A Matter of Malevolence

Part Three

" - did you SEE the look - "

" - on his clothes, I've never seen so much dust - "

" - in the hall and then there was this SOUND - "

Severus stuffed his pillow over his head and tried to ignore them.

" - saved his mother's life last year - "

" - when the ministry started fighting the rise of the Dark Lord - "

" - coming from Potter, and HE says that he didn't even hesitate - "

Severus gathered his books and left the library, avoiding the infuriating whispers.

" - so strong for his age - "

" - so quick they're talking about Quidditch in the next couple of years - "

" - to do something like that, I tell you, that is BRAVE!"

"Ugh!" That last - Severus' opinion on the whole debacle - punctuated his next action: moving stiffly and with his teeth slightly bared, he stuffed as many books into his bag as he could and stormed outside the school toward the lake. Perhaps there he could get some peace.

It just went on and on. Around every corner, whispered at every mealtime, even muttered about in the dorm; the infamous James Potter and his Selfless Acts of Heroism were apparently all anybody could talk about. By day two, Severus was already tired of it. By day three, he was ready to start cursing people.

The good side: nobody was talking about him, which meant Black and Potter had not blabbed. The bad side: nobody was talking about him, which meant Black and Potter had a truly terrible revenge planned.

Frowning, Severus sat underneath one of the few trees growing close enough to the water to provide some shade and took out his textbooks. Black and Potter had not done anything to him at all since Friday. Not a thing; they'd given quiet, baleful glares that promised hours of torment in the future, but so far neither one had even tried to so much as ruin his homework. This abrupt good behavior made him suspicious. Scowling at his useless potions textbook, Severus picked up his A History of Magic instead and tried to concentrate.

What were they up to? What? Would they wait until the fervor died down so no one would see them do it? Or were they waiting for it to peak so that when they did it, they'd have approval? He didn't want to give too much credit to to the Gryffindor mind; prowess of planning was clearly not their forte. And yet there was a sort of keen animal instinct, combined with luck, that seemed time and time again to provide them with JUST the right -

"Hello there."

Severus jumped. He'd been lost in thought for far too long; standing over him calmly and smirking like mad stood Lucius Malfoy.

"Oh," said Severus. "It's you."

Malfoy smiled. "It is I, indeed. Do you have a moment?"

"No.Go away." And Severus turned back to his reading. Ugh, History of Magic; putting that aside, he picked up One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi instead.

Softly, Malfoy chuckled. Shaking his head as though disappointed, he scissored gracefully down into the grass beside Severus. "Are you ready to talk yet? Or do you still dislike me for no apparent reason?"

Talk about a loaded question. Severus glared. "I loathe you. Let me be."

Malfoy laughed outright. "Well, I like you, Severus Snape," he said as he lay back and propped himself on one elbow. "You're very amusing. And you're bright, too; do you know, I heard some of the professors talking about you yesterday. You're puzzling them. It seems you have an uneven - "

"They were talking about me?" interrupted Severus, sounding horrified.

Malfoy arched one perfect eyebrow. "Hush. Don't interrupt." He tossed his hair and looked over the lake. "As I was saying: they're puzzled because you seem to have an uneven approach to your schoolwork. Anything that's just brain work, you've got it; anything with wand work, you've sort of got it. Potions, you're top of your class; but put you on a broom and you fall flat on your face."

Oh, gods. They HAD been talking about him. For a sharp, miserable moment, Severus felt as though he'd been betrayed.

Sidelong, Malfoy watched. His voice was warm, conversational; but his eyes were cold. "Why does that bother you?" he finally said.

"Because it's not their affair," Severus, replied very quietly.

"Seems like it is to me. They ARE your teachers," Malfoy drawled pleasantly.

"It isn't."

Malfoy looked very amused. "It is. And, because I'm your prefect, it's mine, too. So what are we going to do to fix your little problem?"

"What little problem? Leave me alone and I'll fix myself," Severus snapped. Then, because he was feeling defensive, he shifted around the tree trunk so his back was facing Malfoy. This put him more directly in the sunlight, which he did not like; but it was better than facing the prat.

There was a long moment of silence.

"Did that really help?" Malfoy finally asked; Severus could feel those grey eyes on his back.

"No. You're still there," he admitted, squinting as the sun turned the book's pages a blinding white.

