Chapter Text
Coming into his eighth year at Hogwarts after a bloody war, Harry Potter knew three things to be true:
1. He was bent as hell, and proud of it (er, now just to find a graceful way to leap out of the closet)
2. Hermione is probably going to take over the world some day, it was just a matter of when
3. The new trend amongst Slytherins was slowly going to ruin what was left of Harry’s sanity
...
The first was taken care of quickly, although Harry hadn’t quite gracefully leapt out of the closet. Rather, he had haphazardly stumbled out of it like a drunken man reaching for a support to lean on.
On his first day of classes, he had managed to literally bumble into one Blaise Zabini in the Great Hall, as he and Ron were making to grab breakfast. He and Ron had been filing into the hall, their sleep-addled selves bickering half-heartedly about the merits of being a professional chess-player versus being a professional quidditch player. Unfortunately, the enthralling conclusion had been interrupted by a rather solid wall of muscle.
Toned muscle.
As it had turned out, Harry had face-first walked into Blaise, his nose acquainting itself with tight, soft sweater of his rather built back. Harry would deny ever being enraptured by the allegedly honey-dew drop cologne, but at the moment, when Blaise had turned around, it was all he could think about.
Centimeters away from Zabini’s lips (and from having a big gay crisis), Harry suddenly lost all previous vestiges of drowsiness in lieu of encoding the image before him in his mind. The bright, hazel eyes, the smooth velvet dark skin, and the devilish smirk— was it just him, or was it getting a little too sweltering in here?
Of course, rationally, Harry knew that nothing truly had changed about him. Blaise was still Blaise— a Slytherin, one of Malfoy’s best chums, and overall, a notorious playboy. However, Harry hadn’t accounted for how he himself had changed, how his traitorous mind would suddenly latch on to how tragically beautiful the boy in front of him was, and goddamn, it was too bloody early for this—
“Potter, are you alright?”
A much too casual, unaffected voice asked. Harry blinked once, twice, before responding with the words that probably sealed his fate.
“Call me Harry,” he blurted out, before clamping his jaw shut, mortified.
By the surprised upturn of an eyebrow on Blaise’s visage combined with the utterly gobsmacked expression on Ron’s face, Harry knew there was no turning back. Although in hindsight, he could have chalked this incident up to merely being blindsided in the morning at his most vulnerable sleep-addled state, Harry instead continue to look anywhere but at Blaise, wondering if he could get the world to open up its giant maw and swallow him whole. The most powerful wizard to have lived could do that, right?
But then, the most peculiar thing happened.
A thumb and a forefinger rested on Harry’s chin, smoothly directing his gaze upwards into those hazel depths. The taller boy smirked, before leaning in, the tip of his nose just barely brushing Harry’s. Meanwhile, the Gryffindor was transfixed, green eyes wide and breakfast completely forgotten in lieu of this very impromptu sexual awakening.
“Alright, Harry, how about you call me Blaise?”
Of course, as all magical moments in Harry’s life seemed to turn rightside up, so did this one.
Ron had decided it was high time to start acting the part of the-boy-who-lived’s best mate, and so naturally, he simply could not allow this Slytherin ruffian molest Harry right in front of him. What was meant to be a threatening step forward into wedging himself in between the two with a bellowing, “now just you bloody look here Blaise,” turned into a rather uncoordinated stumble forward right into the-boy-who-lived’s back.
Which in turn caused Harry to lean forward just the perfect amount, as Blaise steadied his body with strong arms clasped around his biceps. Harry’s unwitting lips crushed into Blaise’s, and the taller boy’s eyes widened imperceptibly, before he took the entire ordeal in stride, sliding one arm down Harry’s until it was firmly planted on the small of Harry’s back.
The world blurred as a burst of flavor and saliva mingled on his taste buds, before he slowly closed his eyes, feeling hypersensitive to the firm grasp on him, to the tongue expertly exploring his cavern, and to the hysterical gasps from his fellow students around him. It was a little harder trying to ignore how Ron’s face turned a brilliant shade of plum as he tried valiantly to “save” Harry from the heinous grip of Blaise.
Needless to say, it had been a rather eventful first day back at Hogwarts.
Blaise had later unlatched himself from Harry, slapping the younger boy’s shoulder in thanks for a jolly old good time, and winking rakishly before inviting him to come over any time he so desired. And with that, the dark-skinned Slytherin had absolutely puffed out his chest and stalked away, leaving a dazed Harry in his wake.
As any good friend would do, Ron grabbed him by the shoulders and gave him a brisk shake, before whisking him away to a table for breakfast.
