“—Severus, really?”

“I assure you, Poppy, this is quite necessary.”

“ Necessary —it’s an invasion of his privacy!”

For some reason, his eyes wouldn’t open any more than a crack.

“Yes, necessary. For his own sake as well as ours. Also, I must say that if this is an invasion of privacy, then what would you call eavesdropping and skulking around after curfew, stealing and hiding and generally being a nuisance? This is absolutely necessary! The boy is a menace!”

His hand felt clumsy and awfully heavy, but he tried to use it to pry open his eyes. All he managed to do was poke himself in the nose several times.

“ Nothing seems to stop him—no detention or reprimand, no consequence or gentle talking-to! On multiple occasions, I have tried—Albus has tried, Minerva too—and nothing works.”

He forced his right eye open halfway with sheer strength of will. It was blurry and closed again almost immediately, but it was a start.

“Severus, I must admit that I doubt you have ever tried giving the boy a gentle talking-to !”

Ah, there it was! Both eyes slightly open!

“Oh—well—not I, perhaps. But Albus has! It did nothing, of course. I merely mentioned it to remind you of all that has been tried. Some of us have tried more than others, I must say. I feel that I have spent altogether too much time chasing the boy after curfew. Something had to be done!”

Now, now he could see. Well almost. It all seemed to be just blurry and white. Where was he? More importantly, where were his glasses? He fumbled around a little, trying to find them. But all he could feel were the sheets of the bed he was in.

He groaned a bit and shifted around, hearing the crackle of stiffly starched sheets. But trying to sit up didn’t work either: he lifted his chest up perhaps a few centimetres before it flopped back down on the bed. 

There was a creak, and a loud jingle, and at that the voices stopped.

Oh, the doorbell. Aunt Petunia would get it. Wouldn’t she?

“He’s awake, now, Severus. Come with me or not—but think well about what you have done!”

But wasn’t the doorbell broken? Last year Dudley and Harry had been out in the front garden, Harry weeding the flowerbeds that lined the path while Dudley… did whatever it was he did. Dudley had gotten angry at something Harry had said—fat pig, bullying cousin of a fat pig that couldn’t tie his own shoelaces—and thrown a rock at him. It was fine, he missed—and hit the doorbell. Aunt Petunia hadn’t been happy with Harry for breaking it and how could Dudley have done that you silly boy, he isn’t destructive at all, just happily playing in the garden—it was you, don’t lie about it .

He hadn’t gotten any dinner that night, nor any food the next day. And it had been Shepherd’s pie, which Dudley didn’t like so much (he still ate a lot of it, no mistake, but he didn’t devour it like the world was ending) so there were enough leftovers for a Harry-decent meal. But Aunt Petunia had sniffed and said that she had put in too much salt, really, and the rest wasn’t decent for human consumption, so she put it in the bin. On top of it she spilt some detergent as she was washing up. 

But anyway, it was broken, so how could it ring?

“Harry dear? Are you awake? Can you look at me, please?”

He realised that his eyes were closed once more, and forced them open. It seemed that there was a blurry white-gray thing in front of him, in the vague shape of a person. Next to that and off to the side there was another one, but that was black and somehow managing to be fuzzily menacing.

“Harry?”

The voice was familiar, but he couldn’t place it. T’wasn’t Aunt Petunia, though it was female, and therefore not Dudley or Uncle Vernon. Too nice for Aunt Marge…

“H’llo?” he croaked. “M’ glasses?”

“Oh, of course.” 

There was the sound of someone bustling around, then he felt his glasses being slid onto his nose. The world jerked into focus, thankfully, and he recognised the woman leaning over him anxiously. He must be in the Hospital Wing.

“Mm Pomfy?” 

“Yes, dear.” The woman was smiling a little at that, and he did recognise that he was pretty incoherent at the moment. He nobly ignored the snort that had come from somewhere nearby—it was probably one of her other patients, finding his speech amusing.

“Well, it is good that you are awake now, Harry. Your body seems to be utterly exhausted, so much so that you must be finding it difficult to move, and stay awake. If you manage to keep awake for another minute, I’ll fetch you a potion to help you get rid of some of that tiredness.”

He tried to nod. It didn’t work very well, but she seemed to understand and swiftly moved away. Harry decided just to rest his eyes until she came back.

The next time he awoke he was much more alert. His glasses were still on his face, of all the miracles, so the world of the hospital wing was far clearer too. Harry lay almost contentedly in the bed (he was still feeling rather tired) but finally decided that he really should sit up. Madam Pomfrey had mentioned a potion before, and he really should drink it if he didn’t want to be fussed over. 

Sitting up was hard work, but he managed it. His stomach muscles and those in his arms felt strained, and as he pushed himself up, he heard a jingle.

That was the doorbell again. 

Wait. There was no doorbell. What was that noise then? Some alarm to alert the Mediwitch he was awake?

He let it slip out of his mind and grasped the goblet containing the potion in his hand. Swallowing it—tasting somehow of sour toffee—he heard the noise again. 

How had Harry gotten into the hospital wing, anyway? Last thing he could remember was—

— The trick step. Harry’s leg caught in the trick step. Footsteps coming closer. The golden egg on the floor, out of reach. Someone coming closer, closer—Snape!

But how had he got into the hospital wing? It was all well and good to remember that, but what had come next? Surely something must have happened to get him in here.

