Potions and Snitches
Snape and Harry Gen Fanfiction Archive

Author's Chapter Notes:
Disclaimer: There's mention of a landmark in this chapter - National Police Memorial in St. James's Park - which did not exist in 1997. Unfortunately, I didn't think to fact check it until after the NEXT chapter was written and by then changing it out would have caused too much delay for what it's worth, so I decided to stick with it.
What Now?

~~~~SS~~~~

Saturday, 1st November 1997

The sun still sat low under the horizon when Severus found himself sitting at his small kitchen table mindlessly running his finger around the edge of his full coffee cup. Staring unblinkingly at the plain wall opposite of him, the professor attempted to concentrate on anything other than the previous night's events; the same ones that plagued his sleep, making his first of many cups of coffee an absolute requirement to get through the day. There was plenty going on in his life to think about instead - Harry's first chemotherapy at the clinic since they discovered the relapse, getting to see Mae, or his plans to explore St James's Park in preparation for tomorrow's meeting with the Unspeakable - but his mind refused to allow him any reprieve, and continued to repeat Williamson's gloating voice in his ears while he, almost excitedly, arrested Draco.

"Draco Lucius Malfoy, you are under arrest on the charges of failing to register after successfully transforming into an animagus."

It was one of those moments Severus knew he'd forever be haunted by for the rest of his life. The words spoken, accompanied by the grey eyes filled with the fear his young Slytherin refused to actively show, felt far too similar to when Healer Walker gave them the news of his son's Leukemia diagnosis in his old reality. Not for the first time, he marvelled at the parallels between the two worlds; as if fate existed in some capacity and him messing in it caused an irreparable ripple, refusing to surrender until he somehow reset the balance.

Six. Against all odds, Draco's unplanned inspection statement assigned him only six spells to pull from his wand to check for any nefarious activity and, for a brief instant, Severus stood there in Albus's familiar, yet suffocating, office believing that drawing such a low number compared to his previous inspections worked in the young wizard's favour. If this were any typical night, he'd easily be able to come up with at least six spells the Malfoy heir might have used after arriving at his girlfriend's room in his small, fuzzy animagus form - a levitation charm, water spell, privacy ward, and perhaps a summoning charm or two. If this were any typical night, he would've walked away as the luckiest wizard on the continent, at least until Severus caught up to him and personally escorted him to the Ministry to register, then made him scrub all of the lavatory floors for the foreseeable future. Regrettably, as Hermione hastily pointed out, Draco didn't have much need for his wand during the Halloween Ball, therefore by the time they reached spell number five - the one he used to transform, and a whole two spells short of the promised land - they all knew the truth. Severus had been careful, almost too careful if anyone asked the teenager, by making sure Draco stayed on the defence more than offence during their biweekly duels, never assigning practical work which might be misinterpreted as aggressive, and he avoided confrontation with his peers whenever possible. It made being caught over something so benign sting nearly as much as the arrest itself.

Returning to the Great Hall alone - triggering Hermione's cries, another sound he'd never forget - left him feeling completely defeated. Although Draco hadn't been on the best of terms with many of his classmates, the entire school felt his absence, not too unlike the first time Severus ate in the Great Hall after his son's death, and the festivities promptly ended. No more dancing, no Weasley Wizards Wheezes "tricks and treats", and no clandestine, inter-house after-party.

"They can't really just send him straight to Azkaban!" Harry argued, throwing down his crumpled tie in anger when they finally returned to their dungeon quarters. "You have to do something!"

"Do you honestly believe I'd let him be arrested if there was something else I could do?!" Severus hissed at the Gryffindor.

"W- well," Harry stuttered, "Isn't there some kind of process they have to follow? Like a trial or something?! When the Dementors-"

"They followed the proper protocol," Severus interrupted. "Once they discovered his Animagus spell, Williamson and Kingsley were in their right to arrest him on the spot. In fact, he'll be lucky if he doesn't get a probation violation charge tacked on top of it.

"As for a trial," Severus ran his hands frustratingly through his hair, "there will likely be one, but it will be merely a formality since the facts of the case are quite simple… Draco's an animagus who is unregistered and doing so holds an instant sentence in Azkaban."

"But my dad-"

"Your father and his mangy group of friends were exceedingly arrogant to assume they'd be so lucky not to get caught," the professor sneered at Harry in a way his counterpart used to do. To his credit, Harry didn't react, a sign of their mutual growth since Severus's arrival here.

"How do they know?" Harry logically asked once the pair calmed down enough and were seated in the sitting room, neither changed from their dress robes yet. "Can't you say he just transformed like… yesterday? It's not like he'd be able to go to the Ministry and register immediately, so there has to be some kind of flexibility built-in."

The professor peeked up at the distraught Gryffindor and shook his head. "Draco's final step and first transformation had to happen in a lightning storm, something which hasn't occurred recently enough to be able to make that claim. They'll corroborate it, of course, prior to the trial with weather records and such."

They bantered back and forth for what seemed like hours, Harry trying to find some loophole - his life had been run by exceptions, after all, so it made sense he'd seek the same for his friend - and Severus logically turning them down. Williamson, and the DMLE as a whole, wouldn't do something as drastic as arresting a young wizard, right out of his school no less, without making sure they covered every possible way out. And when Harry eventually went to bed, far too late considering his treatment first thing in the morning, Severus laid awake in his own bed, reflecting about how the young wizard's fury for his former nemesis' injustice filled him with optimism that the next generation of witches and wizards might find a way to do where their predecessors failed: seeing a person's entirety rather than the superficial layer of what makes them appear 'good' or 'evil'. That single skill might someday be necessary to prevent the next Dark Lord from ravaging across their land.

Harry's uneven steps approaching the doorway drew Severus out of his groggy memories and back onto his breakfast.

"Morning," Harry grumbled, rubbing his bloodshot eyes as he entered the kitchen. Obviously, the young wizard got as little sleep as Severus, a fact which did not bode well for the afternoon ahead of them.

The professor didn't offer his greeting, choosing to remain silent while he watched Harry plop himself down into his seat, take his morning medications, and serve himself his typical pre-chemotherapy breakfast of porridge. The air between them electrified with their combined negative energy, but neither broke the heavy silence. Satisfied Harry's health needs were tended to, Severus summoned parchment, an inkpot, and quill to start a list of things he needed to do or purchase for Harry's subsequent inpatient treatment beginning next weekend.

"Remind me again... why did we schedule these so early?" Harry yawned.

The scratching of Severus's quill instantly ceased. Fighting the urge to burst in his off state of mind, he reproached, "Originally, to give you plenty of time to rest today. If you'd rather have your potential side effects run into Sundays, by all means, I'll reschedule to delay it next time. Certainly, we can both use the extra sleep lately."

"I didn't mean… it's just without classes now… y'know what? No, this is fine," Harry sheepishly responded with his shoulders shrugged up stiffly. "Erm… was there anything in the Prophet this morning about… y'know, last night?"

"You mean about one of your classmates getting detained during his Halloween feast and escorted to Azkaban?" He sarcastically suggested. "Of course there is."

The professor pulled out his morning copy of the Daily Prophet from under his own measly breakfast plate and tossed it to Harry, grateful when the teen chose to read the heavily biased article in his head. Severus absolutely did not want to read those words again any time in the near future. Unfortunately, Harry didn't stay quiet for long.

"The registration requirements were originally put in place as a means to prevent any animagus from committing a crime completely undetected. Leave it to the Malfoys to demonstrate such a blatant disregard for a simple law set to keep the magical community safe," Harry sharply read. "Isn't it a bit ironic to let Rita Seeker, the unregistered beetle, write a report covering Draco being arrested for being unregistered?"

"Your sentiment, though appreciated, is flawed in assuming there's justice in life overall." Severus took back the offered paper and tucked it under his plate. "I'm sure you, of all people, understand not all is naturally right in the world, no matter how much your Gryffindor righteousness wants to believe differently. People need to work hard for their freedom and do what they can to protect themselves. In the case of Miss Skeeter, who would assume a journalist with these views-" he tapped the edge of his plate to indicate the article, "-would then turn out to be hiding a very similar fate? It's quite brilliant actually. An arrest as highly publicized as Draco's will create an equally public fear over who else might be parading around unregistered. And what better way to shield her own guilt, and subsequent discovery, than to rally with the enemy?"

Harry's eyebrows furrowed low onto his forehead as he contemplated the offered theory.

"You Slytherins are so exhausting," Harry declared. "You want to know what else prevents all of this-" he waved his hands, palms out, towards Severus, "-being an honest person."

"Says the child with an invisibility cloak in his possession," Severus retorted without missing a beat. "Do tell, how many trips to Hogsmeade did you make under that cloak over the years? Or how about wandering about the castle at all hours of the night? If you despise the act of looking out for one's own welfare, why not do those activities without the security blanket of your blessed cloak?"

Harry's face instantly crimsoned, and Severus knew he'd won; not that he'd take the pleasure in it over a topic like this one.

"So… erm… where are you going today?" Requested the Gryffindor, frustrating Severus by not raising his head from his bowl.

At least he's eating, the professor rationalized.

"I have a meeting tomorrow morning with an individual from the Ministry," he answered, a long sigh accompanying his highly generic answer.

"And what? You're planning on sleeping there until this person arrives in the morning," Harry tried to jest, but in their current moods it came out more accusatory than funny.

"If you must know, I am unfamiliar with the location and refuse to be caught off guard," he sternly lectured, then sharply stood and leaned menacingly over on the table, paying no attention to the impressive shade of white his knuckles turned. "It's another Slytherin thing, you brazen Gryffindors can't begin to comprehend. Now finish your breakfast-" he stopped Harry's protest, not in the mood for his excuses or lies, "-we're leaving in ten minutes."