“Harry? Harry, blimey, he really got all up in there, didn’t he, mate? Merlin, why is Malfoy staring at you now? Don’t tell me that git wants to snog you too…”
…
“Hey, mate, by the way, are you bent?”
…
Harry had soon become sure of the second fact when meeting with Hermione not even a full day after the, er, incident.
Although he hadn’t felt ashamed of his sexuality, he still rather cared about the opinions of his friends. He knew that Hermione wouldn’t see him as any lesser for it, not with all the hell that they had seen and fought through together. Their bonds ran stronger than the most tempered of iron, deeper than the crimson blood binding family.
Even so, he couldn’t help the twinge of nerves when he recounted the story to Hermione.
As Harry finished his story, fidgeting in his chair minutely before reprimanding himself for it, he dreaded the silence that ensued. However, it wasn’t a silence borne of malice. Hermione had that thoughtful look about her, as if she were pondering in a matter of milliseconds every which reaction she could have, and how each outcome would affect Harry.
In the end, she simply smiled.
“Did you like it, Harry?”
Harry blinked owlishly, before blushing.
“Er, yeah. Yes, I did.”
“Good.”
And with that, Hermione opened her book again, as if everything were settled.
Harry got up to leave and find Ron, who was still undoubtedly in a mental state of shock from the events prior. However, before he left, he gave Hermione a fleeting look.
“Er, ‘Mione?”
“Yes, Harry?”
“You knew already, yeah?”
Hermione simply grinned knowingly into her book, not bothering to look up.
As Harry wondered how Hermione knew more about himself than he did, he knew that one day Hermione would probably just take over the entire world.
…
That leads to the third thing Harry knew to be true: the new trend amongst Slytherins was slowly going to turn Harry absolutely mental.
Back in the day when a young Harry Potter had just been acquainted himself with the ins and outs of the castle, he had quickly learned that a lot of the students had affinities for keeping magical creatures with them. Whereas muggles would probably have a pet cat or dog, the burgeoning witches and wizards here would keep anything ranging from toads to owls to even rats.
However, now latest craze that the incoming and returning Slytherins were enthralled with was keeping pet snakes. This wouldn’t normally be a problem for Harry— he wasn’t particularly scared of the animal, no, the only animal he would prefer to be kept away from was the acromantula. In fact, Harry oftentimes recalled upon his conversation with the Brazilian boa constrictor back when he was living with the Dursley’s with a sense of vague pride.
There was, of course the misconception that after Voldemort was killed, Harry had lost the ability to talk to snakes. With the arrival of the abundance of pet snakes to Hogwarts, that theory was soon quashed. In fact, Harry could understand very well what all the snakes were chattering and hissing on about, and it drove Harry absolutely mad.
A first-year Slytherin named Martin Maroney once had the lack of good sense to bring his corn snake to the Great Hall (where all tragedies in Harry’s life seemed to be happening as of late), and the snake had been in a rather pissy mood. It made a great deal out of scaring the other students, hissing and spitting at anyone who dared come near it.
“Sssss…. Slop! S…top feeding me slop, meat…”
The petulant voice rang in perfectly understandable Parseltongue in Harry’s ears.
In the midst of all the chaos, Harry had simply crouched in front of the snake and looked it straight in the eyes.
“You’re hungry?”
The snake’s head twitched in a show of surprise, before a forked tongue flickered out for a moment. Then the snake bobbed its head in assent. Harry would have laughed at the human-like nature of the response if it weren’t for the fact that Padma Patil’s high-pitched scream was probably now permanently echoing in his head. Lovely.
The Gryffindor got to his feet, before resting a hand on Maroney’s shoulder, who had been staring jaw-dropped at Harry as if he were the Christ incarnate himself.
More like the incarnate of Salazar Slytherin, Harry mused sardonically.
“Right, well, I think the problem here is that your snake here is rather peckish right now. Also, he seems to be a vegetarian. Er, do something about that.” Harry finished lamely, wondering briefly how he managed to be a paragon of leadership just months ago.
“I… oh. Thank you, Mr. Potter, man— sir.”
It seemed, as Maroney’s face lit up a wonderful shade of rose, that he was not a paragon of anything that involved basic human communication either. Harry simply nodded and walked away, not liking how the snake seemed to be eyeing him almost appreciatively.
Days later, it became clear that the serpentine creatures rather appreciated being understood. Maroney’s snake in particular must have spread the word that Harry was Hogwarts’ residential snake-whisperer, because an eclectic set of colored serpents periodically made their way to the boy-who-lived to lament their various problems to him. Or simply to have a chat with a wizard who actually knew what they were hissing about.
