The Shadows of His Past

What is with all these annoying pet names?

"Now, where's my present?"

Ever-prepared Draco, took only a moment to regain his panache exterior. "Pansy, darling, I got you something even better." In one swift moment, he drew his hands around her waist and kissed her pretty, but pug-like face. It was passionless and unemotional, but Draco smiled nonetheless, commending himself for his adept handling of the situation. Oh, I am so good.

Pansy smirked inwardly. Does he really think he kisses that well?

****

"Hello, Hermione," cried two voices in unison, peering down at her while she lay asleep at her desk, he face plastered to her History of Magic essay. She hadn't even changed into her pajamas.

She stirred briefly; she had reached such a state of utter exhaustion, that when she lay down she had dissolved into profound unconsciousness. Harry and Ron's familiar voices grated against her eardrums unpleasantly until they were foreign syllables. Hermione had slipped into lifelessness, and all she wanted to do was lie in bed and hide from her troubles. She dug her head in deeper- she refused to be disturbed.

"Hermione?" Ron asked. All of a sudden, wakefulness pinched her with the realization, the recognition of his voice, delivering from dreamland and back to the world of the wake.

"Harry! Ron!" she gasped, sitting up with a start- the piece of parchment still clinging to her face. "What are you doing here?"

"We got Ginny to let us in." Harry waved a hand in front of her face. "Anyway, it's Christmas!"

"Yeah, we missed you," Ron exclaimed, "waking us all up way too early in the morning to hurl presents at our heads!" He sighed, "We need you to do that. I mean c'mon, it's part of Christmas tradition!"

"Hey! What's this?" Harry said, leafing through a book called, Quidditch Worldwide- An evolution of the classic sport in foreign countries containing a brief description of their teams and strategies with a 'How-to' for the adventurous Quidditch player. Hermione had bought that book so that she wasn't an idiot during Ron and Harry's all-too-frequent Quidditch conversations. She hated not being able to have the last word on any subject. "I'm telling you, Hermione, if the rest of the book is as 'brief' as the title-"

"It's yours!" Hermione exclaimed suddenly- his words were a guilty reminder that she had forgotten to do her Christmas shopping. "I'm sorry I forgot to wrap it, I've been busy you know..." Her listless fingers gestured vaguely at the pandemonium of papers at her desk and pulled off the piece stuck to her face. Ron cleared his throat.

Another guilty reminder. "Oh- Ron! Yours is in here somewhere..." She rummaged through her drawers (each neatly identified with its own label- Sweaters, Spare Quills and Parchment, Potion Ingredients...). "Here!" Hermione cried, thrusting to Ron an object from the 'Miscellaneous Objects Smaller Than a Quaffle' drawer.

"It's- it's-" I wish I got a Quidditch book.

"A Magic 8-Ball," finished Hermione, and continued hurriedly, "You ask it a question and shake it for an answer."
With a disbelieving air, Ron thought, Will I get any action under the mistletoe? chancing a half glance at Hermione. He shook the ball, and peered into the tiny window. It read, Hell, yeah!

"I love this thing! It's like..." Ron struggled for a word, "magic or something."

"Or something." Harry shared a half-grin with Ron, looking at the creased spine and slightly dog-eared pages of his 'new' book, and giving Hermione her present. "Merry Christmas!"

Ron thrust a clumsily-wrapped parcel at Hermione. "Yeah, here..." he muttered, distractedly, giving the Magic 8-Ball another shake. Hermione held both of her presents in her hands with a guilty air. She watched as Harry eagerly flipped through the obviously not-new book and as Ron repeatedly shook the nicked plastic ball that had known better days. There is no way I deserve you guys.

As they walked to the Great Hall for breakfast, Ron gave Harry a wink over Hermione's head. "Are you feeling better, Harry?"

Seeing his none-too-subtle cue, Harry coughed. "Er... worse. I think I'm coming down with -cough- erm... something. I'm off to see Madam Pomfrey." He collapsed into fits of coughing. Hermione raised an eyebrow. Harry always was a terrible liar.

