Trick or Treat or Severus Snape's Halloween

A casual observer would have said that Snape hated children and thus had no aptitude whatsoever for his profession. Such a person would, of course, have been completely wrong, at least from the point of view of the man in question. Snape harboured no hatred for the younger generation, and even was wont to say that he liked children: at least those who were 'quiet and well done'. He would also point out that, during fourteen years as a teacher, no student had been strangled in murderous fury, stabbed to death, or poisoned. (Snape had had no hand in Cedric Diggory's death, so it didn't really count.) No regrettable acts of bodily violence whatsoever had been committed, even though, over the past decade, the school had always hosted at least two members of the Weasley family. Snape considered himself a person of angelic patience.

His unspoken ambition was to make the school's unofficial history as the All-Time Greatest Monster. Sometimes he secretly imagined a sweet vision of a grey-haired Ron Weasley telling his grandchildren 'Heh? You say your new Potions guy is a monster? You never knew old Snape, now he was a real bastard. You don't get them like him these days.' In moments like those, a strange tenderness overflowed his old and hardened teacher's heart, and he almost liked Ronald Weasley. About Weasley's having grandchildren to tell stories to, he never entertained any doubts. The red-headed tribe multiplied in geometric progression, like the flu virus.

His musings were interrupted by a gentle knocking at his door. He opened it. What he saw was Madame Pomfrey, with her hands clutched protectively about the arms of a first-year student. Snape inspected the child with carefully concealed revulsion. At a glance it was impossible to tell its sex. The creature had medium-length hair in all shades of blond, with dishevelled strands getting into the lenses of its spectacles. A too-short robe failed to cover Muggle jeans. The robe itself displayed a greenish badge with a snake. The little Slytherin's one hand was occupied with a paper bag, the other with a sizeable handkerchief. There was no hiding the fact that the child was seriously snotty.

With a certain degree of irritation, Snape realized that, despite serious mental effort, he could not ascribe a name to the juvenile physiognomy. It probably belonged to one of the children hurriedly moved to Hogwarts from the dissolved Shetland branch only two days ago. As many as five had been sorted into Slytherin. Bouget...? Barclay...? Lafferty...?

'Yes, Poppy?' said Severus with false politeness. 'It's one of mine, I believe? What happened? '

'Good afternoon, Severus! I would so appreciate it if you could find some time for us,' simpered the nurse. 'We're having a tiny bit of a problem here.'

She pushed the kid inside. The youngster shuffled his feet and muttered in a terribly hoarse baritone, 'Gd afnoon, sah.'

'A horrible infection of the upper respiratory tracks!' Poppy lifted her eyes to the heavens. 'Pepper Elixir doesn't work! Neither do Camomile oil inhalants, or incantations... Basically, nothing works, Severus. If I didn't know it was impossible, I would suspect an inborn resistance to elixirs.'

Incompetent idiot, thought Snape. Poppy had a notorious habit of treating most of the juvenile infections with pepper or camomile. He had concluded long ago that the average Hogwarts graduate, after surviving seven years of his Potions, Dumbledore's sweets and Madam Poppy's cures, should at once be able to sleep on a bed of nails and join the Foreign Legion. Aloud he said:

'There is no such thing as inborn resistance to elixirs, Poppy.'

'Severus, if you could-'

'I can. Sit down here!' He gestured to the table. The first-year climbed onto the oaken board obediently, together with his handkerchief and bag. A few small biscuits dropped from the bag. This gave the teacher an opportunity to observe that the kid's threadbare trousers looked even worse than the second-hand garments of the Weasleys or that pig Potter. There was a hole with ripped-off threads on one thigh, and the knee was adorned with a skull-shaped tab and the inscription: 'Born to pepperoni'.

'Say: aaah!' ordered Snape, taking up his wand.

The child looked at him askance, his face expressing distrust.

'Siri, open your mouth and show your throat to the professor,' chirped Madam Pomfrey.

Siri! Snape shuddered with revulsion. How he hated that name! A Sirius in Slytherin: that was unbearable!

'Lumos,' he rumbled, lighting the tip of his wand.

'Aaaahh!!!' the brat opened his mouth to a wonderful width, allowing the magical blue light to reveal the most decorative tonsil inflammation Snape had ever seen.

'Brilliant. A consummate classic. I don't need medical studies to know the only thing it needs is an extraction,' pronounced the Potions Master. The urchin's jaws shut rapidly with the force of a closing bear trap, nearly biting off the tip of the wand.

'What the-', the youngster growled sullenly.

'Siri!' the nurse tittered nervously.

'We don't use such words in this school, boy!' roared Snape. 'Five points from-', he gulped down his words at the last moment.

'I am ... not ... a boy,' the child drawled contemptuously (and hoarsely).

Snape was aghast.

'Siri... Isn't it short for Sirius?!'

'For Sirith,' the girl explained with dignity. 'I am Sirith Lestrange.'

