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Other People's Choices	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > General > General Views: 24374 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 5
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am making no money from this story

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Chapter Twenty-Five—Bottled
Severus narrows his eyes as he watches Harry place the ingredients in his cauldron and stir twice. Those are exactly the steps he should be taking, of course. Severus has no complaints about that. Harry has much improved in Potions since he came back to Hogwarts after his summer tutoring.
But there is a strange expression, or lack of expression, on Harry’s face lately that Severus cannot attribute to his increased skill. If Harry had been a Slytherin since first year, Severus might say that he had finally decided to start subduing his emotions and focusing on his studies.
Even focused on his studies, Harry Potter normally exudes more vitality than this. Severus orders him to stay after class, and ignores the indignant looks from Granger, Weasley, and, more surprisingly, Mr. Zabini. Mr. Nott is clever enough not to show anything unusual, and he drags Zabini from the classroom.
“I want to know what happened,” Severus says, taking his place in front of Harry. That calm assumption that he already knows what is going on has shaken loose more student confessions than he cares to remember.
Now, Harry only blinks as though determined to lie with his eyelashes and stares at him. “Happened, sir? Nothing. Except that I think I got the potion right today.”
Gritting his teeth, Severus meets the boy’s gaze. “I wasn’t referring to that, Mr. Potter.”
“Then what were you referring to?”
The problem is, Severus cannot make a guess. If Harry was still sneaking off to visit Lupin, he might have named that, but he does not think Harry can have avoided both Severus’s vigilance and that of his Slytherin companions. Besides, Lupin would tell Harry stories about his father that would have him glowing with joy. This complete lack of affect is both unnerving and doesn’t fit anything Lupin could do that Severus can think of.
Unless…. He whips his wand out so fast that Harry draws his own. But then he just stands there blinking as Severus casts the necessary diagnostic charms on him.
Severus finally pulls his wand back with a relieved hiss. No. Lupin did not bite Harry. Severus has developed spells that can recognize werewolves even when they don’t have the outward characteristics of someone like Fenrir Greyback. He puts his wand away and watches Harry slowly do the same thing.
“What was that for?” Harry demands. At least he sounds a little more alive.
“That was trying to find out why you’re shambling around like a walking corpse,” Severus snaps, resting his hands on the desk. “I thought you were sick. You are not. Tell me what happened.”
For a second, Harry’s eyes rise to meet his, and Severus thinks that he’s going to bear into that green gaze and read the truth right out of his mind. Then Harry grimaces and averts his face. “It’s nothing serious, sir. Just tiredness with the way my life is going right now, with a murderous godfather and another friend of my parents that you’ve forbidden me to visit.”
Severus says nothing for long enough to let the shocking feeling of Harry’s words fade. Then he shakes his head. “You know why that is.”
“I do.” Harry’s voice is exhausted, dusty. “That’s why I haven’t argued back. Can I go now, sir? I think Professor Sprout will be angry if I’m late for Herbology.”
Severus wants to pursue this, but so far he has got nowhere, and even though he would risk Pomona’s displeasure in a heartbeat, he has his own next class coming in. He contents himself with a nod and a narrow-eyed stare that Harry doesn’t look up to meet. “Only understand that these precautions are being taken for your safety, Harry.”
Harry laughs, suddenly, and then covers his mouth. He shakes his head. “Sorry, sir. For a second, I didn’t know if I was standing in front of you or Professor Dumbledore.”
Severus clenches his teeth. He’s not sure how to respond, which is frustrating in itself. “Go, Mr. Potter.”
Harry marches off. Severus watches through the door only long enough to see Zabini and Nott fall in on either side of him, and then his own next class of second-years tumbles into the classroom and he has to glare them into silence.
I did think he was less reckless, that he understood why I didn’t want him going near Black or Lupin. Has he changed his mind? And why is that?
*
Harry blinks and tries to focus on the swimming words in front of him. Everyone in their little group—even Daphne Greengrass, who joined them two days ago—has mastered the wand-shield, but no one has managed the skin-tight shield that goes all the way around your body instead of just up your arms or legs. That made Hermione decree they should study the description of the spell again, and Harry is trying to do that.
His eyes just keep shutting, though. The weight of the burdens on him has got to the point where he seems to feel it all the time. But sleep isn’t an escape, because he just has nightmares, so he doesn’t know what his stupid body is doing. He sits up, rubbing at his eyes.
“Harry?”
Damn. Theo notices everything lately, even the little fleeting expressions Harry didn’t realize were on his face in response to certain words. He yawns and sits up further. “Yeah, what? Did you find a better description of the wand movement?” That seems to be what’s tripping them up. Under Hermione’s instruction, their incantations are note-perfect.
“I think maybe we should end the meeting early today,” Theo says, and shuts his book with a wary glance at Madam Pince. “I’m so tired that I don’t think I’ll find anything else. And I still have that Divination homework to finish.”