"That's right, Severus," Malfoy confirmed, and stood up, dusting himself off. "And I'll continue to be. Right behind you. Whether you think you need it or not. And as soon as you've made up your mind to stop being stupid, I'll help you; but for now, I have better things to do than listen to a child vent his anger at me for no reason other than I tried to be friendly. Have a good day."

And with that, he left. Severus said nothing in his wake; somehow, the older boy's words had shamed him.

---

Severus was late to dinner on purpose. When he finally arrived, everyone else was already in the Great Hall, as he'd hoped; they were all talking, and the noise was abominable. Moving quickly and with his head down, Severus slipped into the last seat at his house table just as Dumbledore stood.

"Everyone! If I could please have your attention!" the headmaster said, both hands raised as he smiled. He waited until the cacophany died down before continuing. "There are a few changes coming your way, and we, the staff, feel that you should be made aware," said Dumbledore. "Of course you know the basics; stay away from the Forbidden Forest because it will kill you. Don't go wandering off school grounds if you value your lives. And now, something new: stay away from the Whomping Willow or it will smash you to tiny bits!"

Students gaped at him.

"The Whomping Willow is going to be freshly planted down by the lake some time tomorrow, so consider yourselves warned," Dumbledore continued cheerfully, bouncing slightly on his toes. "And that is enough morbidity for now. Enjoy your feast!" He clapped his hands once, and food made its appearance.

The entire hall burst into wild speculation.

Severus continued to stare at the headtable, thinking what many others were saying out loud. Whomping Willow? What the hell was a Whomping Willow? And why, if the thing was so dangerous, were they planting it on the grounds?

"This place is insane," he informed his Cornish hen, but the hen had nothing to say. Distracted, he cut into it.

Whomping Willows and guileful Gryffindors; all this, and homework, too. For a while, Severus ate in silence, and ignored the entire world. Eventually, he looked up; the world was ignoring him.

Malfoy wasn't looking at him anymore; since their conversation down by the lake, the older boy had apparently decided to eschew Severus' existence. Similarly, the rest of his house diligently spoke and laughed in any direction except the one he occupied. All of them had come together in pairs or small groups, talking, laughing, and sharing; but it seemed that Severus had in one week managed to do exactly what he'd been trying to do. All of them had learned to leave him alone.

So why wasn't he happy?

Soon, his chicken was gone. Poking at his green beans, Severus listened to the snippets of conversation around him, as usual waiting to see if his name cropped up; and as usual, it did not. Potter's did, but he was beginning to get used to that.

No one looked at him. No one spoke to him. No one even tried. Before desert came, Severus grabbed his bags and left the table, heading to the library. He didn't want desert, anyway. He wanted to be alone; truly alone. That kind of alone was better than watching other people being happy.

---

The library held a kind of quiet comfort for him. Usually, the only other people there were people who were like him: quiet, unassuming, wanting only to learn and not be disturbed. It was a silent communion, but the only one Severus really had, and he valued it.

The fact that the others were mostly Ravenclaws only bothered him just a little.

Finding a chair with nobody near, he settled into it and opened his books. Half an hour passed; here in peace and quiet, he sped through Magical Drafts and Potions (not that that book was EVER difficult), completed his History of Magic assignment, and had driven his way through fully half his herbology homework when a voice from the shelf in front of him grabbed his attention.

"We found the grimoire."

Severus blinked. Grimoire? Interesting; because of his background, Severus knew quite abit about grimoires and how rare they were. Old, valuable books, usually of dubious origin, grimoires contained clues to dark and powerful magicks, and Severus knew for a fact that no student could possibly dream of getting his hands on one. Perhaps he'd misheard. He turned back to his homework, determined to focus.

"Where?"

"Well... okay, we haven't found IT, exactly. But we did find out where it is."

"Where, where?" Three voices, it sounded like; one with information, two with questions. Severus frowned, beginning to wonder if he'd heard correctly after all. There were no grimoires in this library, or at least none outside the restricted section. But the voices he heard were young. What was going on?

"Somewhere near that picture of the fellow with the hawk nose and the potions."

Severus felt the color drain from his face.

"Ah, yes! Power to Hold the World. Ground floor, third corridor. Right? "

Such cockiness, such minds for detail; they were Ravenclaws, he was sure of it. But... what did THEY have to do with a portrait of HIS ancestor?

