“Get out, get out, I don’t want to see you in this office ever again!”

And as Harry hurtled towards the door, a jar of dead cockroaches exploded over his head. He wrenched the door open and flew along the corridor, stopping only when he had put three floors between himself and Snape. Then he leaned against the wall panting, and rubbing his bruised arm.

He had no desire at all to return to Gryffindor tower so early, nor to tell Ron and Hermione what he had just seen. What was making Harry feel so horrified and unhappy was not being shouted at or having jars thrown at him; it was that he knew what it was like to be humiliated in the middle of a circle of onlookers, knew exactly how Snape felt as his father had taunted him, and that judging by what he had just seen, his father had been every bit as arrogant as Snape had always told him.

J K Rowling – Harry Potter and The Order of the Pheonix

He sat there for long minutes before deciding that brooding would simply do no use. But what could he do. He knew he needed to continue the lessons, Dumbledore seemed to think they were important and irritated as he was with the man he couldn’t help but think that he probably did know best. Then again he really couldn’t blame Snape for kicking him out, at all. His father had been an arrogant bully, as had Sirius, and in Snape’s estimation Harry had most likely just joined them. He needed to prove that he wasn’t. Thinking hard he decided that a peace offering was most likely the best way to begin convincing the man to see him as Harry not James. And in a stroke of brilliance he thought of the peace offering to end all peace offerings. Thinking hard he rummaged through his bag and managed to find his invisibility cloak. That done he pulled it on and headed down to the Quidditch pitch where he borrowed a school broom. He raced back up to the second floor and skidded to a halt in a girl’s bathroom. He didn’t know why he was hurrying really, going back that evening would be suicide but he felt that he needed to be doing something nonetheless. Focusing on the tiny engraving on a tap he instructed the entrance to open up. He took a step forward and slid into the chamber of secrets.

He slid down the long slimy pipe and found himself unceremoniously thrown into a pile of small animal skeletons.

“I suppose that’s a good sign” he muttered disgustedly as he brushed himself off .He lit his wand and stuffed his cloak into his bag. “Means no one’s cleared up down here”. He picked his path carefully through the rat skulls. Now that he wasn’t filled by the same mixture of fear, adrenaline and sheer stupidity that he had been in second year he took his time to be thoroughly disgusted by the contents of the pipe. “Lovely” he muttered as he found the snakeskin that had scared the living daylights out of him and Ron the first time they saw it. He resignedly lowered his bag to the floor, tried to find a less disgusting patch, failed and dropped it in the slime, trying not to imagine how he was going to explain its condition. He stuck his hand in and found he penknife that Sirius had given him. He used the knife to cut the snakeskin into large sheets, having read that pretty much all of a basilisk was exceedingly valuable for brewing. Once he had cut up the skin his bag was full, he daren’t think about the condition of his books. Glancing at his watch he decided to abandon his adventure and continue the next day. He put his cloak back on and flew up the pipe, closing it behind him.

When he reached the Gryffindor tower he hurried up to the boy’s dorm and hastily stuffed the skin into his trunk, locking it with every spell he could think of. Still invisible he hurried to the showers in a fairly futile attempt to get the smell of mould and dead rodent off of him. Giving it up as a bad job he found some of Dean’s muggle body spray and sprayed it liberally. Almost choking from the overpowering smell he wandered up to bed.

