Harry Potter and the Flowers of Mimas

Chapter 8: A Small, Familiar Voice

Working for Albus Dumbledore was not without its disappointments. Having completed a harrowing and potentially dangerous mission to Azkaban prison, Snape was far too accustomed to the quirks of the Headmaster to expect to be warmly received or profusely thanked. It also came as no surprise that Dumbledore had made plans to spend the afternoon in Addis Ababa and did not return until well after dinnertime. However, what had disappointed Snape (and had infuriated him, too) was the fact that when Dumbledore eventually made the time to see his spy, he acted as though he already knew nearly every word of Snape's report.

The Headmaster had merely smiled when Snape unwound the flesh coloured string from his arm. "The admirable workmanship of Messrs Fred and George Weasley," he had remarked approvingly. "It's good to see that they're attracting such a diverse clientele. Mind you, I myself have purchased several pairs of their Singing Socks."

As Snape explained that Lucius Malfoy had obtained exactly the information from the Department of Mysteries that the Order had been trying to keep secret, Dumbledore did no more than stroke his beard thoughtfully. Then he offered Snape a squirming Cockroach Cluster from a green glass jar and told him that there was no need to worry. Snape refused the sweet, so the Headmaster ate it himself.

When the Potions Master reported his suspicion that Bellatrix Lestrange had somehow threatened McNair, Dumbledore had nodded. "Yes," the Headmaster agreed. "It is beyond doubt that McNair had an unauthorised visitor. Kingsley is considering the possibility that a party within Azkaban assisted." He added in a forbidding tone, "You need not concern yourself with that matter."

It initially appeared that the Headmaster intended to regard every aspect of Snape's debrief as either only vaguely interesting or beyond the Potion Master's proper field of inquiry. However, when Snape explained that Lucius wished to convey a message to the Dark Lord, Dumbledore's blue eyes had glinted with enthusiasm. "You really ought to help him do so," he said eagerly.

"But - it's impossible!" Snape sputtered. "Even if I knew how to find him - how could we dare deliver such a message? Not to mention handing over Draco."

Behind the thick, silver strands of the Headmaster's beard Snape saw the corners of the old man's mouth twitch into a smile. "I was under the impression that Draco was keen for a change of air," Dumbledore observed wryly.

"It cannot be done," Snape snapped. He understood that the Headmaster was possibly only making one of his little jokes but Snape regarded some things as beyond humour.

The corpulent wizard who occupied the portrait on the wall behind Dumbledore's desk took offence at the Potion Master's tone. "Insubordination!" he shouted, his red nose glowing even more brightly than was usual. "Young fellow, you've been a bad egg ever since you came to this school." He rose to his feet and continued noisily. "When will you learn to do as Albus Dumbledore tells you? Don't stand for it, Headmaster!"

Dilys Derwent looked out from her painting, shook her silver ringlets and admonished her fellow work of art irritably. "Really, Fortescue! Who asked you? Leave the boy alone."

The Headmaster ignored the paintings' interruptions. "You may be right." Dumbledore nodded sagely. "Perhaps we should keep Draco. It would not do to exacerbate the falling enrolments of Slytherin House." His clear blue eyes twinkled. "Still... I wonder.." The Headmaster tented his long fingers and paused to ponder.

"It's not Draco I care about," Snape replied tersely, still scarcely believing that Dumbledore could contemplate Lucius' proposal. "The message, Headmaster. We'd be telling the Dark Lord everything we fought to keep from him." The fat wizard in the portrait made a loud harrumphing noise to indicate his disapprobation as he settled back into his throne-like chair.

"To catch a mouse," Dumbledore replied softly, "one should first select the appropriate piece of cheese." He intently examined his fingers and continued in a contemplative whisper. "Perhaps this is the cheese we need. But it would help greatly if we knew where our mouse hole was." Then the Headmaster looked up and smiled warmly. "How was Narcissa?"

She was as snobbish, vain and spiteful as ever, Snape wanted to say. Instead he offered a detailed account of Mrs Malfoy's decorating tips for Azkaban, her desire to quit England and her apparently unwavering belief in her husband's innocence.

"Did Kingsley return your wand to you without her noticing?" Dumbledore asked pointedly.

Snape realised, to his embarrassment, that using Leglimency had been Dumbledore's own plan. He now had the unpleasant duty to report that the ruse had failed. "He did," Snape began falteringly. "And I used Leglimency - to try to find Bellatrix." Dumbledore nodded encouragingly, as though this had been the course he had expected Snape to take. It was with even greater misgiving that the Potions Master continued. "But it did not yield any useful information." Snape paused. Dumbledore's benign expression was transforming into a stern look. "That is to say," Snape continued, "the memories which she shared with me were old ones - mainly from childhood. I saw nothing more recent than Bellatrix's wedding. I was interrupted."

"So, Kingsley did not allow you sufficient time?" Dumbledore asked crossly.

It would have been easy to lie. There were a number of ways Snape that could have excused his failure. Yet the manner in which the Headmaster peered at him over his half-moon glasses forced Snape to recognise that this was one of those infrequent occasions when deceit would not do.

"There was time enough," Snape regretfully explained. "But Narcissa resisted." The words had scarcely left his mouth before he realised how incongruous they sounded. Narcissa had resisted. How had she done so? Occlumency was a rare magical skill, requiring intensive training. Why would a pampered socialite like Narcissa feel the need to learn Occlumency?

But Narcissa's unexpected talents failed to shock Dumbledore. The venerable wizard leaned forward in his chair and asked avidly, "When she fought you off - what did you see? It is of utmost importance, Severus, that you recollect everything."

