Books And Aconite: The Adventures Of A Potions Apprentice by JAWorley
FeatureSummary: Uncle Vernon’s acting weird, and Snape has designs on making Harry the most obedient student Hogwarts has ever seen. Harry just wants a quiet summer to himself and to earn the money he needs for his school supplies, but he could only hope for something so simple. Entry into the Bingo Card Fic Fest.
Categories: Healer Snape, Teacher Snape > Trusted Mentor Snape, Master Snape > Apprentice Harry, Fic Fests > Bingo! Fic Fest, Teacher Snape > Professor Snape Main Characters: .Snape and Harry (required), Hermione, Original Character, Other, Ron
Snape Flavour: Snape is Angry, Canon Snape, Snape Comforts, Snape is Controlling, Snape is Kind, Snape is Stern
Genres: Action/Adventure, Angst, Canon, Drama, Fantasy, General, Hurt/Comfort
Media Type: None
Tags: Hospitalization, Injured!Snape, Runaway, Snape-meets-Dursleys, Werewolf!Harry, Werewolves
Takes Place: 5th summer, 5th Year
Warnings: Abusive Dursleys, Bullying, Emotional Abuse, Neglect, Physical Abuse, Physical Punishment Non-Spanking, Violence
Challenges: None
Series: None
Chapters: 25 Completed: No Word count: 176255 Read: 71110 Published: 05 Nov 2022 Updated: 29 Dec 2022
Dungeon Brewing by JAWorley
Harry hadn't said goodbye to the Dursleys, but he had gone down to see the librarian one more time to tell her he wouldn't be back until next summer.

"Do they at least have a library where you're going?" she asked.

He nodded. "A big one," he said. He couldn't describe the Hogwarts library to her without telling her where it was, so instead he settled on telling her, "My uncle, the one I'm living with now is into herbs and plants. He bought me a bunch of books about them so I've got lots to read for a while."

"Botany is a wonderful subject, isn't it?" she enthused.

Harry was sorry to say goodbye to her for the year, but reminded himself that so long as Snape didn't keep him locked up in the dungeons for the next few weeks he could go to visit Hagrid, check out books from the school library, and maybe even talk to some of the professors at school he liked. He'd always imagined what life would be like over the summer if he lived at Hogwarts, and now he supposed he'd get a chance to find out.

Snape picked him up early Sunday morning and took hold of Hedwig's bird cage as they apparated away.

"Where is your owl?" he asked.

"Ron has her," Harry said. "I'm not allowed to keep her over the summer. She roosts in one of Ron's sheds all summer and he uses her to send letters so she doesn't get bored."

Snape sighed as he set the cage down on the counter in the flat's small kitchen. "I didn't ask for your owl's life story Potter," he said. "Get all of your things together in a pile by the front door." He turned and went into his own room, presumably to gather his own things, leaving Harry standing there, stunned.

It was probably the most he'd ever said to Snape. It was just a few sentences... something he would have said to anyone who asked him, yet Snape had been irritated. He remembered for a moment the way Leighton and his master Rand, and Soren and his master Edric spoke to each other. They bantered back and forth, and talked like friends, or at least colleagues. Harry wasn't surprised that wasn't allowed here with Snape, but he wished it were. It wasn't that he wanted to have a friendly chat with the man about owls, but it would have been nice to be allowed to talk without feeling like he had to tiptoe around him all the time. It would have been nice to not have to feel like he was always with the Dursleys even when he wasn't.

"If your things aren't gathered in the next five minutes, we will be leaving them behind," Snape said with distaste when he came out of his room with his own trunk and saw Harry still standing there.

Harry looked down as he moved around him and into the guest room to get his potions trunk and other remaining items he hadn't been allowed to take back to the Dursleys.

A few minutes later, all of the items the two of them were taking to Hogwarts were gathered by the front door.

Snape did a spell that washed the items of luggage in a deep blue light, and then when the light dissipated, Harry found that there was a tag on the side of each piece of luggage that read, ‘Severus Snape, Hogwarts Potions Master.'

"It is too much to take via apparation. Apparating more than a few times in an hour is draining, especially with luggage or other people in tow. We will be taking the train," he said.

Harry wanted to ask why all of his things were labeled as Snape's as well, but figured it must be just so they could keep all of their items together since they were going to the same place.

Snape touched the top of Hedwig's cage, which was on top of the pile, and then gripped Harry's wrist and they disapparated with a pop, appearing on platform nine and three quarters with the entire heaping pile of luggage. The spell he'd done must have kept it all together for apparation. The man did look drained and Harry wondered if he could only apparate short distances with this much luggage. It made sense, or else they would have just gone straight to Hogwarts.

"Tickets?" a train conductor asked a moment later. He must have seen them apparate in and had come over to them.

Snape pulled two tickets out of an inner pocket of his robes and handed them over.

"Luggage?" the man asked, eyeing the stack of luggage.

Snape indicated the pile.

"Elves will have it loaded before the train pulls out," the conductor said. He handed the tickets back to Snape and motioned towards the train.

Snape moved towards an open train car door and Harry followed.

Harry had never ridden the Hogwarts Express unless it was to and from school with his friends, so he was interested to see that it ran in the summer at all. They found an empty compartment without issue. There was a woman and her two young children in the hall finding a compartment of their own, an aging man that looked too old to travel anywhere, and a younger man directing houseleves to load a half dozen huge crates of books into a cargo carriage further down the train.

"Are they all going to Hogwarts?" Harry asked when they were finally inside their own compartment and had the door closed.

"Blackpool, Edinburgh, Hogsmeade," Snape said, looking out the window as if he were entirely uninterested in the conversation. "The train goes past them all on the way to Hogwarts and there are magical communities in each of those places. The start and end of the school year are the only times it skips them."

A few moments later some of their luggage popped into the compartment with them. All three of their trunks appeared in the overhead storage, and Harry's backpack along with a leather case appeared on the floor by the door. Hedwig's cage was there as well.

Harry moved for his new leather bookbag which was full of his apprentice books and pulled one out to read. He'd been reading since Snape had bought them three days ago hoping to get as much done as he could before school started so he didn't have to think about his apprenticeship at all at Hogwarts. Snape seemed to approve of Harry's choice to pull out the apprentice book on laws and moved for his leather case. He opened it up and pulled out a box of muggle highlighters.

"Use these."

Harry looked up to see him holding out the box with four thin highlighters in it. "Sir?"

