Harry Potter and the Heir of Slytherin

Moonlight illuminated the field of close-cropped grass. Now and then, a patch of dark would float across the field from right to left, as a thin wisp of a cloud passed overhead. But even with the occasional cloud, the field could be seen as clearly as if it were midday. It wasn't, of course; judging from the position of the moon it was late night. Nearing midnight. In the foreground, the back wall of a small cottage stood to the right and isolated a large rectangle of shadow from the moonlight, but if one squinted, one could make out a very large cauldron sitting in the middle of the rectangle. A door opened and a short, balding man emerged.

The man looked alarmed at the sight of the cauldron. Immediately he gathered an armful of firewood from a pile near the door and carried it over to the cauldron. He placed it underneath, stretched out his wand, and ignited it. The door opened again and he turned around, alarmed.

"Wormtail," a cold, high-pitched voice called.

"Y-yes my Lord," the short man answered in a timid squeak.

"How is it coming, Wormtail?" The second man merely stood in the doorway. By the light of the newly-ignited fire he could see the firewood, barely scorched, sitting under the cauldron, atop a pile of smoldering ashes.

"Very well," Wormtail answered, feigning cheerfulness.

"The fire has gone out."

"No! It was--it was smoldering, but it's lit now! No harm done." The short man had drawn a wand from beneath his cloak and had begun stirring the cauldron. As he stirred, he furtively glanced sideways at the other, taller man. The second man did not move.

"Do not let it happen again, Wormtail." The high-pitched voice was steely-cold, and cruel. Its owner was losing his patience. "We cannot take any longer than we have to--if you were to ruin it, we would have to start all over again."

"But it's not ruined! It's fine!"

"It must be perfect. One tiny mistake and all would be lost."

"No! We haven't made any mistakes!"

"We?" The cold voice quieted to a whisper, and gave way to a cruel laugh. "No. We haven't made any mistakes. You, on the other hand--"

"No! It's fine--come see for yourself!"

But the taller man didn't move. He regarded Wormtail for a moment. "How much longer?"

Trembling, the short man drew a small piece of parchment from inside his cloak. "Lumos," he muttered. The tip of his wand lit up, and by its light he began to read to himself.

"The eggs must stew for two more months. Then we can add the Lobalug venom. But--" Wormtail's voice turned to a timid squeak now "- the unicorn hair--"

"Do not worry about that now," the tall man interrupted. "We have three months to locate it, and a contact to procure it for us. Very well, Wormtail. Mind you don't let that fire burn out again. I may not be so kindly disposed toward you next time."

"Yes, my Lord," Wormtail responded in a hoarse whisper. The tall man receded into the shadow the doorway, and the door banged shut behind him.

***

"Geez, Harry, didn't you sleep at all?" Ron asked as he, Harry, and Hermione sat down to breakfast the Tuesday after the Quidditch match against Slytherin. Ron must have noticed the dark circles under Harry's eyes. Harry hoped he didn't look as bad as he felt.

"Yeah. I mean, I think so. I don't remember."

"I dunno," Ron said, filling his glass with orange juice. "You woke me up twice with your tossing and turning. And the moaning. You were having some kind of nightmare."

Hermione looked concerned at this. "Harry, did you--did you have any dreams last night?" She stared at him. He knew she was remembering the dreams he'd had last year, involving Voldemort. He shook his head and reached for the serving dish, the one holding the scrambled eggs.

Eggs. Suddenly Harry stood up. "I've gotta go," he said quickly and ran out the doors of the Great Hall, through the entrance hall and down the stone steps of the castle. Alarmed, Ron and Hermione left their breakfasts and rushed after him.

It was blindingly bright outside, but chilly, and the air was beginning to smell like autumn. Harry began to run toward Hagrid's cabin. Not far from it, he could see Professor Green standing between the lake and the Forbidden Forest, pausing to watch three exhausted third-years run by. Sitting next to her on the ground was the person Harry wanted to see.