Snape frowned. He had seen absolutely nothing of consequence. "I saw a painting of a church. It might have been hanging at Malfoy Manor, but the furnishings were different. I think the memory was a distant one." Snape hesitated and tried to recall the other aspects of that glimpse into Narcissa's memory. "I may have heard a woman singing," he said uncertainly, "a nursery rhyme about gardens. Just a silly song."

"There's nothing at all silly about songs, you know," a small voice said in Snape's ear. It sounded so strangely familiar that Snape turned around quickly to see if a student was standing behind him.

Nobody was there. But the Headmaster had certainly heard the voice as well. Dumbledore twisted in his chair until he faced the shelf behind his desk. "Yes, thank you, thank you," Dumbledore said, seemingly to thin air, in a tone that sounded anything but grateful. "If we need any further assistance from you, we will ask for it."

Without offering any explanation, Dumbledore fixed his attention on Snape once more. "Can you remember the song?" the Headmaster asked. Snape shook his head dumbly, which caused Dumbledore to purse his lips in repressed annoyance. Then the Headmaster suggested a variety of nonsensical poems that featured gardens, or flowers, or men who kept their wives inside pumpkins. At each prompting Snape answered, with increasing irritation, that the song he had heard had been something else. "So, we are left with nothing more than a painting and a forgotten song," the Headmaster concluded sharply. "It isn't very much to go on, but it will have to do." He rose from his chair, "It is getting very late. I should let you get back to your House." Heeding these words, Fawkes the phoenix swooped across the room and perched on his owner's shoulder.

Snape stood and bowed stiffly, mortified and angered by the knowledge that, in Dumbledore's eyes, the mission to Azkaban had been a failure. The Headmaster appeared to understand that his employee's ego had been bruised, because he added in a kinder voice, "Some things cannot be helped, Severus." Snape grunted an ungracious farewell and started to leave.

He had reached the door when the Headmaster called after him, "Minerva tells me they've set the date for Fudge's visit. Did you know he was coming?"

Snape turned slowly. The Headmaster, still with Fawkes, had walked towards the fire and was taking a pinch of Floo powder from a golden urn that sat on the mantelpiece. "It was mentioned at the staff meeting," Snape reminded Dumbledore.

"Ah, yes, so it was," Dumbledore absentmindedly replied. "He's here for the last weekend in September." He added seriously, "You will hear some strange talk between then and now. Ignore it."

Snape had a very good notion of what the old man meant. But he did not intend to betray his concerns about Cornelius Fudge and so he met the Headmaster's gaze with a mask of impassivity. For the present moment Severus Snape was the Housemaster of Slytherin. No matter how hysterical the public hunt for Death Eaters might become, Snape refused to be cowed. He rested his hand on the door handle and waited in case Dumbledore had any further advice.

"You will always have a home at Hogwarts," were Dumbledore's parting words as he stepped with Fawkes into the emerald green flames.

Snape's thoughts were hellish as he descended to the dungeons. The Potions Master took immense pride in his cunning. He had, after all, been a spy for various holy and unholy causes for nigh on twenty years. He had personally outsmarted the Dark Lord (which was extraordinary) and had lived to do so again (which was unprecedented). Yet Narcissa Malfoy, a woman whose powers of discrimination apparently extended no further than deciding which nail polish to wear, had somehow outwitted him. Snape stubbornly refused to believe that it could be so.

A trickle of greenish water ran down the subterranean stairway. In a puddle on a landing a large slug was oozing slime. Snape stamped on the creature brutally, grinding its soft body into the stone floor. Putrid water splashed from the puddle and stained his robes. Slytherin's Housemaster swore under his breath and drew his wand to clear off the mess. However, he froze when he heard a sound echoing from below.

"Sepra... Sempiter...Semprini." A dull, deep voice seemed to be reciting a mantra at the bottom of the stairs. Silently, Snape edged forward with his wand at the ready. It was late at night. Snape felt a thrill at the opportunity of capturing an intruder to the castle or, even better, a student out of bed.

But when Snape swooped out from the darkness of the stairwell to trap his quarry, he was under whelmed by the student's response. Instead of a look of shock or a startled cry, Montague Montague (whose parents had evinced a cruel lack of imagination in naming their son) simply stood there, blinking stupidly. Then the large boy slowly asked, "Do you know the password, sir?"

"I do indeed, Mr Montague," Snape replied venomously. "And I, unlike you, have the right to utter it at this late hour." He lowered his wand and snarled, "Why are you out of bed?"

"I got lost," Montague unhappily mumbled. A furrow deepened in the youth's broad brow. "I get lost a lot."

"In the future you are to head straight for the common room after dinnertime," the professor warned, "and stay there. Now, why don't you know the password?"

"Forgot it," Montague murmured.

"Pucey was supposed to write it down for you."

"Lost the parchment," the oaf explained forlornly. "And the other parchment he gived me. Then he writ it on my robes but - "

"You washed them?" Snape scornfully interrupted.

"Yeah," Montague drawled dismally. He seemed to be going cross-eyed from the effort of remembering and articulating so many facts. "Draco writ it on my head... but I couldn't read it in the mirror."

Which explains why you wandered about last Tuesday with the word "Moron" inscribed on your forehead, thought Snape.

Montague had never been clever. But since his accident last April his behaviour had regressed to an imbecilic level. The Potions Master felt an urge to take some of the fury seething within him and redirect it towards the gormless Montague Montague. He was on the verge of barking a particularly savage detention. However, something in the boy's dejected expression made Snape resist. There were grave doubts that either the boy's disappearance or his eventual reappearance (wedged inside a toilet) had been accidental. Montague had been the victim of a prank. Snape suddenly lost the desire to victimise him further.

