The Gemini Incantation

The Gemini Incantation.

'I am pleased to announce,' said Dumbledore, 'that we have some changes to our teaching staff this year.'

Harry looked from Ron to Hermione. This was going to be interesting. They couldn't see any new faces on the teacher's table at all this year.

'Please give a warm reception to our new Defence against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor Snape!'

The Slytherin table burst into load applause, but only lukewarm clapping and a lot of grumbling noises could be heard from the other tables.

'Oh, fuck,' said Harry.

'Harry!' hissed Hermione, but couldn't say anything further, because Dumbledore started speaking again.

'In case any of you are wondering about it, we are expecting our new potions master to start first thing tomorrow. We are having a little bit of bother getting him here, but expect to sort this out later tonight.'

'For now, though, let the feast begin.'

As piles of food arrived and the three of them started eating, Ron muttered to Harry, 'We're doomed; Snape is going to spend his whole time hexing us. That's when he isn't inventing new ways to take points off Gryffindor.'

Harry nodded in agreement, but couldn't say anything. He knew that he wouldn't be able to stop swearing if he opened his mouth, and didn't want to upset Hermione again. He knew he was going to need all her help in the months that lay ahead.

.....

As everyone filed upstairs, Harry heard Professor McGonagall talking softly to someone just behind a door they were passing. He waved Ron and Hermione on, bent down to pretend to tie his shoelaces and listened carefully.

'Are you sure it is going to be safe, Albus?'

'I'm afraid that we have little choice but to try, Minerva, Severus is the only one that can advance Harry in the direction he needs to take, even though Harry may find it, shall we say, a little hard going at first.'

'I didn't mean that, Albus, I meant your other plans to...'

'We have little choice there either,' Dumbledore interrupted, 'The Gemini incantation is difficult, not to say dangerous, but there is no one that I can think of at the moment that can do the job as well as...'

Before Harry heard any more, a sudden shout startled him upright.

'Harry Potter!'

It was Snape, and he wasn't happy.

'What on earth are you skulking around for, Potter, you should be in your dormitory already. I don't want to have to begin taking points off Gryffindor before I have you in my classroom, so get out of my sight.' Snape paused, and then in a barely audible but threatening whisper, 'Now.'

Harry had no choice but to move on. Turning back at the end of the corridor, he saw Snape going through the doorway he had just been listening at. The door closed firmly, and he knew there was no point going back to try and hear more.

When he entered the Gryffindor common room a few minutes later he saw Hermione and Ron sitting on the edge of their seats, deep in conversation. He couldn't be sure, but he didn't think he had ever seen them sitting quite so close together before.

As he approached, they saw him and quickly moved apart to allow him to sit down on the next chair. Harry explained everything that he had heard, but none of them could work out what it might mean, except that perhaps the Gemini incantation was something to do with the 'little bit of bother' that Dumbledore had mentioned at the feast earlier.

'I'm tired,' Hermione said, 'I'm going to head up now.' As she got up Harry could have sworn that she gave Ron a warmer smile than the one she gave him. The expression that he was sure flashed quickly across her face as she smiled at him could only have been described as gentle pity.

.....

As was usual for the first day of term, the timetables were distributed to everybody at breakfast. Ron, Hermione and Harry had all elected to continue with Potions since they had no choice if they were not to be shut off from choosing to become Aurors after they finished at Hogwarts. There was still no word as to who would be teaching the subject, but before the three of them could start speculating on this, they were interrupted by a low groan further down the table.

'What's wrong, Ginny?' asked Ron.

'I've got double dada first thing,' she replied, 'I'm not sure I'm going to be able to hold down what I've just eaten when Snape starts throwing curses around all over the place, expecting us to block them or whatever.'

The bell rang, and everyone began moving slowly out of the door. The timetable made it clear that Potions was still being taught in the dungeons and a few minutes later, they entered the door and climbed down the steps into the classroom.

It was dingy as ever, but the figure waiting for them at the end of the room with his back turned to them had a vaguely familiar air about him. Without turning around, he said in a soft voice:

'Come in everybody, and make yourselves comfortable.'

