For some reason, Harry had never been happier to know that he was about to leave Diagon Alley. Maybe it was just Lockhart; that certainly hadn't been a comfortable experience. It hadn't helped that Fred and George had nagged him about it the whole time they were in line to buy their books, either. All in all, Harry was quite glad to see that the fireplace was within sight. Then --

"Severus!"

Harry and Severus both whirled, and Harry's eyes widened. A fet feet away was none other than Draco Malfoy, following sullenly in the footsteps of a man who had to be his father.

"Lucius," Severus said in a level tone, inclining his head ever so slightly. "I didn't see you there."

"No doubt in a hurry to return Mr. Potter here to his home," Lucius Malfoy said with a smirk. "I realize that the boy has no parents to speak of, Severus, but must they burden busy wizards with taking him to Diagon Alley?"

"Of course, they couldn't let you wander around by yourself after last year, could they, Potter?" Draco asked, his expression a mirror image of his father's.

"I don't know," Harry answered coolly. "I just might win the House Cup for Gryffindor again if I wander around by myself, Malfoy."

Draco's eyes narrowed, but Lucius put a hand on his son's shoulder and the boy remained silent. "The boy does have quite the mouth on him, doesn't he?" Lucius asked coldly.

"Obviously." Both Draco and Lucius were glaring at Harry, and so did not notice that, as Severus spoke, his eyes lingered on Draco, not Harry. However, Harry had noticed, and he shot a questioning look at the Potions Master that Severus did not acknowledge.

"Oh, yes," Lucius said at last, turning his gaze back to Severus. "There was something else I wished to ask you; I had nearly forgotten."

"And what would that be?"

Lucius Malfoy's pale eyebrows raised slightly and he said slowly, "If we could talk over here for a moment, Severus...?"

Severus nodded and obliged, leaving Harry standing with a smirking Draco who obviously saw this as his chance to say whatever he liked to Harry without any interference.

"Having a nice summer with the Muggles, Potter?" Malfoy asked with a sneer.

"It's gone downhill since seeing you and your father, I'll tell you that much," Harry answered coldly.

A pink tinge came to Malfoy's cheeks. "Shut up about my family, Potter."

"Why? Are you gonna go running to daddy? 'Oh, Daddy, Harry Potter was being so mean --'"

"Shut up, Potter," Malfoy hissed, and by the twitching of his fingers, Harry could tell that the blond boy was longing to reach for his wand.

"You shut up, then, Malfoy, or maybe I'll do an impression of your mum next."

The fact that Harry had never even seen Draco's mother didn't seem to occur to him just then. He looked ready to dive at Harry when suddenly a huge shadow towered over the both of them.

"'Lo there, Harry!" a booming voice said.

"Hagrid!" Harry forgot all about Malfoy as he grinned up at the giant of a man who was Rubeus Hagrid.

"I didn' 'spect to see you here," Hagrid said pleasantly, apparently not having noticed Draco Malfoy. "Were Ron an' Hermione here, too?"

"I expect the Mudblood's already gone home to the Muggles."

Hagrid certainly noticed Draco this time. His friendly black eyes narrowed darkly as they landed on the boy. "Yeh'd best not say things like tha', Malfoy," he said in a low voice. "'Snot civilized."

Draco snorted with derisive laughter and muttered, "Because you're one to talk about civilized..."

"He's got better manners than you, Malfoy," Harry said coldly. This time it was Harry's hand that was itching to grasp a wand.

"Oh, yes, I'm sure you're an expert on manners, Potter, living with a bunch of Muggles."

Harry opened his mouth to retort, but Hagrid beat him to it, his voice dark and foreboding. "'S wizards like you that let You-Know-Who get hold, Malfoy. An' you can bet i's wizards like you tha'll go ter Azkaban fer it."

"Is that supposed to be a threat?" Malfoy asked, his pale eyes narrowing.

"Not a threa', no. A warnin'. Yeh'll show yer true colors soon enough."

"Hagrid!"

Harry turned around again, this time to see the entire Weasley family trouping down the cobblestone street. Ron was grinning up at Hagrid, but then caught sight of Draco and his grin turned into something more like a look of revulsion.

"What's he doing here?" Ron asked coldly.

"It would probably be a better questions to ask why you're here, Weasley. I would have thought that your family would have to sell their house to pay for this year's books."

"At least our dad works, Malfoy," George said heatedly. "What does your dad do? You know, besides bribing Ministry officials?"

A slight tinge of color came into Malfoy's pale cheeks, but he didn't flush like Fred and George already had. As Draco fell silent, Harry took a stab at resuming normal conversation.

"What are you doing here, anyway, Hagrid?"

"Jus' bin down ter Knockturn Alley --"

"Knownturn Alley!?" Fred and George asked in unison.

"What on earth were you doing down there, Hagrid!?" Harry asked, rather a lot of disdain in his voice for a place he had only ever visited once.

