"True," Snape acknowledged, though he still looked a bit as though he thought Harry had been reckless.
"You know," Harry railed, old resentments surging up from some dark place inside him, "if you'd have just let Remus alone the year before, he wouldn't have had to resign and we wouldn't have ended up with a Death Eater in disguise for a professor! So if it's anybody's fault the map fell into nasty hands and got messed with, it's yours!"
"This isn't about finding fault," Snape answered in a level tone, but Harry was hardly mollified.
"You just don't like Remus! You were cruel to him for no better reason than something he couldn't help that happened ages ago!"
"Cruel would be to stop making the Wolfsbane," Snape retorted. "As for the rest, my objections to having a werewolf on staff were perfectly sound, not the least because I knew first hand what it was to encounter one during the full moon."
"You knew he was safe as long as he took his potion--"
"Which he, in fact, forgot to take." Snape pointed out.
"You've just never forgiven him for being friends with my-- with James!"
Snape held up a hand as though to call a halt. "How I treated Lupin years ago is not at issue, Harry. Nor is what I think of him now. Is there anything further you can tell me about this map?"
Forcing himself to calm, Harry searched his memory. "No. Well, just that it hasn't left my possession since I got it back after Crouch had it. And that as useless as Wormtail might have been in school, he probably knows something about how it was put together. He could have helped Crouch figure out how to... tamper with it, I suppose. I mean, Wormtail was guarding Crouch's father, so I'm sure they had plenty of contact."
"A pity that Voldemort didn't ever discuss the map in my presence," the Potions Master mused, tapping the side of his face with one long finger.
"I had it back by the time you... returned to him," Harry pointed out.
"Yes, but since then he hasn't mentioned it, which means I wasn't as privy to his inner circle as I thought."
"Infighting," the boy surmised. "Like you told the headmaster."
"Perhaps." Snape studied the map for a moment longer, then tapped it with his wand. "Mischief managed."
The Marauders' Map went obediently blank.
"Interesting that it can understand both the old charm and your new Parseltongue one," Snape remarked. "Charmed objects are often a good deal more finicky. Sometimes a mere shift in tone of voice can be enough to throw an incantation off. But the map is able to respond to words not even in English. It's really something quite astounding." The Potions Master turned his gaze on Harry, who only sighed.
"I wonder... do you think maybe if I did a wanded spell to make it reveal people, it might show us what really happened up in the Owlery?"
"I think the most likely result of that would be to destroy the map."
"Wanded magic didn't destroy the enchanted picture frame--"
"It very well could have," Snape insisted. "Moreover, I cannot undo your wanded magic, as you well know. What if instead of destroying the map, a wanded spell sucked you into it, Harry? Only a Parseltongue incantation could get you out! I rather think Voldemort would refuse the request!"
"I could say the incantation--"
"Once you were in the map, you might not be able to tap the surface any longer!"
Harry blinked, realizing that was a good point. "All right. I was just asking, you know."
"I hope you are done being Gryffindor for the time being. Yes? You aren't going to do something completely mad like try to solve this all on your own?"
"Uh, well I did send Dobby off to try to find Draco's wand..."
A flash of green fire in the grate interrupted them. "Severus, I have the Parkinsons in my office. Would you be so good as to join us?"
"Certainly, Headmaster," Snape calmly answered. With a rather telling look at Harry, he folded up the map and tucked it into trouser pocket as he stood up. Before he went to join Dumbledore, however, he stepped into his own bedroom to don a fresh set of teaching robes Emerging with a single dose vial of something thin and rose-colored, he explained, "A very mild sleeping draught. It will do you good to get some worry-free rest. Your temper seems... rather frayed."
"Yours too," Harry grumbled, though he took the vial and downed the contents. "After all that's happened, I think we both need some sleep. I wish you didn't have to go--"
The effects of the draught hitting him already, Harry broke off that sentence to widely yawn.
"Into bed with you. No more sleeping on the sofa," Snape gently chided. "And as for Dobby and the wand, I will take care of matters. You're not to meddle again without speaking to me, is that understood?
"Yeah..." Harry mumbled. As he stumbled through the open door to his room he heard the sound of his father Flooing off.
A few steps more and he collapsed onto his bed to let sleep take him away.
------------------------------------------------------
The ringing of the magic doorbell roused him.
Good thing the draught was so mild, Harry thought when he dragged himself out to the living room to check the door parchment. Otherwise, he might have slept straight through Ron and Hermione's visit. He hated to think what sorts of rumours that might have caused. It was bad enough that they knew about his eye. He hardly wanted them to start thinking he'd gone missing.
He looked about for his cloak, spotting it on the floor beside the couch, the crest facing up. That was enough to help him do the spell to open the door. "Come in," he at once invited, eager to get the door closed again before some passing Slytherin saw his black eye. The fewer people who knew about that, the better.
Hermione and Ron both had their wands out.
"Is he here?" growled Ron before Harry could say anything else.
Harry didn't have to ask who he meant. "No."
"Good," said Ron, glancing around as though to be sure Harry knew what he was talking about. "I didn't think Snape would let Malfoy back in, but with Slytherins you never know."
"Let's sit down," Harry suggested.
"Yes, let's," Hermione agreed, perching herself on the edge of the couch cushions. Ron took a chair, but he didn't flop into it like usual. Watchful, as though expecting Draco to emerge from the shadows at any instant, he sat upright and kept his wand in hand.
Harry almost sighed, but managed to think constructively instead. "Um, so you were up in Dumbledore's office with him when he, um... found out about Pansy Parkinson?"
Hermione shook her head. "No, he already knew by the time we got there. Susan Bones was out for a walk and spotted the... er, spotted her. Anyway, she's in a bad way, but who wouldn't be, seeing... that. Apparently she told a few people, sort of babbling it all out hysterically. Then one of the teachers overheard and informed the headmaster."
Harry tried to take all that in, tried to form a mental timeline that would account for everyone's movements. "Uh, so you went to Dumbledore to tell him about my eye, I guess? You could have left it for my dad to straighten out, you know. I mean, we really don't want another visit from Family Services."
Hermione leaned forward to put a hand on Harry's knee. "I know. When we couldn't find Malfoy anywhere--"
"Yeah, I was going to give him a right good punch in the face, thought I'd see how he liked it!" Ron interrupted, fists clenched, his face flushing with anger.