The next two weeks flew by in a fit of sunny weather as summer ended, followed by several cold, windy, rainy nights as fall was determined to make it’s presence known.

By now Hermione had found several other books for Harry to read on both Muggle and Wizard survival (something none of them had expected to find a single book on). The Muggle survival books contained more about camping and starting fires with no matches or wand, and the wizard survival portion of the stack consisted of certain tree roots and barks, as well as certain berries and other plants that you could cook in a fire that would substitute for food, and would also boost your energy or heal minor cuts and scrapes. Harry found the salve that Snape had made in the Shadowland towards the middle of one of the books, and made sure to memorize its ingredients and how it was made. Neville also made it a point to meet them in the library every night. While Hermione hadn’t gotten him caught up to where Harry and Ron were yet, he was definitely doing better on his Potion’s essays, and was now turning in twice the amount of work he had been, and getting twice as good a grade.

In the last couple of weeks, the Gryffindor Quidditch team met no more magical resistance when they played, but Harry also noticed that Draco had now taken to following him around in the halls, most especially any time he went down to the dungeons to pick up or drop off papers. This annoyed Harry at first, Draco following him around, scowling at him all the time, but soon Harry had decided to have a little bit of fun with it, leading Draco in circles until he tired of Harry’s game, and left him alone. The first time Harry had done this, making several circuits around the Transfiguration corridor, Draco didn’t seem to understand, but the second time, Draco got angry quickly, and decided that it wasn’t worth bothering Harry, if he was going to be bothered himself, even in such a round about way.

Harry was proud of himself for making Draco leave him alone, but found himself sorely displeased to find out the next day that he was followed not by Draco, but be five or six Slytherins everywhere he went.

“What’s this about?” Ron asked him as he stomped on Crabbe’s hand at lunch as he tried to grab Harry’s bag from under the bench as he walked by.

Harry shook his head. “At first I just thought Draco was following me around to tick me off, but now I know he was just doing it to see what my schedule was. Everywhere I turn a new group of Slytherins takes over following me!”

Ron cursed, and Hermione shook her head in disgust. “Harry, one of these times they are going to get your bag and even though they can’t get in, they’re still going to have the papers you need to grade.”

Harry frowned. “What am I supposed to do? Grade down in the dungeon?” Harry didn’t like that thought at all. So far he had managed to avoid Professor Snape fairly well with the exception of the minute and a half he saw him each day to pick up or deliver graded papers. A minute and a half was a lot better than hours on end, though at least they were being civil to each other now, he told himself quietly.

As the day wore on however, the prospect of grading papers in the dungeons was seeming better and better to the alternative. Midway through Transfiguration class, Harry reached down to get another bottle of ink from his bag, and found it missing. He spotted it on the other side of the class under Ken Montague’s desk, and shook his head. On the way out of class, Harry hurried over and picked his bag up to no protest of Ken, who only glared as Harry walked by. “Thanks for keeping this safe for me,” he commented quietly as he passed.

Out on the grounds for Care of Magical Creatures class with Hagrid, the Slytherins they had class with seized every opportunity to nick the bag whenever Harry wasn’t looking because he was trying to care for his baby Clabbert, which was a hairless creature that looked something like a monkey. Twice Ron had to leap on the bag to keep it from being pulled away by magic, and once Hermione uttered a quiet curse that sent Pansy Parkinson to the hospital wing with great boils in a place she refused to show Hagrid or any other class member.

“This is getting ridiculous,” Harry said to himself directly after a massive seventh year Slytherin he only knew as Hans shoved into Harry in the hallway on his way to dinner, and tried to forcefully remove the bag from his shoulder. Harry had already had his wand out though and spoke a quick jinx on Hans that bound his arms to his side, and made his feet move in a quick jig. The seventh year Slytherin looked very odd, dancing about, but not moving his arms.

“Nice Jinx Harry,” Seamus told him as he passed by and went into the Great hall. Harry leaned against the wall and let his head fall back against it. Suddenly not feeling hungry anymore, he decided to seize the opportunity to dash up to the Library, where he felt that he might escape the Slytherins for just long enough to complete grading the second year papers.

