Harry Potter and the Psychic Serpent

Harry cried out, then clamped his hand over his mouth. He bit into the back of his hand to stifle his cry, drawing blood. His scar had never hurt so badly. He tried doing the pain management, the floating...but it was no good. This was real, physical pain. When it was just a spell, just the illusion of pain, he could remind himself that it wasn't real, that no one was actually, physically hurting him. But this kind of agony was no illusion. There was no blocking it, no way to escape it. He thought his head would explode...

He had skipped dinner, because he had felt so exhausted, climbing up the stairs after the Dueling Club. He had started up the stairs all right. He had thrown off a lot of pain during the duels, especially when he was up against Malfoy, but it caught up with him while he was climbing the stairs to Gryffindor Tower. Suddenly, not remembering how, he collapsed. Alicia and Hermione were bending over him, shaking him. Had he blacked out?

Then Ron had taken Alicia's place, catching up with them, and, leaning on Ron and Hermione, he had managed to get back up to the tower. They took him up to the fifth-year dorm. Harry remembered very little. They put him in bed, closing the curtains around him. He vaguely remembered that Neville had been in the room, reading on his bed.

He took his hand out of his mouth; the shape of his teeth showed in a bloody imprint on the soft flesh between his thumb and index finger on his right hand. And now he realized that that hurt like hell, too. But the scar was still worse. He closed his eyes, panting, growling low in his throat. Maybe he could transform into the golden griffin until the pain went away, he thought. He didn't have to worry about Sandy; he wasn't wearing her. He'd left her by the fire in the common room during the dueling, not wanting to risk her getting hurt (and not wanting Ron and Hermione to accuse him of cheating). As a griffin, I don't have a scar, he thought. And the pain of the transfiguration was nothing compared to this.

He pulled back the covers, crouching on the mattress, willing his bones, his skin, his hair and eyes to metamorphosize into the golden griffin. He felt the change come over him, felt the pads of his paws on the blanket, a mane tickling his back and face, his tail swishing back and forth. He felt the usual pain too, but he welcomed it, it receded in importance, became a kind of background noise. The scar torment became a thing of memory. He hunkered down on the bed, his front paws kneading the blankets instinctively. He put his chin on his paws, closing his eyes. Maybe he could actually sleep like this, find some respite from the pain.

He was starting to drift off, enjoying the feeling of his own purring motor resonating throughout his body, lulling his brain to sleep. Then he was aware of a step on the stone floor, and suddenly he heard his bedcurtains pulled aside. He opened his eyes to see Neville standing at his bedside, framed by the red hangings.

He had forgotten about Neville, whose mouth was open in shock. Then Neville's brain connected to his mouth. "Aaaaaah!" Neville screamed. Harry immediately returned to his human form and clamped his hand over Neville's mouth, making him produce a strangled sound. Neville's eyes were very large; Harry slowly removed his hand from his mouth and Neville swallowed and tried to speak.

"You--you're--you're--"

"Ssssshh!" Harry hissed at him. He whispered, "Don't say anything! McGonagall's been training me in private. No one's supposed to know yet."

Neville nodded, his eyes as wide as ever, his mouth still open. Suddenly, the curtains on Harry's right were swept open. Ron stood there, looking concerned. Harry turned to him, then looked back at Neville, pleading silently for him to keep his secret. Neville gave a very small nod, but Harry never really seriously thought that Neville wouldn't keep his word; somehow he knew he could trust him completely.

"What's wrong, Harry?" Ron wanted to know, his breathing irregular. "Is it your scar again?"

Harry nodded, his hand on his head, even though the pain was duller, less piercing. He checked his watch; it was only six-thirty in the evening. Ron must have skipped dinner, stayed in the dorm to be near him. Harry ached inside, thinking of what a good friend Ron was, how little he deserved him. Even now, he was still keeping the Animagus training from him, and Neville knew. In fact, he realized, Neville was the first person apart from McGonagall and Dumbledore who had seen his transfigured form. Even Ginny, who had guessed what he was up to, hadn't actually seen him change, and still thought he was planning to be a lion. Of course, Neville probably thought he was a lion too, he realized.