Next evening Harry was once again in the second floor girl’s bathroom, with his broom and cloak. He had faced possibly his most horrible potions lesson ever, and cursed the fates that were clearly getting a whole lot of entertainment from assigning him potions the morning after Harry had seen into his pensive. As if that hadn’t been bad enough his friends had not given up easily on the state of his bag and his books, and his excuse that he had dropped it in the edge of the lake just didn’t seem to cut it. He couldn’t really be surprised but making a homemade gift for Snape certainly sounded a whole lot less plausible. He slid down into the chamber. He removed his cloak, lit his wand and again began trekking through the slime. He passed the part of the chamber that had contained the snakeskin and soon reached the cave in. Wondering at how small he and Ginny must have been to fit through the tiny hole he had to move a few more rocks to make a hole big enough. He scrambled down the other side of the cave in and continued down the pipe. He hissed at the entrance to the main chamber and watched mesmerised as the snake like locks moved with mechanical beauty. He supposed that the fascination with the silvery metal snakes was something that came with the territory of being a parselmouth. He stepped through the doorway and into the main chamber. The smell made him want to retch but the thought of Voldemort controlling him without occlumency made him continue forward. Surprisingly, the giant snake itself was almost in the same state as it had been three years ago. He supposed there must be some preservation spells down there. The snake had survived an unreasonably long time without a visible viable food source, he reasoned. Getting out the large knife and the crates that he had shrunken and stored in his bag he returned them to their normal size. He had spent a frustrating half hour at lunch trying to convince a reluctant Dobby that ‘Master Harry Potter sir wasn’t going to kill anyone’ but had eventually managed to obtain them. He put on his dragonhide gloves and began hacking at the tough snake flesh, once again close to emptying his stomach. He was glad that he had had the foresight to only eat a small dinner. He painstakingly cut all the flesh away from the bone, careful to keep the organs intact. He decided that if the potions master did not accept his gift he was going to use his newly acquired skills to obtain some human ingredients. By the time he neared the head it was time to return to his dorm. He shrunk the now mostly full crates and the bloody knife and left the chamber, estimating that he could complete his work the next night.

Friday night brought Harry back to what was fast becoming Harry’s second leas favourite place on the planet, (first being the Dursley’s). He had returned with his empty crates and his truly revolting knife. He had omitted to eat at all since the previous day due to the fact that he had been unable to get the smell of dead basilisk off (despite the dragonhide gloves), which he had found tended to kill ones appetite. He was immensely pleased by this fact once he began attempting to remove the creature’s brains, as he felt certain that anything he had eaten would have been revisited at that moment. He collected the brain, eyeballs and the tooth that he had used to stab the diary then stood back to look at the skeleton. Having prepared for the big finale of his mission he cast a spell that worked a lot like a pressure washer, removing the remaining gore from the skeleton. Once it looked presentable he shrunk it and carefully manoeuvred it into a crate. More than pleased to get out of the revolting place for what would hopefully be the last time he left, making a beeline to the bathroom where he used most of Dean’s body spray.

Saturday morning brought the start of the ester holidays and the perfect chance to confront Sirius. He pulled Hermione aside at breakfast and dragged her to the room of requirement. Upon entering the room he saw a small pensive and rolls of green and silver wrapping paper and ribbon. He chuckled and stuffed them into his bag.

“I’m going to break several hundred rules today, and I’m telling you so that you don’t worry more than you will anyway.” He told her bluntly

“What are you doing? You shouldn’t do anything dangerous.” He sighed.

“It’s worth the risk. I did something pretty unforgivable in occlumency lessons – I didn’t realise how bad it was at the time – and Snape’s cancelled my lessons because of it. I need to speak to Sirius about something so that I can possibly get him to give them another go, so I’m going to headquarters.” His all too intelligent friend thought back to the items Harry had just packed away.

“You saw a memory” she realised. “Are you sure telling Sirius is the way to go? You know how they the each other.” Harry nodded

“I’m certain. Lets just say that Sirius was in this one as was my dad.” He shook his head in disgust “they were just as bad as Snape always said they were.” Hermione’s eyes widened.

“Is there no way you can avoid going out?” Harry shook his head. “Well how do you plan to get there?”

“I’ve uh – commandeered - a school broom ad I’m going to fly. There’s no way Voldemort can have the whole sky monitored.” She nodded doubtfully.

“I see why it’s important but is there really no other way. Couldn’t someone at least come with you?” Harry shook his head

“Sorry Mione. I can’t risk anyone overhearing. It just wouldn’t be fair.” She hugged him

“Be careful then. When will you be back?”

“Thanks Mione, I knew I could count on you. I should be back by dinner. Most likely ready to kill an animagus. I’ll be careful, I promise.”

“Good luck” she called as he hurried out of the room.

Harry hurried to the statue of the one-eyed witch under the invisibility cloak. He travelled the passageway and cautiously made his way out of Honeydukes cellar. Once outside the shop he climbed onto his disillusioned broom and looked at his broom compass. Having looked it up on a map the previous day he had a rough idea of the bearing he should take so he took off, fleetingly hoping that he didn’t end up totally lost forever, or that the old broom didn’t die on him.

Harry could have jumped for joy seeing Grimmauld place, but that would have been inadvisable while riding a broom. He dismounted on the top step and knocked on the door.