"They are your books. Use these to highlight things you wish to remember. Write notes in the margins. Do whatever you must to retain the information. These are your highlighters. They have a never-ending ink charm on them, but the tips will wear out and fray eventually. When they do, tell me and I will get more."

Harry took the highlighters uncertainly and pulled out a red one. Hermione always came to school armed with boxes of highlighters like these, but he'd never used them. Experimentally he pulled the cap off of the red one and ran it over a word on page 14 he would have to look up later and was pleased when light red ink shone over the word, making it easily distinguishable from the others on the page. He flipped the page over and was even happier to see that the ink hadn't bled through. The pages were thicker than his school textbooks and he wondered if it was because these books were meant to be written in. Snape certainly seemed to think so.

The train pulled out of the station twenty minutes later, and Harry read and highlighted for two hours before Snape interrupted him to give him a handful of coins.

"Take this down to the caboose and buy lunch for both of us."

"From the lady with the sweet trolley?" Harry asked. He was surprised Snape wanted sweets, and also that the sweets lady hadn't been by yet. She usually made rounds on the train ride to school within the first hour, and then again a few hours later.

"From the meal car," Snape said. When Harry frowned, uncertain what he was talking about, Snape sighed and said, "Go out the door to the left. Go to the last car. Buy lunch. Come back."


Harry stood up with the coins he'd been handed and wished the man hadn't felt the need to talk down to him like a small child.

Out in the corridor Harry turned left and walked down the train. He'd never been all the way to the end before. Generally he and his friends found a car in the middle of the train and stayed put until they got to their destination.

At the end of the train, just as Snape had said, there was a meal car. It was little more than a small kitchen with a house elf and a cranky old man serving food. There was nowhere to sit and eat as it appeared that passengers were supposed to take their food back to their own train compartments.

"What'll it be?" the man asked as the house elf worked away behind him at the stove, frying up vegetables in a pan.

"Lunch?" Harry asked.

The man grinned, revealing some missing teeth. "Yeah, and what'll you have for lunch?"

"Erm- I'm not sure. What is there?" Harry looked around but didn't see a menu on the walls. Instead the man pointed down at the counter and Harry saw a menu taped to it.

"Sunday," the man said, pointing to a column that said ‘Sunday'.

It looked like there were cold and hot sandwiches, eggs, crisps, coffee, tea, and scones. Snape had said lunch, so Harry assumed he didn't want eggs and bangers.

"Two hot roast beef sandwiches," Harry said. He looked at the coins in his hand. It seemed Snape had given him more than enough. "And a cup of peppermint tea and a cup of coffee."

"Cream?" the man asked. He pointed to the menu to show there were a few flavors of cream to go in the coffee. Harry wasn't sure what kind Snape liked, but he had seen him pouring creamer into his coffee in the mornings.

"Hazlenut?" Harry asked.

The man rang up the purchase on an ancient till, and Harry handed over seven sickles and two knuts. The house elf had the food finished before Harry had even finished paying. The two hot drinks were in throwaway paper cups with lids so they wouldn't spill, and the sandwiches were in a paper bag.

"Crisps?" the man asked. He pointed to several kinds of wizarding crisps and Harry handed over four more knuts and then took two bags of crisps and put them in the bag.

"Thank you," he told the man and house elf, and left the caboose.

When he got back to their compartment he handed Snape the coffee, a bag of crisps and a hot sandwich, and then took his own to the other bench seat across the little compartment and sat to eat his lunch as he stared out the train window. When he was done eating, he remembered the change and gave it back to Snape before settling in for more studying.

The law book hadn't taken Harry as long to get through as he thought. The section on the British Ministry of Magic laws was relatively short, only fifteen pages, and Harry had already been through it twice now. It was boring stuff, but Snape had been right, it was important to know. There was an entire list of banned magical substances that they'd need special permission from the Ministry to gather or use in potions, such as asphodel, which was highly addictive and illegal to buy, sell, grow, or trade. Even having it in his possession was illegal if he didn't have a signed permit from the Ministry.

The book detailed how to go about getting a permit for special use substances, how to store those substances (and other dangerous potions and ingredients), and even had laws for apprenticeships, though they were few and were rules that had already been explained to Harry. For the most part the rules all seemed sensible enough.

Harry spent almost twenty minutes underlining and highlighting in the section about bringing ingredients and potions in from other countries. Apparently you could gather ingredients from anywhere under Ministry of Magic rule, but if you brought in ingredients from other countries, they had to go through a customs process. Once the customs office at the Ministry approved what you were bringing in and you paid a fee (ten sickles per substance being evaluated), you could do what you wanted with your ingredients, including selling them to others.

"Are certain potions ingredients more expensive at the apothecary because a fee had to be paid at customs?"

"That, plus travel expenses to gather items from out of country or to pay someone else to gather them or sell them to you," Snape said. "Some items are expensive simply because they are rare or dangerous to gather."

"Is that why Soren is training to gather dragon scales?" Harry asked.

Snape looked up from the paperwork he'd been doing. Harry hadn't asked what he was working on, but assumed it was something to do with upcoming classes at the start of term.

"There is no training to gather those materials, only a willingness to risk your own life for them. Soren is one of the few in the isles willing to gather ingredients in such a way. He will be a rich man if he doesn't die young. Often those that gather those sorts of materials stop as soon as they get married, and move on to more mundane potions work. Soren is crazy."


Harry raised his brows. He wasn't used to hearing Snape put down other potions masters or apprentices in such a way.

"Do not repeat that," Snape warned him.

"I won't."

"Master Edric has warned him off of gathering dangerous ingredients several times, but he continues to do so on his own time."

"Isn't all of his time apprentice time?" Harry asked.

Severus stared at him from across the small compartment. "Is all of yours?"

Harry frowned. It was, wasn't it?

With a heavy sigh Severus said, "Read the law book again. Pay attention to the parts that talk about apprenticeship rights."

Harry flipped to the part about apprenticeships again and re-read the entire section. He couldn't figure out what Snape was hinting at, though there was a section about, ‘rights of the wizard', though it only referred to something else and didn't explain. Harry flipped to the appendix in the back of the book and used his finger to move down the page under ‘W'. He found ‘Wizard Rights' near the middle, looked at the page number, and flipped to page 112, which was just a few pages before the appendix.

‘All apprentices are subject to wizard rights under Ministry Law 17. Apprentices do not need to be paid for apprenticeship work, however they must be allowed the minimum amount of free time to tend to daily life (see subsection 17.2), and to work as necessary for compensation if not being compensated by their apprentice master.'