He swung his legs over the side of the bed, fumbling on the bedside table for his glasses. Ron sat next to him, still looking very concerned. Then Harry heard a small squeak, and Ron said, "Okay, sweetheart, you want to come out?" and took Argent from the inside of his shirt, where she had been nestled. She was still quite small, although weaned from Bainbridge now, and Ron had been in the habit of letting the kitten ride around inside his shirt when he could; sometimes Harry had heard her mewing in class, while Ron sat, wide-eyed with innocence, and the professors paced around the room, looking for the source of the noise.

He held the small kitten in his hands now. She rubbed the side of her face against his palm, purring loudly, and Harry smiled, watching her. It was impossible not to smile at a kitten, especially this kitten. Harry watched Ron's face as he watched her too; his expression softened whenever he looked at her, clearly showing how he had fallen for this little ball of fluff.

Harry had been surprised by Ron's relationship with Argent. Thus far, Harry's experience of Ron and pets had been Scabbers, Errol and Pig. Scabbers, of course, wasn't really a rat but the dark wizard Wormtail. Still, Ron had spent quite a lot of time insulting him and complaining about him (although he'd been livid when he thought Hermione's cat Crookshanks had eaten him). Scabbers was also yet another hand-me-down, something which reminded Ron of his family's poverty (the rat used to be Percy's). Errol wasn't really Ron's owl, but he had been allowed to use him; being quite elderly, Errol was winded by even the shortest flight carrying the smallest piece of mail. Pigwidgeon, on the other hand, had enthusiasm to spare, but Ron was constantly frustrated by his manic behavior and the fact that his diminutive size prohibited him from carrying large packages as much as Errol's advanced years did.

Now here he was, almost constantly carrying around this tiny creature who was so attached to him, cooing to her the corniest endearments and letting her climb all over him. Harry had seen that Ron had claw marks all over his arms and legs and chest and shoulders when Ron was changing his clothes. When Argent climbed up his robes and her claws went too deep, he merely winced, waiting for her to reach his shoulder, and she would rub against the side of his face and purr in his ear.

After what seemed like a long silence between them, punctuated by Argent's squeaks and mews, Ron said, "Hermione should be back from dinner. Do you want to tell us both what made your scar hurt?"

Harry nodded, swallowing, still watching the kitten. If only my life could be that uncomplicated, he thought. Eat, sleep, wash, purr and look at someone with big eyes so that they'll pet me.

He struggled to stand, and when he seemed about to fall backward onto the bed again, Ron reached out his hand to steady him. Argent sat on his shoulder, claws sunk into his robes, but Ron didn't seem to mind. They walked down to the common room, Harry leaning heavily on the railing. They found Ginny and Hermione sitting in armchairs by the fire, talking excitedly about the dueling, but they stopped when they saw Ron and Harry. Both girls stood, alarmed at the sight of him.

"Harry!" Hermione said first. "What are you doing out of bed? You're pale as a ghost!"

"Go back to bed, Harry," Ginny said, putting her hand on his arm, then on his cheek. "You don't look well." Then she moved her hand to his forehead, as if checking for a fever, but when she made contact with the scar, he cried out, closing his eyes and knocking her arm away.

"Ow--" she started to moan, then stifled this when she saw the looks on Ron's and Hermione's faces. Hermione looked very, very grim.

"Harry--it's your scar, isn't it?" Hermione said softly.

He opened his eyes, looking at her dully, nodded. Then he turned to Ginny, who was still holding her arm. "Sorry, Ginny," he mumbled. She shrugged, letting go of her arm reluctantly, as though she were only trying to make him think she wasn't hurt.

He staggered to one of the empty armchairs by the fire, sat down heavily. He started speaking in a low voice as the others moved to sit in the other chairs.

"Voldemort is going after Muggles now. I saw him. It was a tube station. It--blew up..." He hit the arm of the chair repeatedly, frowning, his eyes squeezed shut. Suddenly his eyes flew open. He remembered. He knew.

"It was Westminster."

"Westminster!" Hermione squealed. Ron and Ginny looked at her strangely; they didn't know why this was significant. "Westminster," she said again, softly. "That's right near Parliament, and Westminster Abbey. And from Parliament Square, you can walk along Whitehall to Trafalgar Square..."

