Snape got Harry and Teddy back to the Slytherin dormitory early the next morning so that they could change clothes and head to the Great Hall with the other first years. Or at least, that was Snape’s plan for them. Luckily Teddy and Harry had their own room together, so there was no need to involve any of the other first year boys that morning. True to the plan, they did shower and change, but instead of waiting for their classmates, they made for breakfast on their own.
Harry had quite a developed sense of direction, thanks to his years wandering the streets of London by himself. When he wasn’t living at the Dursleys, which was most of the time from age eight onwards, he spent living on his own, responsible only to himself.
No one noticed the two first years slipping out of their dormitory that day, and they met no one else on their way to breakfast. True to his word, Harry took them directly there, keeping them from getting lost the entire way.
It wasn’t until after they had left breakfast and headed for their first class that the staring began. Teddy informed him later that there had been whispers as well, but Harry hadn’t noticed. He’d been too focused on finding his classes.
There were a hundred and forty-two staircases at Hogwarts, which he knew because he had had time to count them while being stuck on them during the course of his first day. Teddy thought he was crazy for doing it, but he preferred to know what his options were.
There were wide sweeping staircases, which weren’t so bad, because Harry could manoeuvre his crutch easily on them without being crushed by the other students. On the other hand, after taking three narrow and rickety ones, he vowed to either find alternate routes or learn how to fly. They were hair-raising to climb. He could feel the creaking of the steps through his feet, and with his crutch in the way, it meant that there could only be one way for the traffic to move. No one could go past him, although several larger Gryffindor boys had tried, only to fail when he expertly jabbed his foot into the last one’s arse; causing them all to fall over like a set of dominoes.
They discovered that some of the staircases led somewhere different on Friday, and some seemed to be booby trapped to catch your foot. All in all, Harry found the staircases to be a little too sentient than what he was used to, and what he’d prefer to deal with on a regular basis.
As if that weren’t bad enough, the doors seemed to enjoy playing with the students as well. Some wouldn’t open unless you asked politely—Nott figured those out first, since Harry couldn’t hear the other students asking. There were also doors that wouldn’t open unless you tickled them in exactly the right spot, like the entrance to the kitchens that they found their third day in.
It helped that they’d been following the Weasley twins and seen them tickle the pear, but it was still a thrill to know something that their classmates were completely unaware of.
Then of course, there were the doors that weren’t really doors at all, but just solid walls pretending. Harry discovered early on that he had a knack for detecting which was which though. He could smell a difference in the air next to a real door, and the air next to a pretending wall just didn’t smell the same. It was thanks to that talent that they figured out several shortcuts through the castle.
Unfortunately, everything also seemed to move around a lot, which made it hard to get a full concept of how everything fit together. Luckily, Harry’s experience from his time on the streets worked in his favour once again; so even when the suits of armour randomly changed positions with each other, he still seemed to be able to find where he was going with a minimum of fuss.
Their most boring class was easily History of Magic, which hopefully was the only one taught by a ghost. Luckily for him, Binns was unusually solid in appearance, and therefore Harry was still able to read his lips. Of course, that didn’t mean that he actually gave a damn about the goblin wars, but if he wanted to, the option was at least there. Thus far, with the exception of Binns and the Bloody Baron, he had largely found the other ghosts incomprehensible.
. . .
Harry and Teddy were walking to the greenhouses behind the castle to study Herbology one Wednesday afternoon, when suddenly someone who was walking behind him shoved hard into his shoulder. He pivoted around, using his crutch as a support and saw that it was none other than the idiot Gryffindor boy, Ronald something or other.
“Oh, I’m SORRY,” the boy said with a grin, laughing to a few of his friends as he did. The other boy didn’t seem to care one whit that he had nearly pushed Harry facedown into the muddy earth.
“Prat,” Teddy muttered beside him.
Harry didn’t respond, he just continued to stare until the boy got uncomfortable and moved ahead of him. Then he snorted and turned to Teddy with an eyebrow cocked. “Must be pretty hard for him to see, don’t you think? I mean, what with this head up his arse and all.”
