
“In an emergency, you are not to attempt to deal with it alone. You are to wake your prefects, and if it is beyond them, you are to wake your Head of House. Had a member of Slytherin house failed to wake me in similar circumstances, I should have been very angry. Do you understand me? “
“Yes, sir.”
“Very well. You may go.”
“Thank you, sir,” Sally Blake said, and quailed at his resulting grimace. He watched the child scuttle out the door, breaking into a run once she had reached the hallway. Then he sighed and sat down again, both hands at his temples. He was starting to have a headache, and besides this he had a strong feeling he had forgetten something important. It was something to do with the previous night, and he was sure he would have no peace until he was able to remember it.
Then it came to him. He had no pictures in his head, but he knew, just as he knew the times tables or the periodic table of elements (a gift from a favorite teacher at his Muggle primary school), that he had warned James Potter about the coming attack. And Potter had laughed in his face. The arrogant bastard! If Potter had listened to him, he and his wife and child would all be alive today. It was his fault Lily was dead. Severus clenched his teeth and pounded the desk in front of him. He would never forgive Potter for that. No, never, not if he lived to be two hundred years old. Not in eternity, if there was such a thing. Never.
Mary Johnson, March 2006
All characters and settings are the intellectual property of J.K. Rowling, without whose work this story would not exist.