Snape didn't know himself whether he should feel relief or the opposite. On the one hand, he would not have to suffer a Sirius in his House. On the other, what he was facing now was a female variant of Potter - a dishevelled 'it' in breeches held together only by magic, with grey eyes of impudent and cynical aspect behind round glasses.

'According to Hogwarts regulations, girls do not wear trousers except for gym classes, ' said Snape dryly. 'I fully intend to send an owl to your parents, Lestrange.'

'Dad is in Azkaban, and Mommy has hanged herself,' pronounced the child with a shade of satisfaction.

'Poor little orphan!' whimpered Poppy, patting the creature on its small fair head.

Snape felt for a moment that all his insides turned around within him.

'Off the table!' he barked and indicated the direction with his thumb. 'Down there! I need some space to work.'

The girl barged down from the table and hastily collected the scattered sweets. The nurse was still gazing at her sentimentally. Sirith Lestrange trumpeted into her handkerchief, and started to look around the laboratory.

This school is going to the dogs, thought Snape, putting together the list of the ingredients for the elixir almost by reflex. There were some moments he all but understood some of the Dark Lord's motives, especially those which might lead to elimination of certain snotty individuals with skulls on the knees, offspring of alcoholics and Knockturn Alley scum. On the other hand...

'Your father worked for You-Know-Who, is that not so? ' he asked offhandedly, grinding wormwood and a hippogriff's tail hair. From the corner of his eye he noticed Madam Pomfrey tightening her lips and the girl straightening herself, bristling with rightful indignation.

'Dad was an honest burglar, not some thug! He got nicked for theft and destruction of property,' she protested.

What is the world coming to nowadays, thought Snape, inattentively heating up the cauldron with the half-product. Honest burglars, moral conmen and most probably noble pickpockets too.

Thrown off balance, he noticed only with the outermost layer of his mind that he was absentmindedly consuming a biscuit that had been mislaid on the table. Strange... Suddenly every inch of his skin started to itch, then he felt a tickling sensation. He looked at Pomfrey and Lestrange: the brat was gaping at him with widely opened eyes, and her lips gradually started to curve in a crooked smile. Poppy looked as if she was about to fall down.

'Sev... Sev...'

He looked at his hands. They were covered with a multitude of fluffy, garishly yellow feathers. He dared not look into a mirror.

'Yellow actually becomes you, Sev,' moaned Poppy.

The first-year emitted a sound usually associated with choking on a hot potato.

'AAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGHHHHHRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!'

To give them their due, they were both quick movers. In a split second, the girl dived under the table and the nurse screened herself with the cupboard door. Five minutes (and two broken chairs) later all was over. The floor was covered with a layer of yellow feathers, and Severus, now in his more usual black, was engaged in persuading the kid to emerge from under the table.

'Get the hell out! Get out, or I will pull out your blasted tonsils through the nose, with no anaesthetics!'

'You must be joking, sir,' replied the child indignantly.

'Severus, don't frighten her! She went through a traumatic experience,' intervened Madame Pomfrey. 'She's is shocked. Aren't you, my dear?'

'Sure,' Sirith confirmed from under the table.

'I am shocked, too! And bloody traumatized!' howled Snape. 'I was changed into a frigging canary!'

'Sev, don't curse before a student!'

A muffled mumbling could be heard from under the table and Severus could have sworn he distinguished, 'So feebly, too.' Resolved not to respond, he took several deep breaths, and waved his wand over the canary carpet.

'Turbulentio.' The feathers were gathered into a revolving funnel.

'Evanesco!' The irritating yellow vanished.

Snape bent down again, looking under the table, where Lestrange cowered in the furthest corner, by the wall.

'Riiight,' he drawled. 'There will be no tonsil amputation, no strangulation, drawing and quartering or roasting on a gridiron. But if you don't get out in ten seconds, I will make your life a nightmare. And you're going to stay here for seven years.'

Siri crawled out at once, sniffing. Snape, avoiding looking at the snotty Slytherin, filled a sprinkler with the completed potion.

'Aaah!'

He sprayed the solution into the girl's throat several times, and then pressed the sprinkler into her hand.

'Repeat a few times a day until it works. Now, goodbye to you, ladies.'

'Is that all?' Siri asked unbelievingly.

'What else do you want?' Snape barked and turned to Madame Pomfrey. 'And if I hear the word 'canary' uttered anywhere in my proximity tomorrow, I am not responsible for the consequences. And you would say goodbye to your anti-wrinkle cream, Poppy.'

Poppy cast him the moist look of a dying gazelle.

'But Sev...! Siri, say 'thank you' to the professor.'

'Thank you, Professor,' she parroted, still eyeing Severus warily. Her voice, he noted with satisfaction, was already sounding better.

'Remember what I told you,' he said in an undertone.

'Yeah,' she mumbled back, and at once corrected herself in a sugary voice: 'Of course, sir.'

Quite a little devil, Snape thought acidly. This year was turning out to be exceptionally interesting. As if the Golden Trio wasn't enough!