~~~~HP~~~~

If Harry were honest - something he didn't want to be on the gloomy Saturday - he'd admit Draco's arrest during the Halloween Ball left him feeling more than a little conflicted and confused. At first, he felt angry, a very logical reaction to the apparent injustice he'd witnessed. In his mind, it seemed unfair for the Aurors to be able to come in, break the Slytherin's right to privacy by pulling all of the histories on his wand, and then use it as a means to arrest the teen. How many "unfriendly spells" did they use as students throughout their normal class day? And who's to say the reasoning behind the spells they found didn't have a perfectly normal, perfectly rational explanation? Of course, that would only be true if they found something like stupefy. Like Snape explained, the animagus spell left no room for interpretation; they found the spell and his unregistered status meant they needed no further explanation or proof. Who would've thought a more dangerous spell - one where he might need to clarify its usage - would have actually worked in Draco's favour?

Talking things through with Snape after returning home last night did little to ease his skepticism about the DMLE being within their rights to make these demands of Draco, even though Snape described in detail how his probation sentence outlined exactly what these visits might have entailed; highlighting his lack of rights to refuse them. Apparently, while Harry was unconscious after The Battle of Malfoy Manor, the courts determined this to be the preferred option when compared to going to Azkaban for being the Death Eater who kidnapped The Chosen One. And although Harry agreed with the rationale on principle, no one asked him if he wanted to press charges against the Malfoy heir for his kidnapping - which, for the record, he didn't - making the whole situation feel more unfair. The sole relief he found in it all was trusting Kingsley to keep a level head and not do anything too drastic without some kind of legal backup; concluding Snape's reasoning to be valid.