Although Hermione thought it adorable, and Ron refused to get near any of the creatures, Harry was of a different mindset. He didn’t despise them, but rather, was completely and utterly exasperated by them. Clearly, the Care of Magical Creatures course had not prepared him for how rather petty and insipid some of the snakes could be.
For one, they gossiped like old women having a cup of tea with their ladies after a particularly exciting game of croquet. This lead to Harry sitting through rather odd sessions of conversation with the creatures. Apparently, Rhonda was a promiscuous little hatchling who took after her mother’s flamboyant ways, Marquis loved to sneak up on the first-years and scare the souls out of them, Connor (Maroney’s snake) had a hatred for meat due to some top-secret trauma as a hatchling, and Sylvester was a playboy through and through.
… Harry knew way too much about these serpents.
For two, every Slytherin who owned a snake now saw it fit to come to Harry with any possible problem they would have with their beloved creature. This lead to more than a few awkward talks about how “Terrence’s stomach is simply upset” to “er, Delilah is about to lay eggs and wants a proper place to do so” to “Marquis loves to frighten everyone and I honestly don’t know what to do about it”.
It wasn’t as if Harry knew what to do about it either, yet here he was, Hogwarts’ new unofficial snake whisperer.
(George had howled with laughter when Ron had sent the letter denoting just how much Harry’s skills had been coming into use in their eighth year.)
…
Even so, the fact that Harry could still talk to snakes was not an integral part of his life. He still focused on his classes about as much as he did with the circumstances being what they were— no more Voldemort to worry about, except within his abundant, intrusive nightmares. In fact, the first month had gone by so swimmingly that Harry almost felt suspicious at the lack of a threat to his life.
Ron chalked this up to just how much Voldemort had fucked up Harry’s life (he had received a cuff to the head from Hermione and a cheery “thanks, mate” from Harry), whereas Hermione insisted that Harry try to relax for a moment. Harry thought this rather hypocritical, since Hermione had once again delved herself into the world of textbooks and knowledge, but that was probably just Hermione’s odd way of relaxing into her usual routines.
Therefore, when Harry woke up one morning feeling a faint headache thrumming behind his forehead, he knows that it’s nothing.
(Nevermind that it felt so localized to the area around his scar.)
The remaining vestiges of sleep still grasping at the sides of his nightshirt wantonly, he decides it couldn’t hurt to roll over and catch a few more seconds of much-needed slumber. However, he had barely closed his eyes for a second before a hand was on his shoulder, shaking him wildly. Harry got up with a start, ignoring the bit of whiplash that he felt ringing in his ears.
Ron met his questioning stare with pools of blue, before stating, “you’ve got potions in ten.”
Groaning, Harry pulled himself out of bed and into a fresh set of robes, as Ron watched on almost plaintively.
“What’s got you in a twist?” Harry grunted, debating whether to try to flatten down his hair. Some of the 8th year girls insisted that his messy nest was all the rage these days, but from the way his own mirror seemed to be cringing away from him, he had to disagree. Then again, Harry never was the paragon of fashion— not in this lifetime nor the next.
“Last time I saw Slughorn, he grabbed me right by the shoulder, told me I should make sure you were on time to his class— something about you being a very special student of his. Said it all with a great manic smile too. Bloody wankers, that one is.” Ron shuddered as if reliving a traumatizing memory.
“Better than potions with Snape,” Harry quipped back, to which he received a hearty “aye”.
The two made their way down the corridor to the dungeons, the familiar dank feeling of the Slytherin wing causing the hairs on Harry’s arm to stand up. Although he had made his peace with Severus Snape, he couldn’t quite reconcile his new-found feelings of forgiveness towards the professor with his everlasting hatred of the potions dungeons. After all, the only memories cultivated down there were of the bad variety. Even when he had been almost acing his class with the help of the so-called “half-blood prince,” it had been a great point of contention between he and Hermione.
However, it wasn’t Snape teaching potions anymore; that prestigious position went to one Horace Slughorn, who had a penchant for favoring Harry, much to the dismay of the Slytherins— and to be honest, Harry wasn’t too keen on his admiration either. It made him feel rather like a celebrity, like he was the boy-who-lived again rather than the boy-who-is-simply-trying-to-figure-out-his-life-thank-you-very-much. Harry did admit though that receiving anything more than a failing grade in potions was a wonderful and novel feeling that Slughorn blessedly granted the boy.
