Silent Serenade

Silent Serenade
Prologue - Remembering Harry Potter

"Memory Restoratives," Snape lectured, once all ten of his N.E.W.T. students had reached the most crucial part of their brewing, "are undoubtedly the most difficult potions you will attempt to create in this class. Their purpose is as obvious as their name, to restore one's memories. If made correctly, they will do one of three things; restore a suppressed traumatic memory to its original clarity, recreate a forgotten childhood experience, or destroy a mental block produced by Obliviate. House points will be taken from those who are not brave enough," here he leered at Hermione Granger, who had the unfortunate luck of being, not only the lone girl in the class, but also the only Gryffindor, and the only Muggleborn, "to drink their finished product. You have ten minutes remaining."

Ten minutes to spare, thought Draco Malfoy as he made one last counterclockwise stir to his potion, and watched as it morphed from a disturbing shade of paisley to a pleasant tone of pale lavender. That would definitely make ingesting it easier. He hadn't been looking forward to swallowing a potion that resembled regurgitated peas. Carefully, he poured a portion of his brew into a glass beaker for grading, and the rest into a mug for drinking. Then he lifted the mug to his lips, and hesitated. A quick glance around the dungeon showed him that he and Hermione Granger were the only two who had finished. She was staring challengingly at Snape as she too lifted her mug to her lips. The look in her eyes was rebellious, proud, indignant; it said question my courage Serevus Snape, dare to take points even though I've brewed this potion perfectly, go ahead.

Draco watched as she closed her eyes and tipped her mug back and swallowed.

Her face went very blank and her eyes lost their smothering edge. She was viewing a scene no one else could glimpse. Vulnerable, Draco thought, she looked so vulnerable. She wasn't aware of what was going on in the classroom, only of the vision she was reliving in her mind. A fire could have started and she would have had no idea. Blaise Zabini could have drawn his wand to curse her and she would have remained sitting there, unaware. Even after all the reading he had done on Memory Restorative Potions, it hadn't occurred to Draco that he would be defenseless. He lowered his mug, second thoughts swelling up. But then Granger's face cleared and emotion returned to her eyes. It was over and it had only lasted a minute. He needn't get overly anxious, he told himself. Nothing was going to happen if he zoned out for a matter of moments, while in a classroom under Snape's watch. Nothing was going to happen.

And yet...

Snape was looking at him then, questioningly, as though wondering if a Gryffindor would really be the only one with enough nerve to drink the damned potion. Beside him Blaise Zabini, whose potion was several steps away from being complete, caught his eye. Draco could tell he was wondering the same thing as Snape. He shook himself. This was no time to be paranoid. The blankness would only last a moment. Besides, Hogwarts was safe. The war was going on outside castle walls, not staking in the shadows of the dungeon waiting for him to relax.

He lifted his mug once more and met Snape's gaze just as Granger had, not wanting to prove himself brave, but to convey that what Snape thought of him mattered very little. Then he drank the entirety of light purple liquid in his glass. Nervously, he waited for his present mind to sink away and the mind of his younger self to surface. While he was reliving his memory he would not be conscious that it was just that, a memory. It would be like he was experiencing it for the first time. Only when it was over would he be about to analyze it, to see it from the eyes of his present mind. It happened almost instantly. His vision lost focus for the slightest moment, just long enough for him to feel disoriented and lose sight of Snape, and then it was back in full force, enhanced somehow. He was no longer in the dungeons, but standing with a group of first years outside the double doors leading to the Great Hall. Minerva McGonagall was welcoming them to Hogwarts and describing the four school houses.

It was September first and he was eleven years old.

"The start-of-term banquet will begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into houses," McGonagall was explaining. "The sorting is a very important ceremony because, while you are here, your house will be something like your family within Hogwarts. You will have classes with the rest of your house, sleep in your house dormitories, and spend free time in your house common room..." She went on to encouraged them to smarten themselves before the sorting took place, and then departed to the Great Hall, promising to return when it was time for the first years to enter.

Once she had left, Hermione Granger asked, "How do they sort us into houses?" to which Ron Weasley answered, "Some sort of test, I think. Fred said it hurts a lot, but I think he was joking."