Coming to terms with Draco's rights not being completely violated, however, left Harry with nothing else to ponder except Draco being the kitten he'd once poured his heart out to. The Gryffindor stayed up most of the night going through every one-sided conversation he had with the small white kitten, with Draco, since arriving back at school, and debating if he had it in him to actually hit the other teen when he finally got to see him again. Embarrassment was the first emotion he identified some time around two o'clock in the morning. At the forefront of his mind sat the confession he spoke of in one of his darkest hours, how scared he was about his relapse and how much he didn't want to die, but at the same time didn't think he had the strength to start over. With the more difficult looking Cycle B approaching next week, Harry still seriously doubted himself in his ability to finish this regimen and until Dumbledore announced Draco's arrest - revealing the charge as a way to calm the nervous student body against the blonde having done anything nefarious towards them - Harry truly hoped to cross paths with the kitten again; finding it easier to talk to the white ball of fluff than any other person who tried to get him to open up. Sometime between two and three in the morning, Harry put aside his embarrassment and focused back on his anger; only now rather than anger for the blonde's seemingly unfair arrest, it was over how Draco could hide this from him, especially considering the conversions they'd unknowingly had. How could Draco, someone Harry thought of as a friend, not tell him about being privy to Harry's innermost feelings? Had the Slytherin been trying to gain knowledge and power to use against him later? Betrayal was the emotion Harry finally fell asleep with at around half past three in the morning. His wake up call for chemotherapy came mere hours later, and he woke feeling no less bothered and confused than when he went to sleep.

With all of the non-chemo related thoughts racing inside of his head Harry never considered what walking into the chemotherapy clinic - and the same exam room he sat in when Dr Swanson delivered the awful news - would be like for him. Sitting on the exam table, cringing at the harsh sound of the paper crinkling every time he shifted his weight while Samantha collected his blood and went through his other pretreatment stats, he almost broke down and asked to stay in the main room for the rest of the examination. He didn't, though, no matter how much he despised the small claustrophobic room because it would fall on deaf ears, this being the only place to do his IT.

"Your weight is declining," Dr Swanson boldly started to kick off his consultation. Her equally exhausted appearance surrounding her didn't go unnoticed as she sat on a stool at the small countertop on the other side of the room with his exceedingly large file opened up to his latest results on top.

"It's nice to see you too," Harry muttered back, ignoring Snape's pointed glare. The two wizards barely said a word to one another after breakfast, a silence which only became more strained after settling into the exam room.

"How has your appetite been this week?"

"Fantastic," the young wizard sarcastically replied, placing a hard emphasis on the fah. It didn't come close to causing the reaction from his doctor as he'd hoped, making his face fall. "I'm just not very hungry lately. Same old, same old."

Annoyingly, Dr Swanson turned to Snape, silently asking his mentor to corroborate the statement; which he did with a small incline of his head. Harry frustratingly huffed and began to swing his legs back and forth, tapping his heels against the table with each pass.

"I've noticed he does better if he's distracted during the meal," the professor clinically added. "Therefore, I've made arrangements for someone to be in our quarters, and it seems to have helped a bit."

Regardless of making zero eye contact with either wizard, Harry assumed Dr Swanson was paying attention by her ferocious scribbling into his file.

"How about sleep?" She went on, still not lifting her head or pausing her writing. "Now that you're back at home, have you fallen into a better sleeping pattern?"

"No," Harry flatly replied, too agitated to be anything but honest, "and I'm sure the steroid tablets I started this morning will do wonders for it."

That got her attention. She stopped her pen and rolled the stool over until she sat directly in front of him, making his attitude towards her much more difficult to maintain.

"Harry," she practically whispered, leaning her arms over her crossed legs, "I apologize if I've made you believe otherwise, but you're doing well here. As you know, weight and sleep loss are very much normal and therefore things I take seriously to watch out for. Both can weaken your body and your mind, and, unfortunately, if we don't keep careful track of them, it's too easy to become complacent and miss out on the dangerous levels approaching until it's too late. Your bloodwork, physical exam, and these questions help me to recognize if there is a potential issue or simply the way your body is reacting to the regimen."

She halted her speech for Harry to speak up and when he simply blinked at her, she nodded her head and continued, "With that out of the way, have you had a difficult time sleeping?"

Harry clenched his jaw tightly closed.

"Or sleeping more often?" She casually guessed, then waited, making no attempt to show the heavy silence being at all uncomfortable to her.

"The latter," Severus answered again for Harry. He wanted to be furious, however, he was given the chance to answer first and, for some unknown reason, hadn't.

"Dare I say that's a small improvement from last year," she sighed and rolled herself back to the countertop to scribble something else into his file. Satisfied with her notation, she pulled out a small stack of paper and closed his file. "You'll be reporting to the hospital Friday night, so let's table these two incidents until then. If things stabilize this week, we'll make some adjustments for the next break period."

"You aren't concerned his excessive sleep might mean the new chemotherapy isn't working?" Snape inquired, cautiously.

"That's not what I said," she corrected him. Turning to Harry, she clarified, "I try not to read too much into the more generalised side effects and symptoms of the disease and you haven't reported anything out of the realm of 'normal' for this part of your cycle. Is there anything else that I should know about?"

Harry shook his head, but the feeling of Snape's stare burning into the top of his head made him uncomfortable.

"Then we'll reevaluate when I see you at the hospital on Friday evening. Does that sound acceptable?" This time the question was posed to Snape who nodded silently. "Perfect. So while we wait for the pharmacy to release your chemo for today, I thought we'd take the extra time to go over the start of cycle B."