“I heard we’re making something scrumptious today,” Ron said as they walked down the dungeons’ spiraling corridors, earning him a look from Harry.
“Scrumptious??”
“What? Those were Seamus’s exact words— bollocks,” Ron hissed, flinching away from a flash of movement in the corridor, “what the bloody hell was that?”
Something white and almost shiny had darted behind the tapestry hanging from the stone wall in the narrow corridor. Harry had just barely seen it, but hadn’t gotten a good enough look to identify just what the creature was. Although, he had a sneaking suspicion of what it might have been…
“It’s a fucking snake, isn’t it? Oh Merlin, bloody Slytherins and their bloody obsession with serpents—”
Harry ignored Ron’s moans, instead opting to approach the tapestry and pull it back.
His emerald gaze met a shock of red eyes. The snake flicked out a tiny pink forked tongue, staring back at Harry almost indignantly, as if Harry were a creature beneath the attention of itself. It’s scales were a brilliant white with a faint faded intricate greyish pattern that denoted mystery and class all at once. The creature was about the length of Harry’s forearm, but much thinner and sleek.
“Oh yes, Harry, why don’t we interact with the snake, instead of making our way to class? Excuse me, but not all of us are snake-whisperers!”
The snake bobbed its head towards Ron, staring accusingly. Harry could almost hear the condescending voice— “Red hair and hand-me-down clothes? Must be a Weasley.”
At some point, Harry must have become acquainted with the very body language of snakes (yes, he’ll freely admit that he might need some therapy but who doesn’t) and he make out the arrogance resident in each and every one of the creature’s pearly scales. It held itself with an aura that made a mockery of normalcy, poise full of a perfect balance between tense and relaxed. No, it was not awkward or out of place at all. Rather, it made Harry feel like he was the one intruding.
Harry kneeled down in front of the creature, ignoring Ron’s exaggerated whingeing behind him. The snake’s head followed his movement with a calculated alertness that couldn’t help but remind Harry of a wizard’s attention in a duel.
“Are you lost?”
The snake paused in its movement for a moment, its only sign of surprise, before it hissed back.
“Not losssst. Neglected…”
Harry would have felt a pang of sorrow at the words, were it not for the haughty petulance of the snake. As if it were one of those soap opera actresses on the telly, with a metaphorical palm clutching its chest in dramatic agony.
“Neglected? By who?”
The snake seemed to give Harry a once over, which was a rather odd feeling, coming from the serpentine creature. Being the Chosen One, Harry had gotten his fair share of stares and odd looks, but never had he ever been judged by a snake.
(There was, of course, Nagini who had despised him, but Ron agrees that she doesn’t count.)
“Harry, mate, we have to get to potions. Do try to finish up this lovely conversation within the next millennium or so.”
Harry wasn’t sure if he imagined how the white serpent perked up at Ron’s words.
“Doessssssn’t matter who. You’ll do.”
“What?” Harry said aloud in regular English.
Without warning, the snake began to slither up Harry’s arm, which had been propping him up as he squatted on the floor. Ron shrieked rather girlishly as the creature disappeared underneath Harry’s billowing robe sleeve, whereas Harry simply froze in awe of the warmth streaking a path on his skin. He had expected it to be colder, less sentient for some reason. However, he could practically feel the hot throbbing of the animal’s heart pulsing in tandem with its movements. The dry texture rubbed raw against his own forearm, until the snake wrapped itself around his bicep, settling there resolutely.
“I… alright then.”
And with that, Harry made his way to potions, leaving a stunned Ron in his wake.
“ ‘Alright then’!? Blimey…”
…
Potions with Slughorn was a much different affair than Potions with Snape. In fact, there were a lot of changes after the war, as Hogwarts’ 8th year students tried to make the most of the limited space on top of being thrust back into academics after a grueling war. As such, most classes were not simply “8th year only” types of classes, but rather “7th year with a few 8th years smattered within” types.
Harry had the delight of having yet another mixed Potions class with Gryffindors and Slytherins. This meant that for seven years in a row, he was confined to the same room as one Draco Malfoy for set hours every week. Although after the war, Harry had testified before the Wizengamot to prove how Narcissa had saved the Chosen One’s life and how Lucius had abandoned Voldemort in the final hours, thus pardoning Draco’s mother and father from a life in Azkaban landing Lucius fifteen years of house arrest instead. This had resulted in an almost civil relationship between Draco and Harry.
Civil meaning that Harry didn’t have the urge to throttle the blonde prat or follow him to foil his next suspicious plot everytime they were in the same vicinity.
