"Forgot the rules, boy?" Snape looked down at the boy in disgust. Potter had abandoned his futile attempts to leave and was simply standing there, staring at his toes, obviously pondering his next act of disrespect. Snape moved to drag him back to his desk and stick him in place, when the brat's defiant streak reasserted itself. "No, Snivell-"
The sound of the hated nickname, devised by the little fiend's father, had the instant effect of overwhelming Snape's reason in a red haze of rage. How dare he! How dare the arrogant brat, this egotistical, spoiled monster, think he could employ the same jeering taunt that his father had used to make Snape's school years a misery? The word hadn't even made it past the boy's lips when Snape's hand, acting entirely of its own volition, lashed out.
It struck the small boy square on the cheek with enough force to lift him off his feet. He bounced, head first, off the stone wall and fell to his knees, dazed. The frame of his glasses had been caught between the boy's skull and the unyielding wall, and the broken remains now hung crazily from one ear, while a cut over the child's temple began to pour blood.
Snape froze.
Dead. He was dead. To hell with Voldemort. Suddenly the threat of the Dark Lord paled by comparison to what Dumbledore was going to do to him. The ugly spy had just struck the Golden Gryffindor. Dumbledore would kill him.
No, he corrected himself numbly. Dumbledore would fire him and тАУ quite possibly тАУ kick him out of the Order. Minerva would kill him.
All his fury had fled the instant Potter's head connected with the wall. No, to be fair, it was gone as soon as his hand had connected with a loud crack against the boy's jaw and Snape caught sight of the wide, shocked eyes тАУ Lily's eyes тАУ staring at him.
Pow! Harry saw stars. It was a few moments before his vision cleared enough for him to clamber painfully back to his feet. He dropped the remains of his glasses on the nearest desk and dabbed at the blood streaming down his chin. His cheek and jaw throbbed where Snape had hit him, and he tasted blood from where the inside of his cheek had been cut against his teeth. He could feel a goose egg already rising on the other side of his head, where he had collided with the wall.
He blinked hard, holding back tears. No crying. That was another rule.
He shouldn't have been caught by surprise like that. Just because Uncle Vernon let you finish speaking didn't mean everyone did. Aunt Petunia would sometimes do the same thing тАУ ask you a question then let fly just as you were trying to answer. He should have seen the blow coming. Even though he couldn't have dodged it тАУ that would have led to TRULY dire consequences тАУ he could have braced himself solidly enough to avoid going airborne. At least this time he didn't think he had a concussion, just a goose egg.
Snape had moved back to the front of the room, presumably to retrieve the cane. Harry followed him, a trifle unsteadily. Between the blow to his head and his stiff gait, it was surprisingly hard to walk a straight line, but somehow he managed. He halted at the first row of desks and started to take off his robe. Maybe, just maybe, if he got into position quickly and showed how good he could be, Snape wouldn't be too hard on him.
Snape practically staggered back to his desk at the front of the room. How could he have done that? In a single rash, unthinking move, he had just destroyed what little life he had managed to reclaim for himself. There was no exculpation that he could offer Albus.
Snape was the icy Potions master, the man who never lost control. For years he had been able to hold his temper with students, even the Weasley twins, despite formidable provocation; no one would believe that Potter had, in his very first detention ever, done anything to excuse, let alone merit, a physical assault of this nature. It would be obvious even to a Hufflepuff that Snape had simply chosen to batter the boy. In other words, he had acted exactly like the Potter-hating Death Eater everyone suspected he still was, and given his choice of victim, he could be quite certain that Albus Dumbledore's lengthy protection of him was about to come to an abrupt end.
Maybe, just maybe, if he had only given the boy a swat on the rear, he might have talked his way out of it. But to leave a livid handprint on Potter's face, to say nothing of slamming his head against the dungeon wall, was something Dumbledore would never excuse. Frankly, neither could Snape.
However much he might have loathed, despised, hated, and abhorred James Potter, the two of them were contemporaries. They had insulted, attacked, cursed, and hexed one another for years, but they were always more or less evenly matched. Potter hadn't even enlisted the other Marauders very often; he preferred to fight one on one. But when Snape had slapped Harry Potter, the disparity in their size was incontrovertible. In that instant, it had been indelibly brought home to Snape: Harry was not his father тАУ he was a little boy who had just been unforgivably assaulted by an adult twice his size.
It didn't matter what the little brat had said тАУ he was the adult. He was the one who was supposed to remain in control despite the tantrums exploding around his ears. Yet all it had taken was a single word from the boy and Snape had completely and irretrievably lost control of himself.
Where had Potter even learned the insult? Still reeling from the cataclysmic events of the past few minutes, Snape's brain wasn't really working very well, but it finally identified the problem: surely everyone who might have shared the story of the Marauder/Snape rivalry was dead or imprisoned long before the boy was old enough to retain any details of the tale? Well, he would at least get the answer to that question before releasing the brat to run screaming to Dumbledore. He turned to confront the boy and stumbled backwards, his surprise at the sight before him literally taking him aback.
Potter had removed his robes and was now bent over a chair, in perfect position for a thrashing.
"What? What?" Snape quacked, his heart nearly leaping from his chest. If Voldemort had popped out of the nearest cauldron and started singing love songs, he couldn't have been more astonished. What on earth was Potter doing? How did the Boy Who Lived, the Golden Child, even know such a position, let alone assume it with the ease of long practice?
The child was muttering something to himself. Snape tentatively stepped closer. "What is it, Potter?" he asked with unaccustomed hesitancy.
"The rules," Harry answered obediently, hoping тАУ sort of тАУ that the professor would finally be willing to get the punishment over with. He stayed in position, wondering if the first blow would fall while he was still speaking. "No sniveling, no crying, no running, no yelling, no flinching." He paused. No wallops so far. Was that a good sign? Maybe he could sneak in a quick apology in case it helped? "I'm very sorry. I won't do it again. I don't know why I tried to get away. I just wasn't expecting the cane. I'm sorry. I'll be good. I promise."
Harry waited again, surprised that Snape hadn't yet started the beating. What had he done wrong now?
Snape stared around in confusion. What cane? What was the boy blithering about? Where тАУ oh. The stirrer. Yes, it resembled a school cane, vaguely. But that still didn't explain why the boy would actually think such an object would be used. Let alone used on him, of all people.
The professor also realized, with a rush of shame, that he had put words in the boy's mouth. Harry hadn't been using his hated nickname, he was trying to recite some appalling rules. And where did they come from, anyway?