[Children of the Sun series]: Silver Shadow Snake, gen, PG-13, 25/?
Part Twenty-Four.
Part One.
Title: Silver Shadow Snake (25/?)
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Pairings: Gen other than background Lucius/Narcissa
Content Notes: For this part, mild angst
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Harry wasn’t sure when he first started noticing the odd doubleness of Professor Quirrell’s familiar, but he had no doubt it was there. And since no one else was doing anything about it, he thought it was probably up to him.
Author’s Notes: This is the beginning of a longer story arc, which will be updated every Saturday. You should read the other fics in the series first: Children of the Sun series.
Thank you again for all the reviews!
Part Twenty-Five
Albus looked up with a pleased smile as the door to his cell opened. He thought he was making progress with both of the two youngest Aurors assigned to watch him, who seemed thrilled and fascinated to learn about his theories on the origins of Harry’s golden familiar. But his smile dropped away when he realized it was Amelia Bones stepping in.
Her tiger was too big to enter the cell next to her and had to wait outside, but Albus could hear his growl filling the corridor.
“Is this true, Albus?” Amelia asked. She was staring at a letter in her hand.
“Perhaps I would know if you let me see the writing,” Albus suggested mildly. He could feel his heartbeat returning to normal. Perhaps Amelia had heard about his efforts at persuasion and had come to cut them off, but that did not undo the effect of planting his seeds in willing hearts and minds. His two young visitors would begin to think about what he had said, and surely spread the secret to trusted friends and confidantes.
“That you hid the Philosopher’s Stone in a school?”
Albus controlled the widening his eyes wanted to do, and only sighed. “It was the best place to hide it, Amelia.”
“I fail to see why.”
“Because Hogwarts is the safest place in Britain, of course! And my old friend Nicholas Flamel felt that he could no longer hide it-”
“Why not?”
“There had been threats,” Albus said, picking his way through the field of truth with care. “Nicholas feared that someone who is currently a bodiless wraith would attempt to gain access to the Stone, and would do anything they could to anyone who was standing in his way. Nicholas and Perenelle are not trained Aurors, you know, or battle wizards. He gave the Stone to me to hide.”
“Why not have it remain in Gringotts?”
“My dear Amelia, surely you know that Gringotts was broken into two months ago? It’s true that the thief didn’t manage to steal anything, but on the other hand, they didn’t catch him, either. That says to me that the bank’s reputation may be exaggerated.”
Amelia gave him a quiet, grim look. “And you think that Hogwarts is safer? For the children?”
“With the protections that I placed on the Stone, the children would never have known it was there.”
“Don’t lie to me, Albus.” Amelia just sounded disgusted now. “Susan wrote to me the night after she was Sorted that you’d told the students to say away from the third-floor corridor. You think that all the students would respect that warning? Why advertise it? Why go out of your way to tell this thief, whoever he is, that the treasure he’s seeking is most likely in the school?”
Albus blinked. “I didn’t advertise it, Amelia. Warning and advertisement are not the same things.”
“For adults, Albus, no, they’re not. For children?” Amelia shook her head. “And you haven’t told me who this disembodied wraith is, yet, or why you’re so sure he would overcome the Flamels.”
“Voldemort will return, Amelia. You know that.”
“The wraith is Voldemort?”
Albus nodded. For some reason, she hadn’t flinched when she said the name. He had been sure she had, last time. “He would go after the Philosopher’s Stone the minute he had the chance, to try and secure himself immortality. I couldn’t let that happen.”
“Then why not hide it in some Unplottable place?” Amelia asked, her voice flat. Albus had known her for years and never heard her sound like that. “Or under the Fidelius?”
“The Potters’ fate showed us how easily the Fidelius can be subverted. I didn’t want to rely on a notoriously tricky spell to safeguard the one magical item that Voldemort must never get his hands on.”
“Then make yourself the Secret-Keeper. Or do you think Voldemort can overcome you as a wraith?”
Somehow this was not the way Albus had envisioned the conversation going. He had thought she would either be openly hostile or accepting. Instead, she simply sounded-tired.