“Harry?” asked Sirius in shock. He did the relevant checks for polyjuice. “What are you doing here? Is something wrong?”

“In a way.” Harry replied coolly. Hearing voices from the kitchen he led Sirius up to a deserted bedroom. “Would you please lock and silence the door?” he asked. Sirius complied. “I had a rather illuminating occlumency lesson on Wednesday” he said slowly.

“That greasy git didn’t hurt you did he?” Sirius snarled. Wrong thing to say.

“No Sirius. That ‘greasy git’ did nothing, however for reasons that I won’t go into I saw into his pensive. Do you know what I saw? I saw the day of your defence OWL” Sirius smiled “and I was horrified” he continued mercilessly. “What were you and dad thinking? That was cruel. Picking on him because you were bored.” Sirius had the grace to look ashamed.

“Harry we were fifteen.” He informed his godson as though that explained everything.

“Do you know how old Dudley was when he started picking on me? Because I sure don’t. He did it as long as far back as I can remember. Do you know how old he was when he got a gang together and managed some organised bullying? Six, when I started school. They picked on me because Dudley wanted to. A group against me. Just like you picked on Snape, a group of you against Snape. Just because he was different. You were fifteen. So what? Dudley was six. How does that justify your actions because you were a damn slight older than Dudley?” He ranted. He removed the pensive from his bag and added his memory from Snape’s pensive and his memories of Dudley’s bullying. “Go on, look. Because you see, you’d have picked on me. I was the scrawny kid in the second hand clothes,”

“Harry…”

“Watch them!” Harry snarled. Sirius went into the pensive. Harry was very tempted to break something, preferably something named Sirius. “We were fifteen” he mimicked angrily, pacing backwards and forwards. Sirius emerged a few minutes later looking pale.

“I’m sorry Harry.” Harry glared.

“Yes I’m sure you are. Sorry that I don’t agree your actions. Sorry that I saw you at what I sincerely hope was your worst. You and my dad were just as bad as Snape always said. Merlin, it’s no wonder he hates me. I’d hate me. You tried to kill him!”

“Harry…”

“is my name. Well done Sirius, gold star.” He replaced his memories in his head and put his pensive away. “I have to be going before someone realises I’m gone. You need to apologise to him the very next time you see him, every time you see him. Grovel on your knees. Be his personal house elf. I DON’T CARE. You and my father were nothing more than bullies. Remus wasn’t much better, watching like that and look where Pettigrew ended up. And to think I admired he marauders. To think I was so desperate to be like my dad. That would have created a paradox if I had been like him. I’d have had to bully myself. Don’t you get it?”

“Harry…” Sirius repeated desperately

“I will speak to you again once you have done your best to act as an adult and rectify the situation. Do not speak to anyone about that memory. I am doing my best to get my occlumency lessons restarted and if you spoil my chances I will chop you into potions ingredients and give them to Snape. Merlin knows I’ve had enough experience at that. I will see you in the summer.” He gestured towards the door which Sirius helplessly unlocked. He left Grimmauld Place without another word, leaving an animagus with a lot to think about.

“Oh Harry, your safe” Harry whispered in relief as Harry arrived for dinner in the great hall.

“Yep” he admitted “But right now I’d be willing to eat Hagrid’s cooking. I missed lunch and controlling ones temper and not murdering one’s godfather really works up an appetite. Well, it was either that or flying across the country all day. Somewhere along the line, I’m pretty hungry” she laughed quietly.

“So, you didn’t kill him. It went that well huh?”

“Oh the best” Harry replied sarcastically between mouthfuls.

“So do you have a play for you know who?”

“Voldemort?” he asked sarcastically

“You know precisely who I mean” she scolded playfully. “So do you?”

“As far as more gifts than you can shake a stack at and a feeble apology go yeah I’ve got a plan”

“What colour flowers do you want at your funeral?” she asked bleakly.

“Thanks” he muttered “your support means the world to me” she pulled a face.

Late that night once his dorm mates were asleep Harry snuck out of bed and reclaimed his Basilisk parts from his trunk. He took them down to the common room and laid out the various crates on the floor. He looked into each of them and attempted to make a note of what it contained. He stopped when he saw the skeleton. It looked like nothing more than a normal snake skeleton, not a mistake one wanted to make. Trying to figure out a way to give it to Snape fully sized he had an idea. He shrunk all of the crates, picked up his bag and hurried down to the dungeons.

