Worser Angels

Chapter Nine

The Sorting Hat

The next morning, Severus sat in the staff room before breakfast, reading the Daily Prophet. He supposed he'd have to go to the Great Hall later, to keep an eye on things. Fah.

He usually skipped the gossip pages, but when he glanced over it, he saw Draco's face staring up at him, under the headline, "Malfoy Heir 'Seriously Disturbed.'"

He read the story with growing unease. "Draco Malfoy, son of convicted Death Eaters Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy, admitted in a closed Ministry hearing that he had been committed involuntarily to hospital for psychiatric observation. The troubled Malfoy heir also made disturbing allegations against his infamous father. He alleged that his father has used the Cruciatus curse against him, beginning when he was nine years old. When asked why he did not report this abuse to his teachers at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Malfoy said, 'I didn't know there was anything wrong with it. I thought it was normal.' Says Norman Nobbles of St. Mungos Hospital, 'If he thinks using the Unforgivable Curses against children is normal, he must be serious disturbed in his morals.' Added the well-known medi-wizard, 'Of course, it is not unusual for criminals to fabricate these sorts of allegations in order to gain sympathy from a gullible public.'"

Severus felt like he was going to be sick, and for once not because of the Prophet's novel take on the concept of journalistic integrity.

"Is this true, Snape?" McGonagall demanded of him.

"Which part? You already know about the hospital. As for his morals, you'll have to judge for yourself."

"You know what I mean."

"I don't know," Severus admitted. "They threw me out of the interview."

"He hasn't talked to you about it?"

"No," Snape growled.

"That's funny. I thought he liked you."

Snape glared at her. "I'd better go and warn him."

In the hospital wing, Malfoy was just waking up. "Morning, Professor," he said blearily, and stumbled into the lavatory. Snape toyed with the idea of putting the paper on his bed and getting out while the getting was good, but reluctantly decided that such a move would be unworthy of Draco's trust in him.

Pity, that.

When Draco emerged, he had his school robes on and his hair slicked back. "I suppose it's too much to hope that you're here for a social visit."

"I'm afraid so." He handed Draco the Prophet, folded open to the story.

Draco scanned the first few lines standing up, then backed up until he hit a chair and slumped into it. "Oh shit," he said. Then he read a few more lines and, "Oh shit," he repeated. "People are going to read this."

"I'm afraid that's the general idea."

"Do you think I could just stay here for the rest of my life?"

"Probably not."

Draco looked a little green under his usual pallor. He loosened his tie and swallowed hard. "I think I'm going to--" Then he put his head down and retched, bringing up bile.

Severus jumped to his feet. "I'll get Poppy--"

"No," Draco said between heaves. "Please."

"All right," Snape acquiesced. He stood next to Draco, awkwardly patting his back. When Draco seemed finished, Severus offered him his handkerchief.

"Thanks," he said, wiping his mouth. "I'm sorry."

"It's fine. I take it it's true, then? The factual details, if not the unusually foul and contradictory interpretations?"

Draco nodded, without meeting his eyes. "I don't want to talk about it."

"I'm not surprised. The Cruciatus curse is highly unpleasant."

Draco looked over at him. "Yeah, I guess you'd know."

"Yes. The Dark Lord," he added.

"Father didn't do it all that often. And now that I'm at school....It really wasn't that bad."

"Don't be stupid."

Draco flinched.

"I just mean--why didn't you say something?"

He gestured at the paper. "You were in with Father. I assumed you knew. And I'd rather die than have anybody else know about this." He turned away. "Guess that's..."

Severus handed him another handkerchief. Albus would know what to say. He didn't, so he patted Draco's back until he finished crying.

"Thanks," Draco said shakily. "I'm just going to--" He shuffled off to the lavatory again. When he returned, looking a little more composed, he said, "We'd better go."

"Yes," Severus agreed. Classes would be starting soon, and Severus wanted to supervise his foray into the outside world.

"Anything else good in the Prophet today?" Draco asked as they left the hospital wing.