Ron pretended concern. "Yeah, Harry that Pepperup Potion is in short supply- you better go get some. Like, now." He glared a message so clear it could not have been more obvious unless it was written on his face, Harry if you screw this up, I will hunt you down. Perhaps, Harry saw this or perhaps the lure of Pepperup Potion was too strong, but he sped off quickly, leaving Ron and Hermione alone. The portrait hole of the Gryffindor Common Room slammed shut.

Ron paused to open it, taking perhaps a little more time than strictly necessary. Offering his arm to Hermione, he said, "Shall we?" With a rather stupid smile, he looked pointedly up at the mistletoe that dangled above him, this time holding out both of his arms, and repeated, but in a slightly different tone of voice, "Shall we?"

Ron blushed. Almost as embarrassed as he, Hermione inclined her head forward and pecked him rather quickly on the mouth. He didn't have any time to react. In fact, for several seconds he stood there as though still awaiting her kiss.

****

"Hermione!" Parvati called, running up to them. She gave her a nudge and a wink to which Hermione didn't respond. "So..." Parvati gave Harry and Ron a look that said, whatever she wanted to say she didn't want to say in front of them. Without complaint and, if truth be told, rather grateful they left.

"I saw this article- I thought it might interest you- er, Harry. Apparently for reporters, old trends die hard. Here's Rita's legacy-" she handed Hermione the Witch Weekly and added rather ominously, "and ouch."

Hermione rejoined Harry and Ron who had patiently waited. She suspected that they stayed for more their sake then hers, but, oh well...It's Christmas.

Through the open door of the Great Hall Harry, Hermione, and Ron could hear the din of the Hogwarts students eating and talking with the animation of Christmas vigor. Hermione looked anxiously over her shoulder.

"Parvati said there was this article about you in here." She coughed. "If you...erm, want us to read it before, you know... Just in case-"

Harry's scowl clearly told her what he thought of that suggestion. Peering over Hermione's shoulder, Harry read in a whisper, "...According to anonymous sources... Death Eaters in training are given assignments... Several months before they commit the crime, they torment their victims... If the task is not performed satisfactorily or by the appointed time, the initiate is either killed or sent to Azkaban on fabricated charges... Legal process needs reform to prevent corruption within...wait, what does this have to do with me?"

Hermione tutted and pointed to the article on the opposite page.

The Boy-Who-Lived has learned to survive through his typical teenage troubles by taking solace in his new girlfriend, the half-Muggle Cho Chang. Cho Chang is the former girlfriend of the late Cedric Diggory, a former attendee of the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry who died under suspicious- and to this date unknown- circumstances associated with the young Potter, who incidentally has a history of mental instability.

Coincidentally, Cho Chang plays the Seeker for the Ravenclaw Quidditch team at Hogwarts, like Harry on the Gryffindor team. However, this illustrious journalist

This notoriety was created during his second year when he was accused of Petrifying several Muggle-born students attending Hogwarts and is further supported by his unabashed hatred for his non-magic caretakers. Records in the Improper Use of Magic Office show that he has a history of illegal use of magic - namely he used his abilities to "blow up" his Muggle aunt.

The parents of the lovely, Oriental girl declined comment.

"Who is this anyway?" Hermione snapped. "She sounds like the annoying Skeeter woman."

"Don't have much luck with reporter's, eh?" Ron waved his hand in front of Harry's face, which had gone oddly slack. "Harry? You there?"

"I'm not going out with Cho," he replied levelly. He remembered that fiasco at Madam Puddifoot's and cringed.

Ron shrugged, "I never said-"

Harry continued, voicing Kate Risete's implied thought. "Where the hell did she get the idea that I even liked her? Great, now Cho's going to think that I'm some Muggle-born hating bas-"

"Harry!"

"Who killed her first boyfriend just so I could move in and boost my reputation."

