Severus was one of the few professors to be up and in the Great Hall at the ungodly hour on the first day of classes.

The official excuse was giving out schedules to the students of his house; even as Sprout had boasted more than once that she managed to cultivate a plant which bloomed schedules on a predetermined day, so her students simply had to pick them on their way out (Severus wasn't certain that everything about this type of gardening was strictly legal, but kept that thought to himself); and he knew for a fact that Ravenclaw chickens would spend their first day trying to unstick their schedules from their bags, exchanging elaborate if uncharitable epithets on Flitwick.

But McGonagall handed the schedules out herself, and so Severus did, too. He couldn't guess at her reasons for doing it, but, personally, expected that showing his sleepy, grumpy and dreading the classes students his own sleepy, snarly and dreading the classes all-year-low attitude was a great incentive for the incoming term. He had seen the prefects the night before, and their reports had been satisfactory; his presence in person wouldn't be amiss, however.

“Good morning, Severus.” Minerva pulled out a chair next to him and seated herself, offering a tight smile. “You ran away awfully fast last evening, I didn't manage to congratulate you on your new acquisition.”

“You, too, McGonagall?” Severus looked at her, half-exasperated, half-wary, nursing his cup of bitter tea. It wasn't a warm greeting by any means, but much better than the 'Just take him!' that tried to reach his vocal cords instead.

“Oh, don't dramatise it for me. There couldn't have been that many people talking to you between the Sorting and now, taking into account your general pleasantness, multiplied by the beginning of the year.” Her smile was slightly more pronounced now, like she had been trying to restrain it. “Well, to tell the truth, even Dumbledore didn't try to be overly radiant this time; I've no definite idea as to why – perhaps, the security concerns, – but Pomona thinks it was a nice change of pace.”

Her words brought Severus' mind into focus, and suddenly he didn't want to give anyone over to McGonagall. Not overly radiant – he had noticed that. It seemed almost certain that his plans turned out to be contradicting those of Albus; and he recalled that he had decided to be stubborn in this case. Severus was hazy on the details of the decision at the moment, but was quite confident that they included his students remaining his students.

“But honestly, Severus,” Minerva continued, “I find the whole situation extremely amusing – don't you dare glare at me, – as long as you don't use it as a vehicle for some or other sort of convoluted revenge.”

Misreading something in his face, she added hastily, “Yes, yes, it's safe to say you won't. I reckon that if a child liked you enough not to be distressed by meeting you for a second time, much less facing the prospect of your constant supervision for the next seven years... You two, most probably, are off to a good start.”

“You must be joking,” the younger professor muttered, pushing his cup away in disgust. The tea had turned cold.

Meanwhile, Dumbledore was entering the hall and heading towards them. Him. Suppressing the instinct to flee immediately, he waited till the headmaster was about to sit, no other way around it, and then excused himself, picking up the pile of glossy sheets. He resolutely didn't look back: a good plan for a confrontation was yet to be developed.

He rounded the table and went along the row of Slytherins. Ahead of him, akin to a sound wave of his steps, students stirred, straightened and murmured their greetings, turning their heads towards the professor. There weren't an awful lot of them at such an early hour, but the presence ratio was better than at the other tables, and all of the first years were sitting at the far end, presided over by the iron-willed Weaver girl. Not a bad choice of a prefect for this bunch, he felt.

Severus distributed what he could, leaving the rest of the stack with the prefects responsible, before approaching the Weaver group. Of the girls, only the unmistakable Parkinson breed was recognisable, but all of the boys were more or less familiar snotty nuisances this year. Looking over the children, he caught himself frowning minutely and thinking that for some, the undoubtedly giant effort spent in training them in perfect table manners would have been better applied elsewhere. For example, to attitude correction.

He glanced at Potter and saw him aborting a yawn and straightening up, as the boy noticed him in turn. Their eyes met for a moment, and, to Severus' horror, Potter gave him a tentative smile. He made a short forbidding jerk with his head and broke the contact.

Harry blinked, swallowed his confusion and said his greetings with the other students, as Professor Snape gave them the timetables.

“Don't be late for your classes. See you on Friday,” was all that the man said, before turning and leaving the hall through one of the side doors.

~HH~HH~HH~HH~

“I say, take it,” insisted Theo, nibbling on a piece of chocolate. “Take it, check for curses and hexes, and then eat. Better yet, check for curses, then take it.”

“But we didn't this time,” Harry pointed out. He hadn't opened any of the assorted candy in his bag. “Anyway, I don't know how.”

Theo stopped chewing. “An oversight on my part, I admit.” He looked at the half still in his hand. “I know a couple of useful spells, but we definitely should hit the library for more, just in case.”

“You should check for poisons, too,” said Greg, catching up to them and falling into step on Harry's other side. Vincent, following Draco, was farther ahead, near Prefect Deena and the girls. “And for normal potions, if possible. Trust me, Vince likes to mix jokes into my sweets; once, I was green all over for a week.”

Theo frowned in thought: apparently, the concept of joke candy didn't quite fit into his worldview.

Harry sighed. “I'm not sure what to think. They don't even know me.”

“Everyone –-” Theo began with a roll of his eyes.

“---knows me. Only not really.”

The banquet and the sorting hadn't been the end of it. Any time when Harry ventured out of the lower levels, it was to a whirlpool of susurration. 'See him? The short one... His scar is like a snake, no wonder... Scary... All of them...'

The practical Theo had told him that having his way cleared by the power of sheer superstition was convenient.

To his profound relief, the professors were more or less indifferent towards him. Well, he thought that Professor McGonagall had watched him with interest and the tiny Head of Ravenclaw had lost his footing on a stack of books in excitement, but What's-his-name Binns overcompensated for it by being incorporeal and totally ignorant of his students, his lesson plans, the time of year and, probably, the century.

And last night, passing through the common room with Theo, he had been waved over by a merry group of older students sharing someone's birthday gift of a large box of sweets, it'd turned out. An astonished Harry, hands loaded with candy, had been patted on the head more than once and solemnly instructed to grow taller soon, because the house image should be preserved in the new generation.

Finally, they came to the Potions classroom. Deena left them with a good-natured warning about clashing with Gryffindors, and they filtered in. Their counterparts soon followed, with Professor Snape on their heels.

Not bothering to sit, he grabbed a journal from his desk and began taking the register, in his usual quiet talking voice. In the classroom, it carried. Actually, the only time Harry had heard him raising it was at Aunt Petunia's prompt.

The boy looked over the other house. They hadn't had the other lessons together, and on Monday night, over the Charms homework, Theo had speculated wildly why they should meet in such a potentially hazardous class. Vincent had put an end to it by stating that if the other kids behaved, it was no concern of Slytherins, and if they didn't, woe unto them, the home air of dungeons and all.

So far, some of the boys merely tried to glare through Harry, which wasn't a big health threat, because they quickly turned away when he glanced back at them. Draco didn't, but then, Draco's glare was of glazed, reflective variety he always projected to some measure anyway.

“Ah, yes,” the professor said, as if remembering something, and Harry realised his name was being called. “Potter, Harry. Our new – asset.”

Things suddenly and rapidly went downhill from there. It never occurred to Harry that they could have done it much more spectacularly, and it wouldn't have been a comfort if it had.