But Harry was remembering something else. Something to do with his name...why couldn't he remember?

"Oh, Harry, do you think he was targeting Parliament?"

He shook his head, looking at the fire. "I have no idea. I saw--all of these people on the platform, waiting. Mothers with--with children...old people..." he swallowed; his throat felt very tight.

"Harry," Ginny said softly, "Is there any chance that it--that it was just a dream? That it didn't really happen?"

Harry shook his head again. "I wish. But whenever my scar hurts like that--"

"You have to go to Dumbledore," Hermione jumped in. He looked up at Ron and Ginny, who both nodded agreement. He swallowed again, knowing they were right. He rose and went to the portrait hole, the others following him. He turned and put out his hands to stop them.

"I--I need to go alone. Wait here. Please." They looked doubtfully at each other. "I'll be fine. Really. The pain's not so bad now. Please," he said again. They nodded and let him go.

But as soon as he was in the corridor, he realized he didn't want to go alone after all. He started to give the password to go back in, but he realized that he wasn't interested in Ron or Hermione or Ginny coming along. He wanted to talk to someone else.

Without thinking, he started down the stairs. Down, down, down--until he was in the dungeons and knocking at Snape's office door.

"Alohomora!" came the reply, causing the door to swing open suddenly. Harry stepped into the room cautiously. Snape was sitting at his desk, reading essays. There was a large pile of rolled pieces of parchment on the desk; he would probably be working quite late. He could have had all of that done already if he hadn't accepted responsibility for the Dueling Club, Harry realized.

Perhaps Snape realized that too. He looked up at Harry, irritated, snarling, "What is it, Potter? Can't wait until tomorrow for the Club standings? Well, you're still ranked first, the only one still undefeated. Happy? Now, I have essays to grade. You may go."

But Harry stood in the doorway still, holding onto the jamb for support.

"Potter? Are you all right?" Snape tried to sound surly still, but he didn't completely succeed.

Harry shook his head. "I didn't--didn't come for the standings. The dueling exhausted me, especially throwing off the pain. The Hara Kiri--"

Snape frowned. "Yes. Technically, that's not illegal in this country, but if it looked as though you couldn't handle it, I'd have aborted the duel and suspended Mr. Malfoy from the club."

"Don't do that," Harry said feebly, feeling weaker and weaker. Snape actually looked concerned, trying to hide it beneath a sneer.

"Come, Potter," he said briskly, getting up and guiding him to the wing chair by the fire. "That's what chairs are for," he added, still trying to maintain a churlish demeanor, but the edge was gone from his voice.

Harry sank into the chair gratefully. Snape sat at his desk again. Harry looked around the office. He'd never really looked around when he'd come in to use the Pensieve or when he'd been hiding under his Invisibility Cloak. In addition to the shelves and shelves of carefully labeled potions ingredients, there were dozens of potions texts lining the walls as well; many did not appear to be in English, or even written with Roman letters. On the spines of a few texts he recognized Greek letters, Cyrillic, something that could be Chinese or Japanese, and others that he assumed were ancient runes, simply because he did not recognize them. A broom stood in the corner behind Snape; it looked old and slow. Then Harry realized that Snape's robes were rather frayed at the edges, the tips of his shoes showing beneath his black robes looked scuffed and muddy.

There were no photos of family members waving at him, no friends or former students who had sent signed pictures with their best regards and thanks--not even Slytherins. It was the office of a lonely man. An alone man.

"I don't know if Sirius told you about my dream. On Christmas night," Harry said suddenly. Snape looked at him impassively.

"Yes." His face betrayed no emotion.

"Well," Harry went on, "I saw--I saw you. Looking like Lucius Malfoy. I saw you pulling Karkaroff and Draco Malfoy away from the Death Eaters and Voldemort. Then, when he did the killing curse, I didn't know--I didn't know who had died..."

Harry tried to keep his voice even, but it was difficult. He wanted him to know he was glad it was Karkaroff, but that didn't seem right. He wanted to say he was glad it wasn't Snape, but he couldn't get the words out, somehow.

"Karkaroff was stupid. And a coward," Snape said bitterly. "But he didn't deserve to die. Not like that."