"Right! So what do we do?"

His question exactly.

"I don't know. That's all I've been able to get out of the Grey Lady so far; but she said there are more clues to come, and she'll keep giving them to us once we've figured out the last puzzle."

"All right." There were sounds of bookbags being opened, quills being taken out, parchment rustling. "Let's see, let's see... okay, the first thing we're going to do is review. Ready?" And the speaker read:

It bears thee many a mile away,
And yet its place it changes ne'er;
It has no pinions to display,
And yet conducts thee through the air.

It is the bark of swiftest motion
That every weary wanderer bore;
With speed of thought the greatest ocean
It carries thee in safety o'er;
One moment wafts thee to the shore.

...what the hell?

The book closed. "Okay, troops. And that one is?" said the one Severus thought of as their leader, and altogether, the others chimed in: "A telescope!"

"Good!" exclaimed the leader, and apparently put that aside.

A telescope? What? How the hell did they get "telescope" out of that?

The leader read on:

Once I was water, full of scaly fish;
But, by a new decision, Fate has changed
My nature: having suffered fiery pangs,
I now gleam white, like ashes or bright snow.

"Salt!" answered the students with one voice again, and now they were chuckling, caught up in the pure joy of solving these riddles.

Severus was baffled. There weren't enough clues in the poem itself to answer the question it posed; ridiculous. How were they figuring it out?

"Okay, troops," said the leader once more. "This is the latest one:"

We are little airy Creatures,
All of diff'rent Voice and Features,
One of us in Glass is set,
One of us you'll find in Jet,
T'other you may see in Tin,
And the fourth a Box within,
If the fifth you should pursue,
It can never fly from you.

Silence met this.

"Anybody found anything yet?"

Variations of "no," met this query, the students sounding fairly despondent. Severus was making faces at the bookshelves. What on EARTH?

The leader sighed. "Well, bother it all," he said, and Severus quite agreed. Curiosity was getting the better of his good sense; standing and moving as quietly as he could, he shifted over to the bookshelf and peeked between the volumes.

Six children sat before him.

The oldest seemed about fifteen, maybe sixteen; the youngest looked his age, although in this case, it was a little hard to tell. All of them were a bit undersize. There were three girls and three boys; four of them wore glasses, and all of them had bookbags far larger and more used than Severus' were. They leaned together, huddled.

"So where do we start looking?"

The 'leader' - the oldest boy - pushed his glasses back up his nose. "Well, let's look at it logically." Better words Severus had never heard. "The first one - Frederich von Schiller - was a Muggle playwright from the 16th century. St. Aldhelm of Malmesbury, on the other hand, was a wizard from about 600 A.D. There's no logical connection, except that they're both male. I don't like it."

"It was a lucky chance we found the 'salt' solution, anyway," said a girl who looked about thirteen. "And I don't want to have to go back to reading Muggle-written things anymore."

"We'll do it if that's what the Grey Lady wants," proclaimed the leader, his hands on his hips, and Severus resisted the urge to snort at him. Idiot optimism....

The youngest girl - who looked a little familiar to Severus - smiled as she piped up. "I don't mind reading the Muggle works, if you have a problem with them," she squeaked cheerfully, and the others looked at her oddly.

"I guess you wouldn't, would you, Evans," said the leader quietly, "given that that's where you come from. All right then, it's decided: Evans can check the Muggle literature. The rest of you, split up and see what you can find in the Wizarding. Okay? Ready? Let's go!" And all six of them began packing away their parchments and preparing to leave.

Severus was horrified. Quickly, he scrambled back into his chair. He knew that girl, Evans; had seen her in his class. She wasn't in Slytherin, but she WAS in Gryffindor. She was also a mudblood. Suddenly, Severus felt dirty.

And what on earth was some mudblood Gryffindor doing with a bunch of questing Ravenclaws?

What was this task the Grey Lady had given? What point was there to answering obscure literary riddles? What prize REALLY lay at the end of their journey?

Was there really a grimoire waiting for them?

Severus was determined to find out.

---

The Grey Lady was the official ghost of the Ravenclaw house, Severus knew that much. What exactly these ghosts did, per se, he was not entirely sure; the Bloody Baron seemed absolutely useless except for the purpose of scaring people at ungodly hours of the morning. But the Bloody Baron also did not talk; it seemed that the Grey Lady did.