"Hold out your arm," Snape ordered.

The boy meekly offered his massive, hairy forearm.

"Hold perfectly still," the professor said briskly. He touched his wand to Montague's flesh and muttered, "Indelibilis." The tip of Snape's wand glowed green and he tattooed two words on the student's arm. When he had finished he asked, "Can you read that?"

With great effort, the boy read, "Se-m-per Call-id-us." The door to Slytherin House appeared in the damp patch of the wall in front of them. Montague plodded through the doorway and stared vacantly around the room.

"The boys' dormitories are to the left," Snape quietly reminded him. Montague lumbered away like a morose and sleepy troll.

The green lamps that were suspended from chains above the common room hardly bothered to give off any light. Snape was gratified to see that all the other students had gone to bed. The sole occupant of the room appeared to be the Bloody Baron, who sat in a shadowy corner with his silver head in his skeletal hands. The ghost looked as though he was grieving for the fall of the House of Slytherin.

Snape noticed that even the ornate picture frame above the fireplace was empty. Phineas Nigellus had been absent from his portrait in Dumbledore's office as well, and Snape casually wondered what was keeping Hogwarts' former Headmaster so busy.

His speculations ceased abruptly when Snape spotted something else near the fire. A less assiduous observer may have concluded that the area around the common room hearth was, like the silver picture frame, deserted. However, Slytherin's Housemaster's keen eyes were drawn to a small shoe poking out from the back of a large leather armchair. He stood for a while, waiting for the shoe's owner to come out from his or her hiding place and surrender.

Snape was just about to instruct the shoe to give itself up when the poker near the fireplace clattered to the ground. This sent the silver snakes that decorated the fireguard into a frenzy of hissing. A small, black-clad form darted from behind the chair, stumbled over the fallen poker and half ran, half tumbled in the direction of the girls' dormitories.

"Stay where you are!" Snape shouted, sending out a jet of light, which sealed the girls' doorway before the escaping student could reach it.

The student froze. She was exceedingly small, but the way that she was hunched over and cowering made her seem even shorter. "Turn around!" Snape commanded. Mary Floyd slowly turned to face him.

"Miss Floyd," the Potions Master sneered, "as an attempt at creating invisibility that was utterly pathetic." He walked slowly towards the girl, talking softly, evenly and with withering contempt as he approached her. "A Vanishing Spell is one of the most complex that the craft of Transfiguration affords us. It requires significant skill. It is not taught, even at a rudimentary level, until fifth year." He leaned over the little girl, so that his stare bored into her tear-filled eyes and asked viciously, "What made you think you could make yourself invisible to me by hiding behind a chair?"

The girl began to sob convulsively. "I w-wasn't hiding from you, sir," she tried to explain. "N-not at first. I was l-looking for you." She buried her face in her hands and howled.

Snape glared at Miss Floyd unpityingly. The child had been snivelling constantly, for one trivial reason or another, ever since her arrival at Hogwarts. The Potions Master decided that Slytherin's littlest witch was wetter than a Grindylow's arse. "You chose a strange way to go about it," Snape said harshly.

"That big boy - he came through the door," the girls said, before wiping her snotty nose on her sleeve. "I thought he was a monster, or a zombie or one of those - those things in my room."

"You mean a ghoul?" Snape asked. He recollected that itinerant ghouls sometimes frequented the girls' dormitories.

"It's horrid, sir, whatever it is," Miss Floyd wailed. "It w-woke me up. G-growling like a b-bear. It threw a book at me - and I was scared - and then one of those nasty tiny people with the big ears tried to make it stop - and then I ran here to try and find you."

"Are you saying that a house-elf restrained it?" Snape asked irritably.

"I don't know," the distraught child responded. "It was really short - and ugly. It kept bowing to me."

"You don't have house-elves at home?" Snape would not have been remotely surprised it the girl's family kept no servants. She lacked the arrogance of all the young ladies who came from wealthy houses.

"We don't have any horrible things at my home, sir," the girl replied. Snape saw a spark of anger flicker in her brown eyes. She pulled herself up to her full, albeit unimpressive, height before continuing. "And if I had known that a magic school was going to be so full of awful stuff and hateful people, I never would have come here. I thought we'd being learning tricks - you know - with top hats - and white rabbits."

"Top hats and rabbits?" Snape whispered, momentarily perplexed.

"Proper magic," the child explained proudly. "Like my Granddad knows. Slight of hand. He even taught me some card tricks before I came here. And I can make a coin appear behind your ear. Look, sir." Mary Floyd seemed to be cheering herself up with the thought of doing proper magic. She dried her eyes on her robes, fished a coin from her pocket and began to wave her right hand over it theatrically. In the dim light Snape peered at the money. It was golden, but not the gleaming lustre of a Galleon. The money the girl was holding was small and dirty yellow. Muggle money.

"Give that to me," Snape snapped, snatching the coin from her.

"Hey! My Granddad gave me that!" the girl protested as she tried to take the coin back.

The coin was undoubtedly a Muggle pound. Snape turned it over in his palm, almost hoping he would see Merlin's noble profile - not the slack-jowled features of the Muggle queen - stamped on the reverse.

"Your grandfather is a Muggle?" Snape asked softly.

In a small, affronted voice Mary Floyd answered, "He prefers to be called an electrician." She looked up to her Housemaster with a defiant glare. Snape was horrified to see absolute truthfulness in those angry young eyes.

"But your home - the rest of your family -" Snape did not wish to believe the obvious. He clutched at the hope that Miss Floyd was of predominantly wizard blood. "You live with witches and wizards, don't you?"