Harry stopped dead in his tracks. The voice was even more familiar, though it had an odd lightness, almost a mellow quality to it. The figure slowly turned around to face them and all doubt left him.

.....

It was Professor Snape.

And he was smiling.

Only he wasn't smiling in the usual cold, rather nasty way that Harry had grown used to over the years, with no evidence at all of the smile ever having made the effort to reach his eyes, but in what appeared to be a genuinely warm manner. Well, not warm exactly, but definitely not frosty either.

As they moved closer, it was clear to Harry that the smile was not the only new thing about him. Instead of a long black cloak made of a dull, slightly grimy, matt material, he wore a fine velvet cloak which had a soft violet shade to it.

Harry, Ron and Hermione sat together around a cauldron at the front, intrigued about what would happen next. It was unusual for the Gryffindor points total to have survived so long undamaged after first contact with Snape. And how on earth could he be here, when Ginny was supposed to be upstairs being taught defence against the dark arts by him as well?

'Factio Delicium!' whispered Hermione.

'What?' said Harry and Ron together, turning towards her in shock, not expecting her to have started casting spells so early in the term.

'It's not a spell, it's a shop,' she said, 'In Diagon Alley. It sells the most expensive stuff you can buy and he got that cloak there, I'm sure of it. I saw it in Witch's Weekly. It must have cost about eighty galleons.'

'Bloody hell,' said Ron, 'Do you think he's got himself a girlfriend?'

'Ron!' Hermione laughed. 'Do you always have to reduce things to such a base level? You've spent the whole summer insinuating that so-and-so has got off with somebody or other. Do you ever think of anything else?'

Ron gave Harry a quick and dirty smirk. 'I think it's my wand talking,' he whispered.

Hermione went bright red and looked at her shoes.

Harry was sure that he caught a distinct smile on her face though, but before he could think about it further, a soft cough from the front of the room interrupted him.

'If everyone has finished speculating...I mean settling down, then we can begin,' said Snape, still smiling at them.

He waited until the whole room had quietened down, and then said, softer than Harry thought possible, 'Calming Potions...'

No-one breathed or said anything for several seconds.

'Some of you have been, how can I put this - involved in interesting times these last few months,' continued Snape, looking round at Hermione, Neville and the others that had fought so hard in the last year to stop Voldemort from gaining what he wanted in the Department of Mysteries. 'I think it would be very useful if you could all demonstrate some fluency in making the kind of draught that can help you through difficult times, and there will certainly be more difficult times ahead...'

Snape paused, looked down at Harry, and said '...such as bereavement.'

What was he playing at? Harry thought. Snape hated him and he hated the one person that Harry had begun to believe would be there to help him deal with this sort of emotional torture, only to end up dead in such a stupid, senseless way. Fleetingly, he allowed himself to think again about how much responsibility he carried for Sirius' death when Snape interrupted his thoughts again, leaning down to whisper in his ear.

'Don't blame yourself, Potter,' he said, gently.

Harry said nothing because he didn't want to give away how much it shocked him to realise that Snape was so casually reading his mind. He realised that he had been aware of no attempt at occlumency and as a result a cold trickle of sweat began trickling slowly down his spine.

Snape, however, had moved on.

'Making these potions isn't too difficult. You need to be careful about how precisely you crush the anaujiram leaves. Join the pieces of srepapalzir together very carefully and weigh accurately the scorched and crushed epod into it and I would be surprised if any of you go wrong. The rest of the details are on the board.'

.....

Two hours later, they left the dungeons feeling unusually peaceful. Apart from a few huge fits of giggles from Padma Patil, little else had happened. Neville had much bigger pupils than normal but no-one noticed. Harry's paranoia had risen slowly throughout the class, but he wasn't sure if this was the effect of the potions themselves, the fume from the cauldrons or the result of his fear of Snape's effortless access to his mind.

They were supposed to go next to Transformation, but none of them had any real inclination to do so. Even Hermione seemed to be quite incapable of any focussed action. As they fumbled their way up the stairs to the entrance hall they met Professor McGonagall coming the other way.

