Chapter Forty-Seven of 'Other People's Choices'- Ways and Means
Chapter Forty-Six.
Title: Other People’s Choices (47/?)
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Pairing: None; this is a gen story
Content Notes: AU of CoS, angst, present tense, violence
Rating: PG-13
Summary: AU. The Sorting Hat doesn’t just let the Sword go when it falls on Harry’s head in the Chamber, but also Sorts him again, this time into Slytherin. Harry is furious and terrified, and the adults aren’t helping much.
Author’s Notes: This began life as another of my Advent fics in response to an anonymous request for Harry being re-Sorted into Slytherin when the Sorting Hat hits his head in CoS. The title is based on Dumbledore’s quote: “It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.”
Chapter One.
Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter Forty-Seven-Ways and Means
“I want to talk to you after class, Mr. Potter.”
“Yes, sir.” Harry keeps his eyes down and utters the words without looking up from the potion in front of him. He knows he’s doing better in Potions than he ever has, but he no longer thinks he’s really improving. It’s just that Snape is marking him better for substandard efforts.
The way he always does with Slytherins.
Harry is starting to think that Sirius is right. He’ll never be an actual Slytherin, but Snape wants to encourage that side of him and so he gives him good marks and pretend smiles and fake talks to make him feel better.
Harry stands passively off to the side as his friends leave, and Snape locks the door and turns to him. He looks as pale as he always does. Harry waits.
“I want you to know,” Snape begins, “that your-wish to be loved for yourself and have someone who will focus only on you is natural. I cannot be that person because of my House duties, as you surmised. But I have a list of candidates who can be.” He pulls out a piece of parchment that he lays flat on the desk in front of Harry.
Harry looks at the parchment and wants to laugh, because the first name at the top is Professor McGonagall. “Have you forgotten that my old Head of House is in the exact same position as you, sir? Or does it not matter because she’s a Gryffindor?”
Snape gives him an odd look. “What would that have to do with it?”
“You want me to reject the Gryffindor side of myself. You would never actually put me with a Gryffindor as a guardian. So you put her name at the top of the list when you know that I’ll have to reject her right off.”
“It is not my life’s goal to make you hate your former House-”
“Real House,” Harry corrects sharply. “It’s always going to be part of me no matter what you do. No matter what you tell me I’m allowed to do or like or act like.”
Snape blinks slowly. Then he says, “If you reject Professor McGonagall, then I believe that you must also reject the next person on the list.” He gestures at the name that Harry just stares at. He doesn’t know who that is.
“I have no idea who that person is,” he says, and his voice is high and sharp and-
He cuts himself off with a shake of his head. He was weak in front of Snape once. It doesn’t mean that he needs to be weak all the bloody time.
“She is Arthur Weasley’s mother.” Snape’s face is blank. “The Headmaster seems opposed to your staying with the Weasleys themselves. But Cedrella Weasley lives by herself, and although she is old, she was capable of caring for a child, the last I heard. She is also one of Black’s relatives by blood and one of yours by marriage.”
Harry swallows. Then he says, “I don’t want to stay with someone I’ve never met.”
“There are other names on the list that you can look at.”
“All of them are Death Eaters, right?”
“Why would I offer you a Death Eater for a choice of guardian? You know that Dumbledore would never let that stand. And I was under the impression that you wanted to placate Albus Dumbledore, or else your tame yielding to his interference in your life makes no sense.”
Harry feels as though there’s boiling water in his throat, and he can’t spit it out because then everyone else will get scalded. He hunches miserably in on himself and says nothing.
“You can look at the other names.”
Harry does, a fast glance. They all seem to be people he hasn’t heard of. “I want to stay with Sirius.”
Snape makes a fast movement, as though he’s going to reach out and shake Harry, and then he pulls back. Harry stares at him hard. Sirius hasn’t actually said that he should watch out for Snape, but that’s one of those things he assumes Harry knows and he doesn’t need to say.
“Why are you trying so hard to make him into something he is not? A sane, competent guardian.”
“I told you,” Harry says. “I hate that I told you, but you should understand it. Sir. He’s the only one who can love me and me by myself. He doesn’t have other children to look after. He doesn’t have grandchildren. Even-even Cedrella Weasley would have Weasley grandchildren to love. Sirius only has me.”
Snape looks at him quietly. Then he says, “He doesn’t have other children, but he does have other obligations.”
“What? He would have told me about those!”
“He considers himself under obligation to Dumbledore. For allowing him to stay free, for finding a Mind-Healer for him. Do you want to stay with a man whose loyalties are divided?”
“And that applies to everyone else on the bloody list!” Harry finds himself yelling, his hands clenched at his sides, and he steps back and swallows, appalled at himself. He can’t yell like that. Now if he wants to have any privacy or secrets left. But he has to keep speaking, because Snape looks as though he’ll stop him if Harry tries to be quiet again. “The Weasleys would probably be loyal to Dumbledore, too. The former Death Eaters would be loyal to Voldemort or to politics or the Ministry or something. You’re loyal to people who aren’t me. I want someone who will always put me first.”
