Neither of them expected the half smile that settled on Snape's face, or the next words out of his mouth. "Mr. Flint," Snape said, sounding almost pleased. "I believe I have found you a Seeker."

Severus watched as the expression on Potter's face went through various permutations from startled and ashamed all the way through shock and surprise and halting somewhere around disbelief mixed with joy. The boy's mouth hung agape, and Severus wanted little more than to shut it and wipe the idiotic grin from his face.

"A Seeker?" Flint's brow was furrowed. "Who, sir?"

Try as he might, Severus could not hold back his sigh of annoyance. "Why, Mr. Potter, of course." He caught a jerked movement from the Brat from the corner of his eye, as if the boy could not believe it, still. "Take him out before dinner today. Test his reflexes and teach him the rudiments, but if he does anywhere near as well on the pitch as he did on the lawn earlier, I'd say our chances at the Cup have risen exponentially." He paused and glared at Flint's still furrowed brow. "We have a very good chance at it."

"Oh! Good, sir." But now Flint scowled at the boy, very much like Severus himself must have, before he'd taken the Brat to the Infirmary. Before he'd seen him fly.

"Do not think I am condoning your risky behavior, Mr. Potter," Severus cautioned, using a very quiet voice he brought out when special circumstances warranted, and was gratified to see wariness flare in the boy's eyes again. "You very nearly found yourself in Madam Pomfrey's care again. I suggest you learn a modicum of restraint before you get yourself killed. And I plan to send this message home--"

The jerk was unmistakable this time. "To the Dursleys?" Potter squawked. "Please don't!"

"Do NOT interrupt me, Potter," Severus growled, remembering he still had not heard from either of the blasted owls he'd sent to Surrey. "As I was saying, this lesson will be driven home, one hopes, with the detentions you will serve this next week. You will have a new appreciation by the end of the week of the serious consequences for breaking rules, especially those designed for your protection. Am I clear?"

"Yes, sir. Thank you." The boy's face, which had lost color when he thought Severus was sending a note home, now looked flushed, and he dropped his gaze.

"You are dismissed. I believe you have an hour before dinner . . ."

Potter nodded, and looked at Flint, who glared back.

Severus cleared his throat. "Mr. Flint, if you would be so kind . . . the pitch awaits."

"Oh, yes, sir. Come on, Potter." With that, the large boy led the Brat out of the dungeon, and Severus let his heart finally settle back in his chest, from where it had lodged, at about the time he'd seen the Brat Who Lived to Make Everyone Fear for His Life hurtling through the air like a javelin aimed at the castle.

Then he sent a notice to the caretaker, Filch, to let him know to expect Draco Malfoy for detention. Perhaps a week scrubbing the mud from the Entrance Hall floor and combing the fleas out of Mrs. Norris' coat would teach him some humility. Or at least the value of not getting caught.

At dinner, after getting the report from Flint on the boy's exceptional talent, he had to gloat to Minerva. She was suitably annoyed . . . and jealous.

"Well it makes sense," she snapped. "After all, James was a very talented player."

The words froze the smile on his face, but he made himself respond anyway. "Ah, yes, and I can just imagine his pride, showing up for Quidditch games and cheering for Slytherin, waving a green and silver flag, holding--"

"That's quite enough, Severus," she interrupted. "You've made your point."

He smirked. "And it's worth a hundred and fifty, let's not forget."

She rolled her eyes. "As if you'd let me. Pass the potatoes, if you would."

He did so, and took the opportunity to look over his Snakes, who were behaving themselves, for the most part. When he caught a glimpse of the Potter Brat speaking animatedly with Draco Malfoy, both of them sporting frowns, he wondered if they were discussing the information he'd given each of them to hold over the other. The son of Lucius Malfoy would have little trouble making use of such information, he knew, but he was looking forward to seeing what use the Brat would put it to.

Well, he supposed he'd find out, one way or the other.

That night, he set the Brat the task of chopping half keg of flobberworms. As before, Potter didn't complain or even look put out by the request, just went right to work. Severus watched as the boy's confidence grew at the task after a few mistarts. It was obvious he had never touched a flobberworm before, but just as obviously, he knew his way around a knife. The first was unsurprising, the latter . . .

As Potter cut one flobberworm lengthwise, then turned it to dice smoothly up the length, Severus stepped up behind him. "Were you a chef in another life?"

Potter's shoulders twitched, but his knife did not pause. "Something like that, sir."

"Explain."