"Why, I had ter get flesh-eatin' slug repellent," Hagrid said with a wave of his hand. "They're ruinin' th' school cabbages."

"Cabbages," Ron repeated blankly.

"Well, o' course! Yeh didn' think tha' I only look after th' creatures, did yeh?"

"Actually, yeah," Ron answered. Fred kicked his younger brother, who immediately added, "Except for the plants, I mean! And the castle, and, er.. stuff like that."

Hagrid looked pleased, but Draco laughed derisively. "That oaf, in charge of anything?" he asked Ron scornfully. "You must be joking! He has less brains than you have gold, Weasley."

Hagrid's smile collapsed and Ron's ears turned red. Fred started toward Draco with a murderous look on his face, but seemed to freeze when Mr. Weasley's voice said suddenly, "There are many more important things than money, Mr. Malfoy."

"Unfortunately, Weasley, you have neither," said a cold, bored-sounding voice that heralded the return of Lucius Malfoy. Draco sneered as his father put a hand on his shoulder and they faced the Weasleys. Mr. Malfoy's pale eyes were glittering almost as maliciously as his son's.

"I'm afraid you're wrong, Lucius," Mr. Weasley said with a smile. "I have everything that matters most: a family that loves me, and a means to provide for them."

"Provide?" Mr. Malfoy asked in mock skepticism, reaching into Ginny's cauldron and pulling out a very battered old book. "You call this providing? No, Arthur; I provide for Draco and Narcissa. You disgrace the children of your name."

It happened so fast that Harry thought Mr. Weasley must have suddenly learned to bend space-time. One second, the two men were standing feet apart; the next, Mr. Malfoy had been knocked backward as Mr. Weasley crashed into him. They both collided with the side of the brick apothecary, and then the air was full of voices.

"Father!" Draco gasped with wide gray eyes.

"Go, Dad!" Fred yelled, and then George finished exuberantly, "Get him!"

"Arthur, stop it this instant!" Mrs. Weasley shrieked as she hid Ginny's face.

Then Hagrid was upon them, pulling Mr. Weasley and Mr. Malfoy apart. He came rather close to choking them both by lifting them to their feet via the necks of their robes. And somehow, in the middle of all this, Severus had wound up standing beside Harry again, a perfectly unreadable expression on his face.

"We should go," the Potions Master said in a barely audible whisper.

Harry blinked and looked over; he hadn't even noticed when Severus had moved. "What?" the young wizard asked, sounding confused. "Now?"

"Yes."

"But -- but why?"

"This is not the time. Just go."

There was a hint of the old impatience in his voice, and Harry obliged, not wanting to spend the remainder of the summer holiday with the old Snape. The fireplace wasn't that far away, anyway, and at least he could look over his shoulder to see what was happening as he went.

"Quickly," Severus said in the same low whisper that he had used before. It gave Harry the impression that they were sneaking away, which just made him all the more curious. He wanted to ask more questions, but had the distinct impression that doing so might result in getting his head bitten off. As it was, Harry barely had time to steal a single glance back at the group, all of whom were looking mutinous, before floo powder was thrown into a grate and he found himself standing in the fire.

"Speak clearly this time," Severus said. "And take your glasses off, so that you don't break them."

Harry removed his glasses and tucked them away in his pocket before carefully calling out, "Spinner's End!"

When he fell out of the fireplace back at Snape's house, Harry was glad that he had taken off his glasses. At least, he was until he tripped over the threadbare rug as he tried to hurry away from the fireplace.

Picking himself up and feeling extremely foolish, Harry was glad that Severus wasn't there to see (and probably make some snide remark). But then, where was Severus, Harry wondered as he put his glasses back on. The Potions Master had certainly been in a hurry to leave Diagon Alley; shouldn't he have been right behind Harry?

It was nearly a full minute before Severus emerged from the vividly green fire. He had a distinctively sour look on his face, but managed to mask it as soon as his dark eyes found Harry. However, it wasn't quite quickly enough.

"What's wrong?" Harry asked slowly.

"Nothing is wrong," Severus said in a would-be offhand voice, brushing a bit of soot from his sleeve.

Harry frowned. "I'm not stupid, Severus. If nothing's wrong, then why were we rushing out of Diagon Alley like the place was on fire? What was that look you had on your face just now, and why did it take you so long to get back here?"

Now it was Severus's turn to frown, though admittedly his was more like an ever-so-slight narrowing of the eyes as his jaw set. Nonetheless, after a look at this expression, Harry knew that he was in trouble; he had already made Snape mad. However, Severus merely retained that expression for a moment as he stared at Harry before finally breaking the silence. Harry was quite surprised that his voice didn't sound angry.

"Lucius required a favor of me which I did not wish to carry out. It is not prudent to refuse a favor of Lucius Malfoy. I wished to leave before he could ask whether I would help him."