Inside the library, Harry peered around corners and bookshelves cautiously, wary for anybody that might be waiting for him, or for any Slytherins that might have tried to follow him. Finding nobody, Harry chose a secluded dark corner right near the forbidden section of the Library, hoping that nobody would find him there. Harry hadn’t even had a chance to undo the buckle on his bag though, before a soft voice met his ears.

“Harry?”

Harry spun around, only to find Cho, a seventh year Ravenclaw behind him, smiling brightly. Harry and Cho had dated in Harry’s fifth year, although it hadn’t turned out very well, and had ended with Cho running in tears from Madam Pudifoots café in Hogsmead.

Relieved that it wasn’t a Slytherin trying to snatch his bag, Harry relaxed a little, and said, “Oh, hi Cho.”

Cho motioned with her hand to the seat next to Harry on the bench, as if asking if it were ok for her to take a seat, and Harry nodded, “Oh, go ahead, I’m here alone.” Cho’s smile widened as she gracefully took the seat next to Harry. Harry hadn’t thought about Cho in quite a while, but now that she was there, he was taking notice of how beautiful she was again.

“So-” Harry started, “how, how was your summer? I mean, mine wasn’t-” but before he could stammer on anymore, Cho had moved in, and had Harry in a passionate kiss. Harry was surprised, but not displeased, and did nothing to stop her. After a moment, Cho pulled back, leaving Harry wondering if he had suddenly become a bad kisser or something to make her stop.

Cho looked around, and said, “So, you have a new job I heard?”

Harry looked around to where she had looked, directly at the empty table in front of him, and then at his bag. Harry nodded, “Sure, I-” he paused, wondering what this was about again. He was sure that the Slytherins hadn’t made her do this, but he wasn’t exactly sure what her motives were for suddenly taking an interest in Harry again.

“I have NEWT Potions this year with Professor Snape,” she said randomly, “I guess you’ve seen my essays then?”

Harry frowned, not liking where this was going. Just to see where it would end up, he replied, “Oh yeah, I get to grade those too. Professor Snape said I was smart enough to grade first through seventh year.”

Cho leaned in to him a little further, and put her head on Harry’s shoulder. “It’s good to know that someone capable is grading our papers for once-” Harry suddenly stood up, almost letting Cho topple to the floor.

“What are you getting at Cho?” he asked her directly, not caring if her feelings got hurt.

Cho was taken aback. “I only, I just, thought you might be able, to help?” She had lost her confidence in the statement by the end, until she was only talking in a feeble whisper.

Harry looked away. “I don’t grade sixth or seventh year papers Cho,” Harry told her.

Cho looked up at him and sat back, shocked that Harry had deceived her. “You lied?” she asked a little angrily.

“Yeah, that’s right, just like you lied and played with my emotions to see if I would cheat for you and grade you unfairly.” With this Harry didn’t give her time to respond, and instead grabbed up his bag and stormed away. What Cho had done was five times as worse as what Draco was trying to do by getting his bag. Cho was trying to get his heart, and then use it against him.

Careful to avoid the corridor with the portal to Shadowland when he was in this much of a temper, Harry made the dungeons in five minutes time. Although the Potions Master’s door was open, Harry didn’t knock as he usually did to announce his presence, and instead, angrily strode in and plopped down in the visitor’s chair without a word, dropping his bag beside him, the only place he knew it would be safe.

Snape watched all of this curiously, wondering what had gotten they boy in so much of a temper, and what would possess him to come to him, instead of one of his friends, or even his own head of house.

“Something the matter Mr. Potter?” Snape asked him cautiously when Harry was still musing over his thoughts a minute later, and had still not said anything.

Harry’s head snapped up, and his eyes met the Professors. Why did he care? Then Harry remembered that he was in his office.

Harry looked away, the anger ebbing from him again all too quickly.

The look that Harry had gotten in his eyes just before he had looked down startled the Potions Master. It was one of hurt and confusion. A look he had never seen Harry wear, not even the night that he had reappeared with the body of Cedric at the end of the Tri-Wizard Tournament.