Severus did not mistake the tightening of the boy's grip on the knife, and the way his shoulders were now hitched a bit higher. There was a long pause, in which Severus had to keep a firm hold on his temper, but he knew the boy was gathering his courage, and so he waited. He was rewarded with, "I cooked. For them, from when I was little."

"This would be the same them who starved you."

"I wasn't starved." The knife came down hard on a poor, unsuspecting flobberworm and reduced it to mush.

"Ah."

"I wasn't. Sir." The boy took the few moments of Severus' silence to recapture his equilibrium and quiet his breaths. But there were still spots of color on the boy's cheeks, and the knife was held too tightly for fine work. "Why'd you have to go and say that in front of Malfoy anyway?"

Severus smiled to himself. "I'm sure I don't know what you mean."

"You told him I was injured. You told him I needed to be put back together. Now he knows stuff he that, that he has no right to!"

"I did no such thing."

"Well, you yelled it in front of him. Same difference."

"Mr. Potter. I do not appreciate your tone of voice."

Another twitch, and the shoulders hitched higher. Then a soft, "I'm sorry, sir."

Severus stared at the boy's back for several long minutes, letting the boy get his breathing under control again. Then, in an equally quiet voice, he said, "Draco Malfoy will use any weapons at his disposal in his interactions with others. You would do well to remember that, and that I did not play favorites."

The silence went on far longer this time, and the boy's shoulders relaxed, only to twitch again as Severus moved back a few paces. His startle reflex was rather well honed, for someone who was only terrorized at school as he claimed. There was quite a lot more to this situation, and Severus planned to get to the bottom of it.

Despite his careful scrutiny, and what he thought the silence meant, he was very surprised when the Brat said, almost too quietly to hear, "But I wouldn't use a weapon like that against him."

Severus took a moment to recover from this admission, then sneered at the Brat Who Lived to Confound Expectations. "Then he will always have you at a disadvantage, Potter."

When the boy sighed and made as if to turn around at last, Severus growled, "Get to work! Those flobberworms won't cut themselves."

Later, he had to admit - though he was sorely tempted not to - that he hadn't seen worms diced so well by a student in years.

The next day was the first Potions class with the Brat and the rest of the first year Slytherins. Severus was prepared for anything. Every year, against Severus' explicit requests, Albus grouped the Gryffindors and Slytherins together. It was all he could do not to howl in frustration. The combined Ravenclaw-Hufflepuff class was, frankly, dull by comparison.

But this group . . . he had to watch them more closely than any other class. Untrained and prone to taunts and tricks, they were forty times more likely to blow up his classroom. He swept in, scowling, and set the tone immediately, his voice pitched so they could only hear him if they were perfectly still, with a hint of wonder, and a hint of madness, in it.

They all watched him, enraptured, as he went through his introduction, promised them glory, beauty, a stopper for death, if only they would apply themselves . . . all of them watching and waiting, eager young dunderheads that they were.

Abruptly, he began taking roll. He paused only once, at, "Harry Potter," letting the syllables linger in the air. "Our new . . . celebrity," he intoned, watching the Brat's expression carefully. Potter's head came up, eyes narrowed. Beside him, to Severus' surprise, Theodore Nott stiffened, his own gaze piercing. Severus suppressed a smile. Seemed Potter had a fan club already. Time to find out for certain, who he could count on.

When he was done with calling names, he snapped, "Potter! What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"

Potter glanced at Nott looked as stumped as he was. The bushy-haired girl, Miss Granger, was it? - who'd stepped forward on Potter's behalf yesterday, shot her hand in the air.

"I don't know, sir," said Potter, as Severus knew he would.

His lips curled into a sneer. "Tut, tut -- fame clearly isn't everything." He ignored Granger's hand. She wasn't going to aid his fact finding mission.

"Let's try again. Potter, where would you look if I told you to find me a bezoar?"

The Granger crane stretched as high into the air as she could go without leaving her seat, but Potter was obviously stumped. Behind him, Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle, were shaking with laughter. Interesting. He shot them a glare, and they subsided, but only barely.

"I don't know, sir."

"Thought you wouldn't open a book before coming, eh, Potter?"

Potter flushed, and Severus knew immediately that the boy had not had access to his books before the term started in that house full of Muggles who disdained him. Still, the Brat held his gaze, not an easy feat for grown men, and even a couple of the Gryffindors looked put out on his behalf.

"What is the difference, Potter, between monkshood and wolfsbane?"

At this, the Granger chit stood up, her hand stretching toward the dungeon ceiling.