He ran over to Professor Green and, panting, explained that he needed to speak to Sirius.

"Hang on," she answered gravely. "What is it? What's wrong?"

But he didn't want to tell her. He wanted to tell Sirius. Before he could think of a polite way to say this, she nodded.

"Alright, but listen, you can't talk to him now. Would look a little odd, wouldn't it, you running out here in a panic and demanding to take my dog for a walk? Come by my office at one o'clock, after lunch, and you can speak to him then."

Harry suffered through Professor Binns' History of Magic lecture, then lunch, feeling as though one o'clock would never come. He had told Ron and Hermione what he had remembered of his dream, and they had agreed that he should tell someone.

"I think you should go straight to Dumbledore," Hermione had said. "I don't see why you don't."

"Well, he can ask Si-Snuffles about it," Ron had answered, glancing around the Gryffindor table to make sure no one was listening, "and if he thinks it's important enough, Harry will go to Dumbledore. But he doesn't know if it's worth bothering Dumbledore about yet, does he? I mean, he doesn't even know that it wasn't just a regular nightmare."

At one o'clock, just as Harry was about to knock on the door to Professor Green's office, it opened, and she appeared before him. "Come in," she said. Harry stepped inside, and she shut the door behind him. Instantly the large black dog on the rug in front of the fireplace metamorphosed into the person Harry wanted so desperately to speak with.

"I'm leaving now," Professor Green told them, walking to the door. She remembered something. "Oh, yes--"

"We know. Don't touch anything." Sirius smiled at her.

She smiled in return, nodded, and left.

Sirius watched her leave, then turned to Harry, still smiling. "So," he said, "what's this you wanted to speak with me about?"

Harry told him everything he could remember about the dream: Wormtail, Voldemort, the cottage, the field, the cauldron, the potion. When he described the ingredients he had heard them speak about--some sort of eggs, Lobalug venom, and unicorn hair--he was surprised to see Sirius merely nod, as though he already knew.

"Harry," Sirius said as he began pacing back and forth before the fire. This was a habit of Sirius', Harry was beginning to realize, and he felt oddly comforted by it. "Do you remember at the end of last term, in the hospital wing? I was told that Dumbledore gave--Snape--" he said the name as though he found it difficult to pronounce "--a task."

"Yeah," Harry answered, remembering. "But he didn't say what it was."

"Right. I will tell you now, if you promise to keep it a strict secret. Dumbledore wanted to keep it quiet as possible but, considering what you already know, I don't think it will make much difference if I tell you.

"That night, Snape prepared a Mind-Blocking Potion and went out to see an old acquaintance of his--Lucius Malfoy. His task was to find out everything he could about the Dark Lord's whereabouts.

"He didn't find out anything, although he was convinced that Malfoy knew more than he was letting on. But he kept in contact with him. Eventually, Snape started getting requests. For potion ingredients.

"Dumbledore directed Snape to pass the ingredients on to Malfoy, under the pretense that Snape was trying to help the Dark Lord return to power. All the while, Snape, Dumbledore, and a close circle of our allies have been keeping track of which items Voldemort has requested, in order to try to figure out what he's planning.

"So far, we can't see how he can use these items to create anything dangerous, or even all that beneficial to himself. Some of them are hard to find, but none of them is very powerful. The eggs you heard about were probably the Doxy eggs that Snape gave Malfoy at the beginning of the summer. We didn't know about the unicorn hair--that was a good tip--but even with that piece of information, I doubt that Dumbledore will be any closer to knowing what Voldemort's brewing.

"Maybe it's just a regular Wit-Sharpening potion, or some sort of a healing potion. We can't be sure. But as long as Voldemort keeps asking Snape for things, Snape's going to give them to him. We think Voldemort may be testing Snape's loyalty. Snape's hoping to eventually regain Voldemort's trust, and work his way back into his inner circle."