Severus recognized his attempt to find a neutral topic to occupy his mind, and willingly collaborated with it. The difficulty was in coming up with a subject. Most of the current news had to do with the Ministry's efforts to identify Death Eaters and to predict Voldemort's strategy in the upcoming war. Quidditch results would ordinarily be a safe topic, but even that was potentially inflammatory. He decided on, "They're talking about raising the school-leaving age again, to eighteen."

"Really? Bet you'd hate that."

"I assume most of those who'd otherwise leave school at seventeen won't take N.E.W.T. level Potions anyway. But I don't see why education should be wasted on those who aren't suited for it," he agreed. But the measure was gaining support in part because it would keep hotheaded young witches and (particularly) wizards from quitting school to join the war, on one side or another. He changed the subject quickly. "I'm doing Shrinking potions with the first-years this morning. Doesn't sound very dangerous, but I almost lost one once."

"Lost in what sense?"

"Literally. It was a heavy girl, she thought the potion would slim her down a bit."

"And?"

"Had to find her with a magnifying glass and drip the antidote on her with an eyedropper."

He paused to see if he'd have to embellish the story further, but, fortunately, Draco seemed sufficiently distracted. He grinned, and said, "I didn't know you knew how to gossip, Professor. Who was it?"

"A girl called Smythe. Before your time."

Severus didn't think he could get Draco into the Great Hall with a lever, but he should eat something. Spending the morning attempting to be sick and then not eating anything until lunch would not help him get through what was promising to be an unusually unpleasant day. "Breakfast ought to be nearly over. The Great Hall will be packed. We'll stop by the staff room," he decided.

"I don't think I'm allowed in there."

"Of course not." But Severus murmured the password, held the door open, and ushered him in.

"Professor Snape," McGonagall began.

"Be quiet." Severus poured two cups of tea, shoved one at Draco, and drank the other. "Muffin?"

Draco accepted, saying, "This is so much less awkward than the Great Hall. Terrific idea, Professor."

"You be quiet too," he said. He gulped his tea and added, "I just couldn't be bothered murdering anybody who bothers you. Not this early in the morning."

"Lazy git," Draco said fondly.

Severus knew he ought to warn him off from addressing one of his teachers in such a familiar and disrespectful way. But he was secretly thrilled--he could not recall ever having been the object of a friendly slagging off before.

McGonagall was openly staring. As was Vector. And Flitwick. Severus cleared his throat. "Be that as it may," he said stiffly.

Malfoy favored him with a credible imitation of his usual smirk.

#

After that awkward breakfast, Draco hurried to Transfiguration on McGonagall's heels.

"I hope you realize," she said frostily, "That I cannot be relied upon to murder any of your classmates."

"Er...Yes, Professor."

"However, I will ensure that the usual standards of decorum are upheld."

"Oh, thanks." He assumed that meant she'd stop anyone being too horrible to him, at least when the class was going on. He was only too able to imagine what might happen--as he'd told Snape, he was a bully, so he knew how they thought. If this news had come out about someone else, he'd have had his people jumping out fro behind statues and shouting "Crucio!" at them. And Draco was far from sure that he could so much as hear the word without throwing up.

"You've been spending a lot of time with Professor Snape," McGonagall observed.

"So what if I have?" Was she going to say something awful about the Professor? He didn't think he could stand it, just then.

"I hope you know," she began, then stopped abruptly.

"What?"

"It's not my place to say. I just hope he isn't keeping any secrets from you."

"I'm sure he is," Draco said complacently. "I'm only fifteen, you know. I'm sure he knows plenty of things I'm too young to hear about." He could think of a number of things he knew about Snape that could qualify as the secret McGonagall was alluding to. He wouldn't be surprised if there were even worse things he didn't know about. But he trusted Snape, independent of anything he might have done.

"That isn't what I meant!"

"I know. If it's about...I know what side he's on." If McGonagall didn't know, that wouldn't give anything away, would it?

"Yes, well....he still isn't very nice."