She stood and handed Harry and Snape another schedule. The professor looked over his copy and casually stood up to stand beside Harry. To the Gryffindor, the message came in loud and clear: even though we were at odds this morning, I'm by your side.

"Does this mean I'm in remission again?" Harry asked hopefully, perking up for the first time since Draco left the Great Hall last night.

Dr Swanson leaned against the wall, holding her arms across her chest facing her patient and his mentor. "You know we can't say anything about it until we do another bone marrow biopsy, which I'll do first thing Friday when you check back into the AYA ward."

"Why can't you do it now? It's only a week difference."

Her eyebrows rose in a manner too similar to Snape's for Harry's liking. "A week, yes, but a week where you're having chemotherapy and on steroid tablets, both of which could make the difference between a level of remission or not. It's best to let this cycle finish completely and then, as with your eating and sleeping, we'll reevaluate."

"And if I'm not back in remission on Friday?" His voice cracked mid-question.

"We'll cross that bridge next week," she vaguely answered. She gestured to the colour-coded schedule in his trembling hand. "Now, for cycle B you'll follow the same framework as this cycle in that you'll do inpatient treatment in week one, off in week two, and end in week three with a clinic IT/IV followed by five days of tablets."

"So then what's the difference?" He knew she'd go through it with him but still felt the need to show some kind of control over the situation.

"Different medications," she asserted. "We're still following the theory of delivering a constant stream of smaller doses to provide more medication overall, but these will be… stronger… for lack of a better word… and on a molecular level, they attack the cancer cells differently than those in cycle A.

"The first difference you'll notice is that you're doing five days of chemotherapy, rather than four, in the hospital," she completely ignored Harry's moaned 'wonderful', "and it's a much more complicated schedule. At some point, our goal is to have you able to do cycle A from home, but cycle B absolutely cannot be."

Reading through the daily schedule, Harry fully understood why, even if he hated the end result of it. Like Mae promised at his last hospital stay, he'd be admitted into the ward on Friday night with the plan to start treatment at five in the morning on Saturday. His first real day in the hospital wasn't all that different from the last time. He'd start the day with a one hour IV concurrently with two twenty-four-hour IVs; one chemotherapy and the other described to him as a medication used to balance the pH of his urine caused by the first twenty-four-hour one. Unsure of the science behind it, Harry bobbed his head and trusted his doctor to understand the reasoning behind it. Interestingly, her notation of his urine pH being checked throughout the day didn't bother him nearly as much as having to measure his fluid intake and output, a task still required in cycle B.

At first glance, the next two days - Sunday and Monday - appeared highly complicated, but when explained, helped calm him down, if only by a little. The main part of his chemotherapy was easy enough to remember: a two hour IV every twelve hours, which would start when the last of his Saturday continuous IV ended at five in the morning on Sunday. There were two other components along with it though: steroid eye drops and a one hour IV four times a day, or every six hours. Two of those four times a day at least coincided with his longer chemotherapy, but a quick check at the bottom of the daily schedule showed the last IV ending at approximately one in the morning.

And that's if it starts on time.

The only consolation to his late-night IV was that while the steroid eye drops played an active role in his chemotherapy, the IV part contained supplemental medication - some kind of vitamin, actually - used to help his body process the first day's medication. Therefore, theoretically, it wouldn't give him any negative side effects going into the overnight hours outside of the nurses entering his room to end it an hour later.

The final two days, not counting any extra needed for his blood counts to rise, consisted of one final twenty-four-hour IV on Tuesday starting at five in the morning, and a one hour IV on Wednesday once Tuesday's finished. Then, twelve hours later, at five in the evening, he'd have an IM - a new abbreviation for him, meaning intramuscular or a muggle shot in his muscle - of medication to help raise his white blood cell count. He didn't dare allow himself to hope the shot for his white blood cell counts implied he might go home sooner. No, he'd learned enough of this process to know if they needed something to aid in the reproduction, he'd probably be in bad shape by then.

Taking it all in, Harry cleared his throat and asked, "So… Some of these sound pretty serious. I mean, that first full-day medication has two others to stop me from having a bad reaction… how serious are these side effects going to be?"

"Well," Dr Swanson's voice faltered just long enough for Harry to pick up on her nervousness. "everyone reacts different-"

"I get that," Harry interjected, impatiently, "but in general, what can I expect?"

If Harry wasn't so focused on his oncologist's answer, he'd have noticed the glimmer in Snape's obsidian eyes over Harry taking a vested interest in his own health and well being. Typically, the professor made sure to cover the topics Harry asked and whether it had to do with his support group - being surrounded by his community of kids who knew the ins and outs of their own care - or because of the colder demeanour from his mentor over breakfast, he didn't care.

"Generally speaking, these medications are rough on the body," she told him with confidence. No patient wanted to hear any level of uncertainty in their doctor's words. "In addition to those you've already experienced... mainly low blood counts, nausea, vomiting, mouth sores, diarrhoea, tingling hands and feet… the first continuous medication may also see kidney and liver issues, stomach ulcers, and severe skin reactions. Admittedly, though, the skin reactions are sometimes delayed by a couple of days, so we'll monitor you closely during the week.

"As for the second major chemotherapy drugs you'll be receiving - the twice daily, two hour IV - we add abdominal pain, fever, bone pain different from your leukaemia symptoms, and some short term neurological effects... writing, walking, or talking. We'll be doing a neurological exam prior to the start of that specific medication to be on the safe side. If anything like that does occur, typically it's reversible when the medication works its way through your system."

Typically. Harry didn't like the sound of that one bit. Things in his life somehow never followed a "typical" path. Hopefully, he'd avoid those particular side effects, and if he did get any of them - and they didn't reverse - he'd handle it just as he did everything else in his life.