"You're absolutely right, Harry," snapped a voice and the next thing he knew was he felt a stinging blow numb his cheek. A crack. His glasses had broken. And from the feel of it- his jaw had too.

Through blurred vision, he saw tears glistening in Cho's eyes. "I- I tried not to listen to what they were saying, but-" she collapsed in her friend's arms.

A whispered word of comfort, "It's okay Cho, it's okay... I warned you about Harry..." Harry's head snapped up and he knew who this was- it was the fifth grade girl he had point-blank refused to take to the Yule Ball in fourth year. Damn.

"Cho- the article- it-it isn't true..."

"Do you love me?" she whispered in a sudden deadly calm.

...On the smooth Chamber floor..., lay a small, black-robed figure with flaming-red hair.

"Ginny!" Harry muttered, sprinting to her and dropping to his knees. "Ginny - don't be dead- please don't be dead-" He flung his wand aside, grabbed Ginny's shoulders, and turned her over. Her face was a white as marble, and as cold, yet her eyes were closed so she wasn't Petrified. But then she must be-

"Ginny, please wake up," Harry muttered desperately, shaking her. Ginny's head lolled hopelessly from side to side... How odd that Harry should think of Ginny- now of all times-

"I- I... Yes." Harry turned away from Cho and dropped to his knees to search the floor for his broken glasses. He heard her swish away. He wanted to stop her- to say- if she stopped, what would I say?

He heard footsteps approach him and a kindly voice break through the snickers. "Here you go, Harry." He reached out blindly for his glasses. Ginny laughed and clasped his open hands in hers and put his glasses in them. "Oh! They're broken!" she muttered, quickly fixing them, and placing them on Harry's face. I'd say, Cho- I love Ginny.

"You know what? I just realized something," Harry remarked, straightening his glasses and focusing on the grinning face of Ginny Weasley in front of him.

"Oh really? And what's that?"

He bent and whispered conspiringly, "No one knows this but- I don't love Cho." Out of the corner of his eye, he checked her countenance for a reaction.

Ginny looked surprised and a little flattered that he was confiding in her, "Why not?"

"Because..." he paused, purely for dramatic effect, "I'm already in love with you." Spying Ron and Hermione ahead he ran and caught up with them and called back at Ginny, "See you at dinner!" Ginny didn't move, but her radiant smile was threatening to stretch off the sides of her face.

****

The Yule Ball came and went. To Hermione, it was a tedious affair. Small talk smattered with triumphant looks from her "fellow" schoolmates. She could hear their unhushed whispers. Viktor Krum, Quidditch player extraordinaire came queuing up to be her partner. So when the next ball came and she rejected some of her fellow Gryffindor's, people expected a likewise dramatic entrance, with a set of equally resplendent robes. Too bad for them. Hermione felt no regret. So it was only to assume that the sideways glances were those of pity from her friends and amusement from her enemies.

"Look, it's the Mudblood- all alone," simpered Pansy in her false high voice. Hermione knew that Pansy's voice was easily deeper than Goyle's, but she kept that knowledge to herself. Better that the pathetic Slytherin keeps her own secrets.

"Drakie. Let's get some punch." She flounced past the wallflowers, Draco trailing ungracefully behind her. Seeing his crisp robes wrinkled by her iron grip and his usually immaculate, but typical slicked back hairstyle in disarray, Hermione felt the beginnings of pity for him. In uncommonly high spirits, Hermione mouthed, Good luck, you'll need it, to him. Draco gave Hermione a hopeless shrug and resolutely followed his date. He turned around again and mouthed, Save me.

It was then that she saw an approachable, vulnerable boy- stripped of his pride and arrogance, leaving only pink embarrassment and a pathetic half-smile that was uniquely his. His eyes were like two twin evils in a complicity- to allow a moment of weakness- of curiosity. She felt something that connected from deep within, and then he looked away, and the moment was gone, like candle doused in a gush of wind, and everything came fluttering back into place. Despite herself, her gaze lingered on his retreating form- hopeful?- that perhaps he would turn.