Harry was fascinated. "So he's trying to spy for Dumbledore--again? But isn't it dangerous?"

Sirius nodded. "It is. Incredibly dangerous. He's taken every protective measure he can, but still--" The disdain toward Snape that had marked in Sirius' tone seemed to recede a bit. "I didn't think he'd survive this long, to be quite honest with you. But Voldemort hasn't even tried to hurt him yet. Hasn't even spoken with him face-to-face. It's as though he's trying to be very careful. As though he's biding his time."

***

Later in the common room, Harry looked around to make sure he couldn't be overheard, then told Ron and Hermione about his talk with Sirius. They listened intently, but when he had finished describing the conversation, they didn't seem to know what to say in response. It was then that all three of them realized that, even though Cedric's death served as a reminder of the reality of what had happened last term, they had begun to think of Voldemort as a memory rather than a real threat. Now Sirius had confirmed that the events Harry was dreaming about were in fact real. Voldemort was real. He was planning something, and no one knew what it was. This unsettled them.

After an uncomfortable pause, Hermione changed the subject. "Don't forget about tomorrow afternoon. The gray robes and all."

Harry had nearly forgotten. In their last Defense Against the Dark Arts class, Professor Green had announced that they had gleaned all they could from books, and were ready to begin practical lessons.

So after lunch the next day, the Gryffindor fifth-years changed into their gray robes and met Professor Green on the lawn in front of the castle. She was waiting for them, though Harry noticed that Sirius was absent. The day was overcast, and the wind blew the clouds along overhead at a brisk pace.

"We'll head down to the Quidditch pitch, I think," she said once the class had gathered. They followed her across the grounds to the middle of the field, where she arranged them into two rows, and turned to face them.

"Now, you've got a good grounding in the principles of self-defense," she began, "but putting them into practice is another thing entirely. Who can tell me," she said, looking around at them all, "the first rule for defending yourself--the first thing I taught you in our first class? Miss Brown!"

Lavender Brown, who had been whispering to Parvati Patil, suddenly looked up at Professor Green, startled.

"I need you to focus, Miss Brown." Lavender nodded apologetically. "Well then? Who can tell me?"

Harry wracked his brain, trying to remember what he'd written down in the previous class periods. It all seemed so remote now that he was standing out here, with the wind in his face and the withering autumn grass under his feet. In front of him, Hermione's hand went up--but, to her right, so did Neville's.

"Neville?" Professor Green asked. "What's the first rule for protecting yourself against an attack by a Dark wizard?"

Neville smiled sheepishly. "R-run away," he said hoarsely. The other students laughed.

"That's right! Thank you, Neville. Five points to Gryffindor." Professor Green nodded toward him, and Neville went pink. "You want to get away if you can. Only fight back if you're cornered. Some of us know this by intuition--" she shot Harry the quickest of glances "--and some of us lose our wits under pressure, and forget that the first rule of fighting is to avoid the fight altogether. I'm afraid that's not something I can give you practical lessons on, however. So don't forget it."

They spent the rest of the class period learning blocks, punches, and kicks. These were much less exciting than Ron and Harry had hoped, since they were done very slowly, so that Professor Green could make sure everyone had the proper form.

"Don't worry," she said to Ron as she corrected his right hook, "you'll be sparring in a few weeks. And then you'll wish you were back here, throwing punches into the air and not being hit in return." But as soon as her back was turned Ron gave Harry an excited grin that said he couldn't wait to flip Harry flat onto his back.

But October turned into November, and still they hadn't begun sparring.

"What's she waiting for?" Ron said one Saturday morning at breakfast.

"Maybe she's waiting for Neville to catch up to everyone else," Harry answered. Poor Neville had never failed to injure himself in a practical Defense Against the Dark Arts lesson, even though his only opponent was himself.

Ron groaned. "If that's the case, we'll never get to fight."