It was getting late, but Severus was determined to hurry. Keeping his bookbag tight over his shoulders, he hurried through the second-floor hall with classrooms on either side of him. He'd seen her here, he knew he had, and more than once - sitting at various desks, speaking with various professors. It was after-hours now, but he'd noted enough Ravenclaws coming from this direction to deduce their house was close. Surely, the house ghost would be by the house itself.

Briefly, he wondered if any of his textbooks had a spell for summoning ghosts; somehow, he doubted it.

Peeking into a classroom he didn't know, Severus looked curiously at the gathered strange herbs hanging from the ceiling and arcane symbols on the chalkboard. There was power in those symbols; he could see it, feel it. Shivering, he stared for a moment longer, yearning to know what they were, and that's when Peeves caught up with him.

"There's the little baby-snake, crawling so late at night!" cackled the rotund spirit right in Severus' ear, and the boy jumped so badly that his bookbag hit the floor and spilled.

"Peeves!" he squawked, and was immediately embarassed.

Peeves cackled and turned a summersault. "And what is the baby snakelet doing so very far from home, hmmmm? I want to know, I do, I do!"

"None of your business," muttered Severus, stuffing his books back into his bag. His heart was still pounding.

"Oh, but I want to KNOW," insisted Peeves, hovering over him. "And so will the caretaker, once he finds you out of bed! Such a naughty little snake," he added, and laughed very coldly.

Severus frowned. "I'm allowed out of bed. It's two hours until curfew yet, so go bother someone else."

"Oooh, rude with forked tongue," said Peeves in a terrible, vaguely Asian accent. Severus shook his head in disgust and walked on. Naturally, Peeves followed him.

"Shouldn't be here, no he shouldn't," the poltergeist sang at him, and Severus hunched down. "Shouldn't be here, shouldn't be wandering, shouldn't be walking the halls on his own..."

"I said shut UP," shouted Severus, although he had not yet said any such thing. Hunching down further - it felt for all the world as if his bookbag were the only thing standing between him and that crazy spirit - he turned the corner... and was surprised to find himself facing the portrait of the severe and powerful Veneficus Snape.

Severus stopped. How had he ended up here?

"Shouldn't be here, shouldn't be here!" Scream-sang Peeves joyfully, delighted with having gotten a reaction out of the first-year. But this time, Severus ignored him.

How could this be here? He was nowhere near the hospital wing. There wasn't more than one portrait of Veneficus, was there? That made no sense!

Wait; wait. What had that student said - "ground floor, third corridor." But he was on the second floor, in the sixth corridor. Severus felt a chill run down his spine. Portraits did not move; this thing was huge, lifesized. No student had levitated it here for foolish amusment. There had to be two. Had to be -

Severus suddenly yelped as something wet and icy cold cascaded down his back, over his clothes, and into his bag.

Peeves cackled like a mad thing as he shook the bucket over Severus' head, and it was only as the boy looked up that he realized there had been something besides water in that container.

A single leech fell to the floor in front of Severus and exploded.

Peeves was laughing. "Blood for the hungry, trouble for the student! Everybody gets what they need tonight!"

There were leeches on his skin. Severus shouted in terror, ripping his robes off his body and dancing away from the spilled slime the leeches had been in. Horrified, he tried to feel where they were attached, but he could not; tearing off his shirt, he ran his hands all over himself, waiting at any moment to encounter the cold, slippery bodies attached to him, draining him, drinking him like some sort of demon -

"PEEVES!"

Peeves stopped laughing and spun in the air. Across from him, carrying a book and looking very severe, was exactly the person Severus had been looking for: the ghost called Grey Lady.

Looking very annoyed, she floated up to the poltergeist and surveyed the mess: the liquid all over the floor, the dropped bucket, the remains of the exploded leech, and the shivering, half-naked first year student huddled against the wall.

"Disgusting," she said in summation. Frowning at Peeves, she added, "this behavior is reprehensible. Do you know what you're making the rest of us look like? Pixies with pitchforks, that's what. Now out! Out of here, immediately, or I shall send the Baron down to show you what true fear is about!"

