Potions and Snitches
Snape and Harry Gen Fanfiction Archive

Chapter 7: One Question, One Answer

Harry followed Snape all the way back to Dumbledore’s office, hiding behind him as Snape pulled him to the office impatiently. As he dragged Harry up the stairs, Harry let himself begin to hope that the professor might be able to convince Dumbledore to let him keep the wand. It was singing to him, in his hand, like a much more pleasant version of elevator music to go through his head, and Harry hid it in a robe pocket before he entered the room. If Snape lost, Harry still wouldn’t give it over without a fight.

Dumbledore was sitting at his desk, staring at papers, when Professor Snape slammed his hand down on the desk.

“You—“ he shot out, and Dumbledore held up a hand.

“Severus, please—“

“You know that once a wand chooses no other wand will work the same. You know that to some children—“ here Snape’s gaze sharpened and Dumbledore looked mildly ashamed, and Harry wondered what sort of magic that was, to give the professor that power, “—bonding to wands is faster and more intense than to others. And you know that this is one of those cases, and you know why, and you try to deny the boy that, when it’s your fault he’s been denied so much else?”

Dumbledore had taken it until then, looking more and more cowered until he burst out, weakly, “I don’t know anything at all, Severus!”

And the professor snapped back, “That’s the truth.”

And Harry was staring in awe at the professor who had somehow, magically turned the tables. Who had defended Harry (Harry!), and Harry felt himself start to like this professor more and more.

“Harry,” the Headmaster said, and Harry bit his lip and looked at the sad, lined face. “Harry, I was trying to do it for you.”

Snape snorted, and Dumbledore shot a glare at him. “As Professor McGonnagal told you yesterday, Voldemort—“

“He killed my mum and dad,” Harry said, to prove he’d listened.

Dumbledore nodded. “Yes, and the curse he cast on them was cast with a very powerful wand. And in that wand, there was a phoenix feather who came from the same bird.”

“But, my wand isn’t his, is it? So why should it matter?”

Dumbledore slumped and smiled at him, softly. “As Master Ollivander beat into my head profusely once you had left. And I knew that, deep down, but I merely—I wanted to protect you, Harry. Your wand and his are brothers, and I didn’t want him to have that kind of claim over you.”

Harry shrugged and said, quietly, “I think he already has a claim on me, Headmaster.”

Dumbledore nodded with pained eyes. “I know. I just wanted to protect you, Harry. You know that, right?”

And Harry looked the old man in the eyes and he said yes.

But he was lying.

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The afternoon went by quickly, with Harry trying on and putting away his robes, pyjamma’s, and uniforms, and looking through his new textbooks on his bed. Every now and then his mind would get a little worried about his detention tonight, but he would just push it today. He’s been through worse, he kept telling himself.

Dinner was a very pleasant affair, as Ron and Seamus were off serving detention with Professor Sprout (Seamus had, apparently, poked a rather irritable plant with a very pointy stick, and Ron had simply been standing next to him when the plant attacked.).

“Four hours,” Neville said as he fed Trevor lettuce. “Four glorious, Seamus-free hours.”

“For giving the plants indigestion,” Dean added, and all three boys laughed into their food. Neville poked Harry into having one piece of steak and four little roasted potatoes.

“Hogwarts must have potatoes every night,” Harry said blissfully before downing a glass of pumpkin juice.

Dean shrugged. “I guess. We’ve had them for five meals in a row now, though, I wonder when they let off.”

Harry, Neville, and Dean spent the whole meal laughing, Dean and Harry talking all about weird Muggle things while Neville listened in awe. Neville was visibly shuddering as Dean and Harry told him all about the dentist and drilling for cavities.

“They do not!” Neville said, shaking his head. “You’re taking the mickey, they don’t do that!”

Harry cocked his head. “What do they do here, then?” He remembered last night and his discussion with Madam. “Just stick their wand in your mouth and kazam, gone?”

“Pretty much,” Neville said. “Oh, oh, that’s horrible! Drilling your teeth!”

“You should ask Hermione,” Dean said, looking around. “She’s probably in the library. Her parents are dentists, she probably knows all the gory details!”

Neville simply shuddered and packed more roasted potatoes in his mouth. “Oh, how gross,” he said again.

The boys finished relatively quickly after that, and Dean and Neville started to head up to the dorm, talking about the Potions essay they had to do.

“Coming, Harry?” Neville asked, looking expectant, and Harry felt a jab in him as he shook his head.

“No, I, erm, have detention.”

Neville looked shocked and Dean looked impressed. “How?” Dean asked. “You havent been to any classes yet! Who’s it with?”

Harry tried to think up a suitable lie and failed. “Uhm, Professor Snape—“

The other two immediately stopped questioning, and Dean patted him sympathetically on the shoulder. “Don’t worry, mate, he’s not that bad.”

Neville nodded, but not very enthusiastically. “Erm—right. He’s, he’s not…” But he seemed unable to finish his sentence, and he just nodded. “Right.” He started to dejectedly head up to the Common Room, and Dean ran after him.

“Hey, Nev, wait up!”

“Dean? But—“ Neville clearly looked confused, and Dean simply shrugged.

“Ron and Seamus are arses. I’ll hang out with you. I’ve not quite finished the Herbology paper, your whiz at that, right?”

“Uh, I guess,” Neville said softly, and Harry gave a small smile as he headed to detention, content his friend was not alone.

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Severus was debating whether or not to go through with this.

It was cruel, he heard one part of his mind say. It was cruel to blackmail the boy with the threat of taking away his wand, his magic, it was cruel to pry secrets from a boy obviously unwilling, and it was crueler than cruel to be toying with the idea that, if the boy didn’t give him the right answers, a hit of Legilimency might not go astray.