“Has something else happened that I should be aware of, Amelia?”
Amelia nodded and took another letter from her pocket. “I received this-report isn’t too strong a word. From the Headmistress. She reports that they found the professor who was suspected of being possessed by Voldemort, confirmed that it was him, and freed him. The wraith is gone, bodiless once more.”
Albus sat down hard. “I wanted to avoid that,” he whispered. “They must have conducted the possession ritual without Quirinus’s consent. That has caused untold violation to his mind and body. I am amazed that-he is still alive?”
“I don’t know exactly how much violence or violation de-possession rituals usually inflict,” Amelia said stonily. “I’ve never done one. But you are seriously telling me, Albus, that you put a possessed man’s free will ahead of the safety of your students?”
“You are arguing I should not have? You are arguing that it is a good thing that Quirinus’s consent was stripped from him, and he was forced to do something that I could have persuaded him into?”
“Then why weren’t you persuading him then?” Amelia was actually shouting now, which made Albus flinch back from her. “Why did you leave him in a school full of children? Children, Albus! Bad enough to have the Stone there, but to let the man wander around with Voldemort in his head-are you insane?”
“I knew what I was doing,’ Albus said. “I never would have let him hurt a child, Amelia. But I had to give him the chance to seek out redemption on his own. Not force it on him.”
He felt grief curdling in his stomach. Quirinus would never be the same now that Minerva, and certainly others, had stripped his chance to come willingly to repentance from him. The bright young man Albus remembered from before his sabbatical to Albania was probably gone forever.
“I find myself caring little about his redemption, next to the danger you put the students in.” Amelia turned away with a swirl of her robes. “This information shall be submitted to the Wizengamot as they consider your trial, Albus.”
And she left, and left Albus to put his head in his hands.
Couldn’t they see how valuable second chances were? It was true that the second chance he’d given Severus hadn’t worked out as Albus wished, but he never regretted giving it to the young man. He could still make something of himself. He hadn’t had to wreck his life when Lily died.
Quirinus had deserved that second chance, needed it. He would always be a danger to the students now, and to Minerva, because he would remember that she had ripped a spirit he might have opened himself up to willingly out of his head. He had needed to be persuaded, not coerced.
Albus sighed a little. He supposed he should grimly resign himself to the idea that he would need to battle Quirinus someday when he was free again.
*
“If you are sure you want to see him.”
“I do.” Harry smiled up at Professor Snape, understanding why he was trying so hard to keep Harry safe, and then stepped through the door of the infirmary. Golden was right beside him, and Shadowstriker streaked across the floor and under Professor Quirrell’s bed, where he could climb up one of the legs to bite if he needed to .And Professor Snape stood behind him with his wand in his hand.
Professor Quirrell was sitting up in bed with his rabbit on his lap. He was petting her fur, but he turned around and looked when Harry and Professor Snape came into the room. He looked utterly lost and sad.
“I’m sorry,” Professor Quirrell said, and he sounded the way some of Dudley’s victims did when they were pleading with him to stop. “I never meant to-it seemed so reasonable at the time, to fight you. I didn’t know.”
“A poor excuse, Quirinus-”
“Please don’t argue with him, Professor Snape,” Harry said over his shoulder, which made Professor Snape close his mouth really hard. “It’s all right, Professor Quirrell. I know that maybe you invited Voldemort to come in willingly, but that wasn’t really you in the school the past few months.”
“Some of it was me,” Professor Quirrell whispered, bowing his head. Alanna nuzzled his cheek and wrapped her front paws around his neck. “My pride, my ambition. I thought that I could take revenge on my enemies. That was what made me invite him inside at first, you know. I was so sure that I could master his dark spirit and just use his power. And then people who scorned me would have paid.”
Professor Snape was sneering so hard that Harry could feel it without turning to look at him. But he didn’t say anything. Harry just sighed and asked, “Do you still feel the same right now, sir? Do you want him back?”