After Poppy and her protégée left, Snape remained in the middle of his office, deep in thought. Sham sweets were probably a student contraband from Zonko's, and they were the first portent of Halloween, coming up in three days - and a living hell coming to Hogwarts. The passages would swarm with dressed-up students trying to frighten each other by means of artificial bats, glowing skeletons moved by the Mobilicorpus charm, and rubber basilisks. Festoons of false spider webs would be hanging everywhere, passages would be filled with levitating glowing pumpkins, and Albus Dumbledore himself, heedless of the dignity befitting a headmaster, would, as every year, join the students in this lunacy, encouraging the kids to commit wild excesses and to search for sweets in all kinds of odd places. Last year Snape had nearly broken his leg, stumbling on a skull on the stairway, and a squeaking artificial chicken had fallen on his head from the gallery. All Hallows Eve was definitely a day on which Snape would prefer not to leave his bed at all. Vanilla biscuits changing people into canaries were an insignificant detail in comparison with the wider picture.

Biscuits... changing... people... into canaries. Snape stared into space with unseeing eyes, and his unattractive face was lit with an ecstatic smile. He had just experienced one of those infrequent moments of illumination, when a crystal clear idea suddenly manifests itself in one's mind, whole and complete to the last detail at once. Halloween! They want fun - there will be fun!

'I'm so bad, so bad... very, very bad...' hummed the Potion Master, rubbing his hands together and making for his private lodgings.

***

Midnight at Hogwarts was when those leading active existences belonged to one of three categories: ghosts, cats (one cat, to be precise) patrolling the corridors, and professors suffering from insomnia. Severus Snape fell into the last. In the daytime he was occupied with potions and children so intensively that his night dreams were also filled with potions and children, which he considered a tedious monotony. The only variations from the routine were mangled visions of the Death Eaters' Club meetings, with the chairman making speeches in a dictatorial style. Snape considered children the lesser of the two evils. After such disturbances in his sleep, he usually went out to wander through the extensive castle corridors, with a tacit hope of catching the Potter-Granger-Weasley Golden Trio at their illegal prowlings smouldering in the depths of his soul. The other reason was to have a trivial smoke, a furtive and shameful addiction of Severus's - which was of course common knowledge.

Snape was striding in lazy, catlike steps through the first floor gallery. Dressed in a civilian pullover (black) and jeans (also black), with a 'Modern Wizard' cigarette in the corner of his mouth, veiled in smoke, he looked like a demon on holiday. Sleepy portraits were hanging on the brick walls. Some of them were following him with eyes expressing disapproval. He walked around the corner, and came upon a grey cat.

'Good evening, Madame,' he said politely.

'More like 'goodnight', Sev,' answered McGonagall, assuming her human form. 'It's already after midnight, and you're still up. You had nightmares again, didn't you? You shouldn't smoke, my dear.'

Ugh! Grrr! The man was well over thirty, yet some part of his old Transfiguration teacher's subconscious still considered him a schoolboy! To tell the truth, he too only very rarely, in special circumstances, found himself able to call her by her given name.

'You ought to give up this muck. Good night, Sev.' McGonagall, with her robes rustling, departed in the direction of Gryffindor tower. Snape looked around, stubbed the cigarette on the basinet of a nearby suit of armour, and threw the stub inside.

'Agni', he mumbled, and lit another cigarette with his wand. With half-closed eyes, he relished for a moment the feeling of nicotine entering his bloodstream, and then continued his stroll. On the second floor he again bumped into a grey cat.

'What, furball?' he snarled. He did not need to be polite, since it was only Filch's Mrs. Norris.

'Mueew...' answered the cat, looking expressively into his eyes. With her tail pointed up like a periscope, she took a few steps into the corridor, and turned her head to him.

'I understand,' he muttered, going after her. 'What's up this time?'

Mrs. Norris led him to the door of a broom closet. She rested her paw at it, explained: 'Mrueew, mrueew...' and went away with the dignified bearing of a person who had just fulfilled her civic duty.

Snape opened the door and said to himself.

'Aha... What else should I expect?'

On a makeshift pallet of dishclothes, curled like a kitten, slept a child. Even if Severus had not identified the dishevelled blond mop of hair, he would without a doubt have recognised the dilapidated jeans with a skull on the knee.

'Lestrange!' His voice resonated in the castle corridor.

She opened her eyes at once, switching from deep sleep to full awareness at once, like a wild animal. But she did not look frightened.

'Huh...?' she said in a questioning tone and yawned.

'Why aren't you in your bed?' rasped Snape.

'Cos I forgot the password,' explained the irritating girl, scrambling to her feet.

'You should have knocked on my door or waited at the entrance for some older student,'

'On the floor?' she inquired incredulously, yawning again and scratching her sleep-ruffled hair.

'So a broom closet was a much more comfortable place?' Severus asked acridly.

'Sure,' she responded, mildly surprised. 'When my dad was working, and mom went on a bender, you don't think I slept by the door. Sir,' she added, recalling the rules of basic civility.

'To the dormitory!' Snape growled from his depths. 'And you've got detention with Mr. Filch after your classes tomorrow.'