It was on the tip of Draco's tongue to explain that the sorting was not painful in any respect, that it was done with the help of a magical hat, and that anyone with even the slightest bit of magical education should know that, especially those who wished, for some reason that was beyond Draco, to be sorted into Gryffindor. The hat was Gryffindor's creation, after all, how could they not know that? To his disappointment, he never got the chance to say any of that; a series of shrieks announced the arrival of the ghosts, and chaos erupted among the first years. Draco could have scoffed at their reaction. In his opinion, ghosts were neither magnificent nor frightening. In fact, he thought they were actually quite dull.

So while the other first years were gazing upward with shock in their eyes, Draco took the time to examine the foyer of Hogwarts. It was grand in a way that not even Malfoy Manor was. The stone walls were lit with torches, the floor was a mosaic of intricately carved tiles, and the marble staircase that led to the upper floors was fantastically magical. He moved closer to examine it and saw, to his surprise, a woman with long red hair pulling a boy his age upward. Draco, who had spent hours questioning his parents about every detail of Hogwarts, knew that everyone was supposed to attend the feast; the headmaster, the professors, the students, guests, even the ghosts. Everyone. He wondered why the woman and boy weren't in the Great Hall.

The boy, in what Draco felt was great contrast to the woman beside him, had black hair. He was hauling a large school trunk behind him, and Draco could tell by his slow pace that it was difficult for him to pull it up the stairs. He wondered why the woman didn't offer to help. They were halfway up the first landing when Draco felt an overwhelming urge to follow them. He started up the staircase silently, knowing, without knowing how he knew, that he needed to remain out of sight. Slytherin intuition, he supposed. Of course, he hadn't been sorted into Slytherin yet, but there was no doubt in his mind that he would be.

Soon he was close enough behind them to hear the woman whispering urgently to the boy, "Come on, Harry. Quickly. You can't be seen."

The black haired boy replied, "The trunk is so heavy, Mother. Are we almost there? I don't know if I can pull it much further."

"Hold it as long as you can, child, and then I'll take it from you. It's a long way to the top floor. Once we're there, you'll have all the time in the world to relax, in a room that's your very own. Come quickly, catch up with me. We'll take the secret passageway at the top of the landing."

She drew a wand from her sleeve, and Draco, who was usually so quick to notice such things, realized for the first time that she was not wearing robes. She donned a Muggle looking black dress, and her son wore brown slacks and a dark sweater. Where was his uniform, Draco wondered? Was he even a student? And if not, what was he doing here? The woman told her son to look away while she spelled the entrance of the secret passageway open. It seemed to Draco that she didn't want her son to see magic. She had pulled her wand out so stealthily that Draco doubted the boy had seen it. Even he wouldn't have noticed such a slight movement if hadn't been staring at her when she had done it. But to hide magic, that was inane! Surely he was mistaken.

The woman turned to help her son maneuver his trunk though the opening of the passageway and, just as Draco crouched down to remain unseen, she caught sight of him. He saw her face become anxious, and her forehead crease. Draco wondered if he should continue up the stairs and act as though he was actually headed somewhere, opposed to spying on them, or just start apologizing. Maybe he would be better off if he just made a run for it. While he stood pondering his options, the boy noticed his mother's anxiety and followed her gaze. He smiled with delighted interest upon laying eyes on Draco, who had dared to approach as close as five steps below the two.

"Hello," the boy said, cheerful for reasons Draco didn't know. He began to reply but the red-haired woman spoke before he could. "Get in the tunnel, Harry," she ordered her son. Once he had done as she'd asked and was out of sight, the woman lifted her wand once more, aimed it at Draco, and intoned, "Obliviate."

And then he was once again in the dungeons and Blaise Zabini was pouring his finished potion into a glass beaker, asking him if it was frightening, reliving a memory.

Disoriented, Draco ignored his question and asked one of his own. "Does Professor Evans have a son?"

Behind him, Snape dropped a glass beaker of Memory Restorative Potion, which Draco identified as Granger's from the sound of her disbelieving gasp, and asked in a cold, bitter tone, "What did you say, Mr. Malfoy?"

"A son," Draco repeated, bewildered by his professor's reaction. What was so astonishing about the possibility of Professor Evans, the Ancient Runes professor, having children? More specifically, a son, with black hair and green eyes, and a room of his own on the top floor of the castle. A son, whom she had never mentioned and whom Draco had only ever seen once. Maybe he would take a trip up to the top floor of Hogwarts when class was over.

Any secret worth Obliviating someone over was a secret Draco considered worth knowing.