(Although, if Harry were being honest, he still kind of wanted to. Not that he would. He had it on good authority that Dean, Ron, Seamus, and even Ernie Macmillan were making bets on the next time he went on a rant about Draco Malfoy.)
(Ron thought he wouldn’t even last a month. Well, bully for him.)
“I’m not sure I like the way you’re glaring at me right now,” Ron mused from his seat next to Harry, “which is rich coming from you, seeing as you’re the one who made the detour to pick up a bloody snake!”
Harry was about to splutter out a no-doubt eloquent response, but Slughorn had blessedly walked into the room at that moment. The old man had not been aging gracefully and looked rather worse for wear, but his oddly everlasting outward pleasant demeanor remained.
(Of course, Harry had already seen how the man had crumbled under pressure-filled situations, so there was no point in hiding his cowardice away from Harry.)
“Alright, students, settle down— I’m sure some of you may have heard already what we are to be working on today.”
He looked at the unfazed Slytherins and Gryffindors alike with an expectant smile on his face.
Ron mouthed “scrumptious” to Harry, causing the boy to stifle a snicker and elbow his friend in the gut, eliciting a hiss from the snake still wrapped around Harry’s forearm. A few students turned around and looked at the duo questioningly. Harry and Ron stilled, hoping that Slughorn had not been one of those to notice.
Unfortunately, Harry never really had caught a break in his life before. It seemed that even with the death of Voldemort, that part of Harry’s life continued to remain.
“Ah, Mr. Potter,” Slughorn beamed with a grin brighter than Buckbeak’s talons after they’d been shined, “Do you have any ideas?”
“Um… er, is it something edible, sir?” Harry made a wild guess, hoping that Seamus hadn’t been playing Ron the fool.
Slughorn’s grin widened even further.
“That would be correct! Ten points to Gryffin—” Slughorn stopped himself, chuckling, “Old habits die hard, don’t they? Even as an 8th year, you continue to exceed expectations, Mr. Potter.”
As an 8th year, Harry could not win points for his house. This was a rule instated specifically for the 8th years in order to allow them to bond more, as McGonagall had said it sternly at the beginning of the year. Hermione suspected it had a little more something to do with the fact that the number of people returning for an 8th year at Hogwarts was rather disproportionate between the houses, with less people from Slytherin and Gryffindor returning than people from Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw. It seemed that Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs were eager to finish their education whereas Gryffindors were more desperate to leave and find a job. And Slytherins? After it was revealed who had Death Eater ties and who didn’t, the number of Slytherins returning to Hogwarts had dwindled rather pitifully.
It musn’t have made much of a difference in their career paths. Harry had overheard the Patil twins talking to Hermione about this, and how since most Slytherins were of old pure-blood families, they had heavy inheritances to fall back on and create their own lives. In fact, Harry himself wondered quite often why Draco had returned to Hogwarts, with the tarnish that his name faced with Death Eater ties and also the fact that he had a large inheritance to fall back on. However, Harry had noticed how much the Slytherin had excelled at potions, even without Snape’s subtle favoritism goading him on. He probably wanted to come back solely for the opportunity to work with potions.
(Not that Harry would care in the slightest.)
“We are going to be making a modified version of ambrosia! Can anyone tell me what the purpose of this potion is? Yes, Mr. Malfoy?”
Harry jolted at the name, turning to look discreetly at Malfoy a few rows behind him. The sole heir to the Malfoy family had come a ways from the prat he was in first year. Granted, he was still a prat, but now he was a fit prat. He no longer slicked down his hair to look like a pretentious arse, but rather let it loose in silky blonde locks that reached no further than his shoulder. In fact, it was short, not as short as Harry’s curly mess, but shorter than it had been in previous years. His face was all sharp angles, with a jawline that could cut diamonds. Even the Gryffindor girls were not immune to his charms, Harry having once overheard Lavender Brown moon over his “pouty pink lips” and “those intense grey eyes”.
“Ambrosia is a harmless, non-toxic potion, although highly addictive if not taken in regulated doses. It tastes like the consumer’s favorite food or beverage, and can be used to temporarily soothe shocked patients, or those who have undergone trauma,” Malfoy drawled eloquently in a bored voice, although Harry didn’t miss the interested glint in his eye.
“Correct!” Slughorn said again with a flourish, “Ambrosia is non-toxic, as long as it is made with strict adherence to the instructions. That being said, you can find the detailed recipe and instructions in your textbooks on page 479.”
Ron pulled out the big hunk of a textbook from his bag, nearly slamming it onto his and Harry’s shared desk.