"My Granddad has a electronics shop in Colchester. Mum and Dad and me live upstairs."

"What brought you here?" Snape breathed. He could scarcely comprehend it. A Muggle-born had been Sorted into Slytherin. Why? In Snape's nearly fifteen years of teaching, it had never happened. Half-blooded students were a rarity (and the sort of nuisance that Snape had dealt with in previous years with the utmost discretion). But not even a half-blood had ever been selected for Slytherin House unless they came from the oldest and best family.

The Dark Lord had risen; the wizarding world was at war. Surely this was the worst possible time for the Sorting Hat to make such a blunder.

"They sent me a letter," Miss Floyd replied crossly. Her pudgy hand was still outstretched, waiting for Snape to return her coin. "Mum said it was a good opportunity for me to better myself, but I think she was just happy 'cause it was the only boarding school my family could afford. She wants me to stay here, even though I've written her heaps of letters telling her how dreadful it is and how much I hate it. 'Mary Phoebe Madonna Ray Floyd,' she says 'just give it time and be brave.' But I can't sleep and I've learnt nothing. I'm fed up with lessons full of ugly, squirmy, things. I'm sick to death of being scared out of my wits. I want to go home NOW!" She clenched her hand into a tightly balled fist.

"In my opinion," Snape responded icily, "being scared out of one's wits is a most valuable adjunct to learning. Nothing clarifies the mind like fear."

"That's rubbish," Mary Floyd grumbled.

"Is it?" Snape sharply retorted. He wished he could hex her for her impudence. But instead he continued silkily, "Let's put it to the test, shall we? You can report to my office tomorrow night for detention." Let's see how quickly the little prig learns to skin an ugly, squirmy Boomslang in a dark dungeon, Snape thought maliciously.

The child sniffed and her eyes welled with tears once more. She buried her chin in her chest.

"And if I catch you out of bed at this hour again, it'll be detention for a week," Snape threatened. He waved his wand at the girl's doorway and unlocked it. "Now, get to your room."

To Snape's surprise, she stood her ground. "I want my Granddad's coin back first," Mary Floyd said shakily. "It's my lucky quid."

The child was insufferable. Still, Snape had no choice other than to protect her from her own ignorance. "If you mention your grandfather - or any member of your family - in this school ever again," Snape snarled, "or if I hear you pronounce one more syllable of Muggle idiocy, then you will find yourself placed on detention for a month." He slowly and deliberately pocketed the coin, ignoring the tears that streamed down the small student's cheeks. Pointing to the girl's doorway he hissed, "Now, go!"

After Miss Floyd had slunk out of sight, Snape wearily headed for his own rooms. But when he passed the fireplace he was bitterly vexed to hear a reedy voice issue from the empty silver frame.

"Of course, in my day, Slytherin House prided itself on being an exclusively pureblood establishment."

* * * * * * *

In Harry's few moments of sleep the previous evening, he had dreamt that he was playing his flute (rather poorly) at a Weird Sisters concert. Professor Trelawney had been bouncing up and down energetically at the foot of the stage, in front of a large group of hysterical girls. Then the Divination Teacher started to throw flowers at him but Merton Graves picked one up from the floor. Harry had woken with a pounding heart, feeling like he had been plunged into ice-cold water. The flowers had been lethal. The last thing Harry remembered from the dream was Graves writhing and dying as all the fans applauded.

It had been impossible to go back to sleep again. However, when Ron's head had poked through the curtains of Harry's bed and shouted that it was time to wake up, Harry had feigned slumber with his eyes clamped shut. He did not want to be with people - not when he was such a magnet for death and danger. Not even Merton Graves is safe when I'm around, he thought dismally. He had stayed curled under his blankets when his roommates left the dormitory. He had even remained perfectly quiet and still when, a few moments later, Ginny and Dean had stolen back into the room.

Harry supposed that Ginny had come to inspect Neville's cactus, because the first thing she did was complain that none of the flower buds had opened. Harry also guessed that Dean had tried his best to make her forget her disappointment, because Ginny spent the next few minutes giggling softly. Then she had stopped abruptly.

"That plant - I saw it move!" Dean had exclaimed.

"Don't be daft," Ginny had said scornfully. "So what if it did? Neville says it's completely safe."

"Yeah - well -" Dean sounded genuinely afraid. "It wouldn't be the first time Neville got something wrong. Let's get breakfast."

As soon as the couple had gone, Harry dressed hurriedly and went outside. He chose a spot beside the lake that was hidden from the castle by a large beech tree. He had been sitting on a carpet of soggy fallen leaves for hours. Having been denied breakfast, Harry's stomach growled persistently. He was also fully aware that his backside was getting wet.

Yet Harry did not want to eat or even to move to a drier patch of earth. He just wanted the memories from the night before to leave him be. He recalled Trelawney's bizarrely magnified eyes, full of hatred, telling him that he was "not that boy." He also remembered Firenze, floating absurdly in mid-air and beseeching him to be true to himself.

So it seemed that one Seer thought Harry should become somebody else, while the other Seer thought Harry should just be himself.

In his hours of solitude, Harry had come to the conclusion that he would rather be anybody but himself. He decided that, given a choice, he would much rather be Dean. Then he could go through life happily. He would have a real, loving family who had never heard of Death Eaters, a head full of football trivia and a pretty girlfriend who could cast a mean Bat Bogey Hex. Or he could be Hermione, who pretended to worry about taking so many subjects but was an absolute certainty to gain nine "Os." Being Ron wouldn't be too bad either - he'd still get to play Quidditch and he'd have a much better chance of mastering Apparition. In fact, Harry thought desperately, if given the choice between living out the rest of his years as the Boy Who Lived or as the giant squid, Harry would take the squid any day.