"I don't know," said Potter quietly. "I think she does, though, why don't you try her?"

Nott shot him a look with wide eyes as a few people laughed, though none of them Slytherins. Malfoy's smirk was rather large, however. Potter's hands were shaking, and he folded them sharply together on his desk.

Severus snapped, "Sit down," at Granger. "For your information, Potter, asphodel and wormwood make a sleeping potion so powerful it is known as the Draught of Living Death. A bezoar is a stone taken from the stomach of a goat and it will save you from most poisons. As for monkshood and wolfsbane, they are the same plant, which also goes by the name of aconite.

"Well? Why aren't you all copying that down?"

There was a sudden rummaging for quills and parchment. Over the noise, Severus said, "And another detention for your cheek, Potter."

Potter nodded and continued to get his parchment readied.

As he ordered the students to follow the directions on the board to make a simple cure for boils, Severus hoped the special lesson had not been lost on the boy.

When class was over, he prepared a bin of black beetles for Potter to crush into powder during his detention tonight, with explicit written instructions, as he would not be there to supervise. Amazingly, he knew he could trust the boy to do his detention as assigned.

---

Dinner at the Malfoys was always an interesting affair. The food was as sumptuous as ever, served on the very best china by well trained House-elves. Severus knew not to bring up anything business related until after they moved to the sitting room for brandy and conversation, and he was not surprised to have the topic swing immediately to Draco's performance in school.

"I have had him in but one class," Severus admitted, and took a sip of the brandy, savoring the burn in his throat, "but his potion making is obviously of a superior quality," to that of trained dogs.

"Of course," Narcissa replied, her mouth in a pretty bow. "Lucius has always arranged for the best tutors."

"Of course," Severus murmured.

"What do you think are his chances of making the Quidditch team?" Lucius asked. "He'll make a good Seeker."

Turning the possible answers over in his mind, Severus decided on, "Tryouts will be next week, and final decisions will be up to the Captain, of course. I can put a good word in for someone of talent, however."

"Excellent." Lucius took a hefty belt of his drink. "I happen to be going abroad next week, and will stop over in Budapest. There is an apothecary just south of there you have frequented, haven't you? I wonder if I might pick something special up for your private stores."

Once more, Severus chose his words carefully, a little disconcerted that Malfoy was monitoring his activities. And he did not want to be beholden to this man for any reason whatsoever. Even so . . . "I am in need of a quantity of Boomslang skin," he admitted. "And it is rather less scarce on the continent."

Malfoy smiled and lifted his glass slightly. "Boomslang skin, then."

Talk turned to more inconsequential matters, and the evening passed more pleasantly that Severus might have hoped, until it was near time to leave, and Lucius, with his too-innocent smile, said, "I heard that Slytherin House is now home to the Boy Who Lived." There was a special emphasis on the epithet that Severus knew he would be wise to remember.

"It was a surprise to many people, yes," he murmured.

"From what I have heard," - no doubt from his son, the little brat - "he is getting along rather well with Hiram Nott's boy. And has even been seen standing up for Gryffindors."

"True," Severus said. "Nott has certainly been keeping the boy under observation, as it would behoove many of us to do."

"Mm." Lucius poured himself another drink, ignoring the small sigh from Narcissa. "I should hope Draco sees the merit in that, as well."

"As to that," Severus said, "there seems to be some rivalry between Mr. Potter and Draco. While I heartily approve of activities that will make both boys strive to be and do their best, I have noticed a tendency for their interactions of this nature to spill over past the House boundaries."

"Thus breaking rule one, eh Severus?"

"Exactly." Severus smiled a little. "I'm sure you can see how I would be concerned."

"I do. I will speak to Draco."

As if he didn't already do so every day, Severus thought. Soon he was able to take his leave.

Immediately upon returning, he sought out Dumbledore, to let the Old Codger know that his precious Golden Boy (albeit with green and silver trim) was under scrutiny from Malfoy at least, and that this same personage was going to Hungary next week. There had been odd rumblings from that area, specifically Romania, Hungary and Albania, over the last few years, and with the Brat Who Garnered Too Much Attention now at Hogwarts, there were many more precautions they would need to take, against former Death Eaters, and even against a return of Voldemort. Severus wasn't fool enough to think he was gone for good, and Dumbledore shared his feelings.

He knew this was unlikely to be the kind of quiet, uncomplicated year he always appreciated, and at the center of the hurricane was one green-eyed boy.