Apothecary and Auror

Chapter One: The Silver Fox

Tendrils of mist curled around the man in the Watershed-charmed cloak. He had his hood tied tight, but icy snow, driven on the northeast wind, beat on every exposed part of his face. He picked his way down the path treacherous with scree, to the rime-encrusted shingle beach. The ruined jetty toward which he headed pointed like the gnarled finger of a giant into the choppy slate sea, its tip veiled in fog.

The man--Severus Snape, Master Potioner and second shift Apothecary at St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries--stopped before the signs in front of the jetty.

Danger--Keep Off, and Strong Undertow: Swim at Your Own Risk.

Not that many swimmers would dare these frigid waters, even at the height of summer. The cold, the warning signs, the desolation, even the name of the place, "Deuill's Cove", were enough to keep the Muggles away.

Most of the time. Thus Snape had taken the advice of Tewkes, at Magical Law Enforcement, to come at the crack of dawn to meet the Azkaban launch.

The tide was retreating, so he didn't have to get his feet wet when he approached the jetty and pressed his hand palm-down against the rocks that straddled the high-tide line.

With a roll of his stomach and the sense that a curtain before his eyes was ripped aside, Snape saw the scene before him change, from deserted winter beach to the docks of the Subministry of Corrections. He scanned the slips for the Azkaban launch. Ah, there it was--MM Waterfetters was painted in black letters on the side of the boat, and a scarlet-sashed Auror, standing in the gunwale, was waving Snape over.

Snape climbed aboard. The Weatherman, fiddling with his silvery gauges and the Creature-catcher, clad in his oilskins--requisite crew members for a voyage to Azkaban Island--returned Snape's nods. The sandy-haired Auror stepped forward to greet him.

"Master Snape?"

To his surprise, Snape saw the Auror wore, not a Corrections badge, but a badge indicating that he worked for the Subministry of Criminal Investigations.

"Yes," Snape said.

The Auror stuck out his hand. "McMahan. Andrew McMahan."

Snape clasped McMahan's hand briefly. It was strong and warm. "How do you do."

The Weatherman tapped his gauges, then lifted his wand above his head. The driving wind fell to a brisk breeze. "Conditions aright!" he called, and he and the Creature-catcher pushed off.

Snape and McMahan said little while the Creature-catcher, harpoon balanced in his right hand, wand in his left, manuevered them out of the cove and into the open sea.

Presently a charcoal-colored cloud, like the greasy smoke of a burning oil slick swirled before them. Snape closed his eyes and held his breath against the acrid fumes, just as Tewkes had warned him to do. In a moment, they were through.

The cloud dissipated to wisps of smoky mist. The sound of waves slapping against the launch's hull suddenly ceased: the sea had turned into a glass mirror that reflected nothing but the monochromatic gray of the sky.

The Creature-catcher put a spell on the rudder and the Weatherman spoke a Speedwell charm. The launch plowed forward, north-northeast, slicing a wake in the calm sea. The Creature-catcher, gripping his harpoon, moved into the Waterfetters' prow.

And none too soon. A great sea beast with a shiny black snout, two silver orbs for eyes and twin rows of stiletto-sharp teeth breached the water's surface and leapt for the launch. The Creature-catcher gave a shout and a greeny-black spell, the color of the murky bottom of the sea, shot forth from his harpoon and struck the monster between the eyes. With a bellow, it fell back. The water churned over it, then was still.

"Don't worry," grunted the Creature-catcher, perhaps mistaking the meaning of the shocked look on Snape's face. "Just stunned him."

"Ah--good work," McMahan said.

"Shan't be needing them before long, though, eh, Officer?" the Creature-catcher said to McMahan. "We'll be pulling up the cloud-curtain and letting the little beasties swim where they please. Shan't be needing anything of the sort round about Azkaban, what with the new guards--"

McMahan shot the Creature-catcher a sharp look. At once the man fell silent.

What was that all about? But Snape didn't tax McMahan with it. Instead, standing amidships with the Auror a few minutes later, he said:

"You're not with Corrections, Officer McMahan."

A look of loathing twisted McMahan's features for a second. "No!" he said.

A bit of interdepartmental warfare there? Snape tried another tack.

"I'm here on the Warden's new project, myself. His infirmarian needs help in preparing a Defenses-Downdraught for a round of interrogations." Snape paused. "Though I thought you people did the interrogations. At the Subministry, in London."

"You'll have to speak to the Warden about that." The soft burr was gone from McMahan's voice. He practically hissed through his clenched teeth. "I'm quite--peripheral--to his current project."

"Right." Snape backed off and made no further attempts at conversation. In about ten more minutes, the Viking-age fortress of Azkaban loomed out of the smoking mists. In mingled awe and revulsion, Snape stared at the lichen-pocked stone walls and narrow, dark windows of the wizarding world's prison.