The rest of the Slytherins around him burst into sudden laughter, snickering the rest of the walk to their class, and then smirking every time they saw the redheaded boy do anything stupid for the rest of the hour.
The only one who didn’t laugh was Malfoy, and like the Gryffindor boy, Harry vowed to keep a closer eye on him.
. . .
The class that Harry was really looking forwards to, aside from Potions, was Transfiguration. As luck would have it, the stern faced woman that had been in charge of Sorting turned out to be the professor that taught that class.
"Transfiguration is some of the most complex and dangerous magic you will learn at Hogwarts," she told them, her eyes flicking over each of them in turn. She gave them a rundown of the basics, not much different from what he had read in the book, and then they began on their first practical lesson.
Harry raised his hand as most of his classmates started to work on changing their matchsticks to needles.
“Yes, Mr. Potter?” She asked, coming over to his desk and staring down her nose at him.
“Professor, I was wondering if it was necessary to use one’s wand for transfiguration,” he said, unaware that the room had fallen silent around him.
“As the use of one’s wand is a means of channelling your magical ability into something more concrete and finite, I would have to say yes it is, Mr. Potter,” she answered carefully, her eyes back and forth across his face curiously.
“Yes ma’am,” he murmured, putting his head back down towards his assignment.
At the end of the class, Hermione Granger was the only one who had managed to cause any change in her matchstick, having caused the end to turn silver and pointy. For this, McGonagall awarded her points. Harry didn’t care about the points, but he was interested in the small proud smile she gave the girl when she found out what she had done.
He waited until the rest had filed out—Teddy having promised to wait in the hallway—before going up to the front of the room to speak with McGonagall once more.
“Professor?” He asked.
“Shouldn’t you be getting onto your next class, Mr. Potter?”
“I disagree with you about the use of a wand to transfigure items.”
“Excuse me?” She said, her lips pursing in annoyance.
“It seems to me,” he said, speaking very slowly in an attempt to be clear. “That transfiguration has more to do with intent than creation.”
“You’re arguing semantics,” she shot back, eyes narrowing as she made to stand. “I didn’t see you do any better than the majority of your classmates, so for now this argument is pointless.”
“Of course,” he answered, giving a short bow. “Oh but, Professor?”
This time she did stand, towering over him in an obvious desire to intimidate him.
“Really, you should be going now.”
“Yes ma’am,” he said, dropping something on her desk and slowly limping out the door.
Minerva watched the boy go, a frown on her face at how different he seemed from his parents. Then she looked at her desk to see what it was that he had dropped. Flabbergasted, she reached down and carefully picked up a perfectly transfigured needle.
. . .
Severus had just begun grading some of the summer assignments when he heard a knock against his office door.
“Come!” He barked irritably. He hoped to Merlin and beyond that it wasn’t the Headmaster asking for another bloody favour.
In some ways, who came through the door was worse, really.
“Moody,” he hissed, trying to look casual as he got to his feet and flicked his wand into close proximity under his sleeve.
The older Auror stomped in with that uneven gait of his, pausing only to slam the door shut behind him.
“Oh don’t get your knickers in a twist,” the older man muttered, throwing himself into one of the sturdier chairs in front of Severus’ desk. “This isn’t about business,” he added, giving Severus a harsh look over with his good eye.
“What do you want then?” Severus retorted nastily, leaning over his desk and scowling hard at the scarred creature sitting before him.
“Understand that Potter was sorted into your house,” Moody answered casually, taking a well practiced chug from his hip flask.
“And your interest in him stems from what, precisely?” Severus snapped, allowing himself to perch ever so lightly on the back corner of his desk.
“How much do you know about where that boy has been for the last four years?”
Severus’ eyes narrowed suspiciously. Why, of all people, would Moody be the one to know something like that about his little snake???