But who will stop Voldemort if I don't?

He closed his eyes and leaned against the tree's cold trunk. His stomach growled ferociously.

"Mate, that sounds like a troll with a sore head."

Harry's eyes opened to see Ron standing over him. "I skipped breakfast," Harry explained baldly.

A flash of concern passed across Ron's face, but was quickly replaced with a friendly smile. "Well, come with me and we'll get some lunch," Ron said. He offered Harry a hand to pull him from his damp seat. While Harry brushed away the wet leaves that stuck to his robes, Ron continued talking. "I've been looking all over for you. Hermione's had my nose to the grindstone since breakfast, revising History of Magic and Transfiguration. But I gave her the slip when Vicky started bending her ear about Protean Charms again." They began to walk back towards Hogwarts Castle, which looked bleak and unwelcoming against a backdrop of iron-grey clouds. "I reckon we'll be able to sneak up to the seventh floor when everyone else is at lunch," Ron explained. "We can eat there and I'll be able to work out how to land on my feet."

Several students were sitting on the marble staircase, waiting for the Great Hall to open for lunchtime. Ron's voice dropped to a whisper as they went inside. "I'm really keen to get up there. I got so close yesterday." His voice dropped lower still. "This time I'm sure I'll be able to - you know."

"What?" Harry asked mischievously. "Kiss Luna?"

Ron screwed up his face in disgust. "Yeah, right!" he replied with loud and cheerful sarcasm. "The day that happens -" He paused and looked around the Entrance Hall, trying to think of an event so unlikely that it would make kissing Luna seem possible. He pointed at the massive oak doors. "The day I kiss Loony Lovegood," he said decisively, "is the day you hold those doors open and let the Death Eaters walk into Hogwarts!"

The lunch bell sounded. The boys needed to press against the stone walls of Gryffindor Tower's staircase and battle the tide of students coming downstairs to be fed. To their relief, Hermione was not one of the many familiar faces they passed. "Vicky must have dragged her off to classroom nine again," Ron speculated when they reached the common room. He chuckled. "I think Hermione's getting thoroughly bored with the Charms Club."

But Harry noticed that the common room was not as deserted as he had wished. Seamus Finnegan was standing beside the door to the boys' stairs and looking decidedly worried.

"Did Neville come and get you?" Seamus asked quietly.

"No," Harry said.

"Why should he?" Ron wanted to know.

"That flower's come out," Seamus whispered nervously. "Ginny insisted on going straight up - so Dean went too - for protection, I guess. I'm staying down here till Neville comes back. You can't be too careful, you know."

At the sound of Ginny's name, Ron pushed past Seamus and bounded halfway up the stairs. Harry called for Ron to stop, lurched after him and grabbed the back of his robes.

"She's not allowed in our dormitory," Ron muttered fiercely. "And if I catch her -"

Harry did not wait for Ron to tell him exactly what he expected to catch Ginny doing. Two things needed to be done. First and foremost, Harry realised that he needed to calm Ron down. If the Mimbulus Mimbletonia's defensive mechanisms were as finely tuned as Professor Sprout had said, it would not do to let Ron loose in the dormitory making threats and behaving aggressively. Secondly, Harry and Ron needed to find a way to sneak Barnaby Wibble's book out of the room without anybody - not even Dean or Ginny - noticing.

"Wait on," Harry warned. "We don't want to get into a fight with Ginny. Let's just grab the Apparating book and go."

Ron frowned. For a few seconds he stood still and breathed deeply. He seemed to be fighting back his brotherly instincts to argue with Ginny for the sake of an afternoon's fun in the Room of Requirement. "Okay," he agreed reluctantly. "We'll tell them we're going to practice Quidditch. I'll grab our brooms while you get the book. Stick it in your Broom Servicing Kit's box."

The plan sounded like a good one and Harry walked into the dormitory full of confidence. Ron greeted his sister perfunctorily, not even looking in her direction before diving into the mess under his bed to find his broom. Harry moved towards his school trunk casually, saying hello with what he hoped was a breezy, unconcerned air. Then he stopped in his tracks.

Ginny was kneeling on the floor, her long red hair glowing warmly in the light that streamed through the window. She looked serene and (Harry was embarrassed to admit to himself) quite beautiful. Dean, on the other hand, was sitting on the edge of Neville's bed with his wand pointed to something on the floor. Dean's arm was trembling. Harry had never seen his friend looking so tense.

On the floor between Dean and Ginny, the Mimbulus Mimbletonia sat crooning in its pot. Yet the little plant was so transformed that Harry could hardly recognise it.

Above the lumpy, grey stump of the cactus, balancing on a slender stalk, was a flower of breathtaking loveliness. Shaped like a double rose, but twice as large, each petal shone as though it had been crafted from the finest silver. The edges of the petals were tipped in gold and in the centre of the bloom a mass of pollen glittered with the brilliant, tiny rainbows of a handful of diamonds.

A heady scent wafted towards Harry. At first, he could not tell what it smelled like. It made him think of summer jasmine, lavender and rosewater. But none of those scents did the fragrance of the flower justice. All Harry knew was that the flower smelled wonderful. Without knowing why, Harry decided that the flower smelled just the same as his mother's skin once had.

Light reflected from the exotic flower onto Ginny's face. She wore the placid smile of a Madonna kneeling at a crib. Looking up, her freckled nose crinkled as her grin widened. "Not bad, eh, Harry?" she said.