“Right, so—” Ron began, before Slughorn cut him off.
“I’ve randomized the groupings for this assignment with the idea of allowing you to complete the task at hand without getting too reliant on your current partner.”
Ron wore an almost scandalized expression, which grew into a look of sheer horror as Slughorn uttered his next words.
“Mr. Weasley, you are to work with Miss Bulstrode.”
From the small whimper Ron let out, Harry knew that he also didn’t forget the strong headlock the rather large Slytherin had once held Hermione in during a practice duel. However, Harry had much bigger things to worry about, as his fate was sealed in the next few seconds.
“Mr. Potter, you shall work with Mr. Malfoy. Get to it!”
Harry turned around and met blazing grey eyes and a sneer straight out of his first year memories.
Bloody hell.
The snake tightened around his arm in what seemed to be agreement.
…
“So, er, it says here that we need to cut comfrey leaves into strips and add it to the rest. I can do that— do you mind handing me that knife?”
Wordlessly, Malfoy handed him a small silver blade. It was halfway through the class period, and Malfoy hadn’t tried to start a conversation with Harry, which was just fine with him. In fact, Harry couldn’t help but notice how efficient Malfoy was, plucking out erumpent hairs from the jar with devastatingly dexterous fingers. He had barely looked at the textbook, and Harry wouldn’t have put it past him to have memorized the entire recipe beforehand. Harry himself had always been bollocks at that sort of thing.
In fact, it was taking most of Harry’s concentration cutting the comfrey leaves into precise thin strips.
Which is why Harry was very much not prepared when Malfoy casually said, “So, I hear you’re bent now, Potter.”
Many things happened at once. Immediately, Harry feels the red hot scorch of embarrassment settle underneath his cheeks as his body jerks in reflex to being called out so blatantly by the person he least expected to ask him that question. Unfortunately, his full-body flinch caused the pad of his thumb to slice itself on the knife, causing a small smattering of blood drops to fall on the desk.
“Fuck,” Harry breathed, overturning his palm to look at the small droplets of blood lethargically flowing down his palm.
He then felt a weight on his forearm, and turned to see Malfoy with slightly widened eyes (probably wondering how much of a disaster his so-called rival really was, Harry thought past the utter mortification of the situation), and in his other hand, he had been holding out a handkerchief.
Harry nodded gratefully and took the cloth to wrap around his small wound, too utterly humiliated to acknowledge the irregular occurrence of Malfoy voluntarily helping him. Throughout the whole ordeal, Harry had forgotten that Malfoy was currently putting pressure on his forearm with his own hand. More specifically, his hand was resting on the exact place that a certain white snake had wrapped itself around.
An annoyed hiss sounded from underneath his robe.
Malfoy froze. His features slowly turned into an indignant frown.
“Potter, are you hissing at me?”
“I—”
The hiss was louder this time, and Harry could feel movement underneath his sleeve as the snake tried to slither out.
“Did your robe just hiss at me?” Malfoy raised a single eyebrow.
“Maybe your robe just hissed at me— oh, sod it all,” Harry groaned as the snake finally poked its white head out of its sleeve and positively glared at Malfoy, pink tongue flickering out almost threateningly.
To Harry’s surprised, Malfoy let out a small annoyed noise as well.
“Potter, what are you doing with my snake in your robe? Nadeshiko, come.” Malfoy held out his hand to Harry’s (not to hold Harry’s hand, Harry reminded himself) to allow the snake— to allow Nadeshiko to slither on to it.
“Nade— what?” Harry couldn’t hide his surprise, but in hindsight, he supposed it made sense that a snake as pompous and flashy as this stark white one had to belong to the only Hogwarts student that could match its personality.
“No.” The snake hissed petulantly, and laid its head flat onto Harry’s still outstretched palm.
“What did you do to my pet, Potter? And why, pray tell, do you even have her?” Malfoy demanded through gritted teeth.
Harry couldn’t believe his ears at Malfoy’s almost accusatory tone. Sure, in the past, Harry hadn’t held himself above following the Slytherin around and seeing what nefarious plans he was getting up to (“stalking, it’s called stalking, Harry,” Hermione had tried to supplement unhelpfully) but Harry had no reason to do so now. Therefore, Malfoy shouldn’t be looking to paint Harry out to be a no-good-dirty-rotten-snake-thief. That’s simply not right.
And then Harry remember what the snake had told him back in the dungeon hallway.
“It— er, she said that she was neglected.”