There was more about Ministry law 17, like that wizards had the right to a safe work environment (including during apprenticeships), that jobs had to allow time off for a minimum number of hours per day for sleeping, eating and bathing (10 hours), and that people under the age of 17 weren't allowed to work unless with permission of a parent or guardian (which was why apprenticeships for those under 17 required a transfer of guardianship to the apprentice master, so they could give them ‘permission' to work).

Harry underlined and highlighted in this section too. He'd had no idea about the rights he had under the Ministry until now. He knew muggles had laws like this, but wasn't sure what exactly those were. The book made mention about other subsections of Ministry Law 17, but they weren't outlined in this book as those laws pertained to people in general, not those in the workforce or apprenticeships.

He spent the rest of the trainride flipping around in the back of the law book and reading the sections here as they had interesting information that pertained to apprentices, and finally looked up around seven and found that they were nearing Hogsmeade.

"Put your things back in your bag," Snape instructed. "You can take it with you. The rest of the luggage will be sent to the castle."

Harry's stomach grumbled as the train pulled into the station and they got off. They were the only ones getting off here, aside from the man with his many wooden crates of books, which were apparently going to a new store in Hogsmeade.

Snape and Harry walked up the long dirt drive to Hogwarts in silence, and when they got near the steps leading up into the castle, Snape said, "The Headmaster is expecting you."

"Sir?"

"Go directly to the Headmaster's office and then come to my office afterward to collect your things. Dinner is already over, but you can still eat in the Great Hall if you tap the table with your wand."

"Am I in trouble?"

"You are not. You are the first apprentice at Hogwarts in 12 years. There are new rules you must be acquainted with."


Snape didn't tell him twice, and instead left him in the Entrance Hall to do as he was told. Harry took a breath, tried to squash the nervousness inside himself, and went up to the third floor to the stone gargoyle guarding the Headmaster's office.

He didn't need to tell it a password, because it seemed he was expected like Snape had said. The gargoyle moved to the side and Harry went up the spiral stairs.

"Harry, come in my boy," Dumbledore called from inside after Harry knocked on the large wooden door. Harry tried to let his anxiety leave him at the smile the Headmaster wore.

"Have a seat," Dumbledore said. "I expect your trip on the train went well?"

"Yes sir."

"Good." The man's smile faltered a little, not fading entirely, but suddenly he didn't seem pleased anymore. "Harry, I wasn't expecting you to take an apprenticeship before you came of age."

"I wasn't expecting it either sir," he said.

"Hm. Severus did explain some of the situation to me. Would you mind telling me how this came to be yourself?"

Harry fidgeted with the strap on his new suede backpack. "It was my uncle's idea. He said my potions grade needed help and when we ran into Professor Snape on Diagon Alley the two of them set it up without me."

"I see." Dumbledore nodded, sighed heavily (though not in an irritated way like Snape usually did), and said, "I know you and Professor Snape do not always see eye to eye or get along. Despite that you may not have wanted this apprenticeship, it may be in your best interest for the time being."

"Sir?"

Albus leveled a serious gaze across his desk at Harry and steepled his fingers. "Are you aware of the way the news has been portraying the two of us this summer?"

Harry shook his head and Albus pulled several old copies of The Daily Prophet out of his desk and slid them over to Harry. He let Harry read the headlines on the front page of each for a few moments and said, "The Ministry does not want to believe, or want others to believe that Voldemort has returned. To combat what you told your friends at the end of the tournament, and what I told the school at Cedric's funeral a few days later, they have decided to slander us both to make the public question what we have said. It is their official stance that Voldemort has not returned, and that you and I have lied to the public."

"But-" Harry sputtered, mind whirring, "that's crazy! He is back!" He looked up at the Headmaster, eyes full of panic and said meekly, "You believe me, don't you?"

"Myself, Professor Snape, the rest of the staff, and many students who have parents within Voldemort's ranks. The truth is not hard to discover, but the Ministry is often not focused on finding the truth."

Harry stared back down at the newspapers in disbelief. He kept up with The Prophet sometimes during the school year, but because Ron always had his owl in the summer he rarely got news of the wizarding world at all unless his friends sent him a letter with their owls.

"You said- the apprenticeship was in my best interest-" Harry started, looking up at him again. "Why?"

"Technically the Ministry has no role at Hogwarts, but this year they've insisted on providing the new Defense Against The Dark Arts teacher. Her name is Delores Umbridge, and she is here primarily to discredit the two of us. She's not to be trusted, for many reasons, not least of which is that she was almost expelled in her time at Hogwarts for using dark magic."

Harry raised his eyebrows at that. "She will do whatever it takes to further the Ministry agenda. What exactly that means, I don't know yet. She only arrived a few days ago, and it will be difficult to tell what her plans are until school starts. With that being said, as an apprentice, you have different rules to follow than the rest of the students. This could be a protection for you from her this year."

"Master Snape said there were different rules, but he didn't say what they were," Harry said.

"You are still under all school rules," the Headmaster said, leaning back. "However, because you're an apprentice, you are also under whatever rules or orders Professor Snape gives you as your apprentice master. For instance, curfew for fifth through seventh years is nine pm, but if Professor Snape has given you direct permission for some reason to be out after nine pm, you would need to follow his orders first, and school rules second."

"Do you think he'd let me stay out late?" Harry asked.

Dumbledore laughed, "I highly doubt it," he said. "This special rule also pertains to punishment however. As he is your apprentice master and is also a staff member at this school, any discipline will go through him. Another teacher can assign you detention, but it would have to be done with him, or if he decided the detention was unwarranted, he could cancel it altogether."

"Or he could take away Quidditch and tell me I can't be friends with Ron and Hermione," Harry grouched, feeling comfortable enough there with the Headmaster to do so. He liked Dumbledore, and the aging man had always made Harry feel as though he was on his side, even though he'd never let him stay at Hogwarts over the summer instead of going home.

"As it so happens, he may not take away privileges that are provided all students at the school. He could not make you leave the Quidditch team unless your grades slipped below A's for more than one month, as that is the rule for all students. The same can be said of who you are friends with. He can however give you as many detentions as he feels is necessary."

"And this is supposed to help me?" Harry asked, skeptical.

"It is my belief that Delores Umbridge will try to catch you at any wrongdoing she can so she can report that wrongdoing back to the Ministry. With all of your ‘punishment's' to be handled by Professor Snape, it will allow the staff the chance to cancel any unfair punishments she hands out to you. It will give us oversight."


"Do you think master Snape will let me get out of anything? He always believes I'm guilty."


