The Master Plan

Chapter Twelve: Is it Masochism or Just an Earnest Love of Learning?

Harry, on the other hand, found the next day that he was very much looking forward to class with Snape. He tried hard not to think about why. This was difficult, as his mind kept wandering from his classes and...back to one of the teachers. Instead of ignoring the subject completely, he rationalized.

Snape was entertaining, in a black-hearted, nay-saying way, and his irascibility could be...endearing. No. Not endearing, as such. Horrible. Yes, that was more the word. Harry carefully did not think about the fact that he was losing his mind. As if giving it deep and thorough consideration was going to improve anything, anyway. Easier to think about...People he knew. And professors. Harry found, thinking it over, that he particularly admired Snape's contrary nature. He so often said not to do or think or be something, and yet totally was that way himself. Or the way he said he'd kill you if you did a certain something, and yet only seemed to notice it half the time. He was getting to be that way a lot more often lately. Harry didn't really imagine the man could be getting forgetful; it didn't fit with the keen intellect Harry knew. It seemed to him...and it was something he probably wouldn't voice to his friends, because he knew they'd look at him strangely again...that Snape had actually enjoyed himself so much that he let certain things slide. Not always, because that wouldn't do, and he couldn't actually be NICE about it, because he was Snape but... Like the way he'd let them refer to him as 'Snape,' which was, frankly, how they thought of him...for most of the time. He'd heard it, said nothing, and then put on a big display later. And Harry rather liked the big displays, the grandstanding. The man might complain about Ron's whinging, but Harry was beginning to suspect that Severus Snape was something of a Drama Queen himself. And, Harry had to admit, he fully relished the performances.

He watched the clock all day, trying not to appear too preoccupied. Then, in the common room, he had to put up with Ron and Hermione giving him funny looks and muttering things to each other behind his back. Well, not behind his back, exactly; they were right there in front of him, but they were obviously talking about him...they were only concerned, of course. Still, he wished they'd stop; he got stared at quite often enough as it was. And then, finally, FINALLY the day was over, and the trio made their silent way to Snape, quills, ink and parchment in hand. For the first time in months, Harry was whole-heartedly looking forward to something.

His face fell when they entered the classroom. Snape had plainly been there at some point, but was not present now. High up in one corner of three of the walls glowing blue words stood out, waiting to be copied. Harry could almost feel Ron tensing up behind him, and Hermione's sigh was audible. Someone evidently thought himself very amusing. One wall read, 'NO ONE EVER SAID LIFE WAS FAIR.' Another proudly proclaimed, 'I SHOULD HAVE THOUGHT ABOUT THAT BEFORE,' and the third, and in Harry's opinion, most spitefully obnoxious phrase ordaining the stonework was, 'IT'S FOR MY OWN GOOD.' Oh, he just couldn't WAIT to see his classmates tomorrow. This was positively HUMILIATING. He turned to his friends, and they stared at each other, bonded in wordless grievance. Ron's teeth were clenched tightly, and Hermione appeared singularly pained.

Suddenly, a pithy voice broke through their reverie. "Getting to class on time means getting to work on time, children. Wands out." They didn't need telling. All three had already spun around, wands drawn, fear written conspicuously across their faces. Snape was standing directly behind them, fingering a silver clasp at his collar, suffused with smugness and satisfaction and wicked amusement. He gave a roguish smirk. "Surprised to see me? It is, after all, my class."

"We just--"Hermione croaked, hand over heart. "How did you do that? We didn't even hear you. One moment the room was empty, and then you--nearly scared us to death!" She was leaning on Ron's arm, and began glowering at the Potions Master.

"Hmph. If I had been any of the other Death Eaters, the three of you would be roasting on a spit right now. That was a genuinely dismal show of defense." He glided back to the desk, looking haughty and aloof. Harry got the impression the man was rather enjoying himself. He stopped in front of the desk and said casually over his shoulder, "You should have seen the looks on your faces." He breathed a small sigh. "A moment I would press in a book and cherish. Weasley, gaping and gawking like a mad halibut, Granger clutching at her heart like a weak old woman, and Potter as pale as milk, eyes as round as galleons. Very droll." There might have been a smile in his voice. He whipped around to face them, and Harry's wand hand jerked up abruptly in reflex. He saw Snape's eyes flick down to the wand before meeting his own, and Harry thought he might wet himself. Well, not really, but his mouth did go very dry. The moisture presumably went SOMEWHERE. To his surprise, Snape gave him a slight nod. "A decent first instinct, Mister Potter, but you lack commitment to your response. You must learn not to repress the reaction."