Peeves spun upside down in the air and blew a rasberry; but apparently he knew she did not make an idle threat. Making rude noises the whole way, he corkscrewed down the hall like a deflating balloon until he was out of sight and could no longer be heard. Then, the ghost looked down at Severus.

"You aren't one of mine," she said airily, surveying the damage. "And you don't have any leeches on you. It was a crude joke. I suggest you take your things and go home. This is most... undignified." She turned to go.

"Wait!" cried Severus. He was soaking wet; terror of things being on him still had him shaking, and he was humiliated at being caught like this, panicked. (Leeches; horrible. They belonged in potions and nowehre else.) He could not have come so far and been through so much to fail now.

"Yes?" said the Grey Lady, looking at him over her shoulder.

"I... I have a question. About the grimoire," ad-libbed Severus, and stood. His shirt was wet, but he pulled it on anyway. No leeches? Then there was no reason to be naked. Cold, he shivered.

"Oh," said the Grey Lady, and - looking a little more friendly - turned toward him completely. "You must be one of the young Questers. Tell me, little one, what is your question?"

Questers? Heh; Severus saw no reason to disabuse her notion. "Your latest clue. We're having a lot of trouble finding the answer - "

The Grey Lady turned again, suddenly and visibly bored. "You know the rules. You must find answers all by yourself - I cannot help you."

"Wait, wait! I'm not asking about the riddle," insisted Severus, still making it up as he went along. "I want to ask about the painting."

The Grey Lady turned back, pleased again. Her interest seemed to wax and wane as easily as the moon. "What about it?"

"I'm..." a Snape? No; he couldn't tell her that. Better she not know who he was. "I think I noticed something. Something that's very important, and... I want to know if I'm right." He was going on pure instinct here, instinct and logic; the clues so far given were nonsense, he was sure of that. Or if they were not nonsense, then that thing which was the key to understanding them had not yet been given. Or had it?

Maybe it had. Suddenly, Severus knew what he was going to ask.

The Grey Lady's attention was waning again. "Yes, child?" she prodded, not out of gentleness so much as boredom.

"The portrait. There are two of them, aren't there?" said Severus, and to his surprised, she smiled.

"Very good. Yes, there are; how did you happen to notice?"

Because he's my bloody ancestor, Severus wanted to say, but did not. "They're the key to all your riddles, aren't they? Or maybe they're even the real clue it self. Those puzzles you keep giving us have nothing to do with anything."

And she laughed.

It was a cold, high-pitched sound, one that wasn't entirely sane, and Severus' shivering abruptly had nothing to do with his wet clothes.

"You think like a Slytherin, child," she accused lightly, still smiling, and her milky eyes were gleaming just a bit. "In conspiracies and tricks. The answer is yes and no. The puzzles give you the pieces you need to form the key; but the keyhole IS within those paintings. I will give you only one more clue." Her smile grew cool. "Within the pictures lies the key; within the key is hid a door, but no true pathway will you see until your thoughts a hole can bore. Good luck, young Quester mine." And with that, she turned and glided away.

Severus let her go. His mind was spinning.

Riddles, riddles, the riddles were ASSININE, but now he was getting somewhere. And he alone held a clue that the others did not; but on the other hand, the others perhaps had the answer to the last question by now - information that he did not have.

So what should he do?

He could go back to the library and try to find the answer; but it had been a lucky circumstance that brought him that information in the first place, and he could not possibly hope to have that luck again. Besides, curfew was right around the corner. He could try to find the clue in the portraits themselves, but that would require running back and forth between them, or at least taking copious notes; and even assuming he found out what that key was, he still lacked the answer to that third crazy riddle.

He wanted to look now. He wanted to do something, to act, to solve this puzzle before anyone else could, before anyone else had the chance. But if he went now, he would surely fail; he did not have the knowledge he required. So that meant the only option he had was patience.

Patience! Ugh; patience was horrible and took so long. But what else could he do?

...he could at least begin to gather information on the paintings tonight.

Slowly, he sighed. It felt like a dreadful race in which he couldn't see his competitors and so couldn't tell just who was going to win; almost without direction, the only thing he could do was make his way and pray for no pursuit in the distance. Damn it all to hell. Taking out his (slightly damp) parchment and avoiding what was left of the leech, Severus walked up to the painting of his ancestor and started taking notes.

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