"Really? I hadn't noticed."

McGonagall gave him an unreadable look and swept into the classroom.

#

The day didn't go as badly as he expected it might. He had Transfiguration, Arithmancy, and Potions, and no one dared talk much in those classes. Snape stood around glowering during the breaks--in an even more obvious manner than he'd been doing the last few days--so people pretty much left him alone. The occasional student awkwardly saying, "I'm sorry about...you know..." was the worst of it. A few people loudly declared in his hearing that they thought making up stories to get attention was revolting, but that was fairly easy to ignore.

After the last class of the day, he was summoned to the Headmaster's office again, and was unsurprised to meet Snape on the stairs.

"Do you know what it is this time?"

"No."

"D'you think we're in trouble?"

"I daresay if I was in trouble, Albus wouldn't invite you to the meeting." He rapped the gryphon knocker. "Why, have you done something?"

"Not that know of."

"Me neither. Lemon Drop."

There weren't any Ministry officials in the Headmaster's office, which would only be a good sign.

Dumbledore told them to sit, and offered them tea and a tin of peanut brittle. Snape took a cup of tea, and Draco had both.

"The Ministry hasn't sent and official word regarding your estate, but they don't have any grounds to hold it. I wouldn't worry if I were you."

"Okay." He had plenty of other things to worry about, anyway. "Why are we here, then?"

"First of all, you two left so quickly yesterday that we don't have a chance to talk."

"We're fine, Albus," Severus said.

"My dear boy, you do realize that there doesn't have to be a crisis for you to talk to me."

Draco would have expected Snape to protest--vigorously--being called anybody's "dear boy," but he only said, with uncharacteristic meekness, "I'll try to remembered that."

"And how are you feeling, Draco?"

"Fine," he said, glancing at Snape. "I'm okay, really."

"And about the Cruciatus curse?"

Draco sighed. "No, I'm not making it up; Yes, I'm fine now; I didn't say anything for exactly the reasons it says in that damn article, and no, I don't want to talk about it."

"Am I really so predictable?" the Headmaster murmured.

"You're something like the twentieth person today." It would have been nice to have someone express concern about his welfare before his father had died. "I talked to Professor Snape this morning. If you need to know the details for some reason, you can ask him. When I'm not in the room." He thought Snape would probably tell Dumbledore what he had said anyway.

"All right. As long as you've talked to someone. How are things with the other students?"

"Okay. No one's tried to kill me for a few days, anyway," he essayed a joke.

Snape and Dumbledore looked at each other.

"Actually," Snape said, "We meant to talk to you about that."

"What fresh hell?" he asked rhetorically. He was pretty sure he knew.

"Severus caught Parkinson, Nott, Zabini, and Crabbe on their way to the hospital wing last night. Apparently he's been keeping watch in the corridor the last few nights." Dumbledore gave the Professor a fondly disapproving look.

Snape fiddled with his teacup. "I thought they might have something planned," he said stiffly. "And I was right, wasn't I?"

"If you had said something, we could have kept watch in shifts. You don't need to do everything yourself."

Snape steered the conversation back to the plot on Draco's life. "I couldn't find out what exactly they had planned. They said something about not suffering the Blood Traitor to live, and impressing the Dark Lord with their initiative. So they weren't acting on orders, at least. I convinced them that Dumbledore had me standing guard over said Blood Traitor, and that he'd be suspicious if anything happened to you on my watch. Then I gave them detention for being out of bed in the middle of the night.--you'll have Filch take that for me, by the way," he said in an aside to Dumbledore, "Because I don't trust myself not to wring their necks--and sent them back to their dormitory."

"Oh." And that was all an attempt on his life was worth, a lousy detention with Filch? He supposed there were strategic reasons for keeping the junior Death Eaters in the castle, but he was still a little put out.

"So we've decided the hospital wing isn't safe enough," Snape concluded.

"What are you going to do with me now?" He didn't exactly enjoy living in the hospital wing, but it seemed preferable to the alternatives.