“Neglected?” Malfoy gasped, before scowling at the creature in Harry’s hand. The intensity of the glare would have burned through Harry’s very flesh had the snake not been acting as a buffer, Harry was sure of it. “Why, you little— I simply left you in my room! I have not once neglected you.”
The snake sniffed disdainfully.
“You leave me alone while you go to class, and I have nothing to do all day. Why didn’t you take me to this class with you?”
Harry blinked at the clinginess inherent within Nadeshiko’s complaints.
“Er, she wants you to take her with you to classes,” Harry translated, feeling like the awkward outsider in this argument.
“Classes? Take her to classes?” Malfoy turned back to grinding Moonseeds with an added vehemence that made Harry wince. “Brilliant idea, Potter. Maybe Granger could bring her cat to lecture, or Weasley bring his stupid rat!”
Harry had half a mind to explain that it wasn’t his idea, and another half to explain the more pressing issue which was that Ron didn’t have a rat anymore for rather obvious reasons, but Harry figured Malfoy wouldn’t have appreciated either response. So instead, he responded to the only one in the conversation with the participant actually interested in what he had to say.
Angling his head to look at the snake in his palm, he hissed, “Maybe you could make friends with the other Slytherins’ snakes? It isn’t right to expect him to be with you all day, you know.”
Malfoy made no reaction at Harry’s use of Parseltongue. If anything, he seemed even more determined to continue on with their potion.
“I suppose. But the others are so dull,” Nadeshiko whined, and Harry thought that if Malfoy and Nadeshiko could speak to each other, they would get along just fine.
“That’s not their fault,” Harry leveled, “Just give them a chance. Draco— er, Malfoy doesn’t mean to neglect you, not really.”
The snake looked at Harry for a moment, before letting out a serpent’s equivalent of an exasperated sigh. Harry then held out his hand to Malfoy again, whose face was devoid of emotion.
“She’ll play nice from now on. Needs a lot of attention, that one,” Harry said as Malfoy allowed Nadeshiko to slither onto his hand and disappear underneath his robe. Harry ignored the warmth of Malfoy’s touch as their fingertips connected for a split second (how could he be lost in a split second? Harry must have been going barmy).
“Thanks, I suppose,” Malfoy muttered, which was more of a thank you than Harry had expected to receive.
Harry smiled softly to himself, going back to cutting strips of comfrey leaves, not noticing the peculiar look that Malfoy was giving him.
…
All in all, Harry and Malfoy had done rather exceptional on the potion. They had finished early (Harry knew it was because of Malfoy’s rather advanced skills, but he liked to pretend that he had played a part in it as well) and no explosions had happened throughout the process which was a win on Harry’s account. The Ambrosia potion had a golden sheen to it, almost like the Felix Felicis potion, except it wasn’t the same brilliant molten golden color. Rather, it was softer, almost more comforting.
Just as Harry was about to call Slughorn over, a startled choking noise and a subsequent thump from a table behind them caught Harry’s attention.
A seventh year girl had collapsed like a dropped bag of rocks, crumpling to the ground, much to the shock of those around her. Immediately, Slughorn motioned for students to back away from the area, kneeling down to inspect if the student was still breathing. Her eyes were still open, and Harry almost missed the slight rise and fall of her chest, but he most certainly did not miss the thin trail of liquid gold leaking from the corner of her mouth.
Slughorn stood up and eyed the girl’s horrified partner, before speaking in a quiet, grave voice.
“What happened here, Mr. Burke?”
The Slytherin, a nervous slight person, blinked rapidly and stuttered reminiscent of Neville until he finally choked out, “She w-wanted to taste the ambrosia. I-I told her not t-to, but she was really insistent.”
Slughorn nodded, taking in the meek words as he lifted the girl with a simple wingardium leviosa.
“Let this be a lesson to all of you— you are to not consume any of the potions we create here without explicit permission, especially if I have not checked over it already,” Slughorn said with grim authority.
“But sir,” Pansy Parkinson piped up from her cauldron, “I thought this potion was non-toxic?”
“Right you are, however, it is possible that Miss Daniels here had an allergic reaction to one of the many ingredients in this potion— however, that is for Madam Pomfrey to ascertain,” Slughorn said with an air of finality, before making his way out of the dungeons with the unconscious student at his side.
With the rest of the class dismissed, Harry returns to his desk besides Ron to gather the rest of his belongings. Unease was thick in the air, and although it wasn’t unheard of for students to collapse in the middle of classes, Harry couldn’t help but feel off.
In fact, it felt like the beginnings of a headache were dawning upon Harry Potter.