****

It was Arithmancy again. Hermione had learned to hate it. Her thoughts always seemed to roam to Draco in Arithmancy. The assignment that she needed to be done was finished in its 2 ½ roll glory. How dare Draco say that about Harry? She nearly screamed aloud with frustration. No, think about something else. Think about Harry. Think about Kate Risete. How did she know about Cho? Unless, Rita... Harry obviously hadn't told and it was only Ron and she who actually heard Harry admit to liking her. She stopped. She had told Rita. She bit her tongue with rage and shut her eyes tightly against the triumphant face that plastered itself on the walls of her mind.

"Miss Granger, there will be no sleeping in my class."

She opened her eyes. "Sorry, Professor Vector."

****

A pea rolled across the Hermione's plate. The fork drifted aimlessly around the plate- roaming, but with no particular purpose. Should I tell him?

"Hey Harry! Guess what- I told your Rita that you liked Cho Chang and clearly she tipped off this reporter and that's why she hates you now!"

She winced. Better that he didn't know. Thus convinced, she prepared to enjoy her meal. It wouldn't do him any good, anyway.

Harry entered quickly, plopping himself down into the empty seat next to her. "Hey Hermione! What's up?"

"Oh! Not- not much!" Hermione squeaked, quickly collecting herself. "What about you?" Her voice had nearly returned to its normal pitch. Nearly. She mentally smacked herself. I sound like Colin Creevey going through puberty.

"Me? Not too much. I failed my Divination test. I knew I would."

Hermione grinned, "You should get extra-credit for predicting your test grade."

He laughed, "Not like I 'foresaw' it or anything- I just haven't been doing too well since I gave that old bat a piece of my mind." Harry shifted uneasily. "Looking back I regret that now..." Hermione was torn between esteem and disapproval. Guilt; however, came with a vengeance and held her tongue.

Seamus and Dean, approaching the table, both laughed, "Yeah, but it sure was funny!" Peering angrily above their latest issue of Witch Weekly with a scowl, Parvati and Lavender quickly shut them up.

"Hey where's Ro-. Ron! Hey how's it going?" Harry smiled broadly, offering Ron a treacle tart. Ron, trained by experience borne of living with Fred and George, refused. He knew a false 'jaunty, winning' voice when he heard one. Hermione, looking up from her wandering peas, sensed trouble.

"Cut the crap, Harry," said Ron with a grin. "What's up?"

Harry, sensing that Ron was itching to shovel in the Shepard's pie in front of him, quickly got to the point, "Ron I- I like Ginny. I mean I really like her- and she knows that."

"Your kidding. My little sister?" Ron started laughing hysterically.

The way Ron stressed 'little' nettled Harry. "It's not like I'm a giant over here..."

Something in Harry's voice made Ron stop laughing. "This is my little sister." Harry shrugged. "This is my little sister."

Harry shrugged again, "It's not like she's my sister."

Ron ignored that and snapped, "What about Cho?'

"What about her?"

"You like her." Harry opened his mouth to speak, but Ron continued. "You like her. You have liked her. And just one hour ago you told her that!"

Harry choked on his Shepard's Pie. "I was wrong." He sighed, "Don't you remember how things turned out? I thought-"

"No- no. I don't think you were. I think you still like Cho, but now that she hates you, you're thinking, 'What the hell? Why don't I go and tell little Ginny Weasley that I like her and-"

"Why would I do that?" Harry was yelling now.

"To get Cho jealous. To make people forget about that stupid article. Because you just wanted to mess with my sis-" People began to stare.

"Why can't I like Ginny?" Harry shouted, pounding on the table.

"Because she's the same Ginny she was six years ago and she's had a crush on you since then! And then she seems to be moving on-" Hermione tugged on Ron's sleeve.

"-You wouldn't even give her the time of day!"

"Hi Ginny!" Hermione screamed, and, as intended, stopped her two fighting friends.