"Well, we've got to get the proper form first, haven't we?" Hermione chimed in, not taking her eyes off her Daily Prophet. "Professor Green said it's got to be second nature. You wouldn't have time to think about it in a real fight."

"I suppose so." Ron thought for a second. "Hermione, what are you going to buy in Hogsmeade today?" He winked at Harry mischievously.

"Well, I need to buy some ink and parchment, and then I thought I'd--Oh no, you don't!" She put the paper down and scowled across the table at Ron. "If you want to find out what I'm getting you for Christmas, you'll have to do better than that!"

That day was the first Hogsmeade Saturday of the year. Professor McGonagall had made the announcement to the Gryffindor table a week before, and the resignation in her tone had conveyed in no uncertain terms how unwise she thought it was to allow the students to roam freely about the village.

Ron had received an owl from his mother shorter thereafter, warning him to be careful. Thankfully, she hadn't forbidden him, Fred, or George from going to Hogsmeade, but she had made it clear that they were to remain on guard at all times.

"What in the world is wrong with everyone? Has everyone turned into Mad-Eye Moody now? 'Constant vigilance!'" Ron had exclaimed after reading the letter. "It's only Hogsmeade! What, do they think You Know-Who's going to come swooping down out of nowhere in broad daylight and begin randomly attacking fifth-years?"

"Honestly, Ron!" Hermione had chided him. "She's your mother! She's only worried about you."

"Well, I'm not going to let anything ruin this weekend. I'm not going to worry about him or anything else."

The three of them walked into the village together later that morning, though they would have to split up as soon as they arrived, in order to do their Christmas shopping. It was cold and gray, threatening to snow, and they each wrapped their cloaks tightly about them as they made their way down the lane. Once they entered the village, they agreed to meet up in the Three Broomsticks in two hours, and they each went their separate ways.

Harry headed straight for the bookshop and bought Ron the latest installment of his favorite comic book, The Adventures of Martin Miggs, the Mad Muggle. Then he found a jewelry store, where he bought Hermione an inexpensive but very pretty silver brooch that was charmed to never need polishing. Finally he made his way back down the lane to the Three Broomsticks, where he met Ron and Hermione, who were weighed down with parcels of their own. They found a table and stowed their packages under it quickly, each trying to keep his things out of view of the others. It was a very pleasant afternoon, sitting around that table by the fireplace, sipping butterbeers, and watching the first snowflakes of the season falling outside the window. They chatted about Quidditch, classes, and O.W.L.s, which Harry had tried to avoid thinking about.

Afterwards, they went together to Honeyduke's, where they stocked up on Chocolate Frogs and Every-Flavor Beans, and found Fred and George trying to sell the owner Dragon Breath Drops and Canary Creams. The lanky, wizened old wizard looked suspicious, but curious as well, and in the end he bought a dozen of each.

That evening Harry, Ron, Hermione, and an ecstatic pair of Weasley twins headed back to the castle.

"The witch at Zonko's joke shop bought two dozen of each!" George exclaimed.

"We'll have to make more," Fred mused. "I wonder how they'll sell?"

"That's really great," Hermione said. They beamed back at her.

"I won't tell Mum you're encouraging them," Ron whispered.

***

Before they knew it, November had become December. Transfiguration had grown much more difficult that term. Harry hadn't realized how difficult geographic transfiguration--moving something from one place to another--would be. It was going to take them two years just to learn to Apparate themselves.

Surprisingly, Charms had become one of Harry's least favorite classes this term. His Disillusionment Charm was very unpromising indeed, and as a result he spent most of each class period being given reproachful looks by Hermione, who was already able to make herself appear to take on the form of a tree stump.

But Potions class was by far the worst. Snape seemed to have rediscovered his old hatred for the Gryffindors in general, and Harry in particular. To make matters worse, he seemed bent on making up for having taken points from Slytherin by never missing an opportunity to publicly humiliate Neville. Neville, for his part, didn't seem to get used to this; after Snape's inevitable rant he would always turn beet-red and avoid the other students' stares for the rest of the class period.