"Harry?" Snape's voice, softer than it'd been all morning, brought the young wizard's mind back into the small exam room with the professor standing to his right and his oncologist directly across from him; two sets of eyes trained on him. "Are you alright?"

"Y-yeah," he stammered out, peeking down at the schedule barely held in his weak grasp. "And the last two? T-the twenty-four-hour and one hour? What are those like?"

Dr Swanson's face scrunched in concern. She'd seen the gamut of reactions from patients, especially from AYAs, and the quiet withdrawal always left her nervous.

"Those two you've received previously," she explained, "however, at the end of the twenty-four hours you'll have gotten a higher dosage, so the reaction may be more extreme. I'm sorry I keep reiterating this fact, but it's the main difference between what you're doing now and what you did the first time around and I want you to be prepared."

A knock on the door caused Harry's anxiety to increase exponentially. How could he be on… what round was this? …and feel just as nervous as his first. He'd even get to go home in a matter of hours, and yet his leg kept bouncing, almost on its own, nervously against the front of the table, causing the paper underneath him to continue to crinkle. The sound echoing against the walls was deafening; at least to Harry, the other two occupants in the room didn't appear to notice. Unsurprisingly, Samantha's head appeared around the door.

"I come bearing supplies," Samantha's cheery voice called out, pushing in the tray filled with his IT supplies. "And, look who I found!"

"Hey there, Harry," the door continued to open and in his nurse's wake came Mae. Dressed in her own set of nursing scrubs, prepared for her later shift, Snape's girlfriend settled next to the professor, who leaned in to give her a quick kiss on her temple.

"Hi Mae," Harry reddened a bit watching the kiss. "Are you staying for my IT?"

"If you want me here, you bet I will." The blonde nurse looked around the already cramped room. "It'll be a tight fit, you're lucky I'm small."

