CHAPTER 48
Disclaimer: All recognizable characters belong to JKR. All situations are mine. No $$$ is being made from this fanfic.
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Chapter 48 ~ A Bit of Payback
First thing Monday morning, Severus sent Raucous to the Malfoy mansion. The snarky bird refused to give any house elf the message attached to him and the smart raven wouldn’t enter the manor proper, so the elves were forced to contact Draco and tell him that there was a message that the delivery bird would not allow them to retrieve.
Draco didn’t think this too odd. He often received correspondence that was to be delivered directly to him. Raucous sat on the head of one of the two stone serpents that stood guard before the manor stairs. Draco walked out. He looked at the raven, having no idea it belonged to his godfather.
“What a ghastly bird,” Draco said out loud, Raucous puffing up in rage. Draco walked down the stairs.
“Give me the message, bird,” he said to Raucous who gave a rather nasty birdie smile. Oh, he’d give him the message all right. The raven looked the wizard over and saw no telltale imprint of a wand on his person. Draco had left it in his study.
Raucous fluttered down and allowed Draco to untie the parchment, but before the wizard could draw his hand back, the raven pecked him, drawing blood.
“Ow! You bloody bird!” Draco exclaimed, taking a swing at Raucous who slipped it and pecked him hard in the head before full out attacking the wizard.
“Damn it!” Draco cursed, fleeing up the stairs, Raucous beating him about the head with his wings, pulling at his hair with his claws and pecking at his hands as he flailed at him.
The raven topped the blonde wizard off with a huge wet, nasty dripping turd before he made it inside the manor, cawing at him in raucous birdie laughter before taking off for Hogwarts again. His master would be quite pleased. Maybe Severus would give him some anchovies.
Raucous loved anchovies.
Cursing, Draco walked back to his study, clutching the parchment in his bloody hand, bird shit dripping from his hair on to his shoulders, ruining his green silk smoking jacket. Once there, he grabbed his wand and scourgified himself, then healed the small wound left by Raucous’ beak and sat down, tearing open the parchment.
Inside he saw the Hogwarts seal and the seal of Slytherin house. Now it made sense. It was from his godfather. No doubt the attack on him had been planned.
Draco’s ice blue eyes scanned the letter.
Draco,
I know it was you who leaked Hermione’s location to the press. You can claim innocence, but we both know better. The next time you enter my presence, you’d best have your wand drawn.
Sincerely,
Severus Snape, PM
Draco’s eyebrow arched. Well, that was short and sweet…he’d expected much more threat, but his godfather wasn’t a man of many words. Ah well. He really didn’t need to see him anyway. The wizard already had restricted him from his premises and Hermione. No loss really. He just wished he could have seen the dark wizard’s face when all those reporters showed up at his door.
Draco crumbled up the parchment and tossed it into the trash bin. His hand throbbed where Raucous had pecked him. He healed it but it was still tender.
“Damn bird,” Draco hissed, though he thought such a creature could certainly come in handy when sending missives to those he disliked. Shit. He couldn’t even ask Severus where he got him from.
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Bara sat at a desk in front of Professor Flitwick, his little brow furrowed as he pronounced the sounds of the letters the diminutive Charms teacher pointed to on the blackboard with a long rubber-tipped pointer.
“Buh, Cuh, Duh, Eh, Fff, Guh…” the boy rattled off as the wizard tapped the letters. Flitwick then alternated letters, just to make sure the boy hadn’t memorized the order of them. He hadn’t.
Professor Flitwick put down the pointer and clapped his hands.
“Very, very good Bara. I must say you’re a quick study,” Flitwick said, praising the beaming boy, “And now for your reward.”
Bara watched eagerly as Professor Flitwick retrieved a wand from out of his file cabinet and handed it to the young wizard. Bara ran his hand over the chipped, well-handled wand. It was a substitute used by students when their own wands were lost or sent out for repairs. Flitwick placed a large white feather on the desk in front of the boy.
“Now remember Bara, say the invocation clearly, then swish and flick!” the professor said, swishing and flicking his own wand in demonstration. They had been working on this spell for about two weeks now.
Bara concentrated for a moment, visualizing the feather rising and floating.
“Wingardiam Leviosa!” the boy said clearly, swishing and flicking his wand at the feather. It shuddered, then lifted about two feet before falling back to the desk. Bara let out a joyous shout and trill. It was the first time the feather had ever lifted.
“Wonderful, wonderful!” Flitwick said, patting the boy on his hand. “You are coming along nicely for a lad your age. Well done young wizard.”
”Thank you,” Bara beamed, his brown eyes resting on the feather. He wanted to try it again, but the professor only let him try once each lesson, so he didn’t over-extend himself. Bara reluctantly handed the wand back and watched as the wizard replaced it in the file cabinet and slid the drawer closed. Bara cocked his head.
The professor hadn’t warded the drawer.
Flitwick turned around and smiled at the young wizard.
“All right Bara, you may go. I need to go into my storeroom and retrieve some class supplies,” Flitwick said.
Bara walked toward the door slowly as Flitwick left the room to retrieve some parchment for his next class. Bara stopped and looked in the direction the wizard disappeared, then ran back toward the file cabinet and quickly opened it, looking down. Several wands were inside.
The boy looked back toward the storeroom, then quickly plucked a wand out of the drawer and stuck it in his pocket. He closed the file cabinet and quickly left the classroom.
Bara felt he was a proper wizard now.
He had a wand.