"Uh, hi..." Why is everyone looking at me? There's something between my teeth isn't there? She self-consciously ran her tongue over her teeth.

"Harry? What's going on..."

Ron turned from red to purple. Go ahead, ask 'beloved' Harry. Don't ask your own brother.

Harry shrugged and looked at his new watch - a Birthday present from Hermione, "It's 6:47 right now." He shyly brushed his lips against Ginny's cheek and then walked away.

Ron was fuming, but allowed Harry to go away unscathed. He merely took out his wand and surreptitiously poked the tart, muttering, "Finite Incantatem." Noting the edgy looks from his fellow Gryffindors, he grinned falsely and laughed, "Just in case," before popping one in his mouth.

****

Even without Fred and George, the Gryffindor Common Room was a disorganized and loud place; with third years playing Exploding Snap and a small group of fourth years and a couple of seventh years Hermione didn't recognize playing Wizarding Chess, but throughout the Common Room was a feeling of perfect contentment and utter chaos. Unbelievably, they liked the room as it was, with its air of disorderly comfort and barely controlled pandemonium.

Thus was the setting when Hermione entered. She was less-than-surprised to see Ron and Harry seated at opposite ends of the Common Room. Hermione could feel Ron's gaze on her as she uneasily walked in Harry's direction and the slam of his Unfogging the Future book showed clearly what he thought of that.
"Hey Harry." A nod. "Mind if I borrow Hedwig?"

"Uh...yeah, whatever..." Harry muttered distractedly, poring over his History of Magic notes. Suddenly, he exploded, "You'd think that being someone's best friend would include some sort of trust. I mean we've been saving each others asses for ages-"

"I'm not getting in the middle of this." She jabbed a finger in Ron's direction. "Talk to Ron. That's right, Ron, you. I know you're eavesdropping with a Listening Charm so you might as well talk!"

First, there was the slamming of a door. As she was not in a particularly good mood, and quite a few things felt the brunt of her wrath, but in the end she was comfortably lounging in front of her desk with a quill and torn piece of parchment chewing on the former and doodling on the latter.

Her arms had meanwhile been operating quite separately from her mind; they had drawn several flowers, which adorned the parchment so that it verged on flamboyant. She ripped them off and suddenly with that abrupt gesture, her whole inclination of thinking shifted drastically. She scratched out the customary 'Dear' that she had already penned. I'm just kidding myself; I'm just being nosy. And that was good enough for her.

-H

****

-

****

-H

****

"Over-confident Mudblood." Draco Malfoy took her latest letter, crumpled it up and threw it over his shoulder at a wastebasket, where it missed. He scorned her help, but in the deepest recesses of his being, he knew that in that brief moment, Hermione had learned more about him than Pansy had in all those years of Hogwarts. The thought rather alarmed him.

Pansy. He supposed she loved him. But was she in love with the same person Narcissa had fallen in love with twenty years before? Another alarming thought. The same idea of power, wealth, and prestige that personified the name Malfoy, and perhaps had his father. But not him. Not Draco.

As he grew older, his father had been the epitome of everything he had hoped he could be someday... Now he wasn't quite sure it was worth it anymore. To die with no one to mourn him. To live a sadistic life of... undignified servitude- knowing that he was following a campaign where subterfuge and fallacy are the cornerstones. That uncertainty, that minute, but crucial, flaw in the delicate structure of his beliefs was ceaseless in eroding at his sanity.

Draco pulled out the length of rope that Pansy had given to him. It could be used to bind his Monsters Book of Monster book- true, but that look she gave him had been unmistakable. She knew that he would use it, now that he-

His arm stung. He ignored it. Voldemort knew that Draco could not be expected while he was at school. After all, all pretenses must remain. He ran the rope lazily through his fingers and let it curl loosely around his arm. Slowly it tightened, like a boa constrictor strangling its prey- tighter and tighter around his wrist. A pink tinge appeared on his fingertips.