Severus Snape was in the sort of bad mood that would have sent one of his seventh year Slytherins running. He wasn’t just angry. He was furious, embarrassed and more than a little bit apprehensive about the cruel ways the students and his colleagues alike would find to use the memory that Potter had spied on. Damn that brat. He stalked to the great hall, dreading having to teach that class. Someone was definitely having a good laugh at him right now, and he was lucky if it was only fate. Most likely that statement included the whole of Gryffindor house at the very least, possibly the there three houses as well. He took his normal seat and looked out over the hall, his eyes pausing on the Potter brat and his gormless fans. They didn’t seem particularly jubilant; perhaps he hadn’t had a chance to tell them yet.

By fifth year potions he was onto that boy. He was making him sweat it out. That brat knew that he would be expecting the information to be shared and he was making him wait. Severus was beyond furious, and the worst bit was that thanks to the boy and his merry morons Albus was gone, and with him his only chance at limiting the damage that Potter was going to inflict. Oh he was going to have words with the old wizard once he returned though, holding onto the information like this had to be evidence that the boy who Albus swore was the epitome of love was going dark. He stalked over to Potters cauldron and nearly gagged at the smell. There could be no reason on earth to wear that much deodorant.

“50 points from Gryffindor for smelling ridiculous” he sneered, then walked away. Only then did he wonder if what he was doing was wise. Surely the crueller he was the crueller Potter would be. But he would not be controlled by that brat. He was like his father and godfather rolled into one. Who knew bullying was hereditary.

By Sunday morning Severus was jumping at shadows. He had always been a little paranoid, it came with the territory of being a spy, but this was getting absurd. Potter hadn’t done anything as far as he could tell, but the previous morning he had dragged the Granger girl off, no doubt planning something horrible, and by the evening they were whispering and giggling. He was certain that whatever Potter was plotting was going to happen soon, and one part of him couldn’t help but be glad. After all, he couldn’t punish Potter for plotting, Merlin knows he’d tried. As he was drinking his morning coffee a nondescript school owl arrived with a letter for him. Cautiously, he removed the note and the owl flew away. He unrolled the note and attempted to read it, no mean feat when it looked like it had been written by a drunken spider ballet dancing across the page.

Professor Snape

Please go to the classroom next to your office after breakfast, you probably want to come alone.

P.s. there won’t be anyone there, I’m not trying to challenge you to a duel or kill you or anything

Now he was confused and concerned. Damn that brat for making him so edgy. It probably had nothing to do with him, even his handwriting was better than this spider scrawl. But why did he want to go alone. Damn that note. Damn the whole situation. What was there to gain if he did go alone? What risks could there be? Who would he bring if he brought anyone at all? Who wrote the damned letter? All of these unanswerable questions ran through his head as he automatically ate his breakfast. He glanced at the Gryffindor table and saw that Potter was happily conversing with his two shadows. They didn’t seem to be paying any undue attention to him which suggested that it wasn’t Potter…or that if it was Potter he was more devious than he had expected, which made the invitation even more concerning. Damn that boy. Deciding that he had better get a Gryffindor perspective on what was most likely a Gryffindor problem he passed the note to Minerva. She looked at it with puzzlement.

“It seems innocent enough” she commented, passing it back. “But in these times who can be sure,”

“What do I do though?” he asked, a little of his frustration surfacing. She looked at him oddly, he never let anything get to him.

“Why don’t you go alone, and I’ll stay at the door. That way we can see who it is but you are still following instructions. Problem solved.” He nodded and mumbled his thanks.

Walking to the dungeons with Minerva by his side he berated himself for his stupidity. He faced the dark lord on a regular basis, lied to him on a regular basis but was unnerved by what was most likely a student prank and had felt the need to get backup from a Gryffindor no less. He knocked on the classroom door. There was no answer, He looked to Minerva, who shrugged, so he le himself into the classroom. He took one look around and gasped.

The room contained a very strange shaped wrapped something and behind it were at least fifty full of large boxes wrapped in green and silver “You might want to take a look at this” he called. Minerva looked around the door cautiously then stepped in

“Oh my!” she exclaimed, then with a mischievous grin added “I didn’t know it was your birthday”

“It’s not!” he grumbled

“Aha, a secret admirer then” he sent a death glare, to which she just rolled her eyes.