“Harry?” the Professor prompted, startling himself when he used the boy’s first name.

Harry still didn’t look up. He was trying to master his emotions and failing miserably. He didn’t understand how one person could make a persons anger go away so quickly, and bring back so many unhappy memories at the same time. Dumbledore had a way about him to do that to Harry, whether he meant to or not, but why was Snape able to? Even though Harry’s thoughts were lead back to all the times he’d been treated unfairly or cruelly by all of the Slytherins, or his uncle, or even Snape, he felt a small bit of calm come over him.

“I’m sorry Professor,” Harry said, trying to get up and leave.

As always, Snape stopped him though. “Wait Potter.” With a flick of his wand, his office door was closed, and Harry plopped back down into the seat, unhappy, and hoping that he wasn’t going to feel trapped now that the door was closed. After a moment, no such feelings came to him, so Harry relaxed a little, and was content to sit there so long as he didn’t have to say anything.

“Now,” Snape said, Harry still not looking up at him again, “you are the one who came storming into my office, remember? This leads me to believe that something must be either horribly wrong with the world, and you are now considering me worthy to talk to, or, something is still horribly wrong with the world, and you now consider me the only option. Which is it?”

Harry shook his head, unwilling to answer, as he wasn’t sure of the answer himself. “I don’t know sir,” he told him quietly, examining the edge of the desk in front of him instead of looking all the way up to meet the Professor’s eyes again.

Snape sat back and thought a moment, and then asked, “Do you have the second year papers graded yet?”

Harry shook his head, and the Professor said, “Do so now then.”

Without hesitating, Harry pulled the papers out of his bag, and set them on the desk along with his quill and some blue ink. Grading in the Professor’s office was much better than talking to him and telling him all of the rotten things the Slytherins, and then Cho, had done to him that week.

Severus sat back to watch him grade, not having any grading to do himself. In fact, a few moments more and he would have left and gone to his private study if Potter had not come storming in. Looking around for something to busy himself with instead of dwelling on the boy who would not talk, Snape espied the Wizard Wilderness survival book he was in the middle of reading, and picked it up.

A half-hour later Harry finished the papers, and finally looked up, his mind off of Cho and Draco. Across the desk Harry noticed the book that he was reading. Before he could stop himself, Harry blurted out, “Hey! I haven’t seen that one yet! No wonder Hermione hasn’t been able to find it!”

Snape looked at Harry over the top of the book before lowering it. “Explain,” Severus told him, watching him curiously, as the boy’s mood had changed over the course of 45 minutes from distressed and angry, to almost amiable again.

Harry pointed to the book and said, “Ron and I have been studying every night in the Library with Hermione, and a week ago she gave us a break and brought out some Muggle and Wizard survival books for us to look at. That’s the only one she said that she knew the Library had, but she couldn’t find.”

Snape looked back down at the book he was holding. “You have also been reading survival books?”

Harry shrugged and looked down at the papers he had just finished grading for a moment. “We thought it might be good to know, just in case.”

Snape nodded. “My thoughts were also lead to that conclusion,” he said plainly. There was a moment of silence, before Snape asked, “What were you studying before that?”

Harry looked up again, and said reluctantly, “Potions.”

Snape raised a brow, but before he could say anything, Harry rambled on, “Hermione was put out that I got offered this job, and Ron thought that maybe it was because she was used to being the smartest one, even though she’s usually the reason me and Ron pass most of our classes, because she’s the one who looks over our papers before we turn them in. So, so to get her to talk to me again, I asked her to tutor me because you said you were going to grade me twice as hard, and Ron agreed to it too to make her feel useful again.”

There was another pause as Snape considered this as being the reason that the boy and his friends were now getting exemplary grades in Potions. “How far ahead of the lessons are you?” Snape finally asked him.

Harry shrugged. “Hermione reckons six weeks, but she’s had us reading texts that have potions and ingredients we’re not even going to study this year.”