The slight amount of her usual sass in the response instantly began to chip away at the tension within Harry, and the strained muscles around Snape's face equally relaxed. Her positivity over the situation was infectious and unable to hold it back, Harry grinned, happy to have her there to help balance some of the toxicity from their last two days.

~~~~SS~~~~

"Is everything ok, Sev?" Mae asked Severus as he wandered the clinic in search of another blanket for Harry. He heard his girlfriend whisper she'd be right back to Harry and her footsteps following him down the corridor to the cupboard with the blankets, but he hoped she wouldn't comment on his evasive mood. Nevertheless, being in a relationship meant he owed her some kind of answer and so he steeled himself for the windfall. "You guys seem a little off this morning, did everything go well with Harry's exam?"

Severus pressed his hands onto the countertop to the right of the cupboard and used it to support most of his weight down onto them.

"Yes," he admitted, "his examination went as well as to be expected. This is… about another matter."

He closed his eyes almost in physical pain, feeling her soft hand begin to rub the stress out of his back, not too unlike what he did with Harry when the young wizard was sick to his stomach.

"I'm here if you need me," she quietly offered. "Don't forget that, alright?"

"I won't," he turned around and pulled a blanket from the cupboard, seriously contemplating if he could do a wandless, nonverbal heating charm upon it. In the end, he decided against it, unsure if he'd be able to undo the charm undetected. Holding the white fabric securely to his chest, he looked over at Mae watching him intently, and before he managed to talk himself out of it he gestured his head for them to walk back to the treatment room and said, "One of my students got arrested last night on a petty charge. I tried every angle I could think of to get him out of it, but it didn't work. I'm sure by now he's sitting in some high-security cell all because of his father's reputation."

"Is he guilty of whatever they charged him with?"

The professor's heart lurched. "Yes," he stated, simply, "yes, he's guilty, however, he had extenuating circumstances leading to his need to protect himself and thus break the law."

"Like stealing bread to feed your family," Mae didn't ask it as a question, but as a statement.

"Hardly," Severus gave a sad chuckle. The Malfoys needn't steal nor want for anything. "This particular student would never need to steal food."

"It's a phrase, Sev," she gently hit him in his upper arm. "It means the crime had moral implications to it, making it criminally wrong, but morally right."

Not much better.

"He did it to safeguard himself," Severus allowed his anger to take control again and the words were practically spat out of his mouth. "He merely wanted some… protection."

Though he knew he made little sense to the woman who reached out to link her arm in his own, she still didn't pry for more details on it. In their short time as a couple, she knew about him having to deal with the flooded dormitory, the accident last weekend, and now an arrest. If she had any sense at all, she'd turn and run as fast as possible in the opposite direction. Severus wouldn't even hold any ill feelings towards her for it. A mere three meters from the door leading back to the main treatment room - back to Harry and his need to stay as positive and upbeat as possible - Severus halted to a hard stop.

"It's not fair!" He turned to his girlfriend who flinched at his louder than expected exclamation. "What did they want him to do given the situation they placed him in! He couldn't even breathe without someone commenting on it… of course, he wanted privacy any way he could get it! And to hold him on such a… minor violation... is complete bollocks! The purpose of these inspections was to protect the other students and yet what he did… and how he used it… couldn't get any further from dangerous!"

Unable to hold in his frustration any longer, but his arms filled with the blanket for Harry, Severus swiftly rotated away from Mae and kicked the bottom edge of the wall, causing the blanket to fall from his hands. His girlfriend jumped at the sudden and quite aggressive movement. An awkward moment passed between them before she bent down to pick up the blanket and held it close to her chest.

"I'm sorry this happened, Severus," she spoke slowly to him, "and based on what you said, it sounds like this kid got a raw deal. But you didn't do anything and you are not responsible for his well being. At some point, kids need to take responsibility for their actions, big or small. If this is truly a minor offence, I'm sure they'll have it figured out soon and he'll be back at school. They don't send teenagers to a high-security prison for something like shoplifting. Trust me, it'll work itself out and you'll see how silly it was to put so much negativity into it."

He wanted to believe her. The muggle world may have its downfalls as well, nevertheless, the former spy could admit to a much fairer due process than they saw in the Wizarding World. He'd be shocked if Draco received a fair trial. If he had one at all, it didn't have to go much further than the Wizengamot showing the date of the last lightning storm and Draco's lack of registration on file. And to make matters worse, the DMLE would do everything within their rights to punish him to the fullest extent of the law.


Just as they always did, Mae's words stuck with Severus long after the end of Harry's chemotherapy - when the Gryffindor left from Spinner's End with Minerva to go back to Hogwarts -, through his exploration of the meeting place in London for tomorrow, and when he returned to Spinner's End with the intent to floo directly back to his quarters. The very last thing he needed to add to his already trying day was an inquisition regarding Draco from every group of students he passed, therefore making apparating directly to the gates of Hogwarts highly inadvisable.

His first stop - to London - once Harry returned to Hogwarts frustratingly did little to prepare Severus for his meeting in the morning. The vague instructions translated via Dr Swanson of "the memorial in St James Park across from the Ministry's visitor's entrance" left him wandering around the expansive, unfamiliar area, having no clue which of the half dozen, give or take a couple, monuments and memorials the Unspeakable referred to. He ended up roaming around the park in the misty weather, reminiscent of his walk in the storm in Guildford, for hours moving from one area of the park to another, taking in all the potential places for danger and ranking the locales for the most likely location to meet. As this was to take place before his shift at the laboratory, he'd have very little time to explore in search of a muggleborn wizard he couldn't identify and therefore needed to decide on a plan of action that afternoon. Eventually, he narrowed it down to two of the memorials - the Guards Memorial and National Police Memorial - based on the fact that these two specific ones had wizarding equivalents nearby and were also nearest to the Ministry's Visitor Entrance. It was, by far, his weakest reconnaissance mission, but it'd have to suffice for now.

With his afternoon in London taking longer than expected, he didn't return to Spinner's End until around four in the evening. He'd missed lunch, spent more time away from Harry than he originally wanted to, and left Minerva with some of Harry's worst side effects. Had he not been nearing his breaking point, he might have felt guilty about plopping down in his sitting room's armchair, cradling his head in his hand for a moment's reprieve, rather than immediately floo'ing back to Hogwarts. Mae's words before they left the treatment centre, given during an embrace he'd never admit to craving, rang in his ears:

You need to give yourself a break, Sev. You're doing the best you can with Harry and your students, given the situation you're put in. Don't be your own worst enemy by making your life unnecessarily harder, and don't forget to take of yourself too.

On principle, he vehemently disagreed with her. Of course, she also wasn't privy to nearly enough information on the full picture of the story to be able to be anything outside of borderline condescending. Who would look out for these two boys - still teenagers forced to grow up sooner than any boy should - against the very real threats waiting to attack them around almost every turn? Harry needed Severus to be there, even if the Gryffindor took a more active role in the conversation at the clinic about Cycle B than he ever had in the past. And Draco? He'd never ask for it, but realistically the Malfoy heir never had someone to consistently rely on…

