"Good?" he lightly joked as Snape issued a series of Finite Incantatems toward the warded doors. "You didn't like being Remus?"
"I did not," Snape murmured, throwing wide the doors to the corridor. "But that is not what I meant. It is good if I remain my usual self, so to speak because..." he looked down at Harry, a sardonic gleam dancing in his eyes, and finished, "Anything else would, I think, truly baffle Draco."
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Coming Soon in A Year Like None Other:
Chapter Thirty-Four: House Colors
Comments very welcome,
Aspen in the Sunlight
Chapter 34: House Colors
http://archive.skyehawke.com/story.php?no=5036&chapter=34
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A Year Like None Other
by Aspen in the Sunlight
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Chapter Thirty-Four: House Colors
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"Draco!" Harry shouted at Snape, incensed. "What do you mean, Draco will be baffled?"
Snape made a sharp motion with his hand. "We aren't behind warded doors any longer. Now, stay close to me as we make our way down. Students should be in class at this hour, but some enterprising soul may be lying in wait for us."
"I thought you were too all-fired intimidating to be attacked by your own Slytherins," Harry sniped, furious as he began to realize why Snape had made that comment about Draco.
"Unfortunately," Snape sneered back, "Not every fool in Hogwarts gets sorted into Gryffindor."
Harry fumed, but after that he managed to shut up and follow Snape. Walking all the way to the dungeons was actually a lot more daunting than he would have expected. In the hospital wing, he'd gotten somewhat used to walking around half-blind, but the floor there was at least flat. Now, he was walking down slopes at times, and even staircases, some of them without handrails, and it was disorienting at best, downright scary at worst. Mad as he was, he still found himself having to clutch at Snape's arm at times. It was either that, or fall.
He couldn't help but realize it was a good thing it was Snape walking him down. Otherwise, he'd probably end up falling, since he still had this thing about touching anybody else.
Snape's rooms were down in the lowest levels of the castle, even further underground than the Slytherin quarters Harry had once visited in disguise. The halls down there were dark and gloomy, lit up only by Snape's muttered Lumos. After he said it, though, he gave Harry his wand to hold, so Harry figured that Snape could probably walk this route in the dark. Holding someone else's wand was rather interesting. It didn't make his insides glow like his own wand did, but it did sort of tickle at his magic, and make him want to spill some.
Snape's rooms weren't guarded by a painting or statue, or by anything at all, as far as Harry could see. The doorway was disguised as an uninterrupted expanse of stone. Even more strange, there wasn't a password like everybody else seemed to use. Well, Harry had concluded before that the man was positively paranoid, but as his own life depended on good security, Harry supposed he couldn't object too much.
Instead of talking to the wall, Snape set his hand flush against a stone. Taking up his wand again, he tapped his own fingers in some rapid sequence; Harry could only see it because the wand was still casting a narrow beam of light. Nothing happened, though. Harry was about to question that when Snape murmured, "I was simply telling it to expect another resident."
His grip firm, he placed Harry's hand, fingers splayed, on a lower stone, and tapped his fingers with the glowing wand, too. Harry couldn't tell if the sequence was the same. Snape pulled his palm away, and said, "It knows you now. Put your hand back; use the same stone."
Harry did, and the stone vanished to reveal a wooden door set into an archway. As it opened, it revealed brightly lit rooms within. Snape went to go inside, but Harry put a hand on his sleeve and asked, "Um, I don't need my wand working to get in?"
"No, though Draco and I both do. I'll set the door to require magic from you, too, as soon as that becomes feasible."
Impatient, Snape tugged Harry inside, just as the door began to close on its own. From the inside, Harry noted, it stayed looking like a door. Appropriate for a dungeon, too. Hard, thick planks of wood were welded together with thick iron strips.
"All right, what's all this about Draco," Harry gritted. "Spill."
"He's right behind you," Snape merely commented. "And as I'm sure you've reasoned out on your own, he's living here too, for the time being. Draco, would you show Harry around? I do believe I have some potions to tend."
With that, Snape was striding straight away, but not in the direction of the door. Harry squinted after him, bemused, then whirled around at the sound of a dry laugh.
Draco stood there, just as Snape had said, a blur of gray clothes leaning against the dark stone wall. "He doesn't, you know," the boy said, pushing off it and taking a step toward Harry.
"Doesn't what?"
"He doesn't have a potion brewing at the moment. I was just in there, I would know. That's Severus' oh-so-subtle way of saying he doesn't want to referee us all the time."
"What did he mean, you live here too?" Harry asked, warily backing up a step.
Draco's smeared visage either frowned at that, or gave a twisted little smile. Harry couldn't tell. "Just what he said. The headmaster and he moved me down here even before Pansy loosed that snake, but since then, I haven't been allowed to so much as leave."
"Pansy," Harry slowly repeated.
"Yeah."
"The way I heard it, nobody knows who incanted Serpensortia."
"Oh, they don't officially know," Draco answered, chuckling deep in his throat, "but I know. The look in her eyes, Potter."
Harry knew what look he meant; it was the way Malfoy usually looked at him. Harry squinted, wondering if the Slytherin boy was looking at him that way, just then. He couldn't really tell. "So what happened to Parkinson?" he asked.
Draco shoved his hands in his pockets, and scowled. "They fixed her up at St. Mungo's and sent her back."
"She was hurt?"
That time, there was no mistaking the smile curving the other boy's lips. "Oh, yes. You don't think I just let attempted murder slide, do you? Anyway, though, it got me kicked out of the only class they were still letting me attend. As if I needed Severus to protect me, anyway."
"If you feel that way," Harry pointed out, "you should just go back to Slytherin to live."
"Severus is a bit concerned that I'd be the only Slytherin left." Draco shrugged, then. "So. Do you want the tour? It's not much, but it's home sweet home." By the end, there, he was sneering, and Harry wasn't sure if he was just trying to insult Severus' quarters, or insinuating that he'd been disowned and couldn't go back to his own home, again.
"Uh, sure, the tour," Harry agreed, still wondering quite how to handle the whole situation. Normally he wouldn't have any trouble being completely rude to Malfoy, but Snape's nearby presence sort of put a damper on the impulse. The last thing he wanted was another be nice to Malfoy lecture, this one possibly delivered with Malfoy right there.
"All right," Draco agreed, his smooth voice easy. "How well can you see now, anyway? I wouldn't want you to trip and break your neck. Can you imagine the fit Severus would throw?" He actually laughed.