Harry nodded. No one deserved to die like that. He thought of Cedric. He thought of Snape, holding his mother, crying, her green eyes staring into the night sky which had had its constellations augmented by the Dark Mark...

"I had another dream," he said abruptly.

"The Dark Lord?" Snape said apprehensively. Harry nodded. "Where?"

"In London. The Westminster tube station. Near Parliament. It was--it was full of people going home for the evening. It blew up." Harry's voice caught. "There were little kids..."

Snape interrupted him. "Enough." He stood and went to the mantel. He picked some powder out of a ceramic bowl next to what looked like a pickled toad in a jar, and, throwing the powder into the fire, he said, "Remus Lupin."

The flames turned green, then a moment later, Sirius' head appeared to be nestled in among the coals in the firebox.

"Hello, Severus. Oh, hello, Harry. Didn't expect to see you. And if you'd called at this time tomorrow, you wouldn't have gotten me. Or Remus, of course. Full moon, next three nights. Remus is at work right now. Why did you call?"

Snape nodded grimly at Harry. He turned to the flames.

"I had another dream." Sirius looked very frightened.

"Tell me about it."

So Harry described it; the people in the station, the train coming in, seeing Voldemort's face, the explosion, and waking up with his scar hurting.

"Sirius," Snape said when Harry was done. "Didn't I see one of those Muggle contraptions when I was there, one of those--tellies? Can you get any information from it? Or from the wireless?"

"I'll try both the television and the radio. Can I call you back?" Snape nodded. Sirius' face disappeared from the flames and they returned to their normal red-orange-yellow glow.

Harry turned to Snape, confused. "They have electricity there?" Snape looked at Harry as if he were hopelessly naive.

"There's no work for Remus Lupin in the wizarding world, any more than there is for Sirius Black. Remus lives in a flat in Manchester, works as a night watchman in a warehouse. On nights with a full moon, if he has to work he locks himself into the warehouse. If Sirius is around, he goes with him, stays with him in dog form. His employers also gave him a gun, for the guard job. When the moon is full, Sirius puts bullets into the gun that he made special--bullets made of silver. Remus has made him promise that if it looks like he could possibly get out or hurt someone in any way, he will use the gun."

It took Harry a moment to register the fact that Snape and Sirius and Lupin all seemed to be on a first-name basis, finally. Then he realized what Lupin had asked Sirius to do. "He wants Sirius to shoot him?" Harry whispered.

"Silver is the only thing that can kill a werewolf, Potter," Snape said matter-of-factly. Harry nodded, looking down at his hands, trying to imagine his best friend asking him to do the same. If Ron asked him to kill him, could he ever do it? Dueling was one thing, but this--

The time seemed to drag, but Harry checked his watch and saw that it was only five minutes since Sirius' head had disappeared from the fireplace. Suddenly, he was back.

"Severus, Harry, I have bad news," he began. "The tube station--Westminster--it's very bad. They're going to be getting bodies out all night. It's on every channel, and it's the only story on the radio. Even music stations have stopped playing music and are just reporting this. So far they've removed twenty-two bodies and gotten nine people out who survived--but they're all very iffy. All critical, being rushed to hospital by helicopter. The P.M. has evacuated the houses of Parliament; it's Sunday night, but here are always some government drones slogging away in an office somewhere. Scotland Yard's on site--they won't find anything, of course. I could probably Apparate right down into the tunnel, see what it looks like, but I don't dare with all the Muggle police around. My picture's still hanging up in police stations around the country. Luckily, that actually makes me a typical resident here in Remus' neighborhood..."

"How do we tell the Ministry of Magic that it was Voldemort?" Harry wanted to know.

"We don't. Fudge doesn't want to admit he was wrong about his return. We go with the media. I have a contact who can make sure the Voldemort connection gets into the Daily Prophet without your name being mentioned, Harry. The last thing we need is for Voldemort to find out about your dreams."

Damn! thought Harry. Draco Malfoy knows about the dreams. And I still don't really know what side he's on...

"Oh, and Severus," Sirius went on. "That operative has the samples. You'll be receiving them tomorrow. How long before you can run the test?"

"It will take about thirty-six hours," Snape replied.

Harry frowned. "What test?"