'OK,' agreed the child, putting back her glasses on. 'He's that neat grandpa with the cat, right?'

Since Hogwarts had been Hogwarts, nobody had called Argus Filch 'a neat grandpa'. This brat was simply abnormal. Lestrange rambled blithely on at the side of her Head of House, apparently completely heedless of any consequences of either her sleeping on rags or her impudence.

'You look like a Muggle in this gear,' she said suddenly.

'What if I thrashed you?' Snape snarled out of the corner of his mouth.

A wary look.

'I can run very fast,' she replied.

A typical Knockturn Alley guttersnipe, reflected Severus. Who paid her school fees? Some kind of Ladies' Aid society? Her papers needed to be looked into.

Snape unintentionally let his thoughts to flow in another direction. A few hours ago he had received a return owl from the Zonko's shop. He was politely informed that his order for twenty pounds of 'canary creams' could not be realized, since they had no such thing in stock. This was getting really interesting. Where had the child come by them?

'Lestrange, where did you get those... canary biscuits from?' he asked sternly. The word 'canary' he pronounced with some effort. The girl cast him a guarded look.

'What would be a good answer?'

'The true one,' Severus barked in a suitable tone: that reserved specially for first-year students. 'Remember what I told you about tonsils, seven years spent in this place, and the unlimited possibilities of potions.'

'Yep, you said we'd bottle fame and brew glory,' added Sirith. 'A super speech. How do you brew glory?'

'How much for one custard cream?' Severus moved the ball to her court.

'Four sickles apiece. Ten percent discount when one gets two dozen at once, which makes less than three galleons. A good deal,' Siri enumerated quickly and comprehensively. After a short pause she added: 'If one doesn't have three galleons, one must be nice to a redhead senior.'

'Nice?' Snape snapped. 'I don't suspect you of possessing three galleons, Lestrange, so you were 'nice'? In what sense?'

'I earned them. On ads,' she pronounced, raising her chin proudly. 'Weasleys' Wiz... egh!' She put her fist into her mouth.

Snape raised one eyebrow. An enterprising child: in two days she'd secured a contract with a prospering (if illegal) company, won the heart of the school nurse, and survived a visit to the Potions Master's study unscathed. Miss Lestrange had all the signs of a strong personality.

'I'd have guessed that anyway,' he said somewhat indulgently. 'If they were not from Zonko's, the only other possibility was the Weasleys' little factory.'

They stood at last in the familiar dungeon, before a wall with a relief picturing three snakes, entangled in an elegant knot.

'Alvar,' said Snape in a hushed voice. An archway, opening into the Slytherin common room, formed almost soundlessly in the stone wall. Inside it was completely silent, the other students apparently sound asleep.

'Remember this, Lestrange. 'Alvar, alvar... Not altar, and not halva. ALVAR!' he repeated with emphasis. 'Do you think you can keep this in that empty head of yours until Monday?'

'Uh-huh... Thanks,' answered the girl and smiled at him with a wide and sincere smile.

Severus jolted in something like shock. She had smiled? AT HIM?

'Goodnight. And brush your teeth...' he muttered, disconcerted. Ugh! What the hell he was talking about! 'Don't forget tomorrow's detention,' he added quickly, infusing each word with black sarcasm.

'Uh-huh... Goodnight,' nodded Sirith and went inside.

Snape turned to his own rooms. On the way he brushed his temple several times with his hand, as if attempting to tighten a loose screw.

'Too much sugar in the diet,' he growled to himself.

***

Severus was working diligently the next morning: second year Ravenclaw-Hufflepuff: plus ten points for Ravenclaw, minus twelve for Hufflepuff for burning a hole in a table; fourth year Gryffindor-Slytherin: fifteen to nil for the House of the Snake. One medical intervention, after the uncontrolled growth of the right ear of one nervous Gryffindor, who decided to scratch it with his wand. Severus's last working hour before lunch was a mixed seventh year NEWT class.

'Weasley! A word with you.' He beckoned to one twin, who was packing up his textbooks after the lesson. 'I decree a confiscation of your entire supply of Canary Creams.'

The redhead was struck dumb for a moment, but regained his countenance at once.

'According to the law, we are both of age, we have a legal, registered mail-order company, and our wares are not subject to confiscation. What's more, any such attempts will be considered a larc-' he pronounced forcefully.

'WHAT!' bellowed Snape, cutting him short mid-word. 'Considered what?! Distributing this at school is surely not LEGAL! Everybody knows you are dealing this stuff to the students!'

'Evidence, please,' said Weasley firmly.

For the next thirty seconds they engaged in a staring match. Snape realized he wouldn't gain anything in this way. Revenge could wait.

'I am making an order,' he said dryly. 'Four hundred... no! Make it four hundred fifty. For tomorrow, or for the morning of October thirty-first at the very latest.'

Weasley looked as if he was suffocating. Eventually he released the air from his lungs with a whistle.

'That makes...' He looked up to the ceiling, moving his lips. 'Sixty two galleons.'

'Eghm...' the Potions Master grunted meaningfully.

'Minus discount of ten...'