“What do I do with them?” he asked

“Hmm, what to do with presents. Open them maybe.”

“You know what I meant. They could be anything.”

“There’s only one way to find out and they don’t appear to have air holes”

“ha ha ha” he muttered humourlessly as he carefully reached for one that was laying separately from the others on the front desk. It had a note on top of it and a label on it. The outside of the letter simply said ‘read me’ in that same spider scrawl, and the label said ‘open me’. Minerva read them over his shoulder and laughed.

“Well we can safely say that whoever this is had some experience of muggle culture.”

“What? Why?” She rolled her eyes

“You don’t think people normally give instructions on gifts. They’re an Alice in Wonderland reference. You know ‘eat me’, ‘drink me’” at his blank look she shook her head. “Why don’t you just ignore the cultural aspects then and do as the labels say.” He glared but complied

“Potter” he growled upon seeing the much more familiar writing inside.

Professor Snape

I would like to apologise for my behaviour during my last occlumency lesson and would like to humbly ask you to resume them as I feel that they are of great importance. I had not realised this until stopping them forced me to think about their benefits. I suppose you have to loose something before you appreciate its true value.

I have not shared with anyone what I saw in the pensive…

He stopped reading and turned to Minerva

“Your precious golden boy is blackmailing me into giving him occlumency lessons” he shouted in outrage.

“Mr Potter?” she asked in confusion. “That doesn’t seem like him, nor does it explain the gifts” she took the parchment “Severus, read to the end of a sentence before condemning the poor boy” she scolded in exasperation. He took it back

…nor do I intend to, whether you decide to resume the lessons or not. I found what I saw upsetting to say the least. I have always held my father in great esteem, never having heard anything to the contrary but your memory showed both him and Sirius in a new light. I have visited Sirius and spoken with him about what I saw. You will find a pensived memory of that in the box as well as several you may find interesting. Put bluntly I find what my father and godfather did to you repulsive and I would not condone it by spreading the story around the school as I am sure you expected me to do. Furthermore, I would like to add that I am not James Potter nor will I ever be.

I apologise for invading your privacy. I cannot justify it but I can explain my motivations. I am being given no information regarding Voldemort’s or the orders activities and considering my rather unique situation that is unnerving to say the least. I had hoped to find more information on those topics in your pensive. As I said I cannot justify it, it was impulsive and stupid, and I am sincerely sorry. In an effort to make up the invasion of privacy I have prepared these gifts. I say prepared because they were never truly mine to give, but I still believe that they will be of value. I am not a Malfoy and so I don’t expect to buy myself out of the situation but might I add that in obtaining these gifts I effectively put myself off of food for two days and it was infinitely more revolting than the most foul detention you could serve me (please don’t see that as a challenge).

I once again apologise for my deplorable behaviour

Harry J Potter

P.s. Use gloves to handle the gifts and I apologise for the smell. I used half of Dean’s deodorant to get it off of me, as I’m sure you know since you took points for it

“I’m sorry. Not trying to blackmail me. Trying to kill me perhaps, or incriminate me by giving me stolen goods.” Minerva sighed and took the note from his hands.

“Must you assume the worst of him? This seems like a very adequate apology. And he’s warning you about the gifts so most likely not trying to kill you. Why don’t you take a look in the pensive?” He acquiesced and opened the box, then went into the pensive. Twenty minutes later he re-emerged.

“That was illuminating” he muttered as he sat down at a desk.

“What did he show you?” she asked in concern

“Well,” he responded quietly, looking slightly more pale than usual. “There was a message telling me that he and I were not so different. He put in a memory of mine he saw a few weeks ago of myself and Tobias” Minerva winced sympathetically “then some memories of his relatives” She stared.

“What? Do you mean to tell me there are similarities?” He nodded

“I believe so, as does Mr Potter clearly.”

“I told Albus those muggles were awful. Oh I will kill that man…” she trailed off when she realised she was ranting “so I assume there was another memory he saw. One involving the marauders.”

“Yes. He showed me similar and worse experiences with his cousin from age five to present, with a conclusion at the end that I now had as much dirt on him as he had on me, and that he felt no inclination to share mine.” He sat in genuine puzzlement while his colleague ranted about the pro’s and con’s of various methods of muggle torture, followed by Dumbledore torture. After a few moments the ranting wound down and she turned to face Severus.