“Putting you first need not mean putting you only. You could find someone else who had children or a family or obligations, and who would still protect you with all their power.”
“No. I want-for once in my life I want something for myself.”
“Harry-”
Snape put a locking spell on the door, Harry heard him do it, but that doesn’t matter. Harry faces the door and waves his hand at it. The locking charm parts like it’s made of paper, and Harry dashes out.
He stops running the minute he’s in the corridor, though. There are Hufflepuffs walking past on their way somewhere, and plenty of other Slytherins, and they’re glancing at him curiously.
Never let people realize what you’re really thinking and feeling. They’ll use it against you the way Snape does.
Harry lifts his head and meets a few pairs of eyes with deliberate blankness until they glance away. Then he goes on his way. There’s another class. And there will be lunch after that, and then another class, and then another study group meeting, and playing with Sirius in the woods. It’s all right. He can do this.
He doesn’t need someone to see what’s inside him and try to fulfill his every need. He has Sirius for that.
*
I hope you know what you are doing, daughter.
Daphne smiles and folds away the letter from her mother. The single sentence is permission. And she has all the parchment and ink that she’s likely to need for the next part of the plan. She probably won’t need to talk to her parents about it again until she reaches a part she can’t do by herself or until something stops working.
In the meantime, she faces Harry, who’s standing in front of the study group in the small classroom they’ve taken over for their own use. No one else ever comes here, probably because the walls are stained and cracked and horrible-looking. Harry has a patient expression on his face, and he’s looking at Nott with it. It makes Nott bristle. Daphne thinks that’s awfully entertaining.
“I can’t do it. It’s impossible.”
“I can do it. That means you can, too.”
“Yeah, but you’re Harry bloody Potter.”
“Exactly what is that supposed to mean?”
Harry’s voice is so polite. Daphne bites her lip to avoid giggling. It wouldn’t sound right for a descendant of the proud Greengrass family and someone allied to Harry bloody Potter to giggle.
“You have a lot more power than I do.”
“I don’t think power has a thing to do with it. Concentration and practice do. Most people never learn wandless magic because they’re children and children don’t concentrate enough on it, and then they have their wands and they don’t see the point of it. But I see the point of it.”
“What’s the point?”
“That someone might disarm you if you only have your wand. But if you have wandless magic, then you can always escape.”
Daphne looks thoughtfully at Harry. She thinks there’s a good reason that he thinks of escape first, and also why he’s chosen Nott to learn wandless magic first. But she can keep a secret.
Nott looks as though someone has told him to swallow a spider. He lays down his wand on the floor beside him at Harry’s instruction, and stands up and walks a few steps towards him before he stops. Daphne doesn’t blame him. Harry doesn’t have a wand, either, but he has a scary smile. Daphne can think of grown Death Eaters who would be unnerved by that smile.
“What am I supposed to do?” Nott asks.
“Think of what you want most right now. You have to focus on things you really want to do before you can start using wandless magic for other things.”
“I want you to stop smiling like that,” Nott mutters.
He says it softly, but of course Harry hears. “And you don’t know any hexes or charms or curses that could make me stop doing that?” He sounds politely disbelieving. Daphne approves. Harry’s manners have got better since they started spending time with him, and even Granger and Weasley are less rude than they were. No one can do anything about Lovegood’s staring, but Daphne knows a pointless battle when she sees one.
“Of course I do.”
“Then focus on how much you want me to stop smiling, and push your magic towards that target,” Harry instructs him, and moves back a step or so to wait.
Nott scowls, and his brows dive down. Harry faces him and closes his eyes a little. They seem to be struggling and straining with not a drop of sweat falling or a spell passing between them. But Daphne can feel their magic surging and crackling in the air, and even Malfoy looks nervous.
Then Nott sags forwards with a gasp. At the same moment, Harry’s wand flies into his hand.
“What was that?” Nott demands, standing back up. “I was willing your face to freeze, and you-what did you wish for?”
“My wand to come to my hand,” Harry says patiently.
Daphne has to stifle a snicker at the betrayed look on Nott’s face. Harry cocks his head a little. “Just because you didn’t think of it doesn’t mean it’s a stupid idea.”
“I don’t think it’s stupid,” Nott says, although Daphne thinks the expression on his face says differently. “But it proves my point. I really wanted you to stop smiling, and my spell didn’t work.”
“I think you need to want it more.” Harry drops his wand on the floor again, and moves away from it. “Now. I’ll wish for something else, and you try something else, too. Something you can wish for more than for me to stop smiling.”
“Can’t think of what that would be right now,” Nott mutters darkly, but he does pivot to follow Harry without complaint.
Daphne watches, and she sees the slight spark that Nott manages to make fall from one hand at last when he says he was trying to burn Harry’s wand. She participates, and so do Draco and Lovegood and all the rest, and even Zacharias Smith unbends enough to admit he’d like to learn wandless magic, even if he “refuses to humiliate myself in front of the plebeians.”