"Even with you?" Harry challenged. "I could have hurt you, you know. Are you asking me to hex you?"

"Hex away, the next time it happens." Something in Snape's eyes suggested there would be a great many 'next times.' "Harry," he said starkly, "don't be stupid enough to think that I can be felled by anything a person your age can give me. Do it. No matter what the consequences, I would be remiss in my role as an instructor if I did not encourage you to develop the ability to hex the holy living hell out of someone who sneaks up behind you, without even considering the consequences. If it makes you squeamish, limit yourself to the less painful hexes at first. Jelly legs, Impedimentia, whatever. The important thing is that you learn to hex first and think later. We can work our way up to more effective curses from there," he told the boy reasonably.

Harry thought about this for a moment, before nodding and smiling. He stopped when Snape begin mocking him, sneering and jerking his head up and down. "Stop bobbing your head as though you've a spring for a neck, you waste of humanity. Why the hell aren't you doing lines?" he shouted. "Granger, that wall!" he pointed "Weasley, there. Potter, there's only one left, surely even you could not be that witless. Go, go, go. If you aren't well on your way in ten seconds, one of you is going to BLEED."

Harry was disgruntled to realize he had been given 'IT'S FOR MY OWN GOOD.' Hermione was getting to know why life wasn't fair, and Ron, when Harry checked, was growling under his breath about precaution and planning and how only truly heinous criminals needed things like that. Even a just hundred lines doesn't go very quickly, and Harry's wrist was quite stiff and sore by the time it was done. He rubbed at it briefly as he watched the others finish; his line was the shortest, so he was done first. He wondered what, if anything, Snape meant by it.

"Take your seat, Potter," Snape instructed, and Harry realized the man had been watching them discretely from behind the desk. He had been silent for so long, Harry had forgotten he was there. Harry slipped into a seat, looking at the teacher with thoughtful eyes. Since he'd confessed last night that he...could appreciate the man, on an intellectual level, Harry found himself realizing that he'd never before looked at the Potions Master with clarity. He'd always had a veil of hatred and mistrust to complicate things before. Now, he tried to look at the man without judgment. This was difficult; it wasn't as though he could re-meet him for the first time. He thought back on the first time he did meet Snape, and his potions speech. "... foolish wand-waving here... the beauty of the softly simmering cauldron with its shimmering fumes, the delicate power of liquids that creep through human veins, bewitching the mind, ensnaring the senses....I can teach you how to bottle fame, brew glory, even stopper death--if you aren't as big a bunch of dunderheads as I usually have to teach." He couldn't really remember the whole thing...although he remembered an awful lot, and what he did remember seemed crystal clear in his memory. If he had really stopped to think about it, Harry felt he might have noticed that Snape seemed remarkably passionate about his subject.

Waiting for Ron and Hermione to catch up, Harry found himself speculating on his first impressions of Snape...

'...Greasy-haired git...Hooked nosed, foul tempered, overbearing... vindictive, eyes flashing menacingly...glaring, cold, smirking...utterly terrifying...sallow skin...that voice...always sticking his nose where it doesn't belong...biting sarcasm...hateful, cruel, biased...intimidating, impressive... petty, spiteful, nasty to everyone except his favorites...dark, sinister...frightening...rip your guts out as soon as look at you...but that voice...never listens, always thinks he knows everything...whipping round and robes billowing out behind him...black eyes glittering... overgrown bully...thin mouth, twisted, unpleasant smile...but my, oh, my that voice...bitter, sour, rather sad...alone, unpopular...brave, very brave...shrewd and calculating, clever, oh, but he'd have to be, wouldn't he...powerful, masterful...gift of keeping a class silent without effort...brilliant...'

"Potter. Do you have some reason for ogling me like an ill ocelot...or a lovesick squid, or what have you?" Harry felt Ron prodding him in the side with his wand, wanting to know what was going on, and he realized they must be finished. He felt the heat begin to roar in his face. "...You've been peering fixedly at me for no less than ten minutes, always with either a small smile or an outright goofy grin. What is the matter with you?" Snape looked...perplexed? Repulsed? Miffed?