'Have you ever been strung up by your intestines, Fred Weasley?' asked Snape in the tone of a casual conversation. His black eyes looked like two holes leading to outer space.

'I'm George,' amended the redhead.

'It's of no account, I will gut Fred as well,' snarled Severus.

'Fifteen percent, we really can't go any lower,' the young entrepreneur gave up with a sigh.

'All right. Paid on delivery,' agreed Snape.

George rocketed off out of the classroom, as if set on fire. Severus heard him yell down the hallway.

' Freeeeeeeeeeeeed!!! Olé! We're skiving off Herbology! Urgent client for tomorrow! El Dorado!'

***

Very content with himself, the Potions Master decided to check on how the detentions he had handed out the day before were progressing.

He looked into his notebook - according to his notes, Miss Sirith Lestrange was at present in the Trophy Room, presumably toiling at polishing ancient insignia and numerous sport trophies. He therefore set off quickly and energetically in that direction, passing groups of babbling and giggling students, thrilled with the upcoming fun, on his way.

As if there was really anything to be thrilled about, thought the professor sourly. A few hours of circus games, then welcome back to everyday drudgery and a written test in Arithmancy. The general excitement was even transmitted to the teachers' body. Madame Pomfrey was helping the children to cut freaky gobs in pumpkins, using a scalpel with disturbing efficiency. Professor Flitwick had cast a levitation spell on himself, and was flying like a balloon in the spacious interior of the Great Hall, adorning everything within his reach with artificial spider webs.

'Arachniiiiiii...' he pipped, and then thin threads, delicate as gossamer, spun out from the tip of this wand. At other times he buzzed in low bumblebee-like voice 'Arachnoooo...' and then the emerging webs were thick and heavy, looking as if they were covered in centuries old dust.

The top of a high ladder was occupied by Angelina Johnson, who was putting hairy feather-made tarantulas and plush bats among the spider web festoons. She was safeguarded by Lee Jordan, who stood below, holding the ladder and gawking at her legs in jejune rapture.

'Arachnae,' Snape whispered quietly, pointing discreetly at him with his wand. A huge, fat spider appeared as if from nowhere and plopped between the boy's eyes. Lee screamed from shock, the ladder wobbled dangerously, and Angelina's scream echoed the boy's.

'Wingardium Leviosa!' roared Snape, changing his aim rapidly. He heard somebody else crying the same. Angelina, hit during her fall with the double spell, flew up with a squeak. Rotating uncontrollably, she bounced from the magical ceiling and hung head down, showing her lacy lingerie. In the overall confusion, Snape spotted the second rescuer, who was gaping in consternation at Angelina through his round glasses. Of course, Potter!! Still... The bloody pup had quick reactions, that much he had to admit, albeit grudgingly.

'Potter! Release her!' he shouted over the racket.

The boy nodded and lowered his wand, making the 'finite incantatam' gesture. Snape lowered the hysterical girl, who immediately snatched a pumpkin from a nearby table and used it to thump her boyfriend on his dreadlocks, accompanying this with the choicest expressions from Peeves's repertoire.

'Minus five points from Gryffindor for disgusting vocabulary!' thundered Snape at Angelina. The black-skinned beauty - at present red-faced and in tears of fury - rushed out of the room as if pursued by werewolves. The bewildered Lee was brushing off the remains of the pumpkin. The onlookers were laughing their heads off.

'And ten points to Gryffindor for the quick reaction of Mr. Potter.' Dumbledore appeared beside Severus and winked at him.

'Um, yes...' Snape agreed with a sour expression. Ugh! It hadn't quite worked out. Had the headmaster seen the whole situation? Or hadn't he? He had to have. Old Dumbledore had more eyes than a fly. Severus decided to get out of the Hall as soon as possible.

As he had expected, little Lestrange was indeed in the Trophy Room, serving her detention under the supervision of Mrs. Norris. What he had not expected was to find her undergoing the punishment with a song on her lips. Even before he reached the door Snape heard:

When in Hogwarts my shadow falls on you,

darkest night takes over the day through.

Potions Master I am called by you,

Better pray I don't get you,

Cos you know...I'm so bad

I'm so bad, so bad...

Very very bad!

This was madly irritating! And of course she had to howl this offensive tune, a takeoff from a Muggle radio. True, deep down Snape felt a small spark of pride at being honoured even with such poor lyrics as the chief BAD, but, of course, that did not stop him hounding this symptom of insolence with perseverance worthy of a better cause.

When he came in, the girl turned to him with an innocent and at the same time confidential grin all over her face.

'Hi and hello to you, Prof!' she shouted briskly.

She was sitting on the table, surrounded by silver and gold trophies, like a barbarian queen in the midst of her hoard. A thin cat sprawled among the cups and badges. Sirith was holding the Quidditch cup on her knees, polishing it with the sweeping movements of a bootblack.

'I could hear perfectly what you were singing, Lestrange,' said Snape drily. 'It looks like you've earned another detention before you've even completed the first one. I expect you in my office immediately after supper. Half past seven sharp!'