But Severus knew this boy. This boy wanted people to know, wanted people to help, but he didn’t know how to get it or why he might deserve that help, and he had no reason to even expect it might be given freely. So it would have to be this, bartering, this for that until Snape had the answer he wanted.

And he kept wondering—what if he didn’t get the answer he wanted? What if he’d projected himself in that little boy because he’d himself once almost been lost in London, because he himself had been so desperate at eleven for attention that they listened to the first voice that came.

But also, he knew he wasn’t that boy. Because, above all, that boy was a Potter. And Severus Snape could never be anything like a Potter.

He was still mulling these thoughts over when he heard the small, tentative knock at his door.

He got up and went to answer it. Whatever he had been thinking of doing instead, it was gone now. It was too late to go back.

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Harry sat down awkwardly in the chair as he heard Snape mutter the same thing at the door he had that afternoon. Was it a spell? Harry wondered what it would do, and he hoped it wasn’t anything bad.

Severus Snape was scowling at him from across the desk and looking very peeved that it didn’t seem to cow Harry.

“Three questions, three answers, Potter. That’s the agreement. Three completely truthful answers.”

Harry nodded and bit his lip at the hungry look in Snape’s eye. Maybe this would be worse than he thought.

“Why did you run away from the Dursley’s?” Severus asked, and he frowned as he watched the brat in front of him struggle with an answer.

Harry phrased his answer very carefully. “I—I don’t know why I ran away from the Dursleys, sir.”

Severus narrowed his eyes. “That’s not the answer you gave the headmaster.”

“No, sir.”

“Why did you lie to the headmaster?”

“Is that my second question?” Harry asked, and he almost fell out of his chair when Snape slammed a hand down on the desk.

He had forgotten. This was a new place, new rules, and he had let himself forget because everyone was so nice, but he knew that some rules were the same everywhere, and so he looked at his hands and tried to think of some way to evade the question.

“Do you think this is some kind of game, Potter?” Snape spat out, furious. “Do you think that just because you’re a celebrity, I have to bow down to you as well? Ah, I see, that’s it.”

Harry looked up. “What’s it, sir?”

“Why you ran away.” The words stung Harry deep, but he ignored it.

“What do you—“

“You ran away because you weren’t the center of attention twenty-four hours a day.” Harry felt his temper grow. He didn’t mind being accused of things that were at least halfway true, but he wasn’t—that wasn’t the way it was. Snape should know that.

“Your aunt and uncle, they had their own lives to live, didn’t they? And I believe you have a cousin—“ Harry clenched his fists, “—and I bet that you couldn’t take that your aunt and uncle didn’t adopt you, elevate you over their own son—“

“No,” Harry whispered, but Snape kept on. He knew that this, one way or another, would reveal something.

“They just couldn’t raise you high enough, could they? They didn’t see you for who you are, what you are—a celebrity. The Boy who Lived. And they didn’t treat you special—“

“Stop it.”

“They just treated you the same as everyone else, and you couldn’t stand it. You couldn’t even bear to think of it, of treating a scummy little Muggle as your equal—“

“It wasn’t like that!”

“So you thought, I’ll make them pay. You thought, I’ll make them realize how special I am. So you ran away—“ Harry started to shake with anger. How could he have been so wrong about Snape? “You ran away to London where you thought everyone would bow down to you, little boy king—“

“That’s not how it was!”

“And you realized that you weren’t special. You were just some greedy, unclean, arrogant beggar boy. I bet you weren’t above letting someone haul you off for an hour and a few pounds, because they should want to touch you, shouldn’t they?”

Harry remembered the man who had just taken him and looked, the way he’d run for weeks from the man and himself, and he screamed “Stop it! Stop it, that’s wrong!”

And Snape said, slippery as an eel, “Oh, do set me right , then, Potter? Tell me, tell me the noble reason that you ran away and caused your relatives such worry. I believe they told Dumbledore they trolled the streets for hours, yelling your name. I bet you heard them yelling and you laughed at them, at their pain—“

“If they had called I would have come running—“

“You ignored them and decided to wait for someone better to come along—“

“No, I told you, that’s wrong!”

The volume was getting louder and louder and Harry felt near the verge of explosion. “So tell me then, Potter. Tell me the right thing, oh great and powerful—“

“THEY DIDN’T WANT ME!” Harry screamed, and with that the door blasted off its hinges and the cupboards all exploded and Harry made a mad dash for the gaping hole that used to be the door. The locking and warding spell, however, held fast, and when Harry ran straight into it, it propelled him backwards where he fell, in a crumpled heap, crying.

Severus Snape looked down in shock, and he wondered if maybe he should have let the boy go.

“They didn’t want me—“ Harry whispered, and Severus simply got up from his desk and went to the boy.

“They never—“ Harry started, and he stopped when he felt a hand rest lightly, tentatively, on his shoulder. He turned and saw Snape, and instead of being angry he launched himself at Professor Snape like he was Professor McGonnagal, wrapping his arms around his waist and sobbing into the mans robes, which smelled comforting, like his cupboard.

Severus, unsure of what to do, patted the boy on the back twice then stood there, wooden, as the broken little boy (who may have been Harry Potter and may have been Severus Snape, he wasn’t quite sure anymore) cried into his robes and Severus wondered if this had been the right course of action.

After a few minutes, when the sobs had died down, Snape pushed Harry away awkwardly.

“Pull yourself together, Mr. Potter. We have two more questions left.”

Harry wiped his face, took a shaky breath, and nodded. “Yes, sir.”


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