Yes, Harry is far too precious to leave to an insane godfather who will make him risk his life in the name of “love.” Daphne is sure that her plan will have better results.
*
“I don’t like giving you detention, Harry, but I will when it is the only way to get you to talk to me.”
Harry scowls at Snape and says nothing. He honestly doesn’t know what Snape thinks he’s going to achieve by taking Harry away from spending time with Sirius in the evenings. In the end, he’ll have long days spent with Sirius during the summer hols.
God, I want to go.
Sirius has been promising him that he’ll have the house at Grimmauld Place cleaned up by the summer. There will be a pleasant room for Sirius to sit and spend time with the Mind-Healer, and there will be a greenhouse where Harry can grow his own plants, anything he wants, and Sirius will expand the back garden so Harry can fly over it. And there will be something even more, something Harry can barely imagine, barely wants to think about, in case his anticipation makes it go away.
His own room.
Snape waits until Harry looks back at him. Then he asks, “What do you think is going to happen if Black doesn’t get cleared by the Mind-Healer?”
“He will.” It’s the one good thing about Dumbledore choosing the Mind-Healer, Harry knows. She’ll say whatever he wants. And Dumbledore wants Harry to live with Sirius. “He’ll be free, and I’ll be free.”
“Of what?”
“Of people wanting to use me.”
Snape sighs as if he’s being very stupid. Then again, Harry’s been hearing that sigh through all those years of Potions classes, and it no longer affects him the way it used to. “And you don’t think Black will bring you out for photos when Dumbledore wants him to? That he won’t encourage you to have interviews with the papers concentrating on how much Dumbledore is doing to fight the Dark Lord, and how likely the Dark Lord is to return?”
Harry hasn’t thought of that, and the words stick in his throat for a second. But then he says, “It could always be worse.”
“Harry.”
Harry wants to back up. Nothing good ever happens when Snape says his name in that deep voice. But Snape actually drops to his knees on the floor in front of him, and Harry winces. God, he doesn’t want to do this.
“Please don’t do that,” he tries to say, but his words come out as a croak.
Snape doesn’t listen to him. “Your only two choices are not abuse and being used. You can live with someone who will protect you from the press and listen to you. Someone who will respect your power.”
“Who, for fuck’s sake?” Harry shouts, and then immediately wishes that he hadn’t done that. Snape is going to give him detention for months.
Snape only gives him an opaque glance and says, “There is a family named Yaxley who had a Death Eater serving in the Dark Lord’s ranks-”
“This is your great solution?”
“Listen to me.” Snape’s voice is commanding enough that Harry does, although he scowls all the time so Snape can tell how unhappy he is with this. “Not every member of the family supported the Dark Lord. The Yaxley I just told you about went to prison, and that confirmed for the others that becoming Death Eaters was a loss. They have removed themselves from politics. They no longer seek to influence the Wizengamot. I believe they will remain neutral until the Dark Lord has been defeated for good or has taken over Britain.”
“Which will never happen.”
“You are so committed to fighting him?”
“He hardly gave me a choice, did he? Besides, he’s never given mercy to other people, either. So I’m going to make my own choice to face him. Why do you look upset about that?”
“I only wish that you, a child, did not have to,” Snape says, and he sighs a little before he manages to shake that off. “All right. This is what I’m trying to tell you. The Yaxley family can get away with their neutrality partially because they have strongly-defended homes that the Ministry and wizards sympathetic to the Dark Lord can find no excuse to raid, and partially because they are themselves powerful. They are looking for something to change the political situation. The family as a whole would do you no good, but there is one woman, Themis Yaxley, whose great-nephew was the Death Eater who went to prison. He is her only close relative left. She has washed her hands of the rest of her family and asks only to be left alone.”
“Then she won’t want to adopt me, either. Or be my guardian, whatever. No one would leave her alone.”
“She asks only to be left alone. What I believe she wants is very different. I-met her, once.” Snape’s expression says that he isn’t going to tell Harry how that meeting happened. “She wants revenge, too. On the Dark Lord and the Ministry, who barely gave her great-nephew a sketch of a trial but let far more influential Death Eaters walk free. She would enjoy the ability to spite them all. Being your guardian would let her do that. And she keeps her promises.”
Harry snorts a little. “She sounds like the best option, if Sirius didn’t exist.”
“Harry-”
“You still need my consent. And the only person I consent to be with is Sirius.”
And Harry shuts his mouth after that. Snape tries to get him to talk. He cajoles him. Harry stares with silent eyes. Snape finally gives up in disgust and sets him to writing lines, after telling him that he’ll have another detention next week for his language earlier.
Harry doesn’t like alienating Snape, but the man is never going to stop trying to take him away from Sirius. Harry has to make it clear where he stands.
And he’ll do the same thing for Themis Yaxley, and Tarquinius Nott, and anyone else who thinks they have a right to interfere in his life.
Chapter Forty-Eight.
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