'OK,' she answered, not stopping the polishing. 'Mr. Filch told me that when his kitty has kittens, he'll give me one,' she added.

Mrs Norris opened one eye, tapping the table with the end of her tail like an angry rattlesnake. Severus looked at her skeptically, raising one eyebrow. Mrs. Norris was a thin, bedraggled and venomous creature, liked by nobody but her owner. No sane tomcat would dare to approach her closer than a broomstick length, and those who did risked the immediate loss of both ears. Severus would have sooner expected the Transfiguration professor to 'have kittens'. But what was really strange was that Filch had said anything more than 'Take the rag and start sweating' to a student.

'Are you completely unafraid of me?' asked Snape with irritation.

Lestrange cast him an astonished look.

'Uh-uh,' she mumbled as a negation. 'Why?'

'Perhaps you should start!' growled the unhappy Potions' Master. 'Everybody is and they have good reasons, I assure you.'

'OK,' said the child after a moment of thought. 'I'll think it over.'

Snape went out, closing the door after himself, but an inexplicable impulse made him press his ear to the wood.

'Kitty, did you hear that? They're afraid of him,' the muffled voice of the girl came to him. 'Jellyfish! When he's really so sweet!'

'Mrraaaau...' confirmed the cat, and the first-year from hell started whistling 'Bad' again.

Snape drew his head into his shoulders, seeing red mist before his eyes. He marched to lunch, counting his steps to calm himself. Fortunately nobody accosted him on the way, or Hogwarts' population would have been seriously diminished.

***

At half past seven sharp, Snape heard a knocking at his door, and then saw Sirith's blond head drawing inside. The brat was stuffed with food like a hamster, and she was still holding a piece of plum cake in her hand.

'Stop gorging yourself, Lestrange. Come in, greet me, and put yourself to work,' commanded Snape.

The top of his worktable was occupied by three sizable boxes, overflowing with sweet surprises of the Weasleys'. They had been delivered just before supper by a very tired and very proud George (judging by the letter G on his sweater). Several laboratory jugs, filled with a green liquid in which a thick silver dust was flowing, stood next to the boxes.

Little Lestrange at once devoured the remains of the cake, never moving her curious eyes from the table.

'Good ev'ing', she burbled. 'What's that? What for? What do I do now?' A geyser of curiosity erupted.

'Two questions too many, Lestrange,' barked Snape. 'You are supposed to take the creams one by one and, using this syringe,' he showed her the appropriate, calibrated instrument, 'pour precisely two millilitres of this elixir into each biscuit. After every twenty pieces, change the jar.'

The girl nodded and made herself comfortable by the table, and the Potions Master moved a vessel marked with a letter R towards her. The others were marked S, L and B. He sat opposite her and started to work himself. For five minutes it was quiet: Lestrange was wiggling her legs under the table, since the chair was too high for her, and Severus noticed contentedly that she was fulfilling her task carefully and correctly. After five minutes the next question came.

'Sir, do you want to poison off the whole school?'

'Do you know the expression 'unattainable dream', Lestrange?' Snape answered the question with another question.

'Uh-huh...' she confirmed.

'So this is a dream which I will never fulfil. What I can fulfil, though, is my wish to seal your maw with "Willy Wood's Everlasting Repair Plaster". Reputedly detachable only with bits of skin,' Severus continued in a voice dark as night in a graveyard.

Little Lestrange cast him a look full of doubt, but she shut up for a good while, devoting all her attention to counting biscuits. And then she started to whistle. Apparently she was unable to work in silence. Severus meant to roar: 'SILENCE!' but then he realized that the tune was somewhat familiar and rather pleasing. It was not the loathsome "Bad" but a curious and even wild music (he had to admit that the urchin really could whistle), but only after some time did the professor recognise the Weird Sisters' song titled "Horror Magic". The Boston Spell Radio was broadcasting it around the clock. Lestrange was bobbing her head rhythmically, her glasses slipping to the tip of her nose. After "Horror Magic" came: "Call me Merlin", "Address: Azkaban", "Auror's Girl" and all the rest of the magical hit singles. And only after more than a quarter of an hour did the embarrassed Snape realise that he was also whistling! That bloody Lestrange was contagious!

On the other hand, she had at least stopped babbling and asking questions. After two hours of intense work all the creams were treated with the mysterious substance and neatly repacked. Only then did Sirith dare to open her mouth again.

'How is it going to work now?'

'You will see tomorrow,' answered Severus. 'And not a word!'

'Sure! Tomorrow's Halloween, what are you going to dress as?'

'As a serial killer! Shoo! The detention is ended and don't strain my patience or you will earn a third one.'

When Lestrange finally vanished behind the door, Severus had to admit that the brat was in a sense right: it would be better for his plans if he wore some sort of costume.

***

On the afternoon of the last day of October, Severus Snape stood before his wardrobe, trying to arrange some sort of costume for himself. His options were definitely limited: the inside of the wardrobe was almost entirely pitch black, lightened only by white shirts and pearl-grey pyjamas. Going out of his rooms in pyjamas was out of question, so he decided on a spacious rain-proof cloak - black, of course. Some additional details, and he was ready to go, burdened with a huge bucket full of biscuits.