Harry grimaces. “Yeah.” Divination has turned out to be a disappointment. Trelawney does nothing but flounce and tremble and predict his death every seven seconds. But at least it’s a stupid kind of stress, not serious like the others.
Theo and Blaise both talk to Ron and Hermione as they put their own books away and get ready to return to their common rooms, and Harry thinks that’s progress. But he can’t help watching with bleak eyes as Ron and Hermione wave and walk out the library door. They’re going to Gryffindor Tower. They’re going to laughter from the twins and games of Exploding Snap and insults and jokes from all sorts of people Harry knows.
The Slytherin common room is quiet, on Snape’s decree, since people use it to study. It’s full of people who still give Harry these cautious sideways glances or murmur and look away. He doesn’t get insults or jokes from Blaise and Theo, most of the time. Still being a Gryffindor would make what he has to do, resist and fight and study until he defeats Voldemort, easier.
“Okay,” Blaise says, when they’ve walked most of the way from the library back to the dungeons, “you’re going to tell us what’s wrong.”
Harry lifts his eyebrows and turns his head a little. It’s the way Pansy Parkinson keeps looking at him whenever he’s too near her in the common room. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“You’ve gone all silent,” Theo says. “You don’t smile as often.”
“Well, excuse me for having a murderous godfather after my head and taking Snape’s warnings seriously,” Harry snaps. He has no desire for Snape to increase the restrictions he has on Harry’s movements. It’s already hard to make sure that he can go and visit Remus half the time.
“It’s not that. I know you well enough to realize it’s not that.” Theo looks ahead, where Greengrass has gone walking and disappeared from sight, then cranes his neck to look at Harry. “You have to let us help you. Please. We don’t want to watch you go cold and bitter the way my great-uncle did.”
It’s a story Harry only heard hinted around the Nott house, because Tarquinius wouldn’t tell him. Theo sounds as if he will now. But Harry keeps stubbornly silent, watching the torch sconces move past him. He kept silent when Dudley taunted him and Vernon told him he was a freak and people said he was the Heir of Slytherin last year, because talking did no good. He’s going to keep silent now.
Blaise and Theo exchange glances, and nod. Harry finds himself tensing, suddenly horribly reminded of the way Dudley and his gang would communicate when they planned to ambush him, but Blaise and Theo don’t hurt him. Instead, they turn so that they’re standing and facing him with crossed arms.
“What?” Harry doesn’t draw his wand because that would be stupid, but he wants to.
“We’re going to stand right here until you tell us what’s wrong,” Blaise says.
“That’s right,” Theo adds. “Stand here and make us all late for curfew, and get detention. Maybe you’ll finally tell us what’s wrong if we have a detention together. Professor Snape will probably get angry enough to put us all in the same classroom.”
Harry stares at them. He can’t imagine how many points that would lose for Slytherin. Snape doesn’t want to take them normally, but Harry has already seen how he deals with deliberate defiance rather than mistakes. “You—you can’t do that.”
“It seems that we’re pretty easily able to do that,” Theo says, folding his arms harder. “Since we’re just standing here.”
“Right,” Blaise says, and nods.
“Stop finishing each other’s sentences, that’s creepy. You’re not the Weasley twins.”
“No, but I bet we could manage with a bit of ginger hair dye. Right, Blaise?”
“Right. Build up a reputation for pranks to go along with that, and no one would ever be able to distinguish between us.”
Harry shakes his head. “Right, you two, but I can tell that you’re manipulating me to get me to stay out here.” He turns and walks in the opposite direction. There’s another staircase that goes down a floor and has another passageway to the dungeons. It’s just not the most direct or obvious one.
Theo and Blaise trot after him and stand in front of him again. Harry raises an eyebrow at them. He’s heard what he doesn’t think they have, because they’re joking with each other about being twins again in an attempt to—to get him to smile, Harry thinks. It makes him a little incredulous, but there it is.
“What are you boys doing out here?”
That’s Remus’s voice, light but suspicious as he looks back and forth between Theo and Blaise. He might even recognize them, Harry thinks. Theo does look a lot like his dad, and Remus probably fought against Tarquinius in the last war.
It all makes Harry want to squeeze his eyes shut. How in the world can I have any peace when I have all these conflicting loyalties?
“Oh, we were just escorting Harry back to our common room,” says Theo, radiating innocence. “You know, since there’s his murderous godfather around and all. Professor Snape told us to stay close to him.”
“I’m sure that Professor Snape has good intentions,” says Remus. He sounds as though he’s checking the truth against some inner dictionary and finding it wanting. “But it would help more to keep Harry safe if he actually wanted to go with you.”
“Of course he does,” Blaise mutters. He’s squinting at Remus, and his inner dictionary obviously has some different definitions. “We were his best friends all summer, you know.”
“Harry?”
Harry only nods absently. “I just wat to get back to the common room,” he says earnestly. “I can walk with Blaise and Theo. It’s no problem. It’s just that we’re so late already, and it’s almost curfew!” He checks his watch, and sees looks of frustration pass over Blaise’s and Theo’s faces. At the moment, they really do look like twins.