Snape gave him an apologetic look. "I know how you feel about Hufflepuff, but they do seem the least likely to harm you. That has to be our first consideration."

"Any of the other Houses should be fine, Severus," Dumbledore said sternly. Draco had the impression they'd argued this point earlier.

"There have been Dark wizards in Ravenclaw. And I don't trust those Gryffindors any further than I can throw them," Snape said decisively.

"Do you remember," Dumbledore said, "That we discussed how I'd tell you if you became paranoid?"

"I am not paranoid. Just....cautious."

"I don't want to be in another House," Draco said stubbornly. He knew Slytherin wasn't safe for him. But he also felt, vaguely, that there might be some principle at stake. But if he said so, Snape would want to know what it was--and he didn't know.

"You can't stay in Slytherin." Snape didn't sound like he was open to negotiation.

"We did consider assigning you private lodgings--there are plenty of empty rooms--but some of the staff, and certainly many of the students, would consider that a sign of favoritism," Dumbledore explained.

"I do think we should reconsider that option." Snape explained to Draco, "The school was bigger before Voldemort's first rise to power. There used to be larger staff, as well, and most of the vacant lodgings aren't being used for anything else."

"As I've said," Dumbledore said firmly, "Some of the other staff would object."

Draco thought that was a good idea. His primary objection to the hospital wing was the near-total lack of privacy. A normal House life was probably out of the question for him anyway.

"You can take care of that, can't you, Professor?" he asked Snape. The Professor seemed to be inclined to take his side.

"No, but perhaps you can, Albus," Snape suggested.

"I'll not, not even if you two present a united front. Draco would be much better off living with others his own age. They won't get over their suspicions if he's allowed to isolate himself from the rest of the school."

Snape still looked uncomfortable, but Draco gave in. "Okay. Then we still have to decide which House. What about Ravenclaw? I hear some of the Hufflepuffs still wet the bed."

"I'm sure that's not true," Dumbledore said.

"Not the sixth-years, anyway," Snape smirked.

"I'd still never live it--" He stopped short. He had much worse to live down than two years as a Hufflepuff. He decided to try honesty over scheming. "I'm just too vain, all right? Besides, think how awful it would be for them to have me living there. I'm not going to go out of my way to make myself pleasant." That was true, even if he wasn't particularly proud of it. He didn't think he could be as miserable as living in Hufflepuff would make him without spreading it around.

"You might like the Hufflepuffs more than you think," Dumbledore said. "But, in any case, we've decided it would be best to let the Sorting Hat decide."

Snape looked distinctly displeased. "But--"

Draco wasn't terribly upset. Snape had seemed well on the way to convincing Dumbledore to put him in Hufflepuff. "That give me two chances in three of avoiding Hufflepuff, then."

"Don't be so sure," Snape said. "You've been shockingly loyal to me of late."

"Well then I'll just have to think of some way to stab you in the back," Draco told him.

Dumbledore looked shocked, but Snape said, "He's joking, Albus. Or trying to."

They scheduled his re-sorting for two afternoons hence, in front of the staff. Dumbledore showed Snape a schedule he'd worked out to have Draco guarded for the next two nights. Snape insisted that Filch be taken off the rota--he didn't think he could be trusted--before he agreed to the plan.

"Go down to the library until dinner," Snape told him. "Sir Nicholas will escort you. Stay where Madame Pince can see you until I come fetch you."

"What are you going to be doing?"

"Talking to the Headmaster. Privately."

#

When Draco had left--looking a little put out--Severus took a chair closer to Dumbledore and pulled his feet up underneath him, wrapping his arms around his knees.

"You asked them all, and no one would agree to take him," Severus guessed.

"Let us say, everyone agreed to abide by the Sorting Hat's decision."

"And who was it objected to giving him his own room?" When they'd talked the previous night, Dumbledore had seemed willing to be persuaded.