"We shall see," Dumbledore said meditatively. He looked across his desk at Harry again. "Do you understand all that I've said about how the rules apply to you in this new way? If Professor Snape has told you to do something contrary to school rules, and a teacher asks you about it, you must tell them you are doing what Professor Snape has told you to do."

"Yes sir."

"This has been the way of things with students under apprenticeship at the school for three hundred years. In the distant past it was more common to have students under apprenticeship to teachers at the school. Now, when it happens it's infrequent, and students are sometimes under apprenticeship to masters not teaching at the school. This rule allows student apprentices to make arrangements to go to work for their apprentice masters on evenings or weekends, or to engage in apprenticeship activities at the school. If for instance Professor Snape takes you out to collect potions ingredients at night after curfew, this rule makes that possible."

"I understand." Harry had really hoped he'd be relieved of the apprenticeship during the school year. That hope seemed dashed now.

"You are still to do what other teachers tell you (within reason)," he added, "I'm speaking specifically of Delores Umbridge when I say within reason. But if what a teacher tells you contradicts what Professor Snape has instructed you to do, you should follow what Severus has told you first."

Harry wasn't pleased to find out that Snape had complete control of him at Hogwarts, but was relieved to find out that the ‘extra rules' he had to follow weren't too severe.

"There is something else," the Headmaster said, and Harry's eyes came back around to him.

"Sir?"

"Professor Snape has decided that for now you will continue living in Gryffindor tower. You are still a Gryffindor and will continue to be until you graduate. However, an apprentice master who also teaches at the school can decide to have you live in apprentice quarters."

"What's that?" Harry asked.

"There's a set of rooms in each part of the castle set aside for apprentice students. He could assign you to an apprentice room in the dungeons or another part of the castle if he chose to, meaning you would have a quiet place to study, conduct apprentice work, and sleep. You would still be allowed access to Gryffindor tower, but you would have to sleep in your apprentice quarters each night. If he assigns you to apprentice quarters there are other rules you would have to follow."

"What are the rules?"

"You would not be allowed to have any student of the opposite sex in apprentice quarters."

Harry nodded. That was reasonable and expected. Girls weren't allowed in the boys dorms in Gryffindor tower and visa versa, even though Hermione sometimes chose to ignore that rule to come up and berate Ron and Harry for hiding in the dorms instead of studying.

"If you were to be assigned to apprentice quarters you would also be granted Prefect status."

"Prefect?" Harry asked. "Why?"

"Prefects are given leeway to travel the corridors at night as they have need to patrol, to go to the kitchens for food when their prefect duties require them to miss meals, and to do other things like assign and take away points from errant students. As it stands now, you are given some of those same permissions as a student apprentice, but would be given full Prefect status if assigned to apprentice quarters. Being assigned to apprentice quarters is to be set apart from the rest of the student body, such as the Prefects are."

"So I'd be able to assign or take away points too?"

"Yes," Dumbledore said. "You would also be assigned Prefect duties such as patrolling corridors. Quidditch captains are also made Prefects, however Quidditch captains and student apprentices who gain Prefect status this way are not eligible to be Head Boy or Girl."

Harry's head was spinning. He had never wanted to be a Prefect. Ron was proud to be one because his parents were proud of him for it, and Hermione loved taking on the extra duty of helping other students, but Harry had a hard enough time taking care of himself as it was. He did want to be Quidditch captain someday, but he didn't want to be assigned apprentice quarters. He wanted to be in the dorms with his friends. All Harry had ever wanted to do was to blend in. He didn't want to be set apart more than his status as The-Boy-Who-Lived already made him.

Dumbledore gave a soft chuckle at the horrified look on Harry's face. "You may take some comfort in knowing that Severus most probably does not want you to have Prefect status. That alone may be deterrent enough to moving you out of the dorms in Gryffindor."

"Yes sir." A thought struck Harry then. "He can't make me live with him, can he? In his quarters I mean?"

"It would be the same as assigning you apprentice quarters. As an apprentice if you are not in your house dormitory you are given Prefect status. Have things been so terrible for you with him this summer?"

Harry's cheeks heated up then. He was close to putting Snape down, and Snape wouldn't have any of that. "Not so bad sir," Harry said. It was the truth too. He hadn't enjoyed it, but in some ways it was almost better than being with the Dursleys.

"You must be hungry. If you have questions about the way the rules apply to you now with your new status, you may come to me, Professor Snape, or Professor McGonagall. As your head of house and deputy headmistress Professor McGonagall is tasked with ensuring you are doing well with student apprentice rules as well as with your wellbeing." Dumbledore stood up and motioned for the door. "Has Professor Snape told you about getting meals after mealtimes have ended?"

Harry stood up. "He said I could tap Gryffindor table with my wand."

"You may also go to the kitchens to receive a meal, though I must warn you, if you are asking the elves for snacks instead of meals, they may become irritated enough to refuse you."

"Yes sir."

"Goodnight Harry. Let me know if there's anything you need help with this year."

"Yes sir. Goodnight."

Harry left the Headmaster's office entirely unsure of how he felt about these new rules. Dumbledore had tried to spin these rules in a positive light, but he just wasn't sure. He needed to eat and then go to sleep so he didn't have to think about it anymore that night. Between the new rules and reading all day on the train, he had a headache behind his left eye that was getting worse as the evening wore on.

Harry went to the empty Entrance Hall and sat at the end of Gryffindor table. He tapped his wand on the table and a steaming plate of roast chicken with green beans appeared along with a glass of pumpkin juice. He dug into the meal and then took his bag and hurried to Snape's office. He didn't want to get yelled at for keeping the man waiting.

Snape was inside with his door open, which was unusual, and waved Harry inside when he found him standing in the door frame.

He motioned to Harry's two trunks and owl cage, which were sitting on the floor of his office and said, "Levitate these to your dorm room. Fifth year curfew applies to you starting now. Do not let me find you out of the dorms after curfew without a good cause. Come back tomorrow morning after breakfast, no later than nine."

"Yes sir."

Harry wondered how he was going to levitate two trunks and Hedwig's cage all at once and decided against trying. Instead he held Hedwig's cage in one hand and used his wand to levitate his square black potions trunk out of the office and down to the end of the corridor. There he set Hedwig's cage down and went back down the hall to levitate his school trunk. He did this up through the castle, stopping at the end of every corridor to go back to the previous corridor and retrieve whichever trunk he had left behind.