"Not bad at all," Harry said in awe.

"Keep your voices down," Dean panicked. Ginny calmly reached out and steadied his quivering wand.

"It's safe," she said soothingly.

"How do you know that?" Dean countered.

"I know." Ginny regarded the matter as beyond argument. Harry found himself feeling the same way about the flower. For something so sublime to be deadly was unimaginable.

Noticing that her brother had reappeared from under Harry's bed holding two brooms, Ginny asked, "Where are you two going?"

"Quidditch practice," Ron replied, far too quickly to be convincing.

Ginny's brown eyes narrowed slightly. "Katie's already said you're both on the team. And our training doesn't start till October -"

"We - just felt like a fly," Harry interrupted. He edged in front of his school trunk, wishing he had opened it when the flower had diverted Ginny's attention.

"Have you got your Broom Servicing Kit?" Ron asked Harry, with a highly suspicious amount of emphasis.

"You'll miss lunch if you go now," Ginny reasoned. Harry opened the trunk and began to rummage, while Ron moved in front of him.

"We're not hungry," Ron lied. Then for the first time he saw Neville's plant. "Wow!" he exclaimed. "That's amazing!"

"Quiet!" Dean pleaded. It may have been Harry's imagination, but the pitch of the plant's crooning seemed to go up a tone.

"But it is," Ron told Dean. "It's bloody brilliant. No wonder Neville's been so worked up about getting those buds to open." He tilted his head and appraised the bloom. "Flowers like that'd be worth a fortune."

"They're priceless, actually." Neville stood in the doorway. Seamus lurked in the shadows outside the door, peering apprehensively over his friend's shoulder. Neville beamed with pride and added, "There's nothing more precious in the world."

Ron had crouched on his haunches and was counting the unopened buds. "You've got twelve more flowers still to open," he said. "That's a lot of gold."

Neville crossed the room as he spoke, with Seamus following a safe distance behind. "The buds only blossom on Saturdays," Neville said seriously. "Professor's Sprout's lesson about Saturn reminded me - and I checked Phylidda Spore's Unique Flora last night. Mimbulus Mimbletonia only flowers on Saturn's day." He bent over the plant and stroked the edge of a petal, causing the crooning to become softer and gentler. "So the medium sized buds won't come out till next Saturday," Neville explained. "And the little ones should be the week later. But I'd never sell any of them."

"You don't want me to ask around?" Ron offered earnestly. "Bill would probably know some customers at Gringotts who're rich enough to afford one -"

"No!" Neville said firmly. "Don't tell anybody." He frowned and whispered, "Zacharias Smith kept asking me awkward questions in the library after dinner. We mustn't let a soul know about the flowers."

"Do you want me to sort that wart out?" Ginny asked helpfully. She drew her wand from her pocket and flexed it.

"Watch where you point that," Dean begged.

While the others had been talking, Harry had removed his Tail-Twig Clippers and Fleetwood's High-Finish Handle Polish and crammed the Apparating book inside the sleek black leather case of his Broom Servicing Kit. He held the kit aloft and announced, "Got it," in what he hoped was a nonchalant voice, to Ron.

"Good, let's go," Ron said hurriedly. However, he cast a longing backwards glance as they left the dormitory. It obviously made very little sense to Ron that Neville had the chance of earning a vast fortune but refused to take it.

They had climbed as far as the fifth floor landing when a draught from the east wing caused the swamp gases to assault Harry's nostrils with their full force. The boys passed the bare plinth where the bust of Polycarp the Polite no longer stood. The smell of the swamp and the sight of the plinth reminded Harry that this was where he had stopped, the previous day, to check the Marauder's Map. Unfortunately he had neglected to bring the map with him now.

Ron had been chatting cheerfully all the way up the stairs. Harry hushed him. They waited for the sixth floor staircase to move into place and continued their ascent, taking special care not to trip on the vanishing eighth step. Harry thought that he heard a cat meowing when they reached the seventh floor. He froze, dreading that Mrs Norris' evil yellow eyes would be shining in the next dingy corridor. But Filch's cat did not appear. Harry and Ron reached the Room of Requirement without meeting anybody.

Ron propped his broom against the bare wall. "Here we are, then," he said. He grinned impishly at Harry. "Don't forget," Ron reminded him, "we need a wide open space. I don't want to get blown off my feet again."

Harry leant against the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy and focussed on the opposite wall. We need a room, he thought. A really big room. A wide open space where we can Apparate. The notion had barely formed in his mind when the door of the Room of Requirement appeared.

* * * * * * *

It was a longstanding tradition for teachers who resided at Hogwarts to spend quiet Sunday evenings together in the staff room. The only exception, Snape was relieved to note, was that Sybill Trelawney preferred to stay in her rooms. So the Sunday after Snape's visit to Azkaban found him reading beside the staff room fire, wondering if Dumbledore was likely to burst from the flames and join them.

Dumbledore's absence was unusual and a bother, but even more unusual and bothersome was the presence of the centaur. Firenze had glided in beside Hagrid shortly after dinner. The pair now occupied a corner of the room where Flitwick was attempting to instruct the Divination teacher in the finer points of wizard chess. Hagrid was also offering strategic advice but the centaur appeared to be churlishly disregarding them both. In fact, Firenze spent most of the time berating his pawns and complaining that human archers were inferior in every way to centaur ones.

Snape closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. If that infernal beast utters the phrase "human folly" one more time, he thought, I will Flagrate its tail. When he reopened his eyes he realised that Minerva was smiling at him from her armchair on the opposite side of the hearth. Without saying a word she nodded towards the poster above the fireplace. Having tactfully reminded Snape to clasp the hoof of friendship, McGonagall returned her attention to the Sunday Prophet.