Harry put the empty goblet down, and picked up the glass of water that had been beside it. Thankfully swishing the cool water round his mouth, he pondered on his circumstances.

Staircase—hospital wing. 

Even if something had happened to him while he was stuck in that wretched trick step, how had he gotten to the hospital wing? He’d been covered in his invisibility cloak, after all.

He turned over increasingly unlikely possibilities in his brain before deciding to ask the mediwitch later. For now, even though the potion had made his muscles relax and his head more alert, he still felt tired.

“Harry? Wake up, please.”

He blinked muzzily and lifted himself to sit up in the bed, hearing that strange noise once again.

“Hmm?”

“You’ve slept long enough, and you ought to have some lunch.”

Madam Pomfrey bustled over to him, carrying a tray that had both food—which he wouldn’t mind, and a potion, which he would. No thank you.

“Lunch?” Harry asked, wiping his eyes. “It’s lunchtime already?”

She set the tray down on the nearby table and held the potion out to him. “Yes. You’ve been asleep for hours—and yes, you will take this,” she said crossly, noticing that he made no move to take the potion. “Drink it up quickly now, and no arguing.”

The potion tasted awful, all earth and old sweat.

“How did I get in here?” Harry questioned, taking an eager gulp of water from the glass he was handed. “I don’t remember what happened.”

Well, he might remember being out after curfew with his golden egg, but he wasn’t going to admit that to her, was he? Besides, he didn’t actually know how he’d gotten from there to sleeping in the hospital wing until midday.

Madam Pomfrey frowned, and primly gestured towards the lunch. “Eat,” she told him, “and I will explain.”

Harry made sure to begin— he knew she thought he was too light for his age.

“Last night,” the medi-witch started, “it seems that you were wandering around after curfew with your golden egg.” She fixed him with a pointed stare, and Harry squirmed.

“I might remember that part…” he admitted.

“You were on a staircase when Professor Moody patrolled by. He heard a noise, saw a Champion’s egg, and began shooting hexes all around. He’d taken that eye of his out—it has been sticking, recently, so he couldn’t see you under that cloak of yours.”

She muttered something under her breath about trigger-happy teachers.

“Having a leg trapped in a trick step meant you couldn’t move away, so you were struck by quite a few, which hurt you badly and knocked you unconscious.”

Harry winced at the description, then said, slowly, “but how did I get here? If he couldn’t see me…”

He had this awful image of a student walking down to breakfast and tripping over Harry Potter, Hogwarts champion, hexed into the stair. Malfoy would have a red-letter day.

“Professor Moody couldn’t see you,” Madam Pomfrey said briskly, “but Professor Snape knew about your invisibility cloak.”

There was no way this story could get any worse.

“Professor Snape,” Harry said weakly.

“Yes, Professor Snape. He heard Professor Moody casting all manner of spells that have no place in a castle, and went to investigate. After managing to settle our defence teacher, he sent him elsewhere and proceeded to look for you. Then once he’d found you, he brought you here, and I healed your injuries.”

Harry groaned. “He’s going to be so awful.”

“Well, you did break the rules,’ Madam Pomfrey said briskly. Then her face darkened. “Though there is one more thing before you leave...”

“Potter, remain behind.”

Harry, after exchanging rueful looks with his friends, shuffled to the front of the room.

“Professor,” he said warily, standing in front of the man’s desk.

Snape ignored him for a minute or two, gathering the essays together neatly, then stacking them on top of the crate of potions Harry’s class had just brewed.

“Detention,” he said eventually. “For being out after curfew.”

Harry supposed he couldn’t really argue with that, much as he would like to. He looked down at his hands, twisting his fingers together uneasily.

“Err,” he said cautiously, “how did you…” 

He trailed off under the gaze of his teacher.

“Find you?” the man asked.

Harry nodded. He would also have accepted know I was there, or something else. He hadn’t really figured out what he’d been going to say himself.

“If you must know, Potter,” the man sneered, “I went to collect that golden egg of yours and tripped over you. Lying stunned, leg caught in a trick step, under an invisibility cloak.”

Harry could imagine what had happened. Snape, suspicious, going to collect the golden egg, managing to trip on Harry, who he’d half thought might have been stunned under the cloak in the barrage of spells. He’d probably torn the cloak off the boy, then, in a fit of pique—stupid boy getting himself hexed at night by paranoid ex-aurors while invisible—charmed the cat-collar on him.

“I’d already suspected,” the man continued, “and that merely saved me the trouble of searching every inch of the corridor for you. Only you, Potter, could end up in such a situation, because only you would be stupid enough to go out after curfew and have the asininity to end up trapped and hexed by a mad retired auror.”

That was taking things a bit far. It had all been bad luck! Not that Harry was stupid enough to say that to the potions master currently glaring burning holes through his face.

They remained like that for another tension-fraught moment, until Harry bit his lip and Snape picked up a quill.

“Dismissed,” the man said, voice bored. But though it would probably be futile, Harry had to ask.

“Can you take this thing off me, please?” he asked as politely as he could. 

Snape looked up again, seeming to consider it. “No,” he said. “You deserved it. It’ll come off when you’ve proved you can behave.”

Harry scowled and wrenched at the thing around his neck. It gave another jangle but didn’t come off. “Madam Pomfrey—” 

“As I am the only one who can dispel it, it is not up to her. Leave, Potter.”

The boy stomped away, cursing Snape in his head. The cat-collar charm pealed merrily as he moved.