Finally back in Gryffindor tower for the night, Harry sighed in relief. Here at least, he felt safe from Snape and extra apprentice rules, from this Umbridge woman, and from all of the anxiety that had been building up over the summer about the start of the school year.

Harry nudged the desk he shared with Ron aside a little and put the black square trunk between it and the wall, and then settled his school trunk at the foot of his bed in its normal spot. He tried to block everything from the Headmaster's office out of his mind as he put his new clothes away in his half of the wardrobe he shared with Ron.

Deciding not to make his headache any worse that evening by continuing to read his apprentice books, Harry lay in bed and sighed heavily. Tomorrow he would borrow a school owl and send a letter to Ron asking him to send Hedwig to Hogwarts. At least he'd get to spend the last few weeks of summer with his familiar. He might feel less alone then with her in the dormitory until the other fifth year boys came back to school.

* * *

Harry got his first glimpse of Professor Umbridge the next morning at breakfast. Apparently the staff abandoned the staff table in the summer and sat at one end of Ravenclaw table. Harry didn't want to intrude to sit with them since he was neither staff nor a Ravenclaw, so he sat at the end of Gryffindor table and tried to ignore the conversation Umbridge was having with Professor Sprout and Madam Pomfrey about laws pertaining to non-human creatures with magical abilities. Because he never looked up at the staff, he didn't know if they had noticed him or not. He ate quickly and left to go to Professor Snape's office.

Snape was there with the door open again when he arrived.

"I have work to do for the next few weeks, including brewing all of the required potions for the infirmary," he informed Harry. He was shuffling several stacks of parchment around on his desk.

"Take the key to the upper year potions classroom and set up six cauldrons for brewing. Get out all of the supplies for bruise balm and pepperup potion, and if you have time look through the student store room and pull out any ingredients that have turned or gone bad. Do not start brewing until I get there."

"Yes sir." He was surprised Snape was trusting him to do all of that. Sometimes he trusted Harry to mop floors alone in detention, but that was quite different than giving him the key to a classroom and sending him to set things up for brewing.

Harry was just glad he hadn't been set to reading that morning. His headache was gone after a good night's sleep, but he knew if he had to read all day it would come right back.

He turned the old fashioned key in the lock to the potions room for fifth through seventh years and went in, leaving the door open and pocketing the key. He couldn't remember all of the ingredients to pepperup potion, but Snape kept first through seventh year student text books in all three of the potions classrooms, so it wasn't hard to figure out.

Harry set up all six of the spare cauldrons kept in the supply cupboard and set them out, three on one table and three on another, and then set out supplies for bruise balm on one table and pepperup potion on the other. He was halfway through surveying the potions supply cupboard when Snape came in with his black leather case full of paperwork. He set the paperwork down on the desk, came to look over the two workstations Harry had set up, and then sat down at his teacher's desk under the blackboard.

"Start three cauldrons of bruise balm. You will be serving detention on the first day of school if you waste ingredients ruining these potions."

"Yes sir."

Bruise balm was a first year potion and he'd had to brew it that summer, so he could understand how Snape would be angry if he brewed three botched batches of it. The ingredients to bruise balm weren't that expensive (Harry knew after so many trips to the apothecary that summer), but he didn't desire earning detention before school had even started that year.

Using the first year potions textbook just to be sure he had the recipe right, Harry got all three cauldrons set and ready to go with potions bubbling in under ten minutes. Without being asked he moved to the other table to start the pepperup potion.

"I didn't ask you to start that," Snape said.

Harry stopped what he was doing. He had been about to measure out elderberry juice to get the pepperup started. "I'm sorry," he said.

Snape waved him away. "Continue. What I said before is true of this potion as well."

"Detention," Harry said quietly.

Snape didn't respond and Harry set to work brewing. Pepperup potion had more ingredients than bruise balm, but it was only a third year potion, and one Harry had also been made to brew that summer. After twenty minutes he had all three cauldrons on the second table bubbling away with pepperup. He moved to the first table to check the bruise balm and was pleased that it had already thickened. He canceled his flame charm under the bruise balm cauldrons, giving each one final stir, and then went back to the pepperup table. The pepperup had to be stirred vigorously for sixty seconds every few minutes or it would burn so Harry didn't have time to tin the bruise balm right away.

Snape seemed content to ignore him while he worked on whatever he was doing, though just before Harry was ready to cancel the flames below his pepperup potion cauldrons, Snape said, "You will need to get containers from the corridor storeroom. The password is Caldus Major."

Harry nodded in response, mind busy trying to repeat the password to himself so he didn't forget and have to ask again, and when he was finally done with the pepperup potion he went out into the corridor and down to the other potions supply cupboard. This closet was usually closed to lower years, and he'd only seen inside it once last year when Snape had accused him of stealing supplies to brew polyjuice potion that he'd had nothing to do with.


There were floor to ceiling shelves on three walls, as there was in each student potions supply cupboard. One entire wall of this room had various containers and phials for storing potions and ingredients in. Harry found an empty wooden crate and began putting little metal tins with lids into it as well as round glass phials with stoppers. He took them back to the potions room and began with the tins and bruise balm first since it was already cool. He didn't want to wait longer than he had to or it would congeal so much that it would be a mess to get into the tins.

Three small cauldrons of potion made for exactly forty tins of bruise balm. Harry did his best to smooth the top of each cream over before he put a lid on it. He'd get yelled at if it looked sloppy. He had to go back to the corridor store room to find a towel which he used to wipe down the sides of the bruise balm tins to ensure they looked clean and presentable. He stacked the tins up in eight neat rows and then moved to the other table to decant the bright red pepperup potion into the round glass phials. This was not easy as the mouth and neck of the glass was small, so he had to go to the supply cupboard again for a funnel and a smaller potions ladle with a thinner more pointed edge so he could pour the potion without making such a mess.

Almost two hours had passed when he was done with the work and had cleaned the six cauldrons out. He startled when he turned around and found Snape right behind him, hands behind his back as he surveyed the rows of pepperup potion bottles.

He picked one up, pulled the cork out, sniffed it, looked at it, swirled it around, and finally stuck a pinky inside and put a drop on his tongue to taste it. "More peppermint next time," he commented. "Students complain when it tastes bad."

Harry raised his brows. He'd always suspected that Snape brewed the potions for the Hospital Wing, but given how most of them tasted he was surprised to hear that the man cared at all. He held out the bottle for Harry and Harry stuck his pinky finger inside too. The man was right. It tasted bitter and was missing the minty finish that made it bearable.

"Do I need to re-brew it sir?"