Snape also resumed his reading but this was more a source of irritation than relaxation. He had spent the weekend (including the two tedious hours in which he supervised Miss Floyd while she sobbed through detention) poring over Nature's Nobility: A Wizarding Genealogy. In addition, Slytherin's Housemaster had leafed through every page of Who's Not Quite Who: Muggle-borns of Note. Snape had not found a single reference to the surname Floyd. His check of Miss Floyd's enrolment records had shown that her mother's maiden name was Schwarz. This was also an unheard of name in British wizarding society. The girl had not a drop of magical blood.

Putting aside his books, he watched as McGonagall began to attack the newspaper's crossword. This enviable feat was one of the most entertaining parts of the staff's Sunday evening ritual. The Sunday Prophet's most difficult puzzle, the Bamboozler, contained words that moved about and clues that altered completely if the witch or wizard attempting the crossword was not quick enough. Minerva's quill sped over the page. Even though she muttered fiercely under her breath, the puzzle rarely outwitted her. She scratched at the newspaper so rapidly and enthusiastically that spots of ink flew up and splashed her nose. However, nearing the end of her task an expression of intense annoyance clouded her features.

Without provocation she barked urgently, "Astringent crystal lies beyond the ocean and before the bent leg!"

"Calumny," Snape answered smoothly. He rose and walked towards the drinks trolley.

"Oh! Well done, Severus," Flitwick called out.

McGonagall scrawled the word into the last remaining squares and slumped back in her chair, gasping for breath. "Yes - thanks - Severus," she panted. She wiped her inky face with a handkerchief. Then she gave Snape a playful wink. "Although - I dare say - it's the sort of clue I'd expect any Slytherin to know."

Snape was not normally one to ask for help, preferring to form his alliances from a position of strength. But the problem of Miss Floyd had him stumped. As it now appeared that Minerva owed him a favour, he decided it would be an opportune time to consult the deputy headmistress. He poured a long glass of Gillywater and a short one of Ogden's Old Firewhisky. After returning to the fireplace, he handed the Gillywater to McGonagall and pulled up a carved chair beside her.

"Although," Snape began softly, "I doubt the current year's intake of Slytherins could solve so cryptic a clue. It's been a bad vintage."

McGonagall folded the Sunday Prophet and placed it on the floor. She sipped her drink before replying in a considered tone, "Well Ruddock and Downer certainly haven't distinguished themselves in any of my classes. But none of the first years from the other houses are awe-inspiring, either. That's no reason to say we won't make proper wizards out of them someday. We just have to keep them... motivated."

"I was more worried about the girl," Snape quietly explained. Professor Binns, who floated and dozed in the armchair beside McGonagall's, stirred in his sleep and gave a loud snort. Snape wondered why a ghost would have any need to sleep, let alone snore. Still he waited until he was certain that Binns was not about to awaken before continuing. "I have reason to suspect," Snape whispered, "that my Miss Floyd is Muggle-born."

"Muggle-born?" McGonagall exclaimed. Professor Sprout had been aiming a telescope through the window. She jumped at the suddenness of McGonagall's outburst, sending several astronomy charts fluttering to the ground. Collecting herself, McGonagall added in a concerned voice, "Are you sure?"

Snape nodded. "She admitted as much to me - and I can find no trace of wizard family." He continued disdainfully, "From what little I've seen of the child, she doesn't have a single Slytherin characteristic. There appears to be no possible reason for her to have been Sorted into my house."

"Beggars can't be choosers, Severus," Minerva said with a smirk. "The Sorting Hat only gave you three students. I don't think the hat'll take too kindly to you complaining about the few you got."

Snape wasn't enjoying his colleague's mocking attitude. "The Sorting Hat had no business making a mistake like that," he said brusquely.

"Ah, but it never makes mistakes," McGonagall advised. "For more than a thousand years, the Sorting Hat has imbued all its decisions with boundless sincerity." She took a long gulp of her drink before adding, "But a Muggle-born in Slytherin is certainly one for the books. It's a nasty time for that to happen, too."

"I told the student to keep quiet about it," Snape informed her.

"Quite right," she agreed. "It's dangerous information to be spreading about."

"But - can't you see - that's why the girl can't stay. She must be moved out of Slytherin."

"No. Definitely not." McGonagall shook her head emphatically. "The Sorting Hat sent her to you for a very good reason. You have to keep her."

"Even if I haven't the vaguest notion what that reason might be?" Snape asked in exasperation.

The deputy headmistress swirled the slimy dregs of her Gillywater around in her glass and gazed at the dancing flames. "You could always ask the hat," she suggested. "I imagine it'd be glad to be given the chance to explain itself. I know the last time I put it on - back when we were trying to get to the bottom of all that "Heir of Slytherin" nonsense - it was very pleased to have a talk. Actually, the blasted thing wouldn't shut-up. Albus had to wrench it off my head." She rose and placed her glass upon the mantelpiece. "I suppose," she added thoughtfully, "it must be a fairly boring life, being a hat."

She bade good evening to the occupants of the staff room, leaving Snape to finish his Firewhisky and think dark thoughts.

He was not sure whether he was emboldened by strong liquor or simply irritated beyond endurance by Firenze's incessant whining. However, after ten minutes of sitting and staring into the fire, allowing the pleasantly malted smoke to curl lazily from his nose, Snape realised that he could stay in the staff room no longer. It was time to confront the Sorting Hat.