The Weatherman and the Creature-catcher tied the Waterfetters up at dock while McMahan and Snape debarked.

McMahan was calm again, though, as he glanced up at the prison, the expression in his eyes remained cold. "I'm sorry I can't accompany you to the Warden's office, Master Snape. I'm on-shift now and have to relieve one of my colleagues. The Warden's expecting you, though. Just give your name to the guard at the gate, and he'll tell you where to go."

"Thank you, Officer."

McMahan nodded curtly and strode off. Snape, wondering whether it would be one of the new guards who would instruct him, headed in the direction McMahan had pointed out, to a stone staircase that climbed up the steep hillside to the front gate of Azkaban.

#

Whether old or new, the guard at Azkaban Gate had seemed ordinary enough.

"Past the double doors of the receiving area. Up three flights of stairs, first right, second left, third door on your left. Watch your step and have a nice day, sir."

Snape was now in the midst of following his directions. Halfway up the second flight of stairs, he paused to pull out his watch. Fifteen minutes before he was to meet Warden Reid--

Then the torch on the second-floor landing went out. A cold exhalation rushed down the stairs upon Snape; at the same time, he felt something like a clenched fist striking his stomach, sending his breakfast to the back of his throat. He gulped hard, then, shuddering, he sagged against the wall of the stairwell. Weakness washed over him. The watch slipped from his grasp. It bounced down a couple of steps. Then, falling face down on the third step, with a soft tinkling, its glass front shattered.

But Snape didn't heed it. His father had emerged from the darkness of the second-floor landing and was descending toward him.

"Damn you, you pup! Stand aside! The snivelling cow will sign the voucher or I'll kill the both of you!"

Behind Snape, a woman was sobbing. His mother. He spread his arms to shield her.

"Not Mother," Snape whispered. "Please--I'll do anything--"

"Stand aside. Stand aside, boy!"

Next, Father would knock Severus aside with a fist to the jaw. Then, he would beat Mother until, screaming and weeping, she submitted. It was the worst thing that had ever happened to him, the very worst--

How could it be happening again?

The cold, the sickness, the memory, the certainty that it would never end, that he could never, ever be happy.... It couldn't be.

But even as he thought it, Snape was groping inside his cloak for his wand. He drew it out of the sheath at his belt, and, closing his eyes for a moment, cleared his mind.

He put a new memory there. The night he had finally persuaded his mother to leave, the night they'd slipped out of the filthy house, bags in hand, while his father snored in a drunken stupor on the sitting-room couch. Severus hadn't known where they were going, hadn't cared. It had been joy enough to feel the cool, clean night air on his face, to breathe it into his lungs. To know that Mother was safe, and he was free.

Snape opened his eyes. The Dementor was sweeping its hood from its head, to reveal the black void of its maw.

Snape extended his wand. "Expecto Patronum!" White light shot from the wand's ebony tip. The light formed itself into an arctic fox crouched to spring. Like a streak of silver, the fox flew at the Dementor. The Dementor flowed backward in a swirl of robes. The last Snape saw of it was a flutter of hem, disappearing into the darkness above.

Snape scrambled to his feet, his stomach still tilting inside him. A Dementor? Where had the thing come from? And how had it come, across miles of freezing, wind-whipped ocean? Worse yet, what havoc would it wreak, feasting on all the passion and misery bubbling through Azkaban like a poison potion on high boil? Preying on cellblocks full of wandless, defenseless witches and wizards?

He had to get to the Warden, and not only to receive his assignment. He bounded up the next two flights of stairs, two steps at a time. First right, second left, third door on his right. There it was: ironbound oak with a small sign on the wall beside it: Office of the Warden. And, next to that, in smaller letters on a plaque: Thom Reid.

Beside the opposite casing hung a bell rope. Ignoring it, Snape opened the Warden's office door and strode inside.

A man with a bald crown wreathed with wispy gray hair sat bent over a parchment behind an age-darkened desk, scratching away with his quill.

He looked up and fixed Snape with sharply intelligent, gray-green eyes. "Have you an appointment, sir?" he asked coolly.

This was the Warden, Snape saw by the badge framed with administrative piping pinned to the man's breast. "Yes, but that doesn't matter. This is an emergency. There's a Dementor loose in your prison, Warden!"

The Warden looked at Snape. "Shut the door," he said.

For a moment, Snape was taken aback. But of course the Warden didn't want Snape's news spreading and causing a panic. He shut the door and turned back to the Warden, who was now flipping through a small desk calendar.

"Master Snape, isn't it?" The Warden gestured to the chair in front of his desk. "Have a seat."

Snape stared at his calm face in astonishment. "Didn't you hear me? I said, there's a Dementor loose inside the walls of Azkaban! It nearly Kissed me!"

"I know," the Warden answered. "My people are seeing to it. Now, won't you please sit down?"