"This is acceptable. Adding extra peppermint will not harm the potion in any way however. Keep that in mind the next time you brew it."

"Yes sir."

He moved to the table with the neat stacks of bruise balm tins and opened up one from the top of each stack. He used a clean finger to test one of them by rubbing it into the back of his wrist.

"Acceptable," he said. "Put them in the crate and deliver them to madam Pomfrey."

He turned to look at the crate Harry had used to bring in supplies and said, "Return to the corridor supply cupboard and retrieve the black crate. It has cushioning charms on it and dividers to store bottles so they don't break."

Harry went and found one of several crates with this description and brought it back. He loaded each pepperup phial into its own compartment in the crate, and then used a satchel Snape brought him to carry the tins of bruise balm. With the satchel on top of the black crate, Harry left and made his way up through the castle.

Madam Pomfrey was in the Hospital Wing waiting for him it seemed.

"There you are Harry," she said with a smile. "I wondered if you'd be by with some potions for me today. Did you brew these?"

"Yes maam," he said with a smile. He loved Madam Pomfrey as most students did. She was always friendly, never berated him for getting hurt (though she did if she thought you'd been fighting), and always healed his injuries. Potions couldn't make him smile, even if he had brewed them, but her friendly greeting could.

"What have you brought me today?" she asked as Harry set the crate down on the desk in her office at the end of the ward. "Hm, pepperup," she said. "How did it come out?"

"Not enough peppermint," he said. "I'll do better next time."

"I'm sure you will," she said.

He opened the sack of tins and handed one to her for inspection.

"This bruise balm looks good." She did the same thing as Snape had done and took a small amount to spread on the back of her wrist.

"Why do you do that?" Harry asked.

"Professor Snape didn't tell you?"

Harry shook his head.

"Here." She held out the tin to him. "Put some on your wrist. What do you feel?"

Harry rubbed some into his wrist. "It's tingly," he said.

"Anything else?"

He thought about it and then shook his head.

"It's easy to tell if it's not made right. It will have a cooling sensation if you haven't heated it long enough. It will be too thick if you've heated it too long or haven't added enough water, and too thin if too much water was used. It should tingle when it touches skin without a bruise, and nothing else. You did a great job with this."

Harry shrugged. "It's just a first year potion," he said. Hermione could have made it in her sleep, and he was pretty sure Ginny made it on weekends to use after rough Quidditch practices.

"That may be, but it's something you've made well that will be used all year to help other students and staff. Do you know how many bruises I treat just in the first two weeks? We'll be out of this by Christmas. I go through two tins every time there's a Quidditch game and one a week just from scuffles students get into in the halls with each other."

Harry shrugged again, reaching up to the back of his neck. He wasn't used to being praised like this. It was good enough just to hear Snape say the balm was ‘acceptable' and that he wasn't getting detention on his first day of school in a few weeks.

After helping to put the potions and bruise balm away where they went in the Hospital Wing cupboards, Harry took the crate and satchel back to the dungeon classroom. Snape had already started new potions in the six cauldrons.

"Look into each and tell me what's in them," he said.

Harry went to the first set of three. They were bubbling away to a high flame and smelled faintly of lemon and ginger. Harry frowned. He had no idea. "I don't know sir."

"Look at the ingredients that are out on the table."

To Harry it looked like he had been making a pepperup potion, though there were no peppermint leaves, the potion wasn't red and there was the addition of lemon and ginger. All of the other ingredients for a pepperup was there though, from elderberry syrup to hyssop. "It looks like everything for pepperup."

"It is a stronger variation of pepperup potion. Pepperup potion is good for minor colds. This is used for the wizarding flu, which always sweeps through the school in December and January. It's also good for strong colds not responding to pepperup."

He slid the recipe over to Harry, asked what stage the potion was in based on what Harry was seeing in the cauldron, and when he was satisfied with the answer he let Harry take over brewing it. It was easy to brew like regular pepperup.

"What about those cauldrons?" Harry asked of the three on the next table.

"They're the same," Snape said. "Ensure that in the last stage you add enough hyssop. If you don't add enough in the last stage it will be a poor cough suppressant."

"Yes sir."

Harry finished with the Lemonup potion just before lunch time. By the time he was done filling up 34 phials of it and packaging them in two black crates to go to the Hospital Wing, it was nearly one thirty and he was starving.

"Take them to the Hospital Wing and then get lunch. You may have the rest of the day to study or waste your time. Return tomorrow before nine."

Harry gave him a nod and set off to the Hospital Wing for a second time that day.

He was glad when he got to the Great Hall at two and found it empty of staff, and sat down to enjoy a late lunch by himself.

After lunch he knew he should study, but he really wanted a few hours to himself to just relax as Snape had said, though Harry didn't consider finding a good novel at the library a waste of time.

When he found a novel (another apprentice novel, this time about a girl who was an auror apprentice keeping the secret that she was really a werewolf), he took it up to Madam Pince's desk to check out.

"Have you been told the rules?" she asked.

"Maam?"

"As a potions apprentice you have different library privileges."

"I do?"

She pointed to the paper he had always used to write down which book he was checking out and when he expected to return it. "You usually check out books here," she said. Then she pointed to a piece of parchment on the left of it. It was the parchment teachers checked books out on. "Now you check out books here."

Harry frowned down at his novel. "Even this one?" he asked.

"Anything you're checking out goes on this page now."

"But I'm not a teacher," he said. He wasn't trying to argue, and he hoped she knew he was just confused. She was strict and stern with rule breakers in her library, but he liked her like he did madam Pomfrey and Professor McGonagall.

"Apprentices, Head Boy and Head Girl, and staff check out books here."

Harry nodded and wrote down his name in the left column, followed by the date. In the middle column he wrote down the title of his book, and then in the far right column he wrote down the date he expected to turn it back in, which in this case was the next day. He expected to have it finished by bed. Students didn't have to turn their books in by the date they put down, but if they didn't madam Pomfrey would remind them every time she saw them in the library until they did. It was her way of ensuring the books that got checked out returned and were read by those that took them.

She looked Harry's book choice over while he wrote. "Wouldn't you rather have novels about potions apprentices?" He shrugged. "We have ten or twelve."

"Are they any good?" he asked.

"You will have to read one and tell me," she said with a pointed look.

"I might try one," he said, and took his novel and left to settle down with it in the common room.

He purposely waited until he knew dinner was finished before he went down to dinner that night to eat. As it turned out, it didn't work out in his favor this time. Umbridge was there drinking tea at Ravenclaw table and reading through a stack of paperwork. Not wanting to be rude, Harry greeted her when he came in and sat at Gryffindor, which was just the next table over. "Maam," he said.