"If you hadn't dragged him into the staff room this morning, there might have been a chance. After word got 'round that he'd called you a 'lazy git' and gotten away with it, the consensus was that young Mr. Malfoy has been allowed to become entirely too big for his britches."

"It was a joke," Severus explained. "I'd just told him--"

"Yes, I know. Minerva recounted the entire conversation. I need not tell you she was appalled."

"She would be."

"Severus."

The Headmaster's tone was serious enough to make him sit up and take notice. "Yes, Headmaster?"

"As pleased as I am that you've found a friend at long last, I fear you're getting a bit carried away. You have far more pressing concerns than making yourself entertaining to a fifteen year old boy."

Severus wished he had his truth potion. Dumbledore had a point, of course--Draco was a student, whatever else he was, and treating him differently to the other students was fraught with potential problems. But if he was going to be as good a mentor as Albus had been to him, he was going to have to develop his own style of doing so. Severus was temperamentally unsuited to fashioning himself as a biscuit-offering kindly old elf. Sarcasm worked better for him. And besides.... "Have you any idea," he said stiffly, "What it's like for me to be liked?"

"Of course I do. If these were not such dangerous times, I'd be glad to see you forget your responsibilities for a moment or two. But..."

"Yes, I know." He was Dumbledore's dog, and he was a dog of war. Protecting Draco's life was--whatever Dumbledore thought--equally important to his other responsibilities, but his happiness--both Draco's and his own--had to come at the end of the list.

Dumbledore accepted his surrender and moved on. "There are some burdens no one else can bear for you. But others can be shared, and you must learn to tell the difference."

He knew what Dumbledore meant. "I didn't know if he was in any real danger." He had been unwilling to go to the rest of the staff with his mere hunch that Draco ought to be watched over.

"Nevertheless, you can ask for help. Even with Malfoy."

Snape didn't answer.

"Promise me you'll try."

He sighed. "I'll try."

"My dear boy...." In his more cynical moments, Severus wondered if Dumbledore knew he'd do anything for the scraps of affection the Headmaster bestowed on him.

No, that wasn't quite right. He knew Dumbledore knew. He jus wondered if Dumbledore was capable of using that knowledge against him.

"...would do well to trust someone other than me."

He frowned. "You just told me not to get 'carried away.'"

Albus seemed confused for a moment. "Malfoy?"

"He trusts me. I don't know how else to react."

"Well...trust him if you like. But don't act like an adolescent. Especially not in public."

"I wasn't in public." He was deliberately staying out of public. Even with Dumbledore, it seemed, he couldn't win.

"Severus."

That tone again. "Yes?"

"Don't get yourself hurt."

Hah. As if that had ever stopped him before.

#

Draco was far more nervous than he'd been for his first Sorting. Then, he'd known exactly what would happen: he'd be Sorted into Slytherin, where his family had been for generations. He'd make Father proud.

Now he gave the Sorting Hat a wary look before sitting in the chair in front of the assembled teachers.

"Anything you'd like to say?"

Draco was about to shake his head when he realized Dumbledore was speaking to the Hat.

"You know my feelings," the Sorting Hat said. "Let's get this over with."

Draco's thoughts exactly.

Dumbledore placed the Hat on his head.

Well? A querulous voice spoke in his head. The Hat hadn't spoken to him last time, though he'd heard from other students it sometimes did. What do you want?

The answer that appeared in his mind was perhaps the most honest he'd come up with yet. To live my life and be left alone. Then To make Malfoy something other than a byword for evil. And finally To be happy.

The Hat was silent for a long time, though Draco heard a sound like someone muttering to himself just out of earshot. When he was beginning to think it had decided not to Sort him after all, it screamed, "Malfoy."

The Hat was plucked from his head, and all of the teachers started talking at once.

"--chuck him out--"

"--Been tampered with?"

"--make it try again--"

"--back in Slytherin--"

Dumbledore cleared his throat. Everyone fell silent and watched him expectantly. "The Sorting Hat has been privy to our discussions about what to do with Mr. Malfoy. It knows that putting him in some of the unused lodgings was an option we considered. Clearly, it has decided that is what we should do." He made a show of looking at a scroll on his table. "The old assistant Potion's Master's quarters are vacant. We'll install him there, so Professor Snape can keep an eye on him."