“No!” Professor Quirrell’s whole body flinched in the bed. “Maybe I could have put up with what he did to me and counted it worth the price. But not what he did to my sweet Alanna.”
“That is exactly what I would like to talk to you about, Quirinus.” Professor Snape’s voice was smooth. “I have never heard of a possession like this. Usually, a possessing spirit is the soul of someone who has died, and that means their familiar is gone. But the Dark Lord brought his familiar with him?”
Harry shivered at the thought of losing Golden. He hugged the side of his neck, which made Golden rear his head up and touch his nose to Harry’s cheek.
Not until the end, Golden told him in Parseltongue and with the motion of his body as well. Not before you die. Together until then.
Harry came back from the hug and managed to listen to what Professor Quirrell was saying. It sounded interesting, although he didn’t think he understood all of it.
“The Dark Lord has tied his spirit to the world,” the professor was whispering. “Through anchors, I understood that much, although he punished me most terribly when I questioned what they were and where. It means that he cannot die because his soul is bound here, not his body. That means his familiar is bound, as well. She is the extension of his soul.”
“Anchors?” Harry asked.
“A matter for us to talk over at a later date, Mr. Potter,” Professor Snape said, a little sternly. “There is no doubt in your mind that he has corrupted his familiar, then?”
“Of course he has. Most familiars have moral lines they draw, you know that, Severus. They would refuse to do things that they find morally wrong.”
“Ah, so are an advocate of that school of thought? I saw too many Death Eaters’ familiars fighting on their side during the war to believe that. I believe that familiars are ultimately loyal to their wizards or witches, not principle. So they would do whatever their wizard required of them.”
Harry looked down at Golden and mouthed, “Are they?”, but Golden ignored him.
“I believe that Dark Arts induce a certain sort of corruption, as well.” Professor Quirrell bowed his head. “And I cannot say I am clean.”
“Spare me the spiritual nonsense. I want you to tell me as much as you can about the Dark Lord and what you learned of his plans, and where his spirit might have gone now.”
“You and Mr. Potter?”
“No.” Professor Snape turned around and gave Harry a scowl. “You will go, Mr. Potter. You have seen that Professor Quirrell and his familiar are healing. What is left is adult matters.”
“I still want to know what you’re planning, sir.”
“I will explain it to you later. In an age-appropriate fashion.”
Harry studied Professor Snape’s face, but he looked exactly the way Uncle Vernon always did when there was no chance that someone would move him, not even Dudley’s begging. Harry nodded and gave the professor in the bed and Alanna a small smile. “I’m glad that you’re recovering, sir.”
Professor Quirrell just looked miserable. Harry sighed and walked away from the hospital wing with Golden slithering in front of him. He knew there were probably laws that made being possessed illegal or something, but he hoped they wouldn’t punish Professor Quirrell too harshly. He already didn’t like some of the wizarding world’s laws.
*
“So I ask you for a verdict.”
Amelia stood in front of the Wizengamot with her hand on Phantom’s ruff, for support as much as to remind others of how strong she was, how powerful her familiar was, and the position she held. The idea that Albus would willingly introduce such threats into a school and tolerate a possessed professor in the name of some kind of second chance was disgusting.
The Wizengamot members had been inclined to shout at her first, especially the ones who were still loyal to Dumbledore, but as she went on, they had grown quieter and quieter. Amelia glanced from the face to face, and a small dollop of satisfaction curled in the middle of her stomach. She knew she would get the verdict she wanted.
If only because some of them would be frightened to vote in favor of Dumbledore, when they know what else they’re voting in favor of.
Slowly, hands went up on the side of conviction. There were a few inveterate supporters who made passionate speeches about how Dumbledore himself deserved a second chance, but they were overborne easily. Amelia nodded as the official court crier, occupying a sinecure position that normally amounted to nothing much, stood up and cried out softly, “Guilty.” She tapped her crystal-topped staff and sank back into her seat, her tin guinea pig gathered to her chest.
“Very well,” Amelia said. “Then it remains only to decide the sentence.”
Part Twenty-Six.
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