'Hello class,' she said. 'I thought I'd best meet you here. Sixth-year potions are well known for being a bit ... heavy.' With a barely detectable movement of her hand, she muttered 'Clarifimens...'

'Please go up to my classroom now. Ignore any sudden desire you have to sneak down to the kitchens, Weasley,' she added. 'Potter, come with me.'

Once everyone else had left them, Professor McGonagall continued. 'Professor Dumbledore needs to speak to you, Potter. The password is strawberry flump'

.....

As he was carried upwards on the moving staircase, Harry could not help but wonder what was going on. Snape was supposed to be teaching Defence against the Dark Arts, but had ended up teaching Potions instead. And his behaviour was ... well it was weird. He had let Neville simply get on and make his ybood up unmolested, Ron's ffilps was praised and Harry's own refeer had been constructed and consumed entirely without comment. He had even given Hermione 10 points for knowing that the magical ingredient in all the potions was nisersibannac. Still wondering what this might mean, he stepped into the headmaster's study.

'Hello Harry,' Dumbledore said gently. 'Please sit down ... I think I need to give you some explanation as to what is going on.'

'What?' said Harry, still feeling paranoid, and also a bit patronised by Dumbledore's tone of voice. 'Normally you wait until after we've had a chance to work things out for ourselves before you deign to explain anything to me!'

'I'm sorry, Harry, this year is going to be different. I promise. As I said last year, we all make mistakes sometimes.'

'What is going on?' asked Harry. 'First Snape acts as if he actually cares about me, and now you act as if you believe I'm worthy of inclusion from the beginning rather than being allowed to fuck about getting people killed all over the place first!'

Dumbledore ignored this outburst. He knew Harry was still angry with himself and there was very little he could do but wait for Harry to calm down a bit.

'Firstly, you are right, you would work a lot out for yourselves,' he said, 'and no doubt Hagrid would help you fill in the gaps later on, so there is little point in me trying to hide anything from you.'

'You always hide things from me,' Harry said. 'I've come to expect it as part of the learning process.' He couldn't hide the cynical tone in his voice.

Dumbledore paused for breath.

'Again, I suppose you are right, Harry, but then I cannot tell you everything that I am aware of that I know, because it would take too long and we would never get anything done. Also, there are many things of which I am aware that I do not yet fully understand, and many things that I don't know that I don't know about, and this will only become clear later on. These so-called known unknowns and unknown unknowns would send us all into a spiral of despair and depression if we let them, so I caution you not to mind too much if I leave small, but interesting, gaps in your knowledge at this stage.'

Harry's confusion was nearly complete now, but Dumbledore took it one step further.

'The most important thing now is that I need to begin helping you to deal with the fact that there are two Severus Snapes on the staff this year.'

'I thought there was something up with him,' Harry said quietly.

'Yes, you have already met one of him in Potions, and he will help enormously in preparing you for your N.E.W.Ts and beyond. In all the years I have been here we have never had another who could teach the subject in such breadth and depth and I could not afford to lose him from the role. But I fear your problems may lie in the other subject Severus will be teaching you.'

'Why?' asked Harry. 'Surely he can't do any more harm to me than he has done before?'

'Harry, let me explain. The Gemini Incantation which Professor McGonagall and I have used to enable us to - shall we say - extend Severus' range as a teacher ... is incapable of producing two identical people. The Professor Snape that taught you Potions this morning is, I believe, the softer and more sensitive side of the man...'

It slowly began to dawn on Harry what Dumbledore was going to say. He didn't have to wait long for this to be confirmed.

'I think you may find that your new Defence against the Dark Arts teacher has inherited the angrier side.'

Harry gulped.

'I need you to be patient with him.'

'Why should I be patient with him?' asked Harry. 'He's probably going to try and kill me.'

'Yes, there is a danger that he may be a bit ... overzealous, but there is an equal danger that you may overreact. You are no beginner, Harry. You have seen and done things that most wizards never experience in all their lives. I need you to work with him because this year may be the last chance that we have to prepare...'