On his way to the Great Hall he met Madame Pomfrey.

'Severus, you are terribly pale!' The nurse's professional instinct surfaced at once, quenching her holiday excitement. 'Are you ill?'

After so much sunscreen it's a miracle I am not translucent, thought Severus ironically, but aloud he only growled in reply, showing his long incisors.

'Oh, how wonderful you've decided to join in the fun, love!!' Poppy lit up like a Muggle lightbulb, and Severus all but spit out his teeth in delayed shock. Madame Pomfrey was dressed up as a Sugar Fairy - looking at her in a plethora of pink laces, complete with elfin wings, required strong nerves and dark glasses. Snape followed the school nurse to the Great Hall, feeling a perverse relief at the thought that nothing worse than this over-mature fairy could possibly happen to him. In fact he was right, since neither Dumbledore, dressed up as an aubergine, nor Mrs Hooch wearing a sports suit in a somewhat unorthodox purple-orange-black colour scheme and a rugby helmet, made an impression of a comparable magnitude on him. The costumes of the younger pupils swarming in the Hall were dominated by those of dragons of all kinds, false gryndilows, green troll masks, zombies, bats and vampires - as usual, the children went for the gruesome. Among the older students one could observe a sizeable number of Auror uniforms, picturesquely disarrayed nymphs' robes and colourful rags on the followers of the Weird Sisters band. Since Remus Lupin's spell here, werewolves had also gained in popularity. (Unfortunately, the new DADA teacher was such a pitiful and colourless character that one could not even decently hate him.) As far as Snape could see, nobody dared to dress as a Death Eater. So nothing new and nothing above the usual standard.

The aubergine with headmaster's rank jumped onto a chair and made a speech - as usual brief, to the point, and somewhat nonsensical.

'Welcome to the yearly convention of ghosts, dentists and other monsters!" (Audience laughter.) 'Vampires are kindly requested not to drain their lovely female colleagues, and I beg the comely ladies not to whack the vampires with pumpkins.' (Even louder laughter.) 'Sweets have been hidden in various corners of this part of the castle,' (enthusiastic WOOOOOW!!!), 'so go and fill your baskets. Stuff yourselves full, since there will be no supper! BEGIN!!'

The candles' light dimmed and the pumpkin lanterns started to glow with a pallid, ghastly light. Skulls, placed here and there, clapped their teeth in a lively castanet-like rhythm, and a band of giant black spiders started a concert on webs, plucking them like the strings of a guitar. Local ghosts circled under the canopy. Giggling children scattered around the hall, crawling under the tables and looking behind the ancient portraits in search of sweets. In a moment some lucky finder drew a giant surprise-candy from behind a suit of armour's basinet. When pulled at both ends, it exploded with a bang, covering those standing nearby withy silver dust and Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans. Someone else spotted something pink protruding from the nose of the statue of the archwizard Albert the Shy, and in a moment a number of the revellers were looped by a long slug, smelling strongly of pineapple and mint. The worm-like candy seemed endless. No-one dared to bite into it, but it was perfect for giving girls a scare.

'Trick or treat!' A familiar voice sounded nearby and Severus felt a pat on his arm. 'What do you have here, Mister Vampire?'

The bespectacled aubergine looked into the basket with interest.

'Bikkit?' offered Snape. Damn it! Bloody vampire teeth! Snape silently promised himself not to say a word until the end of this madness. Dumbledore helped himself to a cream. The Potions Master watched the biscuit vanishing into the grey bush of the headmaster's beard with concealed tension. Dumbledore savoured it for a while with the expression of a connoisseur, and then a thoughtful expression appeared on his face. He scratched himself instinctively on the stomach, and looked, surprised, at his hand.

'Speculum!' He created a magical mirror in the air, and roared with laughter. The face which looked back from the mirror was the mug of a gargoyle, completely covered with thick green and silver feathers. Dumbledore's crooked nose had changed into a sharp beak.

'Sev, that's absolutely brilliant! If anyone says you lack a sense of humour now, I will be the first to call him a liar! Colours of Slytherin, right? Ha ha ha ha...!' Dumbledore snatched a handful of biscuits and run to the other end of the Hall, where Minerva McGonagall, wearing a kilt, was talking to a flowerbed, recognisable after some effort as Professor Sprout. 'Minerva, my dear, you simply must have a taste of this!'

In a short time the news about the magical treats was spread around, and more and more pupils grew bold enough to approach the Potions Master and collect the traditional Halloween loot. Snape was patrolling the Great Hall and surrounding corridors, feeling like a cross between Dracula and Santa Claus. The surrounding area was becoming increasingly green-and-silver. Giggling children were sprouting green manes and silver talons, and smooth faces were being covered with scales or fur with contrasting silver stripes.