"Told you he was as evil as ever," Ron muttered as they left class one Friday in mid-December. Snape had just told Neville off for leaving his Strength Potion on the fire too long, causing it to suddenly evaporate into a cloud of orange steam. "Wonder why he picks on Neville?"

Harry shrugged. "Guess he's an easy target, isn't he? Snape's just a bully. You know, we ought to teach Neville to stand up for himself."

"Harry! That's a great idea," Hermione said excitedly.

But Neville proved quite resistant to the idea. He was deathly afraid of Snape, and feared that standing up for himself would only make things worse.

"It's alright, I don't mind," Neville lied when Harry and Ron approached him in their dormitory that afternoon. "I'll just let him yell. It's easier that way."

"He won't learn though!" Ron said. He sat down on Neville's bed. "It'll just get worse. Trust me, I have five older brothers, I learned the hard way--if you don't stick up for yourself, Neville, he's just going to keep picking on you."

Neville shook his head. "I ... appreciate what you're trying to do." He clutched his pillow and looked up at them. "But honestly, I couldn't."

He then picked up the copy of Magical Flowering Shrubs of Britain that had been sitting on his bedside table, opened it, and began to read. The conversation was over. Ron looked at Harry resignedly. Harry just shrugged back at him. They left Neville, and began to change for their evening run.

Within an hour they were trudging down to the lakeside to meet Professor Green. It was definitely wintertime now; they had to light their wands to find their way down the snowy path to the lake.

If the students had thought that darkness and snow would have pardoned them from their twice-weekly runs, they were bitterly disappointed. Professor Green wasn't put off by weather or darkness at all; so far they had run in rain, mud, heat, and bitter cold, and Harry was sure they would run in snow or hail too, if the weather ever happened to take a nasty turn on a Monday morning or Friday night.

So this morning they harbored no illusions about the possibility of getting out of their run. Everyone, even Malfoy, resignedly made their way to the lakeside. But when they got there, it wasn't Professor Green who greeted them.

It was Snape.

"No way!" Ron whispered to Harry as Snape surveyed the fifth-years. He wore a look of happy anticipation, as if he were about to open a birthday present.

"Professor Green," he addressed the stunned crowd, "has most unfortunately come down with a case of the flu." Unlike the previous instance in which Snape had informed Harry's class of a teacher's illness -Professor Lupin's--no note of malicious glee could be discerned from his tone. But Harry could hear the smile in his voice when he continued. "She was coming down here to meet you, to cancel your run. Fortunately, I happened across her in the corridor and agreed to take her place while she is in the hospital wing."

Whispers broke out all through the crowd.

"Silence!" Snape yelled. Harry could see him reach into a pocket and draw out a silver whistle, which gleamed in the near-darkness, and a stopwatch. Professor Green must have given them to him. Without a word, he blew the whistle. The students set off hastily.

Of course, Snape didn't run with them. He did follow them at a walk, however, and stand between them and the Forbidden Forest as they ran. When Harry, leading the crowd by a great distance, rounded the edge of the lake that bordered on the forest for a second time, he saw Snape watching the runners and smirking sadistically.

As Harry approached the spot from which they had begun, Snape stood there, stopwatch in hand.

"Not bad, Potter," he said as Harry passed him and stopped to catch his breath. "But you're a bit of a show-off, aren't you? Five points from Gryffindor."

Harry didn't even bother to look up or respond, even though this was clearly unjust. He simply set off toward the lawn at a walk.

The darkness had deepened since they had begun their run, and Harry could see the glowing wandtips of the rest of the fifth-years as they neared the end of their course. He could also hear Snape taking points off for trivial things--an untied shoelace, a dropped wand. Harry continued to circle the lawn as more and more fifth-years joined him.