“Well, off you go, then.” Remus stands there with his arms folded and makes it clear that he’s going to watch them out of sight. Harry waves and sets off with the pace of a good student eager to get to his common room before curfew comes around.
“That was disgustingly brilliant of you,” Theo says when they’re around the corner and out of Remus’s direct line of sight.
“I don’t know what you mean,” Harry says innocently, and ducks when Blaise tries to strike him on the back of his head. What can he say, ducking a frying pan and Bludgers is good training for other skills.
“You know very well what we mean.” Theo says and exchanges a glance with Blaise. For an instant, they look like they’re arguing over who has to say something next. Blaise must have won, because Theo is the one who goes on talking. “We just want to know what’s happening to you, Harry. You’ve gone all quiet. We just want to help.”
“And what if I told you that it’s something you can’t help? That I appreciate what you and your dad did for me, and I appreciate both of you being my friends, but you can’t help me with this, because nobody can?”
Harry winces when he hears his voice echoing off the walls. They’re near the common room now, and a seventh-year Harry knows vaguely gives them a frown as he passes. Harry sighs and waits until he’s out of sight before he says, “You can’t help me. That’s not your fault. It’s just something that I’ve chosen.”
“Not to be helped?”
“Not to go whining about it. Because that’s what it would be when no one can help me.” Harry looks up ahead and sees the door of the common room sliding open. They’re going to get through it without having to say the password. At the moment, Harry’s grateful for that. Even a little bit of extra effort feels like too much. “So, please, thank you, and drop it.”
Theo and Blaise actually do, even if they scowl at him as they go into the common room. Harry is a little surprised, but then he has to smile. His experience of telling friends things is based on having Gryffindor friends. Ron would have relentlessly tried to cheer him up until Harry told him the secret in self-defense, and Hermione would have lectured him about not telling a professor.
In some ways, the Slytherins are more convenient friends to have than the Gryffindors.
But it’s convenience, on my part and theirs. I have to remember that.
*
Blaise lies in his bed after Harry’s gone to sleep, his mind bubbling like one of Longbottom’s potions. He has to do something to help Harry. There’s not much he can do, is the problem. He can’t appeal to his mother the way Theo can appeal to his father, and he—
Well, sometimes he thinks he has a hint of a magical talent. But it’s talent like his mother’s, and Blaise doesn’t want to really exercise it. Not until he’s sure it’s there and there’s a really good reason.
But he needs Harry to survive. Because Harry promised to get him away from his mother and because he’s upending the power structure in Slytherin and bringing Blaise straight to the top with him. Because…
Because Harry is his friend.
Blaise rolls over and scowls at his pillow. His mum has always told him not to have friends. She’s told him that they only make you look weak. And Blaise can see the point. He still remembers, although he was very young, the time when his fifth stepfather died. Blaise’s mother had a lot of friends in the community they were living in then, and they all came over and asked questions and pried into his affairs and made his mum very uncomfortable.
Blaise learned the lesson before his mother told him in explicit words afterwards: friends slowed you down and made it hard for you to do what you wanted to do.
Of course, Blaise thinks now, the first time he’s ever put it in explicit words for himself, that only matters if what you want to do is murder people and steal their money.
And he doesn’t think he wants to do that. He’s not sure what he wants to do, especially if he’s got the talent that he suspects he has. But he supposes knowing what he doesn’t want is a good start anyway.
And he wants to be Harry’s friend. That’s a good goal even if it’s not a career to practice or magic he wants to learn.
Anyway, he can think of two things he can do. One is just to stay by Harry and watch him like an Augurey watching out for death. He might surprise Harry into actually asking for help if he does that.
The other thing is to talk to his Gryffindor friends about it, and maybe Professor Snape. He’s not sure how much the professor can do—he strongly suspects Professor Snape has already talked to Harry about it—but he can learn certain things from the way their Head of House reacts when he asks.
Blaise sighs, and relaxes. He hates being helpless most of all. At least if he decides on a course of action, then he can be fairly sure he can change things, even if it means getting in trouble and changing the balance by getting someone angry at him.
Blaise has to smile as he drifts off to sleep.
If Harry’s going to be angry at me, at least it’s safer to have him be that way than someone like Professor Snape or my mother.
*
SickPuppy: Thank you! I think the moments of humor have to be there, or the story would be too depressing otherwise.
Kain: As far as I know, Obscurials are only created in childhood and don't generally let the child use their magic. But I do take your point. Yes, it's hard for him.
The problem Harry has is that he's already getting a nuanced view of Slytherins whether he wants one or not, but he was clinging to the idea that at least his parents, and to an extent other Gryffindors, were good people without flaws. Now he's getting that truth that they aren't rammed down his throat- but the only reason he can see that truth at all is because he has the nuanced view of the Slytherins. It's another thing to confuse him.
And yes, Snape is not a saint. But he also refrained from sullying Harry's memory of his father so far. That's something Remus didn't do once he knew Severus was Harry's head of house.
And thank you!
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