A short while later he stood before the gargoyle that guarded the entrance to Dumbledore's office. On one side of the statue a sign had been posted that outlined the dangers of the Imperius Curse. It was a copy of the warning that hung near the staff room door. Snape was still capable of reading the warning. He supposed this indicated that, so far, nobody had subjugated his free will.

The propaganda poster on the opposite side of the gargoyle was much more unsettling. It featured a photograph of a family who purported to be Muggles. Snape was certain that the people in the picture were actually wizards and witches. The father and son were each dressed in three-piece suits, while the mother and daughter wore bright, floral dresses. They stood in front of a thatched cottage with a white picket fence. Every now and then, the father took what was supposed to be a mobile phone from his pocket and pretended to talk on it. Snape did not know much about Muggle contraptions. But he knew enough to recognise that the man in the photograph was talking into a roll-on deodorant. The caption for the poster read:

MUGGLES: THEY'RE NOT AS STUPID AS THEY LOOK!

"Pepper Imp," Snape told the gargoyle. It sprung to life and hopped out of the way as the wall behind it split in two. The Potions Master allowed the moving staircase to take him up to the headmaster's office and wondered what he was going to say. As he expected, Dumbledore was not at home. However, the portraits were so accustomed to Snape's coming and going at odd hours that they continued to snooze gently in their frames. Snape strode around the enormous claw-footed desk to the self that held the tattered, grubby wizard's hat.

Folding his arms, Snape looked down his large nose at the Sorting Hat. "I wish you to answer my questions," he stated imperiously.

The hat did nothing at all.

"I am the Housemaster of Slytherin," Snape announced loudly. "You will tell me what I require to know."

The hat remained mute. Snape contemplated using his wand. But (despite his mastery of a huge number of curses and jinxes) he could not think of a spell that would loosen the tongue of an uncooperative hat.

"You have incorrectly -" Snape began to say, before a woman's voice interrupted him.

"Just put the silly thing on your head!" Dilys Derwent looked down at Snape sternly. "How do you expect it to answer you," she scolded, "if you won't wear it?"

Feeling somewhat foolish and more than somewhat annoyed, Snape lifted the hat from the shelf and lowered it slowly onto his head. It was not as large as he remembered. Although still quite loose, the Sorting Hat did not slip down over his eyes as it had done when Snape was eleven. Snape stared at the dirty underside of the brim, waiting. Then a small, familiar voice said in his ear, "Bee in your bonnet, Severus Snape?"

"You know full well there is," Snape muttered accusingly. He dispensed with whatever formalities a conversation between a person and a hat would normally require and launched into an attack. "Your last Sorting was a complete debacle. What's the meaning of sending me -"

"Mary Floyd?" the hat asked. "Don't you like her, Severus? What a shame - I hoped you two could be friends. At least... I thought she might improve you."

"It's not a matter of improving me," Snape snarled. He had never heard of anything so preposterous. It was a teacher's duty to improve his pupils, not vice versa. The Potions Master irately murmured, "She's not a Slytherin."

"But Slytherins come in lots of different shapes and sizes," the small voice said evenly. "Miss Floyd may be hiding her potential. There's ambition there, you know. And plenty of cunning, too."

"It's not ambition or cunning I'm worried about - though Merlin knows, she doesn't have any," Snape retorted. "What business do you have sending me somebody of her family?"

"Not pure-blooded enough, is she?" asked the hat. "You don't think mighty Salazar would approve?"

"Salazar be hanged," Snape fumed. "I just don't want a riot in my common room when the prefects find out."

For a few moments the hat fell silent. Snape wondered whether it had said all it was going to say. After a long interval, he tugged impatiently on the brim. "Mary Floyd cannot stay in Slytherin," Snape said.

"But Miss Floyd chose Slytherin - and Salazar Slytherin, through my humble offices, chose her. It's the choices we make, not bloodlines or talents, which tell us who we truly are." The hat began to chuckle, which Snape found rather disconcerting. "In actual fact," it continued, "there isn't a single student at Hogwarts who doesn't have the potential to be Sorted into every one of the four houses. We're all clever, or cunning, or hardworking or brave - in our own ways. All I do is decide where the young ones would feel most at home."

"That's impossible," Snape countered. "Are you suggesting that I could be anything other than a Slytherin?"

"Of course," the hat replied airily. "I've always considered that, provided James Potter and his friends hadn't been so beastly to you on the Hogwarts Express, you might have found your feet in Gryffindor. You're certainly courageous - in a calculating sort of way."

"Nonsense," Snape snapped. Yet to his consternation the hat had started to sing.

"Here is the serpent, pure-blooded by birth,

Keeping his cunning head close to the earth.

In Slytherin will his perverse plots prevail,

Yet the heart of a lion beats under his scales."

No sooner had the warbling ceased than a very hard and heavy object thudded onto the top of Snape's head. "What the -" Snape exclaimed. A sharp pain caused his eyes to water. He grabbed the top of the hat to pull it off and felt something long and hard beneath it.

A rip near the brim of the hat opened and it said aloud, "You'll need to be brave, Severus Snape. There's nasty work waiting for you."

Inside the battered crown of the hat lay a gleaming silver sword. The weapon was a thing of awesome power and beauty. Its handle glittered with rubies the size of eggs. Snape, wide-eyed and open-mouthed, gawped into the hat. He felt as though a lead weight had plummetted from his chest into his boots. Recovering from the shock he faced the truth. He had just been presented with the sword of Godric Gryffindor.

Faced with such a rare honour, Snape did the only sensible thing. He swore, shoved the sword back inside the ancient hat and placed it on its shelf. Then he swept out of the headmaster's office and fled to the sanctuary of the Slytherin dungeons.