She tilted her head and gave a falsely sweet smile that gave Harry chills. Maybe it wouldn't have if he hadn't been warned about her already, but everything from her curly brown hair to the pink frilly clothes she was wearing was giving him falsely sweet vibes.

"Having a late dinner are we?"

"Yes maam."

"I assume you have a reason for eating so late?"

"I was studying and lost track of time," he lied.

"Potions, isn't it? You are the new student potions apprentice, aren't you?"

"Yes maam."

"I heard you've already been quite busy." She took a sip of her tea, keeping her smile all the while. "Madam Pomfrey said you've already made several of the school's potions and delivered them. I never imagined you were so industrious Mr. Potter."

"I like to keep busy," he lied, tapping Gryffindor table with his wand. She let him tuck into his food for a full minute before she started questioning him again.

"It's curious, isn't it? That with your poor potions grades, you still aspire to be a potions master?"

Harry felt uneasy at her question. Uncle Vernon liked to trap him with trick questions and he always got an uneasy feeling when that was the case. He didn't think she'd push him down and punch him in the face for the wrong answer, but he couldn't shake the feeling like she would.

"I like potions," he said, trying to swallow his potatoes before he spoke so as not to be rude. "It's my favorite subject. I'm not that good at it, but I want to be better. Being a potions master sounds like a good job for after school."

"Does it? What about that excites you?"

Mind whirring to find an answer, his conversation with Madam Pomfrey and his trip to collect wolfsbane with the other potions apprentices weeks ago flashed through his mind. "I want to help people. The pepperup potion I brewed earlier today can keep students healthy all year so they can study."

"What subjects are the most important for you and your friends to study?" she asked, changing the subjects.

Defense was the answer, but he felt like he had to lie. "Potions is right now for me," Harry said. "But it's OWL's this year so I have to study hard at everything. I have all sorts of apprentice books I have to get through this year too though, because I have a test after two years to pass so I can get a second apprenticeship."

"I see."

Harry finished his meal as quickly as he could, said, "Good night," to Umbridge, and tried not to look as though he was fleeing the Great Hall.

That had gone ok, hadn't it? She was hiding something, or planning something, but the conversation hadn't been a total disaster.

* * *

The next morning Snape wasn't in his office. Harry had just found him in the upper year potions room when Snape had sent the door slamming shut with a spell and warded it against eavesdropping.

"You're a terrible liar Potter. None of the staff bought a word you told Umbridge last night."

"Sir?"

Snape narrowed his eyes at him. "You aspire to be a potions master to help people Potter?"

"I didn't say I aspired to anything," Harry said, moving to set up the cauldrons without being asked. Maybe if he was working Snape would leave him alone.

"Luckily none of the other staff members said anything while Umbridge tried to fish for answers. Did the Headmaster not warn you to be careful around her?"

"What did you want me to say sir? She said it was odd that my potions grade was so poor but that I wanted to be a potions master. I thought I did pretty good under that line of questioning. I didn't say anything that would make you or the potions community look bad."

"How about keeping your mouth shut?" Snape snapped, setting a potions book down heavily in front of Harry and then setting a list of potions down next to it.

Harry was quiet for several moments before he asked, "Is Polyjuice considered dark magic?"

"Questionable at best," Snape said, still sounding irritated.

Harry mumbled, "Then maybe you should take that and pretend to be me this year so you can give all the right answers." Unfortunately Snape heard it. Harry was glad he had while being anxious about the consequences at the same time.

The man's back stiffened as he stood up straight, and then he took a deep shuddering breath as if trying to calm himself. He turned to Harry with narrowed eyes and said, "Perhaps you'd benefit from a few hours of studying silently Potter."

That was all? Harry wondered.

"Retrieve your apprentice texts and bring them back here. You have fifteen minutes to be back."

A few hours turned out to mean all day, and after his headache came back behind his left eye before lunch, Harry was regretting his decision to open his big mouth at all. Snape kept him in the dungeon classroom to eat his lunch there, as well as his dinner. Snape brewed while Harry trudged through forty pages of his apprentice text on compositions on the 27 classes of potions, though Harry barely took any of the information in as it was boring as well as hard to concentrate with the pain behind his left eye. He was finally released an hour after dinner at six thirty.

"Bring your books back tomorrow Potter, as well as your black notebooks, a pen and your highlighters and sticky notes. You were so quiet today while reading it appears to be an effective measure in keeping you out of trouble."

Harry groaned but caught himself halfway through and tried to turn it into a fake cough. Snape only gave him a small smile, as though he'd won a private victory against him.

Harry tried to go straight to bed in his dorm that evening, but his headache kept him awake until after ten. When he woke up in the morning the headache was still there, but not as severe as it had been the day before. He knew it would only get worse again as soon as he started to study. If only he knew how to brew a headache potion, he thought. It was the first time he'd really wanted to brew a potion on his own. Polyjuice flashed through his mind, but that had been Hermione's idea, and he didn't want to think about Polyjuice after the comment about it had landed him in study detention all day the day before.

Harry had barely read a few pages after breakfast in the potions classroom before his headache came back full force. He put his hand up to his head to rub around his left eye while he read, but it didn't help much. The pain was sharp and uncomfortable.

Snape wasn't brewing today, he was doing paperwork at the front of the classroom at his own desk and ignored Harry until lunch, which he had the house elves bring to the classroom again that day.

Bending over the desk all day trying to study had also given Harry a crook in his neck and pain between his shoulders, not to mention that it was uncomfortable sitting on a hard wooden stool for that long. At least Snape had a chair to sit in. Harry didn't typically lean over his desk in classes like he had been today, but he had to in order to read while massaging his temple at the same time. The pain in his eye was now traveling all the way back over his head and down his neck. Finally around six that evening it had grown to be too much. Harry hadn't really taken in anything he'd read today either, though he had tried to take notes in an attempt to cut down on his time staring at the apprentice book pages.

Harry sighed in pain and set his book down, bringing both hands up to rub at his temples, which wasn't helping at all.

"You are supposed to be studying," Snape said after a few minutes. He was too busy with his own work to sound as though he cared much at all about Harry's brief break.

"Yes sir." Harry didn't go back to his book though. He couldn't. He needed to stop for the day... for the week even. When he got headaches like this it sometimes lasted all week if he didn't give his eyes a rest. Hermione had thought he'd been trying to skiv out on studying at first when he'd told her about his headaches in second year, but she'd taken pity on him at some point and had started reading aloud to him and Ron when Harry needed a break.