Seeming to instinctively understand his unspoken question, Moody explained, “Dumbledore asked me—as a favour, mind,” the older man eyed Severus pointedly, “to take Potter to Diagon Alley for his school supplies.”
Dumbledore must have already know about Potter’s physical state, Severus mused. It wasn’t surprising that the headmaster knew; what was surprising was that he had allowed such a serious injury to occur to someone like Potter.
“And the boy’s relatives could not take him?”
“Weren’t none to take him.”
Severus cocked an eyebrow and asked, “What precisely do you mean by that?”
“The lad weren’t living with ‘em,” Moody shrugged nonchalantly, though he continued glancing at Severus furtively as though to gauge his reaction.
“Did you inform Dumbledore of this?” Severus asked, trying to refrain from drumming his fingers on his desktop.
“He didn’t ask,” Moody answered.
“You weren’t worried about his reaction at having such a thing kept from him?” Severus wasn’t sure whether to be impressed with Moody’s bravery or disdainful of his stupidity.
“Dumbledore ain’t my keeper,” was Moody’s answer.
Although the implied barb stung, Severus did his best to keep his emotional face down to a bare minimum.
“Why are you here, Moody?” asked Severus tautly. He was getting quite tired of the old Auror’s penchant for conducting an interview as if it were an interrogation. The man was concerned for Harry, but why? What were his reasons for this visit?
“Potter,” the older man stated. Moody’s good eye was settled upon Severus while the mechanical eye had the disturbing habit of rolling about, eyeing everything that was in the Potions Master’s office.
Severus’ lips thinned. “Yes, I had surmised that. If you have something to tell me, then do so.” He glared at the older man’s worn, and perpetually wrinkled robes. “I believe you are drawing flies.”
Moody barked out a laugh. “Just friends, Snape!” He leaned suddenly forward, one gnarled fist on the knee of his artificial leg. “Have ye talked to the boy, Snape? About what brought him to his state?”
“Beyond what I needed to know from a medical standpoint,” shrugged Severus, to give himself an air of nonchalance. “If Mr. Potter wishes to tell me something, then it is he who must come to me.”
As Severus expected, Moody was annoyed by the tall man’s air of unconcern. He rose stiffly from his chair, stomped noisily about the office, and then turned his mechanical eye accusingly upon the younger man. “I do my research, Snape, and you better have more than a passing curiosity about that boy! If you don’t, I wouldn’t be surprised if he winds up happily in the lap of some of your old buddies!”
Severus, no longer protected from the old Auror by the imposition of his desk between them, found himself inexorably backed up against a wall in his office. Behind him, the shelves of the bookshelf dug into various points of his thin body painfully.
Whereas Moody had used his bulk to intimidate, Severus was quicker to use his wand, which had been resting neatly in the palm of his hand. He raised his wand, and the Auror backed away, with an annoying smirk on his face despite the wand tip that threatened.
“Gonna attack me here in Hogwarts, Snape?” Moody asked.
“Why exactly do you think a Potter would be in danger of falling in with the wrong crowd?”
For once, both of Moody’s eyes stared straight at him, and though he was loathe to admit it, Severus found the effect very chilling.
“He hasn’t got any connection ta his parents, Snape,” the older man spat out in a rough whisper. “He hasn’t got any bloody generations of people to look up to, or ta stand by him. He’s alone, and as alone as he can be.” The Auror pointed a gnarled finger towards him and Severus resisted the urge to back away. “Might even be more alone than you; which is sayin’ something.” Moody shook his head.
Slowly Severus dropped his wand and then with a flick of his wrist, he reinserted it into his wand holster.
“You bought him the crutch,” Severus said finally, the truth dawning in his mind.
“And the leg” Moody said with a nod, the humour gone from his face. “He bought the eye himself. Can’t say as I blame him.”
“Although it is usually my tradition to allow my snakes to come to me, I will attempt to make inroads with the lad in some form or fashion sooner as opposed to later.” Severus finally said, not bothering to mention the events that had transpired that first night of the term.
After all, there were some things that needed to remain secret just between him and his snakes.