Severus paused his reasoning and lifted his head until his chin balanced on his thumbs and his pointed fingers were pressed over his lips. Looking back on this year, Draco hadn't been left completely alone. Lucius stepped up and did as he needed to plant his own spies inside of the school walls to watch over his son. The professor heard the genuine surprise in Draco's voice when the blonde told Severus about his father visiting the hospital wing immediately after the flood, and it was Lucius who arranged to get the younger Slytherin into the Muggle uni to secure his future as a dual healer. How could he discount the Malfoy patriarch so quickly? If anyone could get Draco out of Azkaban and back to school, it was Lucius.

Moving swiftly, although having no idea why, the professor hurried to his fireplace, grabbed a handful of floo powder, and threw it into the newly lit flames while quietly announcing "Malfoy Manor". He kneeled into his floo debating why he thought it'd be a sound idea to try to contact his Slytherin friend. Surely the man would be out moving every piece imaginable to get Draco home. Which is why he was shocked when a tender voice on the other side asked, "Severus? Is that you?" even though he hadn't uttered a single word. Staying silent, he waited until Narcissa Malfoy came into his line of vision from the open firecall.

"I'm so sorry to disturb you, Narcissa," he apologized, "especially during-"

"It's quite alright," the Malfoy matriarch interrupted him with a too obvious fake smile. "I was just tending to the gardens. No one ever believes the charmed fall foliage requires substantially more maintenance than their spring counterparts, and yet it takes hours every day to ensure they are growing right."

Taken aback, Severus almost pulled his head from the floo for no other reason than being unsure of how to respond. What sort of parent reacted in such a manner when her son had been arrested less than a day ago? And, taking it a step further, how did one react to such a blatantly heartless statement given this particular situation?

"I'd hoped to speak with Lucius," he uncharacteristically blurted out, internally blaming her for his atypical reaction.

"Regrettably, my husband's been away most of the day," she cheerily expressed, "and I'm afraid he didn't give me any indication on his return."

Severus blinked, a gesture lost in translation through the floo, and found himself left completely speechless.

"Severus?" Narcissa's voice startled him back to reality. "Are you still there? Have I lost you?"

"I'm here. I was simply… distracted… for a second," he quickly replied. In hopes of triggering some kind of response, and receiving some of his own answers, he asked, "Have you any news about Draco?"

The small gasp from other side of the fire didn't come as a surprise. She'd already given him the distinct impression that whenever possible, the Slytherin witch intended to pretend Draco's arrest hadn't occurred. Apparently, Narcissa's healing - or at the very least coming to terms with the events of last year - still had a ways to go, comparatively. If anything, she appeared to be the least healed of them all. Ironically, she also had the least amount of physical trauma to recover from, but Severus knew well enough how emotional wounds ran as deep as their physical equivalents, and required the patient to acknowledge the problem and want to heal first. Although a healer often fixed up a broken leg, cut up face, or wizarding flu with the patient completely unaware, to heal the mind needed a willing participant lest inevitably fail. Narcissa still hadn't acknowledged how caring for her son after having his blood drained - and being donated to keep an evil Dark Wizard alive - deeply impacted her, and thus prohibited her from moving on.

Refusing to enable Narcissa's delusional world, Severus didn't fill the awkward silence following his inquiry. Either she would have to answer him - with the information he knew she possessed -, change the topic to one she'd rather discuss, or abruptly end their call. Regardless of Severus's familiar nature with the Malfoys, for an aristocratic witch of her nature, the last option would be a social faux pas, but he wouldn't put it past her to simply gloss over the topic completely and move onto something she'd prefer to speak about; like art, potions, or any upcoming travels. And so when she next spoke, though her voice was strained from having to make herself do it, he viewed it as a positive change in her previous, almost toxic demeanour.

"His trial is scheduled for Friday," her chin jutted up to give herself confidence. "When Lucius found he failed-" the professor noted her harsh tone on the word, "- to have the charges thrown out completely, he has now been attempting to influence the Wizengamot to allow Draco to be released from Azkaban pending the trial. The last firecall I received did not sound promising."

The ruling, though distressing, he expected. The Malfoys owned properties across the world with complicated centuries-old wards even Moody would have difficulties cracking, an entire infrastructure of associates to help them move undetected for an infinite amount of time, and more resources - both monetary and magical artefacts - to live off of for several lifetimes. Seizing Draco's wand and freezing the Malfoy vaults equated to shooting a troll with a Stinging Hex. With The Malfoys having so many contingencies in place, the Wizengamot knew if they released Draco they had zero chance of him showing up at his trial. No, the student needed to stay locked up in Azkaban until then, with no real chance of being released prior to the completion of whatever sentence got handed down to him on Friday.

Severus hardly said another word as he listened to Narcissa move the conversation away from her newly delinquent son and onto their holiday events, making a side comment on how she needed to know Draco's long-term plans to be able to properly organize their annual Christmas Gala, and ended their call asserting her confidence on everything working itself out. It sickened Severus to hear how easily she manipulated Draco's incarceration into her fantasy world, mostly because this wasn't the Narcissa he knew. She may not have always been the most attentive mother, but this new persona went far beyond anything she'd ever done in the past. Not for the first time, Severus's mind made the eerie comparison to Harry and Draco's upbringing. How was it possible for a teenager who grew up in a 4500 square meter manor, never wanting for any material thing, and a child who lived most of his life in a tiny cupboard under the stairs turned out to be missing the same thing: the care of a parent. At seventeen, neither boy really needed the support, and having Severus and Lucius now there for them almost felt too little, too late. They also weren't anywhere close to replacing the missing, or neglectful in Draco's case, mothers each child deep down craved.

With the reprieve he expected to have when deciding not immediately return to Hogwarts lost, Severus abruptly ended the call. He'd have to deal with Narcissa another day. He then took one more look around his childhood home - genuinely happy with the life he and Harry were making in it - and left for his other home.

The quiet atmosphere greeting him on the other side of the floo put Severus oddly on alert. By this time post-chemotherapy, Harry's expected side effects ranged anywhere from severely ill to soundly sleeping, and for reasons unknown to the professor, he anticipated the former. Minerva hardly lifted her head at his arrival through the floo from where she sat on the sofa surrounded by scrolls of essays she continued marking. Based on the smaller pile of neatly tied ones laying on the table in front of her, she'd either just started on the task or the essays were absolutely abysmal; exactly why he chose not to assign any during the week of Halloween. His ears strained to listen for any sign of the young wizard in the other room, and upon hearing nothing but the scratching of Minerva's quill, he sat down in his armchair deciding to check on Harry after finding out if anything of importance happened during his absence. No sooner than his bottom hitting the indention in the chair did a teacup conjure in front of him and a teapot levitated from Minerva's other side over towards Severus. The older professor made no move to have noticed her colleague's presence, at least not until he eventually spoke.