"Nothing," muttered Harry in a small voice, wishing his desk would just turn into a great black vortex of nothingness and swallow him whole. Excuses, Harry, excuses. Show him Slytherin cunning. "I was wondering if you started out this way, or if you had to go to insensitivity training to learn it. Did you get awarded 'nastiest of class?' Did your diploma say, 'The Governors of the University of Villains have conferred upon Severus Sodding Snape the degree of Bachelor of Backstabbing with all the--'"

"That is enough, Potter."

"Or could you not even get into an actual college? Was it the Vocational School of Villains?" Harry couldn't seem to stop. Why the hell did he want, so badly, to provoke the man? Immaterially, he heard Hermione gasp at his daring.

"You're after class, Potter. Detention for acting up in detention, as it were." Snape was looking at him through narrowed eyes, and Harry wondered how close to the edge he'd just danced. Snape was still Snape, after all, and there was no doubt that he loathed Harry. Harry finally subsided with his tirade, breathing heavily. "Take out your quills and parchment," Professor Snape commanded coolly. "Properties of the Blurring Charm, Granger?" He was examining his fingernails, apparently uninterested in whatever Hermione had to say.

"B--Blurring Charms? Ah. They're relatively useless, what with the innovations in--"

"Wrong," Snape countered. "Blurring Charms are especially undervalued today, particularly because of the innovations in Vanishing Potions and Invisibility Spells, both of which have their drawbacks. Invisibility Spells, for instance, do not deceive many magical devices. Vanishing Potions have time limits and...on occasion, regrettable side effects. I do hope you're writing this down, because if ever there comes a time when I bring the subject up, and you do not IMMEDIATELY call these things to mind, I'll cut your hearts out with a spoon. It is possible to infuse an ordinary item with a Blurring Charm, rendering it able to activate the spell without effort. Do tell me that ONE of you cretins is capable of conferring the rationale behind using this charm."

Hermione, still stunned from being corrected by a teacher, sat silent. Ron was looking daggers at Snape, apparently, for some reason, taking exception on Hermione's behalf. Snape became still and looked straight at Harry, who stiffened. "Um. Because sometimes you can't make the effort? And...maybe if it's ordinary and the spell's...er...dormant...it would be, you know, less noticeable to other wizards?" he suggested with sudden insight.

Snape gave him a curt nod. "Also because it need not be triggered by a wizard. A muggle, with the right knowledge, could use the item, as could a squib. Write it down," he added roughly, and Harry bent head to paper. "It has disadvantages of its own, of course. For one thing, when the charm is first invoked, it does not activate right away. There is a period of time when the user is still quite visible, albeit...blurred. Hence the name. A demonstration, if you will." He reached up to touch the silver clasp at his throat, and his shape seemed to jump radically. Quite abruptly, the figure of Severus Snape appeared to shift three feet to the left, then the right, then faster, until he was merely an area of darkness distorted by shifting at high speed. And then, unexpectedly, he was gone. "My form is now concealed by an inconspicuous spell that moves my surroundings at great velocity, taking my appearance and blending it with the areas nearest me. I do not expect your vacuous Gryffindor minds are capable of grasping it, but this is what we call subtlety." Clearly Snape must have revoked the spell again at this point, because his shuddering, indistinct outline came oscillating back into sight.

"That was ruddy excellent!" Harry burst out, face flushed. He absolutely couldn't wait to try it. Ron and Hermione were equally enthusiastic with this development.

"Fantastic--"

"Think of what a party trick that'd be--"

"Fred and George would be green!"

"Quiet," Snape's voice cut in, and they tried to swallow their eagerness. "History before Theory, Theory before Essays, Essays before Practice, Practice before Spell. Write that down, because that is the order in which things will almost always occur. The Blurring Charm is one of the first three things I will expect you to become proficient at, because it is ridiculously easy. Occlumency is required, it will be practiced more than any other activity, and it will be practiced throughout the year, no matter how proficient or inept you are at it. The third thing you will be studying has nothing whatever to do with magic, other than the people doing it. You are going to learn to be careful. You are going to learn to be suspicious. Even if you are trapped in a dark room without your wand, surrounded by Death Eaters, you are going to know how to keep your head and look for a way out. This is partly physical training. You will run. You will hide. You will duck terrible curses aimed at your heads. You will..."

Harry grinned as his quill skimmed lightly across his parchment. He would learn. Really learn, and it would be useful. He would get some exercise--really exhilarating exercise. And later tonight, he'd get to talk alone with Snape...