"Were you going to consult me about this arrangement, Headmaster?" Snape growled.

"I don't believe I was," Dumbledore said mildly. "You may escort Mr. Malfoy to his new lodgings."

They left. "Probably just as well," Snape told him. "It would be hard for you to fit in in any of the other Houses. And they're not bad rooms." He brandished his wand at the lock on a door down the hall from his. "Alohamora. Lumos."

The opening door and his wand-light revealed a dingy set of rooms, chockablock with jumbled old furniture and thick with dust.

"Have to get the house-elves in," Snape said. "Put the place in order. It'll be all right then."

Draco spied his trunk, the only dust-free object in the rooms, sitting at the foot of a bed hung with moldy old curtains.

"We'll go down to dinner," Snape decided, "The house elves will have things put to rights by the time we're through."

"Who do I sit with?" Draco asked practically. He didn't think he could quite stand it if he arrived in the Great Hall to find a solitary table set up for him.

"With the Gryffindors, I suppose. Since you've been doing."

"Okay." They chatted on the way up to the Great Hall, where Snape immediately sneered and said, apropos of nothing, "See that you do."

When he went to sit down, Weasley demanded, "They didn't put you in with us, did they?"

"No," Draco said shortly, helping himself to lamb stew.

"They why are you sitting here?"

"The scintillating conversation," he said sourly.

"What happened?" Granger asked. "Really."

Word would get around, whether he said anything or not. "That Hat wouldn't put me in another House."

"So are you staying in the hospital wing?"

"No. I got my own room."

"That's...cool," Longbottom offered.

"Not really. It's a sty," he said.

#

Severus walked Draco back to his new rooms. "This ought to be all right," he said again. "You'll be safe, at least." He wondered if Dumbledore had planned all along to have the Sorting Hat override the staff's consensus that Draco ought to be placed in a House. He wouldn't put it past the sly old codger--but if he had, he might have warned Severus about it.

Draco nodded.

The notice-- "Vacant"--on the old Assistant Potions Master's quarters had been replaced by one reading "Malfoy House" and a portrait of a shepherdess and a spaniel. "Password?" the shepherdess asked.

Draco glanced up at him and suggested, "Fac me certiorum?"

The door opened. Inside, the house elves had cleared out most of the old furniture and all of the dust. A wood and leather sofa and two armchairs--both of which had been clawed by somebody's cat--were grouped around the fireplace, where already a good fire was blazing. A blue and silver rug was on the floor, and a plate of tea and cookies were set out on the table.

"Draco Malfoy likes his new rooms?" A voice squeaked. Snape noticed Dumbledore's free house elf curled up in one of the chairs.

"Dobby!" Draco apparently recognized him. "What are you are doing here? And what on earth are you wearing?"

The house-elf wore, instead of Hogwarts' usual monogrammed tea towel, a pair of white shorts, a tie knotted over a bare chest, socks, and a ridiculous had with a bobble on the top.

"Albus Dumbledore took Dobby in after Lucius Malfoy freed Dobby."

"Oh. Well, it's brilliant, Dobby. The rooms, I mean. Nice job." Draco prowled around, exploring his new rooms. "Hey! I've got a kitchen!"

"Of course you do. Watch the left-hand burner, doesn't heat evenly enough for potion-making."

"How do you know?"

"I used to live here, when I was assistant Potions Master."

Draco came out of the kitchen nook and flopped on one of the chairs. "You know, I never liked sharing a room with three other boys."

Snape frowned. "Draco. You absolutely must not put it about that you think of this arrangement as some sort of treat."

Draco stared into the fire. "I know perfectly well I'm only living here because no one else can stand me. I'm just trying to look for the bloody silver lining."

Snape wanted to tell him it wasn't like that. Instead he said, "Just don't do it in front of people."