Dumbledore's voice dropped away.

'For what?' asked Harry, his heart thumping in his chest so loudly he was sure that Dumbledore could hear it.

'For what lies ahead,' said Dumbledore. 'At some point Voldemort will gather sufficient strength to attack us, and you, above all others, need to be capable of defending yourself against more than just the odd mild Hex.'

Harry could say nothing. His stomach felt like lead and he had the awful feeling that things were becoming very, very serious. He could no longer push away all thought about the true meaning of Trelawney's prophecy that Dumbledore had told him about at the end of last year.

'I think it would be a good idea if you went down for lunch now, Harry, I think you'll find you need it. Please do not hesitate to come and see me if you need anything - anything at all.'

As Harry left the room, feeling more like being sick than eating, he didn't see Professor Dumbledore smiling rather sadly in his direction.

His headmaster could not help feeling a little guilty that still he had not told Harry the complete truth about what was going on. The 'Split Snape' that would be teaching him Defence against the Dark Arts this year was the nearest thing to Voldemort that Dumbledore could come up with without actually opening the gates of Hogwarts to the dark lord himself. And Harry would be meeting him in just over one hour.

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As Harry climbed slowly down the steps towards the dining hall, he heard Hermione shouting.

'Ron! Wait! You don't understand!'

Harry stopped and watched as Ron walked across the hall - well, stomped across the hall really, closely followed by Hermione. He waited a few seconds for them to go out through the main door and then followed. One part of him told him in all seriousness that he needed to know what was going on. The other part of him knew full well that he was just being nosy, but didn't care.

By the time he got out into the bright sunshine, he couldn't see where his friends had gone. He walked further and looked around but there was no sign of them. He was just going to head down towards Hagrid's hut when he heard Ron's voice, speaking softly.

'Why have you dragged me in here?'

'Look, Ron, there's only one way for me to show you that Krum means nothing to me, nothing at all ...'

Harry realised that they had hidden themselves inside the very same rose bush that had partly concealed Fleur and Davies as they got to know each other nearly two years earlier. The bush was now a lot denser, and he was unable to see them at all. Before they could possibly notice him he slipped behind one of the stone statues, sat down and carefully took out a book. Several minutes later, Hermione spoke again.

She was breathless.

'You don't have to just ... kiss me you know. There are ... other things you could do ... like this ...'

Several more minutes went by. Harry had no idea what Hermione was showing Ron, but from the noises they were making it obviously wasn't anything to do with spells. The part of him that needed to know what was going on knew enough now, and was telling him that he should go away and leave his friends alone. The nosy part of him, however, wasn't going anywhere in a hurry.

'And there's this as well,' he heard her voice say quietly. 'If you ... lift just here and...'

A couple of seconds passed ...

'Hermione, are you all right?' Ron said. 'You're all w...w...'

'Don't be silly Ron, it's normal. Haven't your brothers told you anything? Or Ginny?'

'My brothers don't tell me anything, and Ginny just giggles at me if I ask her about girls. My mum started telling me once that...'

'Stop talking about your mum, Ron. It's off-putting. Just kiss me again, and don't stop what you're doing ...carry on ... a bit harder ...'

Harry listened intently, but there was now no sound for several minutes until Hermione gasped again.

'... Keep going ... just a bit quicker...and ... and ...alohamora!'

Harry had never heard anyone make the sort of noise that Hermione had just made. It sounded like she was in intense pain or something. What on earth was Ron doing to her? And why had she used the 'unlocking' spell?

'Bloody hell, Hermione, are you ok?' he heard Ron whisper, hoarsely.

'I'm ... I'm fine ... that was ... that was lovely,' Hermione said, panting slightly. 'Thank you. I can't tell you how long I've waited for you to ... to ...'

'What?' said Ron. Harry couldn't help thinking that his friend was being a bit stupid at this point.