Harry's eyebrows raised. "But you didn't, that's why you were late. Isn't it?"

Severus nodded, and a strange look crossed Harry's face. Yes, Severus Snape was definitely very different from the man Harry had thought that he was. The question was, if he wasn't that man, then just what kind of person was he?

"So what are you doing for Mr. Malfoy?" Harry asked slowly. "He doesn't seem like the type of person who would ask you to do anything.. constructive."

A familiar smirk twisted Severus's lip. "Are you asking if I intend to use Dark magic?"

"Well, yeah."

There was a silence, during which Severus continued to smirk at Harry, but yet there was something different in his black eyes. They weren't cold and empty like they had been when he had used that smirk on Harry before, though Harry couldn't tell exactly what it was that he saw in them. Perhaps amusement?

Finally, Severus said in his usual quiet but unreadable tone, "I will not. So you have nothing to worry about."

And maybe Harry was imagining it (Again? Was that likely?), but he thought certain that he saw a real smile on Severus's pallid face as the Potions Master turned away.

*~*~*

"Binns is evil," Harry complained to himself as he lay on his stomach on the bed in his room and tried his hardest to focus on the copy of A History of Magic that lay open in front of him. Why exactly did he have to write such a long essay, anyway? Hermione was probably the only student at Hogwarts who even cared about goblin rebellions -- and what did they have to do with the Ministry today, anyway? It wasn't like they had had a huge impact on the course of government, after all. The only thing you could really learn from them was that it was not a good idea to make goblins angry, and Harry had figured that out for himself the first time he had met a goblin the year before.

"Who was Bandor the Bloody, anyway?" he grumbled as he searched the lengthy text that was spread out over five chapters for a particular goblin rebel whom Binns had asked about in the assignment. It was likely that he had done nothing more important than inventing some sort of swear word for 'wizard' in Gobbledygook or something stupid like that. It certainly seemed to be the type of thing that Binns would ask about: something completely obscure that had absolutely nothing to do with the rebellion itself.

After five minutes of fruitless searching, Harry finally gave up with a disgruntled sigh and just wrote in exactly what he had imagined that Bandor the Bloody might be famous for, making up the "gurthan" for the swear word that he was supposed to have invented. From what he had heard of Gobbledygook (and probably Gobbledygook swear words, though he couldn't be certain) when Griphook had been hit in the head by a falling rock on the way back up from Harry's vault last year, it sounded about right.

There was a knock on the door, and Harry just said, "Yes?" without even looking up. He knew who it was behind the door, because Severus always knocked in exactly the same way. Harry supposed it was a strange thing to have noticed, but didn't really think about it. At the least, he would be able to tell the difference if someone else knocked on the door and, as Severus still seemed paranoid that some renegade Voldemort supporter was going to turn up at any moment, it wasn't likely that he would complain.

The door swung neatly open and, sure enough, there stood the Potions Master, standing with his usual black robes billowing about him in the draft through the doorway. "It's time for dinner," he said tonelessly as his dark eyes swept disdainfully over the mess of coursebooks and parchment that were spread out on Harry's bed.

Harry jumped as if he had been yelled at and glanced at the watch on his wrist that he had repaired after Dudley had thrown it away. "Already?" he said uncertainly as he stared at the time. "I didn't realize it was that late."

"Yes."

"All right," Harry said with a shrug, getting off of the bed and somehow managing not to knock the entire haphazardly-stacked mass of books and papers into the floor. Severus eyed the mess darkly, but said nothing. It was obvious that his idea of studying didn't quite match up with Harry's.

As the smell of stew wafted out of the kitchen and into Harry's nose, it was suddenly painfully obvious that he hadn't eaten for five hours. He didn't know how he could have ignored the growling of his stomach or what felt like the clawing of some small creature at his insides.

Dinner tasted just as good as it smelled; or maybe even better, simply because it quelled the protests from Harry's stomach. He was just beginning to wonder how Snape had ever learned to cook so well when Severus said, "Breakfast may be late tomorrow. I have work to attend to in the basement."

Harry forgot about the food as he looked at Severus in a confused sort of way. "I thought you were finished."

"I finished the antidotes for common miscalculations in the potions that the first through third years will be attempting, yes."

Harry suddenly looked suspicious. "Does it have anything to do with whatever Mr. Malfoy wanted?"

Severus's right eyebrow twitched upward slightly. Yes, the boy was certainly quite a bit brighter than he had once thought him to be. "Perhaps," he answered calmly.

The fact that Snape didn't answer clearly one way or the other just served to make Harry more suspicous. "And you're sure it's nothing bad?" he asked slowly.

Again, the eyebrow just went higher. "Are you suggesting that I lied to you?"

"No, sir," Harry answered quickly. "I just -- er, wanted to make sure, is all."

There was definitely amusement in Severus's eyes as he answered, "Then be certain. And on a different note -- perhaps we should talk about that essay you were writing back at the castle..."