It was starting to get painful. His hand swelled. How was he supposed to get this thing off? "Engorgio," he muttered. The rope doubled in size giving him enough room to quickly slip his hand out. "Reducto." With a muttered curse, he massaged his wrist and moved his fingers tentatively, feeling a faint stiffness in his normally dexterous hands. It still hurt. It could destroy a life. A harmless-looking piece of rope. He slipped it into his pocket. It troubled him slightly that Pansy believed him capable of murder- she knew him better than anyone-

If she knew me better she would have gotten me a Broomstick Servicing Kit. While it would have been easier to let a House-Elf to take care of his broom, Draco was content to tone each twig to perfection himself. It was the same satisfaction he took in a job well done for his master.

His master. He hated the way the words made him feel: weak, subservient to someone who was just as human as he. His only match was Dumbledore and- Potter.

It maddened Draco that he served- that degrading word again- under a man who was consistently beaten by Potter, but who was considered stronger than Draco himself. '...You're the pathetic one, you've got everything and still Harry manages to beat you every single time...' And at the look she gave him, he had nearly lost it. How odd that her words should have struck him more than the frequent reprimands of his father. 'How could you let a Mudblood beat you in every class and a half-blood on the Quidditch field?' Had he known what a record sounded like, let alone a broken one, he might have compared her mocking voice to one, but to him it was merely annoying. '...You're the pathetic one, you've got everything and still Harry manages to beat you every single time...'

If I'm a Death Eater, I'll never be able to beat Potter.

And beating Potter was so important. More important than killing him. More important than cleansing the world of Mudblood-slime.

Then there was the Mudblood. She planted the seeds of doubt in his destiny. She calmly walked into his life and put everything into a whirlwind and his formerly undisturbed, but distorted ideas of pureblood superiority lay in pieces on the dusty floor. '...You're the pathetic one, you've got everything and still Harry manages to beat you every single time...'

He was so tired of being beaten.

Something on her face as she had studied him had made him catch his breath and grin stupidly like that besotted Weasley. It was as if someone had seen him for the first time. Her eyes had communicated a flood of emotions that left him questioning even himself. It wasn't even the first time either.
He cursed again. Draco hated circular thinking. Hated wasting time. Hated Potter and his posse of Gryffindor do-gooders. Hated the way that in the early hours of the morning Crabbe and Goyle's snores would wake him up. Most of all, he hated how he started off thinking about Hermione and had ended up right where he started. Hermione.

He cursed. She even possessed his thoughts.

"I need Pansy."

He stood up from the Slytherin Common Room sofa, and approached the cackling, fireplace that erupted in brief blasts of vermilion. Bending down, he took the poker from the floor beside the glowing hearth and began poking it around the burning coals that had been left aflame. A House-Elf should be doing this.

Suddenly, he stood up and resolved to leave the fire to die. The glowing embers slowly siphoned their heat and light away into the bleak surrounding of the Common Room, but each coal was waiting- waiting for the moment when a light would be struck and the fire would burn again.

****

Throughout his body there was a dull aching pain. It was a vague, obscure tremor that left him weak and fearful. The acute and painful pulsating was like the rapid flow of adrenaline, or the pent-up expectation of the inevitable-

He was so weary.

"Severus?" a frail voice broke through his reverie, "I can't teach on Monday..."

Selfish thoughts of his well-being vanished as though a well-placed Obliviating Spell had been set upon them, when he beheld Evaline Smethwyck. "Is there anything wrong?" His fathomless black eyes darted rapidly, surveying her, measuring her and for a moment the shutters of the windows to his soul were open, revealing-

Severus was fearful. "No, nothing's wrong..." but her frail voice declared otherwise, "You will be teaching in my stead...won't you?"

"Yes. No one else wants to take the job." For the briefest moment his eyes glinted, and he shared a look that spoke volumes with Professor Evaline.

"I was wondering why it was so easy for me to get a position, in one of the most notable magical schools in the world..."

Snape smirked. I always was proud of my jinxes.