“And you three have been doing this in your spare time?”

Harry nodded, “Us and Neville wanted extra help, so we told him he could sit in… we just study a couple of hours a night in the Library after we finish our other homework…” Harry trailed away, unsure if he was in trouble or not, though he couldn’t figure out why he would be. Suddenly the possibility of being in trouble by Snape was a lot worse than it had used to be however, not because of punishment, but because suddenly Harry felt the urge not to disappoint the man.

Snape nodded, and then looked down at his watch. “It is only seven in the evening. If you wish to grade the third year papers, you may stay and do so, but you do not have to. You are free as always to take them and grade them where you wish.”

Harry frowned. He didn’t want to worry about the Slytherins grabbing his bag everywhere he went for another week, and he would have to if he carried the assignments around with him.

After another moment’s thought, Harry looked up and asked, “Can I come back and grade them tomorrow night sir?”

Snape nodded after a moment, and then said, “Yes, but, is there a reason why you now wish to grade them here?”

Harry decided that he may as well know, and launched into the story about how people (although he did not mention the Slytherins) had been trying to grab his bag for the last few weeks, and how it was students who had been looking for the papers that had wrecked all of his clothes and his and Ron’s furniture in their dorm. He skipped the part about Cho however, as he didn’t think he could even handle thinking about it at the moment.

Snape thought a moment, and then told him, “Perhaps it is better that you grade the papers here then,” he paused, and then continued, “I suggest that if you want to get these students to leave you alone, that you remove whatever spell you have placed on your bag, and let somebody take it. It may prompt them to stop following you when they find that you are no longer carrying the papers with you. Also, you may want to make it known, that you do not grade papers above fourth year.”

Harry’s shoulders slumped a little, and he thought of telling him that he had already told Cho about that, but thought better of it, and said, “Yes sir. Thanks for the idea sir.”

With that Harry stood, and wondered if Snape would stop him. He did not, so Harry moved for the door, and said, “Tomorrow night sir.”

Snape nodded, and Harry left.

That night, Harry had strange dreams. Cho was at the foot of Harry’s bed in his aunt and uncle’s house in Little Whinging, standing undressed, and whispering something that Harry couldn’t hear. Harry told her to go away, and she vanished instantly, although the whispering still remained. In a desperate attempt to get the whispering to stop so that he could sleep in peace, the dream Harry rose from his bed, and began searching his room for the source of it. On his desk, he found a book that was entitled, “Shadowland: The Beginning to All Things.” When he opened it, the whispering grew louder and more clear so that Harry could hear it in his dark room. “I am coming Harry Potter, as an icy wind that cuts through the trees at night, a stalker in the dark, I am coming, and you will fall to the Dark Lord.”

The dream Harry tried to step back from his desk in Little Whinging to escape the horrible whisper, but still it only grew louder, “I am coming, I am coming, and you will fall to the Dark Lord!”

Harry awoke and sat straight up in his four-poster, sweat pouring down his face. He looked around him, and felt comforted by seeing the familiar room at Hogwarts. His watch read 4:30. Harry flopped back down onto his bed, and tried to sleep again, finding that he was unable to until it was almost time to get up for breakfast.

That day Harry did as the Professor had suggested. He removed the spell from his bag, and made sure there wasn’t anything valuable in there that he couldn’t afford to replace. When a timid third year Slytherin girl made an attempt to grab his bag at lunch that morning, Harry grabbed Ron before he could stomp on her hand, and instead looked down at her as she took it, and said, “Tell Draco that I am only grading papers in Professor Snape’s office now, and will no longer be carrying them around with me. Tell him also, that I do not grade papers above fourth year.”

The girl ran off directly after Harry had finished speaking, and Ron gave him an odd look.

“Don’t worry about it,” Harry told him.

Up at the staff table, Severus Snape watched the tired looking Harry stop his friend from crushing one of his younger students, and was thankful that he wouldn’t have to walk down to their table and chastise him. Somehow he just didn’t think that it would make his Teachers Aid feel any more inclined to do better work if he was harsh on his best friend.