“Wasn’t there anything about Sirius in there? Mr Potter said there would be.” Severus smirked evilly.

“Oh it was in there alright. He ranted at the mutt for about ten minutes solid, and told him that he and Potter were no better than his cousin, and that they would have picked on him at school.”

“Really? Where did he speak with him?”

“Headquarters. I don’t have any idea how he might have managed to get there since Wednesday.”

“I’m sure we’ll find out soon enough. Well aren’t you at all curious what he might have ‘prepared’ for you in those boxes?”

“Perhaps” he admitted with a small smirk, still reeling with relief that Potter wasn’t going to spread his secrets. He fumbled in the pockets of his robes for a pair of dragonhide gloves. He put them on and approached the strangely shaped wrapping gift.

“I shall have to speak with him about his terrible taste in wrapping paper” Minerva commented. Severus just approached the wrapping with mounting dread. The letter did not make this sound like a normal gift.

“Why can’t he just be like Malfoy and buy himself out of trouble?” he moaned “a handmade gift – isn’t that a bit Hufflepuff for your house.” Minerva had a thoughtful look on her face. She moved to the other end of the giant gift and removed a small section or wrapping, gasped then burst out laughing.

“On the contrary Severus. I think his gift is about as Slytherin as possible without gift-wrapping the man himself.” Intrigued now he pulled off the wrapping and gasped. Inside the wrapping was a giant snake skeleton. The top of its head was taller than him.

“He didn’t” he muttered, stepping back in shock.

“It appears he did” Minerva retorted “I must say it’s larger than I would have imagined, and…sweet Merlin look at those teeth”

“Potter killed that in his second year?” he asked in shock. Minerva nodded slowly

“I wouldn’t have fancied trying” she admitted.

“Well its something Malfoy wouldn’t give me” he replied weakly with a huge smile that looked quite out of place on his face.

“Well now that we know what to get you for Christmas” she teased “why don’t you see what else he got you? I know I would like to see if anything can top giving he head of Slytherin Salazar Slytherin’s pet snake’s skeleton.” He nodded and moved to the box with the biggest label.

“Open me and hold your nose.” He read out loud

“That sounds ominous” Minerva laughed pulling a handkerchief from her pocket and covering her nose and mouth. Warily Severus removed the wrapping. Inside was a large crate. He used a cutting spell to get into the box and gasped. There was a bloody chunk of meat in the box with a label on a cocktail stick proclaiming it basilisk heart.

Laughing loudly at the look of pure glee on her colleagues face McGonagall peered in and immediately regretted it when the smell hit her.

“Great Merlin, how did he get close enough to get that? It’s horrible.”

“And here I was about to put it down to Gryffindor bravery.” He retorted

“My lions are known for being brave, not suicidal.”

“Try telling that to Potter” he replied moving to look in the next box. “What is he playing at?” he muttered in bewilderment “They’re gifts, he doesn’t need to sell them to me” he passed the accompanying note to Minerva

One of a kind basilisk fang. Once pierced the arm of the famous boy-who-lived. Aforementioned hero then used this very relic to destroy a possessed diary belonging to none other than Tom Marvolo Riddle (I am lord Voldemort for those no good at anagrams …well I’m not, I’m Harry Potter- I am good at anagrams not Voldemort, who am I kidding I’m neither Tommy had to spell it out for me - literally). Going once, going twice sold to the man dancing around and singing about all the potions he could use it in. WAIT! Don’t grind it up. I could autograph it for you! It would go nicely with my new book ‘Slithering with Slytherin – Harry Potter’s damsel in distress saving adventures’

“That poor boy spent far too long with Gilderoy Lockhart” she told him in mock sadness. “either that or the smell’s addled his brain”

An hour later the positively gleeful potions master had unwrapped all of the gifts.

“So, has he done enough to get those lessons restarted?” Minerva asked with a grin. She had never seen him look so happy.

“I suppose so.” He admitted, still poking at the contents of various boxes.

“I’ll be off then. It appears you’re in no immanent danger here” She turned and walked to the door then poked her head back around it “Oh and if you manage to make anything with unpleasant effects that you might need to test, might I suggest using a toad.” He snorted, having never seen the vindictive side of his colleague before, then went back to his gifts. Maybe Potter wasn’t quite as bad as he had thought.