She lowered her face so that the sunlight shone upon her jet black hair, giving it the dull, artificial shine of shoe polish. "You'll be teaching Potter's class, I'm sure..."

He raised his eyebrows. "Yes." Not that I'm glad about that.

"Tell them about the Green Flame Torch."

Severus had never heard of such a thing and would have suspected a joke, had he known that he and Professor Evaline had a strictly enforced code of professionalism. To conceal his ignorance, he asked instead for a reason, "Why...?"

Professor Evaline obviously had no intention of answering his question. She merely leaned forward and kissed him, and had she kept her eyes open she would have seen the expression of surprise on Severus Snape's face.

"Professor? Ernie's been hexed..." Severus and Evaline broke apart hastily. It was Hannah Abbot- that damn Hufflepuff gossip. She had no more brains than that pathetic Longottom and a mouth that moved so fast, her feeble brain had little or no time to premeditate. This will be all over the school by tomorrow.

"Nevermind. Not important." She smiled mischievously. No doubt we gave the Hufflepuff plenty to talk about. Twisting her finger in her hair, she still remained standing at the door. "You can continue, you know..." Forget tomorrow. Try- by dinnertime.

"OUT!"

Snape crossed his arms and the resolution in his gaze formed an almost tangible barrier between them. "Why?" he persisted.

Evaline avoided his question- in a moment she was weak again. "Tell them- everything you know." She winced. Out of the corner of her eye, she gave him a brief glance. However, her features were so indistinct and indiscernible that her countenance could have been anything from tender to calculating.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing...nothing..." But the sound of her unsteady footfall on the stone floor retorted otherwise in mocking echoes. Snape stared anxiously after her and slowly walked to the library to learn everything he could about the Green Flame Torch. If he was going to lecture he had to be prepared to answer any questions from that annoying Granger girl. That would mean a whole night's worth of research. He sighed.

Throughout the night he operated on autopilot and seriously began entertaining the thought that this was a joke and that Professor Evaline had set him on what she knew was a fruitless search. Every passing minute brought him closer to acquiescence, until he came across a leather-bound volume of almost decrepit condition and incredible age. This book should be in a museum, not a library. His long fingers impatiently turned the aging pages of the book with little expectation of finding anything. A whole night's search and nothing. Severus was disgusted with himself. And then he struck gold.

The last recorded usage of the Green Flame Torch was to kill the infamous vampire, Count Dracula (whose exploits are even reflected; however fallibly, in Muggle literature), although local legends have mentioned it several times since then. Appearing as an unearthly light, it has been much sought after as the ultimate defense against lethifolds, dementors, vampires, and other beings of malevolent intent.

Snape stared. The conclusions were unmistakable.

****

"Disgraceful, mate."

Dean whistled. "Damn," he muttered, shaking his head sadly at the gruesome photo of the remains of a poor wizard on the cover page of the Daily Prophet. "At least Avada Kedavra was clean."

"Any ideas on how it was done?"

"Nothing was found except the Dark Mark, courtesy of You-Know-Who." Hermione took a steadying gulp of pumpkin juice. It was times like these when she wished that when she went to King's Cross Station there was nothing between Platform 9 and 10; that everything she believed, and been led to believe, over her last six years of her education never existed. Sometimes she wanted to be ignorant- blissfully unaware of the fearsome- the terrifying living her life as a naïve little Muggle. She shivered.

Dumbledore stood up suddenly and beckoned the teachers to follow him out of the Great Hall. He had a copy of the Daily Prophet in his hand.

Once they had all comfortably seated themselves in the teachers lounge, Dumbledore stood up, silencing the anxious, hushed chatter with a sweep of his hands.

Severus opened his mouth to talk, but once more Dumbledore silenced him with a look.

"Times have worsened," said Dumbledore, "He's brought out the Hounds." There was the sound of a collective indrawn breath. "And another thing," he said, pulling out a magazine and pointing at a small article in the corner of the first page. Silence.

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