Finally only one wandtip could be seen circling the lake. It was far behind Lavender Brown, the second-to-last finisher ("Five points from Gryffindor for a slow finish!"). It could only be Neville.

As Neville finished, Harry watched, along with Ron and Hermione, who had begun to walk with him. But just before Neville reached the end of the course, his wandtip fell and was extinguished.

"Get up! Longbottom, you pathetic, worthless excuse for a wizard," Snape's voice boomed. At this Harry snapped. He had had enough. He looked at Ron and Hermione, then set off toward the lakeside at a run.

"Harry, don't!" Hermione's nearly breathless voice called. But she and Ron were far too tired after their five-mile run to go zooming back down to the lake to help Neville. Harry ignored her.

He skidded to a halt right in front of the spot where Neville sat on the shore, holding his knee. Snape was standing over him. Behind Neville Harry could see, as he extended his own lit wand, a patch of ice with a long skid mark where Neville had slipped.

Harry bent down. "You alright, Neville?" he asked.

"Potter! Leave him! He is not your concern. I will tend to him," Snape hissed.

Harry could feel the rage boiling up inside him. He wasn't going to leave Neville to face Snape on his own. "He is my concern!" Harry yelled. "He's my friend! I'm going to help him up to the hospital wing."

"You will do no such thing." Snape bent down so that his face was very close to Harry's, and spoke in a deadly whisper. "How dare you speak to me in that tone! You will both follow me." With that, Snape turned and began to walk up toward the castle.

"Neville, can you walk?" Harry asked.

Neville was still so out of breath he could barely speak. "Yeah," he replied. He stood up tentatively, and began to limp after Snape.

Harry and Neville followed Snape across the lawn, up the stone steps and through the entrance hall. They could see the other fifth-years already sitting around the Slytherin table in the Great Hall, eating dinner. The corridors were deserted.

Once they had climbed up the main staircase and entered the second floor corridor to the hospital wing, Snape stopped walking and rounded on Harry and Neville.

"Pathetic," he repeated as he eyed Neville spitefully. "I pity Professor Green her task of teaching ... you--" he said this with the utmost loathing "--how to defend yourself against Dark magic. You!" He began to laugh bitterly. Neville just bowed his head, ashamed. Harry was livid.

"Just like your father," Snape said. At this, Neville looked up, stunned.

"Wha - what?"

"He wasn't able to defend himself either, even though he was an Auror. The Death Eaters attacked him and your mother, and your parents were powerless to defend themselves. And you're turning out just like them," Snape spat disgustedly.

Harry was beside himself--of course, he knew about Neville's parents, but Snape didn't know that. It was a terrible violation of Neville's privacy for Snape to say something like this in front of Harry. Not to mention the cruelty of taunting Neville for the attack on his parents. Harry had never had a very high opinion of Snape, but right then he was amazed that even Snape would sink this low.

Harry opened his mouth to speak, even though he had no idea what he was going to say. But before he had a chance to make a sound, he saw Professor Green emerge from an adjoining hallway behind Snape.

She had steam coming out of her ears--an unfortunate side effect of Madame Pomfrey's cure for the flu--and her eyes were wide with shock. As Harry watched, her expression changed from horrified disbelief to a furious indignance that rivaled what Harry felt. He was sure she had heard everything.

But Snape remained oblivious. He continued to glare at Neville, who had tears welling up in his eyes. Professor Green crept up behind Snape soundlessly.

"Like fathers, like sons," Snape said, and looked from Neville to Harry. "Both of you had fathers who were arrogant, incompetent fools who failed to protect themselves fr--" Just then, Snape caught sight of a bit of steam wafting forward from behind him. He froze. Then, very slowly, he turned around to find Professor Green staring at him, trembling with murderous rage.

Moving almost too quickly to be seen, Professor Green reached back and slapped Snape across the face so hard that he had to catch himself to avoid falling over.