"Thank you," Severus quietly mumbled, and took a long sip of the orange tea. "I apologize for being late, things didn't quite go as planned in London. How has Harry been?"

He resisted the urge to turn back towards the corridor of the young Gryffindor's bedroom.

"We survived," were Minerva's first words to him. He wanted to ask her for details, but her expression alone told him all he needed of the long, potentially tiresome day. Still, he appreciated it when she continued. "There's a set of soiled sheets outside of his bedroom door. I wasn't sure if you sent those off to the House Elves with the usual wash or if they had any special instructions for them."

Severus grimaced as he thought through what must have happened. "Vomit or-"

"Vomit," Minerva confirmed. "Nothing I couldn't handle, but Harry didn't seem all too pleased with my being there. Somehow I managed to persuade him into the bath and he's been asleep since getting out..." She squinted at the clock on the mantle, "... Roughly an hour ago."

Severus nodded mindlessly. "I'm sorry I wasn't here."

"I'll have none of that," the other professor sternly admonished him. "I said I'd help out and I stick by my word, part of which includes the messy jobs too. Merlin knows you need the help, no one expects you to do this alone."

"Thank you for being here," he began, but Minerva's raised hand stopped him. Picking up on her need to change the subject, he asked, "Did you hear Draco's trial is set for this Friday? As it's sure to be a short event, I can assume the trial and sentencing will be done together."

"Yes, Albus stopped by to speak with you and he did mention the unnecessarily delayed trial date," she acknowledged. "If you ask me, to leave a child of barely seventeen in Azkaban waiting on his trial is completely uncalled for! I don't care who his parents are!"

Though he appreciated her ferocity over the supposed injustice towards someone in the opposite house of her own, there wasn't much debate over Draco's guilt.

"He's guilty," Severus stated, "and it put him in violation of his strict probation. The trial will only act as checking the box, so to say, in order to get him incarcerated. And I doubt the Wizengamot will go light on his sentencing. What is the current length of imprisonment for being an unregistered animagus?"

Uncharacteristically, Minerva rolled her eyes. "There is no standard," she exasperatedly replied. "Those in the Transfiguration community have been trying, unsuccessfully, to produce a comprehensive outline, in writing, for the prosecution of this offence… things such as a detailed description on how soon after the first transformation one needs to register, if the registration can be done on the apprentice's behalf by their mentor, and the length of imprisonment one might receive if they decide to continue unregistered. As it stands, the latter is up to the Wizengamot to determine, and they are supposed to use criteria such as how long they'd gone since transforming, where the paperwork is in terms of filing, and if any crimes were committed while in the animagus form."

"How would they know about any crimes?"

The older witch shook her head disappointingly. "They used to depend on word of mouth and reviewing any old Aurors reports to see if any pictures or mention of an animal of similar nature exist."

"And now?"

"Well," huffed Minerva, "the latest Transfiguration Today reported they've passed a bill to allow the forcible seizing of the convicted's memories. I've written in my own petition against it, citing a severe violation of personal rights, but I doubt we'll see it overturned anytime soon. They're treating these witches and wizards no better than common criminals rather than highly skilled individuals.

"I do wish Mr Malfoy felt comfortable enough to come to me after his transformation, though. Even if he wanted to maintain his privacy, I might have been able to help him be prepared if something like this happened."

Interest piqued, Severus asked, "What could you have done?"

"For one I'd have the paperwork filled out and ready to send off. There are plenty of reasons to explain missing or delayed papers at the time of arrest," she offered. "Then, of course, half of the time the arresting auror only does a quick check of records prior to the trial and adding in a post-dated one between the time of arrest and trial isn't out of the realm of possibilities. I've signed my fair share of post-transformation registration papers. Those were all for pupils I've privately mentored, of course, giving me direct access to the information needed for the registration. I can't do so now without taking a trip to Azkaban, nevertheless, I've offered my services to Albus if he can figure out the logistics to utilize it."

"Why Albus?" Severus queried. "Even as Chief Warlock, I doubt he'll be called to weigh in on this case. Draco's work for the Order isn't unknown and as the Headmaster of the school, it's a conflict of interest."

"I figured it was worth a try," she threw her hands up in the air. "With his probation working against him, they're going to go for a full sentence… whatever 'full sentence' may mean, and no one else in the Ministry will bat an eye at the ridiculousness of it all. As far as I've heard, Mr Malfoy used his kitten form to sneak into his girlfriend's room. It's hardly a punishable offence."

Severus ran his hand down his face, feeling grateful the Deputy Mistress put aside her feelings for the Malfoys to offer her suggestions - especially ones which put her in the line of fire -, and guilty for his own lack of action. Outside of announcing it to his Snakes, what else had he done to contribute to Draco's defence? Nothing. When he discovered the young wizard became an animagus one of his first questions had been if he'd registered, and though the teen confirmed it, the former spy remembered doubting the validity of his answer. It had been the day of the "New Order" meeting and Harry's second day at the hospital, had his exhaustion prevented him from rationally dissecting Draco's response?

Very likely, he sadly concluded to himself.

"And what did Albus have to say about it?" Severus broke the strange, yet companionable silence which fell between them while the Slytherin contemplated his own hand in the messy situation.

"Arrangements are being made," Minerva distrustfully answered.

Severus wanted to scoff and remind the Head of Gryffindor just how much help the headmaster gave his Slytherins in the past, Draco in particular, but based on the equal scowl upon her face, Minerva felt much the same as him about the situation. Draco had been left alone and afraid - an emotional state he'd never admit to - after returning to Hogwarts the week of Severus's own kidnapping, and how did the Order aid him? By interrogating the sixteen-year-old child for days and giving him no inkling they understood his distress call. If it were Severus in Draco's position, with his current experience he would have known the monitoring spell actively placed upon him prevented any flow of information to him, but not back in his early spying days. Back then, he didn't know what the hell he was doing and being isolated, interrogated, then turned loose without a single word of understanding would have caused him to act drastically as well. Sure, one might argue Albus came through in the Death Eater trials, using his Chief Warlock status much in the same way he planned to do now, he'd gotten the Malfoys a relatively light sentence, all things considered. The restitution they paid barely made a dent in their overall lifestyle and the probation should have been easy to follow; if only Draco had gone to sign a damn piece of paper at the Ministry. Hopefully, Albus would come through this time too and by Friday they'd be bringing Draco back to Hogwarts, or at least Malfoy Manor if Lucius refused to allow him to return to the school. A week in Azkaban was infinitely better than whatever "the maximum sentence" he'd surely receive otherwise.


Chapter End Notes:
Coming up Next: The Unspeakable

If anyone is interested in seeing Harry's chemo schedule, I have them viewable here:

Cycle B Overview: https://flic.kr/p/2magWLp
Inpatient Daily Schedule: https://flic.kr/p/2magWXg

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