'To discover how much I like you,' Hermione said, still breathing unsteadily. 'Ever since you won that chess match back in first year ... I've been trying to get you to understand ... but I guess it takes longer with boys. I've waited so long for you to do something positive that I thought it best if we skipped a few of the '9 steps to bliss' that Ginny told me about. You should have a chat with your sister, Ron, you could learn something.'

Ron said nothing for a while. Then he said, quietly, 'what are the other steps?'

Hermione giggled. 'You'll just have to wait and see, won't you? We'd best go now - I've got to go and freshen up a bit or Fang will never leave me alone. The last thing I need today is a load of dog slobber all over my front, and I won't have time between dada and care of magical creatures to change.'

Harry waited until it was clear that they had left the bush and gone up to the school before he followed them. The thought of trying to find out from Ron what had happened with Hermione drove his fear of an abnormally angry Snape out of his mind.

.....

Harry was first to reach the Defence against the Dark Arts classroom. He sat down at the back of the class in the hope that Snape would ignore him, and waited for the others. A few seconds later, Ron came in, grinning broadly. 'You'll never guess what happened, Harry,' he said, 'Hermione ...'

'... and you got to know each other a bit better, Weasley...' a quiet voice from behind interrupted. They turned and found Professor Snape looking down at them. He was smiling, but his cold eyes hadn't found out about it yet. They had a sharper edge to them than Harry had ever seen, and with Snape that was something to be worried about. 'I think you'll find that Potter knows a bit already about you're ... tryst ... with Miss Granger - don't you Potter?'

'What?' said Ron, looking sharply at Harry. 'You know already? ... but how?'

'You can compare notes later, Weasley. Doubtless Potter is bursting with curiosity about it. For now - I want silence.' Snape turned and walked to the front of the class.

It took another couple of minutes for the rest of the class to arrive. Hermione was last and, still looking a little flushed, sat next to Ron and gave him a warm smile.

'Five points from Gryffindor,' Snape said, icily.

'But I wasn't late, Professor Snape,' said Hermione.

'Another five points from Gryffindor. The first five were not for lateness, Miss Granger. Mr Potter has been kind enough to tell me all about what happened to you and Mr Weasley inside a certain rose bush this lunchtime. Gallivanting around vandalising the school shrubbery is forbidden, Miss Granger. The second five points are for arguing back.'

Hermione went a deep shade of puce and looked across at Harry. Ron was glaring at him as well, and all three were being stared at by the rest of the class, some of whom were snickering knowingly.

Professor Snape waited for a few seconds and then said, 'Quiet.'

'You have all had far too easy a time in this class in the last few years,' Snape said. 'It is time that you learned what Defence against the Dark Arts really means. Firstly, who knows what a wand is, and what it does?'

Hermione raised her hand.

'Ah, Miss Granger ... I might have known you would want to answer. You've had a bit of experience with ... wands ... have you not?' Snape wasn't looking at her though. He was looking directly at Ron, who had also turned a shade of puce deeper, if possible, than Hermione's.

'A wand is simply a tool for gathering and focussing magical energy,' Hermione answered, quietly. 'It works best when it fits the user perfectly,' she finished, almost inaudibly.

'Let me see...do you think that Weasley's wand ... fits perfectly, Miss Granger?' Snape asked in his oiliest voice. 'Or do you think his tool could gather and focus its energy better ... in the hands of someone else? Or simply in ... someone else ... perhaps?'

'You bastard!' muttered Hermione.

'Another five points for that, Miss Granger. I would make it ten, but your answer was good enough for me to work with ... for the moment.'

Snape walked slowly up and down the room.

'All of you, before you came here, will have revealed magical power without having to wave a silly bit of wood around. Yes, even you, Longbottom. I have no idea what pathetic bit of sorcery you managed in order to draw Dumbledore's notice, but you must have managed something. Broke something small and weak without touching it, did you? A cotton bud perhaps?'

'I flew,' Neville said quietly, 'by accident ...when I fell out of a window.'

Snape paused, but didn't say anything. Harry saw that Neville's answer had caught him momentarily off guard.