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Hermione finished putting the last memories of the ritual that brought Harry back into the medium-sized pensieve. It had taken her a couple of hours, beginning with Severus handing her Damius journal, right after he had exercised his patron’s rights for the first time. She couldn’t very well add herself getting reamed in the ass, though that might have upped sales. She also didn’t include Harry being tackled by her and Dobby when he “woke up,” though she did include him walking back to the house, standing on the porch and talking to the house elves to show he was lucid and restored.
Hermione then reviewed the pensieve to make sure it included everything necessary to put together the whole picture. It took about an hour and a half to view in entirety. She then gathered together some parchments, sat at Severus’ desk and went about writing the narration. She was quite good at being clear and concise, starting and stopping the viewing, while notating where dialogue would be taken out and embellished.
The scene where Severus divided into twelve separate parts and played the score was very, very exciting. The wizard looked delicious as he threw himself into the song passionately and Hermione frowned slightly. More than likely, this pensieve would make the wizard, who was perceived as cold and unfeeling, much more appealing to witches. He could start being approached by interested women once it was available to the public
Hermione’s wand hand twitched.
She wished a witch would approach her wizard.
Hermione paused. Her wizard? She wondered what Severus would say to that designation?
“I belong to myself and no other, witch.”
Hermione sighed. That’s probably exactly what he would say.
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When Severus returned to his rooms that evening after supper, he found Raucous waiting for him impatiently, perched on the back of the armchair in his study. The bird let out an excited squawk when the wizard walked in, flew to his shoulder and started preening his lank hair. Severus waved at him, and the bird fluttered off his shoulder for a moment, then landed back down.
Severus sat down in the armchair and Raucous hopped down to the arm of it, looking up at the pale wizard expectantly.
“Show me,” Severus said to the bird.
Immediately the wizard’s mind was filled with images of Raucous’ attack on Draco from the bird’s point of view. Severus laughed out loud as the bird pecked him over and over, the wizard running and stumbling as he sought the safety of the manor. The last image was of Draco darting inside, a large bird dropping running down his blonde locks.
Severus petted the bird.
“Excellent, Raucous,” he purred, the bird rubbing its head against his pale fingers. Then Raucous sent him an image of small fish.
“Anchovies?” the Potions Master asked.
Raucous squawked and fluttered about excitedly.
“Yes, you deserve them,” the wizard said, standing up and walking over to the floo. He took some floo powder out of the box on the mantle, threw it in and contacted the kitchen. A few minutes later, Raucous was blissfully consuming a plateful of the salted little fishes, a bowl of water next to him on the tiled floor.
Severus fixed himself a firewhiskey and relaxed in front of the fire, his thoughts idly turning toward Hermione. He felt a strong desire to apparate to his house and spend the night there. Not engaging in sex, but just sleeping with the witch. It was nice having her curled against him in the night, warm, soft and accepting. He wasn’t looking forward to sleeping alone after the passionate weekend he’d spent with her.
Severus took another sip of his firewhiskey and scowled.
“She’s bewitched me,” he said to himself, the flames in the fireplace reflected in his dark eyes. “The witch has worked her wiles on me. Damn it.”
He decided right then and there he would not apparate back to his home until the weekend, no matter how much he was tempted to. He was still a disciplined wizard. He could control his urges. No little chestnut-haired succubus was going to make him throw away years of practiced control, no matter how good her pussy was.
A small voice in the back of his mind whispered, “It’s not just the pussy. You can get pussy for a couple of galleons. It’s the witch. It’s Hermione. You can’t let her go.”
“Shut up!” the wizard snarled and the little voice went silent. But the message was absorbed.
“I don’t have to worry about that right now. The patronage agreement has only been in effect for several months. Most likely she won’t be released for at least three years,” the wizard thought to himself. “There’s no need to say anything if she’s not going anyplace. We can just keep doing what we are doing.”
Severus tossed down the rest of his firewhiskey, attempting to be satisfied with his “do nothing” solution on how to deal with Hermione. Even as he went to fix another firewhiskey, he knew he wasn’t satisfied. The Potions Master liked his situations solved and neatly tied into a satisfactory conclusion. His situation with Hermione was nowhere near solved. The problems were just beginning.
He tried to wish he had never taken her on as his charge, but found he couldn’t even do that.
As much as Severus hated to admit it, Hermione Granger was a gift and a blessing.
And that irked him to no end.
The wizard finished his second firewhiskey, letting the slight glow soothe him. It was too early for bed.
The wizard rose and walked over to his bookshelf, drew back the hidden panel and removed his violin case and bow. He carried them over to his desk, took out his Strad, raised it to his chin and drew his bow across the string, his eyes closed.
Severus didn’t see the golden note that sprang from beneath the bow and hung suspended before him, shimmering with tone before fading away, nor the others that followed as he began to play in earnest, the notes filling the room, glittering and gliding, cascading about him in a cacophony of sound, physical representations of his increased Harper powers.
The wizard’s book hunter had yet to track down a book that told of the uses of the Harper powers, but these notes that stemmed from his instruments could be used to protect, to bind and even to destroy, depending on the wizard’s intent. In other words, they would obey him.
Yet as Severus flowed and melded with his music, caught up in the bliss of artistry and sound, he had no idea what he was truly creating.
It seemed the wizard needed to open his eyes in more than one area of his life.
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A/N: Ooh Bara, you naughty boy…stealing a wand. Slytherin tendencies. Hermione getting the pensieve together, Severus’ Harper powers awakened and becoming stronger. Severus’ conflict concerning Hermione trying to resolve itself. Lots going on. Please review.