"Well, Harry, you suggested that we need to find out about Krum," Sirius said.

"But," Harry said, confused, "I thought you said you were going to get the samples."

"I couldn't possibly, Harry. The Krums all know what I look like as a dog, from last summer." That means Viktor Krum knows, Harry realized. More possible trouble. "It needed to be someone else." Harry was going to say, But you mentioned being an unregistered Animagus--when he suddenly thought he knew how the samples had been obtained. If you don't mind answering to an obsolete dingbat... Suddenly, he also knew who the contact at the Prophet was...

"At any rate, I'll send you all the Muggle papers I can get my hands on concerning the attack. The gits on Fleet Street are going to be wetting themselves--oh, pardon me, Harry--"

Harry grimaced. "I'm fifteen, Sirius, not five."

Sirius smiled at him. "Right. I got that point the last time I saw you...Well. I'm off to monitor the news reports some more. I wish Remus had something better than a nine-inch black and white--and I'll go to the corner news agency first thing in the morning. I'll send the papers using Remus' owl. He's pretty hardy, can take quite a load. Have you told Dumbledore yet?"

Snape stepped in. "I'll tell the headmaster. Harry needs to get some rest; we had Dueling Club this afternoon."

Sirius smiled at Harry. "So! How'd you do?"

Snape answered before he could get his mouth open. "After three weeks and fifteen duels, he's got fifteen wins. Only one who's undefeated." His voice was flat and emotionless. Harry looked at him, perplexed. "Harry threw off quite a lot of pain. Draco Malfoy used the Hara Kiri on him. He's exhausted."

Sirius drew in his breath. "Hara Kiri? And you just--threw it off?"

This time Snape let him answer. "Yeah. Only afterward, I felt like--like I could barely walk."

"Well, you do as Severus says and get some rest. It sounds like he can talk to Dumbledore. I can give him a call, too, before I go back to monitoring the media. Take care of yourself, Harry. Are you going up to Dumbledore's now, Severus?" Snape answered in the affirmative. "All right. I'll give you a chance to get up there, then call in a few minutes. Good night, Harry."

"Good night," he said to his godfather. And he was gone. Suddenly, Harry realized something very odd had happened; when Snape had been talking to Sirius, he had referred to him as "Harry." Twice. It was almost as strange as hearing Malfoy say his first name.

Then he thought about Sirius' reaction to his throwing off the Hara Kiri curse, and also Snape's reaction, and Malfoy's. Why was he able to do it? Why was he able to almost completely overcome the Imperius Curse the first time Crouch had put it on him the previous year?

"Why was I able to do that?" he suddenly said aloud, unable to stop his thoughts from coming out of his mouth. He looked up at Snape. "I mean--can you ask the headmaster for me? I--I don't understand. Is it the same as being a Parselmouth? Is it something I got from Voldemort when he tried to kill me? It was like, once Moody told us we could do it, if our minds were strong enough--I knew I could do it. Last year, when I was in that graveyard..." but he couldn't continue for a moment, remembering some of the more gruesome details of that day. "I mean--Voldemort put the Cruciatus Curse on me twice, and it was--" He shook his head. "I couldn't breath properly afterward, it hurt so much. But just knowing now that I can stop some kinds of pain, somehow--I did it."

Snape looked at him blankly. A silence hung between them as Harry looked desperately back at him. Finally, Snape said softly, "I don't know, Potter. I can ask the headmaster."

He was Potter again. He would say Harry's first name when referring to him in the third person, but not when addressing him...Harry nodded and followed Snape out into the dungeon, looking briefly over his shoulder at the pile of parchment rolls still on Snape's desk; he'd be up until all hours finishing that now.

They walked together up to the entrance hall, silently. From here, Snape went up another staircase, away from the marble stairs to Gryffindor Tower, without a backward glance or another word to Harry. Harry had never gone that way to Dumbledore's office before. Perhaps Snape knew a shortcut.

But suddenly, Harry felt faint again. He leaned against the stone wall, watching the small black dots before his eyes grow larger and larger, blending into each other, one swallowing its neighbor swallowing its other neighbor, watching them begin to dance in whirling patterns, watching them expand until they blotted out the wavering torchlight...