…
Harry tried not to think about the incident after that. Rationally, he knew that there was probably a completely logical reason as to why the student collapsed after consuming what was supposed to be a non-toxic potion.
A completely logical reason had to exist.
However, he was having a hard time distracting himself— he wasn’t Hermione, who could easily indulge herself in her studies like it was second nature, and he wasn’t Ron, who could be swayed by talking about his favorite Quidditch team or chess strategies.
There also was the pressing issue that Harry had begun to feel that at odd times he would hear hissing noises around him. At first, he thought that some Slytherins’ snakes had taken to following him around again (that had happened towards the beginning of the year, but finally Harry had to sit down and have a very uncomfortable talk with them as to why he didn’t want a horde of serpents on his tail), but he never actually spotted any of them. Perhaps they had gotten better at hiding— a thought that made Harry truly shudder.
As the weeks passed, more and more students began to mysteriously collapse, falling into a sort of paralyzed trance just as Stephanie Daniels had done in potions awhile ago. It would happen at random times— in the Gryffindor common room as friends sat down for a snack, in the Great Hall, and even in the dorms.
Some chalked it up to stress (which, frankly, was ridiculous in Harry’s opinion), whereas others feared that a deadly virus was making its way throughout the school (alarmist, and again, ridiculous). The students who were affected by this mysterious malady were either still in the infirmary or transferred to St. Mungo’s— Harry had last heard that some of them woke up dazed, severely magic-drained, and completely confused as to what they had last been doing. Either way, none of the students had been in the least bit helpful in uncovering what had happened to them.
“Bloody weird, isn’t it?” Ron had muttered as they walked down the corridor, “feels like just yesterday people were being paralyzed by the fucking basilisk. Now this?”
“Yeah,” Harry said, remembering images of a young paralyzed Hermione Granger. He rubbed at his forehead with the butt of his hand, feeling another headache beginning to build up at a worrying pace.
Ron eyed the movement warily, clearly not missing the frightening familiarity of it. “You alright, mate?”
“Yeah. Yes, I’m fine— it doesn’t burn like it did with Voldemort.”
Harry felt a small spike of pride as he noted the lack of a flinch from his best friend. It had taken a while for him to grow out of visible reactions to He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named’s true name.
“Right, then, I’m going to head on to Muggle Studies— we’re learning about telly-phones today or something, Dad was ecstatic when I told him. See you,” Ron turned to head up the stairs, but not before adding, “and mate, if you ever want to talk… Hermione’s there for you.”
He left with a rakish grin, causing Harry to snort and mutter, “wanker.”
His good mood didn’t last too long. A shift in the atmosphere makes the hairs on Harry’s forearms stand up, a line of prickles trailing down his spine. He shudders softly, before abruptly stopping. There’s hissing again, but it’s louder this time, and he can’t make out a single word. It was as if a crowd of people were trying to talk, trying to say something, trying to warn him of something, but there was too much feedback, too much audio input.
Spikes of pain throbbed through his head as Harry tried to concentrate on the noise, tried to hear where it was coming from. His feet moved almost on autopilot, bringing him down the ever-changing marble stairs, down a corridor that had been mostly abandoned. He was on the second floor of Hogwarts. Memories flashed through his mind like a tidal wave, flashes of Colin Creevey petrified, Mrs. Norris frozen on Halloween night, and Hermione herself.
The noise was getting louder sounds, of slithering and hissing and spitting, as Harry approached the second floor girls’ lavatory. Infinite scenarios came to him in bursts, wondering if the Chamber of Secrets was open again, if somehow Salazar Slytherin’s basilisk had reanimated, if… if…
Harry swung open the wooden door to a truly ungodly sight.
Water was flowing freely from the sinks with a hearty roar, the dilapidated marble floor covered in a thin layer of the liquid. A horde of snakes slithered on the floor in front of the sinks, curling on top of each other in an unholy tangled rope-like mass which had dread crawling into Harry’s gut. The hissing was loud, agitated— Harry tried to make out some words, any words, but the excess of noises only contributed to his headache and it was a futile effort. They looked like they were writhing in pain almost.
What shocked Harry the most was one Draco Malfoy, standing in the midst of the chaos with the edges of his robes soaked from the water, staring at Harry with pure, blatant panic. Harry realized why as he caught sight of the mirrors right in front of Malfoy, where crimson red was dripping threateningly from the glass, the viscosity of blood unmistakable even from a distance:
THE DARK LORD WILL RISE AGAIN
A sense of fresh hot dreadful anticipation coursed through his body.
Harry really couldn’t catch a break.