As could have been predicted, Potter and his two acolytes refused the snacks. Snape however had anticipated this and in an opportune moment dropped three green pills into a jar of pumpkin juice by means of precisely employed Wingardium Leviosa charm.

At some point Fred Weasley (or possibly George - this could not be unequivocally ascertained) came to him. He had evidently got a cream L, but the Weasleys' genes could apparently overcome even the magic of the elixir, since there were ginger strands left in his lush green mane, resulting in a jarring melange of colours.

'So this is what you needed them for, Professor!' The boy exclaimed with delight, grinning. 'That's really something! How did you manage to counterbalance the canary essence?'

Snape might not have minded discussing the canary project, but he remembered the vampire teeth, fatally impeding his speech, so he only smiled predatorily. Fifty percent of the Weasley&Weasley company interpreted this as a refusal to reveal the secret, and the boy went away.

At last Snape met little Lestrange on the gallery. She was one of the very few who did not show any effects of the biscuits' magic. She was sitting on the handrail as if on a horse, wiggling her legs, sucking on a great red lollipop, and observing her surroundings contentedly. The girl was wearing some kind of a long white shirt; wings, flapping from time to time, were attached to her shoulders; and a shining halo was flowing over her head. She would have looked like a classic little angel, if it were not for a spiky collar, quidditch rib protectors on her shoulders, and printing on the shirt front, asking: 'Got a problem, mate?'

At that moment Severus had no problems. On seeing her Head of House, the child sent him a smile, which was so different from the forced, toadyish smiles that Severus had been given by students for years that, quite unknowingly, he reciprocated it.

'Cool,' the girl said with admiration, looking at the teacher's incisors. And then she looked down again.

'Neat,' she added. 'B for badgers, L means lions, R - ravens, and S is our snakes. Really cool.'

'H'm,' murmured Severus, wondering about the association with coldness. The children nowadays were definitely strange, and Lestrange in particular was as unpredictable as a cat in a valerian factory.

'Are they going to stay like that?'

'Uh-uh,' denied Snape.

'How long then? The one with the canary was a bit shorter,' the naughty angel smartly observed.

'Uh-huh,' confirmed Snape, supporting his elbows on the rail and looking downstairs, where a snake-like dancing line was just being formed, wiggling between the tables and crawling, with a choral song on the lips, to a sideways corridor, to appear after a while from a corridor on the other side. The head of the snake was a feathery aubergine and a grass-green badger in square spectacles.

***

The mood at the breakfast table the next day was definitely less festive. The Great Hall resembled an all-variety lettuce bed. The students who had retained their normal appearance could be counted on one hand. When Snape came into the hall, he was greeted by dead silence and four hundred pairs of eyes fixed on him in recrimination. Snape ignored the looks and went to his place.

'Severus, this is not funny anymore,' said Dumbledore in lieu of greeting. He was sipping tea through a straw, since his long beak precluded the normal use of a cup. 'Is there an antidote?' With some irritation, he fished out a wet feather from his cup.

'No,' answered Severus, helping himself to the bacon.

'Why does it last so long?!'

'Oh, I think I made a mistake with the dosage,' said the Potions Master carelessly.

'How could you?!' sniffed professor Sprout. She still resembled a bundle of dishevelled wild cabbage.

'But Pomona,' said Snape in a mildly taunting tone. 'Green has always become you. And think how it fits your profession!'

'Severus, that's enough!' said McGonagall sternly. 'This must end, or there will be consequences!'

'Oh my God,' Severus replied in low voice, with mock alarm. 'You will forbid me to smoke, won't you?'

'Anything is possible,' retorted the Transfiguration professor coldly. 'There are quite efficient spells for that.'

Severus was eating his breakfast, contemplating his accomplishment with pleasure. The Halloween elixirs had worked with a bang. The Golden Trio, in which three different types of elixirs were mixed, looked probably the worst - especially Weasley, who had assumed a snake-like form decorated with random bunches of ginger hair. Weasley genes really had something in them. Potter resembled a bedraggled green doormat in round spectacles. Nothing could be said about Granger's appearance, since she was wearing a ski mask with openings for only her eyes and mouth. Lee Jordan still looked like a reggae-style raven, while Millicent Bullstrode could have starred in a movie called 'Killer Broccoli Attack Paris'.

Finally Snape stood up and tapped his goblet with a fork to attract attention.

'Due to certain circumstances this year's Halloween was prolonged. However, don't think I will postpone tests in Potions because of that. Thus, order should be restored!'

Snape quickly took a small hourglass out of his pocket and had a look at it. The sand in the upper globe was almost gone.

'Trick or treat!' shouted the Potions Master.

At that moment the last grain of sand dropped. All eyes were fixed on Snape and his hand holding the hourglass. Suddenly the pregnant silence was broken by increasing rustles - the falling of feathers, scales and fur from the students. A hurricane-like gasp of relief was heard, followed by laughter and growing cheers.

Snape stood like a statue of triumph, with his arms folded on his chest and a crooked grin. In the overall commotion nobody heard the Potions Master humming under his breath.

'I'm so bad, so bad, really, really bad... you know, I am bad...'