He must have gotten lost in his thoughts, because Snape was talking to him again. He must have taken too long to comply with what he'd been told to do.

"What is wrong Potter?"

"Nothing sir. I'll go back to reading."

Snape sighed as Harry picked up the book and squinted at it, looking miserable. "Why must you be so difficult Potter? You are my responsibility, that means if you are having an issue you are to tell me. You've clearly given up on reading tonight. You've been sitting there for five minutes."

Harry set the book back down and reached up to his left eye again. "It's just a headache sir. I get them sometimes."

"How often is sometimes?"

He wanted to answer him, he did, but the pain was too much at the moment and he gave up instead and put his head down on the table.

"It is that bad?" Snape asked, sounding skeptical as he stood up and came over to the student table Harry was using.

"I had a headache all day yesterday. It got a little better after I slept but it came right back full force as soon as I started reading this morning," Harry said, not lifting his head up. He was hoping the cool surface of the wood table would calm the sharp pain a little, but all it did was hurt his neck more. "It happens when I read too much."

Snape scoffed but didn't say anything else for a few moments. "When was the last time you had your glasses prescription changed?" he finally asked. Harry was only glad he wasn't criticizing him.

"I don't know," Harry said. He'd never been to see an eye doctor. His aunt had brought his glasses home for him one day when he was nine. Just before eleven she'd taken him to the pharmacy to pick out another pair that he could see through better, but not since then.

"A year?" Snape asked.

"Before Hogwarts," Harry said.

"You've been unable to see properly since you started Hogwarts? Why did you not tell your relatives or speak to Madam Pomfrey? She can change your prescription in moments with a combination of potions and charms."

Harry shrugged and regretted the movement as soon as he did so.

"Up. Get up and go to the Hospital Wing."

"I just need to sleep," Harry half pleaded.

"You can go straight to bed after the Hospital Wing."

Harry dreaded climbing the stairs up through the castle to get to the Hospital Wing or to Gryffindor tower. If he had to make his way up through the castle at all, he supposed it would be better to go to the Hospital Wing first. Madam Pomfrey might have a headache potion for him if he did go so he could fall asleep faster tonight.

He was surprised when Snape followed him out of the room and up through the castle. He probably just wanted to ensure that Harry was doing as he had been told and not going straight to Gryffindor tower.

When they entered the Hospital Wing a few minutes later, Madam Pomfrey came out of her office and said, "Hello Harry, Severus. Have you brought me more potions?"

"A patient," Severus said, sounding irritated.

"Oh my, what's happened? Not a potions accident this early into his training I hope?" She had Harry sit on the bed nearest the door, and he promptly let himself fall sideways on it.

"Not an accident. He spent the last two days studying. Apparently he had a headache all day yesterday and neglected to tell anyone. It came back again today. When I asked he said his glasses prescription has been the same since before he came for his first year at Hogwarts."

"Oooh," she hummed in sympathy for Harry. She did a diagnostic spell, asked Harry to open his eyes so she could scan them, scanned his glasses, scanned his left eye again, and then the rest of his body.

"His left eye is severely strained. It's no wonder he has a headache behind it. His right eye looks as though it's just beginning to get strained. I can see the cause. These glasses don't match his prescription at all. The right lens isn't too far off, but the left lens is far weaker than he needs. You've really been unable to see well all this time?" she asked Harry, who was still laying on the bed in pain.

"It's not so bad," he insisted.

She gave him a pain potion followed by an anti-inflammatory potion, and then a nasty tasting muscle relaxant.

"Wait, I can't see out of that eye at all now!" Harry said, panicked.

"I gave you a relaxant that targets your left eye. That eye needs to completely relax and be rested for at least two days or the headache will come right back. I gave you something for the strained muscles in your neck and back as well. It's not healthy to sit hunched over books studying for too long. If you're going to spend long hours studying you should do it from a more comfortable position... on a couch, or in a comfortable chair where you can sit back."

"Hm," Harry agreed, though he didn't say anything about being made to study on a hard uncomfortable stool for two days. If he did Snape would be mad at him for making him look bad.

Harry wanted to watch what she was doing with his glasses, but it was all a blur to him now so she described it for him instead.

"I have a potion that changes the thickness of glass," she said. "I can tell with the spell I used exactly how thick each lens in your glasses needs to be to work well for you. By charming this potion and then dipping your left lens into it for ten seconds, the glass will change and become the right prescription." She counted to ten and then said, "There now. I'll just do the charm again for the right side and," she counted to ten and presumably pulled his glasses free of the potion. She dried them off, cleaned the lenses with a spell, and handed them to Harry to put on. His left eye was completely blurry from the potion she'd given to relax it, but for the first time in his remembrance he could see with crystal clear vision out of his right eye.

"Wow!" Harry said. "It's all so clear!"

"It will be in your other eye as well after the potion wears off in two days."

"Two days?" Harry asked.

"I'm afraid so. At least you'll be able to see with your right eye to navigate, use the restroom, and eat your meals. No reading for the next two days I'm afraid however. That means no studying, and I would think no potion brewing as your sense of depth will be off. It would be dangerous to chop potions ingredients like that."

Snape gave a nod of agreement, though he didn't say anything about it.

"Just relax for a few days," she told him. "From the sounds of it you've done enough studying to tide you over anyhow."

She released him a few minutes later, and Snape didn't mention him needing to stay or go back to the dungeons, so Harry left on his own and went back to Gryffindor. He took a few moments when he came into the empty common room to appreciate just how much detail everything had. He'd seen it all before, but not like he was seeing it now.

He wanted to ignore madam Pomfrey's orders and read a novel, but remembered his desire to go to bed and decided that was the better option.

When he didn't hear from Snape the next morning, Harry opted to stay in the common room all day, skipping breakfast and lunch so he could avoid Umbridge and Snape both. At dinner, a meal appeared on the desk in his dorm room, and Harry was satisfied to have gotten a full day to himself where nothing was expected of him but to rest and heal.

His second day off passed much in the same way, and by the third day, the vision in his left eye had returned to normal... better than normal. He wished he could just spend the next two weeks of summer by himself, but knew if he didn't go to the Dungeons Snape would seek him out and accuse him of wasting time. At least if he was set to long hours of studying now he had a chance to do it without a headache. Maybe he could convince Snape to let him sit in a wooden chair as well instead of on a stool.

To be continued...


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