'You've never managed to do anything like that again though, have you?' Snape said in a nastier tone of voice, 'with or without a wand?'

'No sir ... I haven't.'

'I don't want people flying around in this class out of my control, Longbottom. However, your instincts may prove useful if you can control them, which I doubt.'

'A wand is only as powerful as the wizard that wields it,' Snape continued. 'You must learn to focus magic without one if you are to meet danger and survive. Let me see...' he said, looking round, and then suddenly pointed his own wand at Harry and said 'accio'

Before he realised what had happened, Harry's wand left his pocket and flew into Snape's other hand. 'Wingardium leviosa,' shouted Snape and Harry himself was lifted slowly up into the air. He began to panic. 'What!' he shouted. 'Let me down!' His panic increased as he felt himself being turned over in the air. His robes fell around him and covered his head so he could no longer see the class room as he hung, upside down, waiting for what was going to happen next.

'So, Potter,' Snape said, 'that's how easy it is to disarm and disorient you. Death, I assure you, could follow along quite nicely; have no doubts about that. Now class, what should Mr Potter try and do?'

Hermione put her hand up again, but Snape ignored her. 'Well, Weasley, what do you think?'

'Try a summoning charm, I suppose?' he said, his tone of voice giving away the fact that he could think of little else.

'Very good, Weasley, very good. You don't always need a helping hand from Miss Granger now do you,' Snape said, 'even though she perhaps appreciates one from you occasionally. Now, how is Potter going to perform a summoning charm without his wand?'

No-one answered.

'You see, Potter, no one down here can help you, I'm afraid. Not even Miss Granger, whose mind, I feel, is on other things. I'm going to put your wand on my desk and get on with the rest of the lesson. You have until the end to fetch it and get yourself down or I will be seeing you later ... in detention.' With this, Snape gave a dismissive gesture and Harry started spinning slowly around in mid-air.

To Harry, the class was now far away, and he could no longer hear much of what was going on. Panic had slowly given way to raw anger and all he could think about was what he'd do to Snape if he ever got the chance.

'Anger won't help you,' a voice echoed in his mind. 'It gets in the way...you must empty your head of it and think solely of what you want, what you need...' Harry had no idea who it was that was talking, but tried to do what the voice said. He breathed deeply and counted slowly to ten. Snape didn't matter to him anymore. All that he cared about was holding his wand, stroking it, feeling how well it fitted his hand and how powerful it was when he worked magic with it.

There were gasps in the room below his head. 'You nearly did it,' the voice said. 'Your wand rose about six inches. Come on ... you can do it!'

Harry thought harder. He focussed solely on his wand ... its length, its shape, how hard it was and how warm it was when wielded properly. And to his intense surprise he found he was holding it again.

'You have your wand, now, Potter ...' Snape said below him with barely concealed fury, '... now what are you going to do with it? You still have five minutes to get down before you will have to see me later.'

Harry didn't want to cast any spells with his wand in case he fell too quickly, so he tried the same trick as before. Emptying his mind, he tried to think of what it would be like to stand on firm ground again. After a short while he was sure he felt some movement, but there was something stopping him, something pushing him in the other direction. He was tired. He was struggling to keep focussed on the ground while a cloud of boiling anger and fear slowly appeared in his head and billowed outwards. His mind couldn't push any more. 'Don't give in,' the voice said. 'You're nearly there ... don't give in!'

With a huge crash, Harry fell onto one of the desks below.

'Time's up,' said Snape. 'See me here at seven tonight. Late, and I'll detain you again tomorrow.' Harry heard the sound of his footsteps leaving the room.

He struggled to get untangled from his robes and looked up. Snape was gone and everyone else had left for care of magical creatures. He rubbed his sore body all over and to his relief decided that nothing appeared to be broken, so he couldn't have fallen from a great height. He was beginning to wonder why even Ron and Hermione had abandoned him when he remembered all of what Snape had done and said.

Burning with shame for the humiliation he had allowed his friends to be put through, and for the fact that his eavesdropping had been so casually exposed, Harry limped his way out of the classroom and towards Hagrid's hut...