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Other People's Choices	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > General > General Views: 24374 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 5
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Chapter List
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Chapter Eight—The Strangest Man
Theo wastes no time in writing the letter. It’s not long. It doesn’t have to be.
Father,
The time has come for me to call in the debt I told you about when I was seven. You praised my cleverness in figuring out the truth then, so I hope you will think well of the same cleverness now.
You’ve probably seen in the papers that the Hat re-Sorted Potter into Slytherin. Potter has indicated that he lives with Muggles and he would prefer to never see them again. However, Dumbledore thinks this is fine and wants to send him back there. If you can make sure that he never has to return, he would owe us a debt and my favor would be cleared.
I am sure I want to use the favor for this, Father. Draco grows more and more of a prat each day, and there’s little I can do to budge him unless I want to reveal my strength too soon. But Potter has the potential to shake things up. If he owes us a debt, that’s an easy way to ride the wave.
Theo.
Theo smiles a little as he signs the letter. He’s seen the ones Blaise writes to his mum, and he knows Blaise would be horrified to realize Theo doesn’t include “Love” or “Sincerely” or anything like that above his name.
But both Theo and his father know why that’s so, and as long as certain rules are respected, the arrangement suits both of them.
Theo reads over the letter one more time, nodding. He thinks he’s forestalled all the counterarguments his father might use and the complaints he must make. He stands up to go to the Owlery.
Draco is in the common room, bragging to Greg and Vince about some potion his father is going to let him brew this summer. Theo keeps his eyes straight ahead as he walks across the room, but he still gets a remark from Draco about how he wishes he could brew that potion.
Theo nods and says nothing more, but his back bristles from the insult of Draco’s eyes on it, and he only relaxes when he’s up in the Owlery watching his grey bird take wing with the letter.
Things are going to change.
*
“Mr. Potter. I need to speak with you, please.”
Harry turns around, blinking. He’s spent most of the afternoon since he left the Slytherin dorms with Ron and Hermione, and he hasn’t seen Professor Snape or Dumbledore anywhere. That suits him. He doesn’t want to listen to them about how he has to go back to the Dursleys for three days.
Snape is walking along the corridor with that frown that scatters people out of the way, only there’s no one here but them. Harry wonders absently if his face is just stuck in that frown and he forgets it’s there.
Then Snape stops in front of him, staring down, and Harry has his answer. The scowl is slowly disappearing. There’s a narrow, searching gaze there instead, as if Harry is an interesting potion.
“Do you believe me when I tell you that the Ministry will remove you from the Dursleys’ care?” he asks softly.
Harry fidgets with the edge of his sleeve, making Snape eye him sharply. But no, the truth is, Harry doesn’t believe him. Snape always does what Dumbledore wants. Harry was grateful for that at the start of the year, when Dumbledore said he and Ron wouldn’t be expelled for stealing Mr. Weasley's flying car. But now, it’s terrible.
“Why not?” Snape asks.
“Because it never changes.” Harry knows his voice is whiny but he doesn’t care. “People say it will, and then they talk to the Dursleys, and the Dursleys make everyone think they’re normal and everything is all right, and nothing changes.”
Snape barks a laugh in a way that makes a small Hufflepuff who is about to turn the corner whirl away again and run straight for their common room. “You think I am as easily fooled as Muggle teachers and policemen? No. I know the truth. That means I will not stop until it changes.”
“But Dumbledore—”
“He cannot stop me.”
“Maybe not right away, but later. I mean, you work here and he’s the Headmaster, right? So he could take your job away, or tell you that you shouldn’t do it if you want to be paid, or something.” Harry shrugs in the face of Snape’s astonished silence. It only makes sense to him. “Why wouldn’t he? He really wants me to stay with the Dursleys.”
“You—” Professor Snape considers him for a long moment, as if he thinks that Harry will conspire with Dumbledore or something. Then he says abruptly, “So the Hat had more than one reason for putting you in Slytherin.”
Harry doesn’t know about that. He doesn’t think he’s cunning or ambitious, despite what he told Blaise and Theo today. He’s just tired. “Anyway. He could do that. So I want to think things will change, but I know they won’t.”
“Do not despair. It will only be three days. That is the earliest time I could secure a Ministry appointment, and they will not cancel it even if the Headmaster Floos them and tells them to.” Professor Snape actually reaches out and places a hand on Harry’s shoulder, which astonishes Harry so much he just stands there. “You need not worry,” Snape continues in a softer tone. “Not this time.”
Harry only stares at him. Snape is stranger than he ever knew. He doesn’t think he knows anyone else who could go from not caring to caring just like that, just because someone had a different color on their tie. The Dursleys wouldn’t, and Ron hasn’t, and Voldemort can’t.
In the end, though, he just gives up and turns back to the common room. Snape walks with him part of the way, hand cocked at a strange angle Harry finally figures out is the angle he’ll use to draw his wand if someone attacks.
Harry goes straight to bed, he’s so tired, and ignores the way Malfoy tries to taunt him. They aren’t very good taunts anyway.
*
Theo gets the owl back the next day at breakfast, their last full day at Hogwarts before the summer.
It says simply,
Consider your favor taken away, and the task fulfilled. I have spoken with the relevant Ministry Departments—the ones I still have more influence in than Lucius Malfoy. Someday you must tell me the history of the feud between Malfoy Miniature and Potter that makes him willing to see the boy locked up.

No signature, even. It hardly needs one. Theo let out a deep breath of relief and waits a moment until Draco starts bragging to Greg and Vince about something. You can almost set your watch in the morning by when he does it. This time it’s something about the size of the eggs he’s served for breakfast each morning and how he must have friends among the house-elves.
Harry is listening to Draco’s boasts with more concentration than he usually does. Theo does manage to slide in next to him, but he has to practically rap Harry’s shoulder with his finger before Harry turns around.
“What?”
Theo shows him the letter. Harry reads it, and his face tightens and shines with a strange light that looks more like the radiance of sweat than hope. Theo supposes he won’t believe it until he’s actually tucked away in a magical house, away from Muggles. “What does this mean? What he’s going to do?”
“Exactly what he says he will,” Theo says, and blinks. He’s pretty sure Harry understood the language of the letter, which makes the question all the stranger.
“But how does he—I mean—” Harry glances up at the head table, and Theo follows his gaze to Dumbledore.
“He has his ways,” Theo says, which probably sounds silly, but it’s true. His father doesn’t give secrets away, even ones that everyone will know about in a little while. “We just have to wait for word from him. If he couldn’t do something before the summer starts, he would have said that.”
“Oh,” Harry mumbles. “I—what kind of debt will I owe him?”
“Not him,” Theo says. “He took the favor that I owed him, and he’s glad to be cleared of that. It’s shameful to owe a favor to your own blood,” he explains, because Harry is staring again. “You owe a debt to our family.”
Harry exhales, and then says, “Just as long as he doesn’t want me to torture Muggleborns for him.”
Theo smiles. “There are so many better things to do with them than torture them.” And Harry gives him a look like he’s not quite sure Theo is joking or not, and that makes the morning all the better.
*
Harry sits next to the lake, listening to Ron and Hermione bicker about whether Lockhart was ever a good professor, and feels as though someone has tossed him from the Hogwarts Express. He challenged Theo to help thinking he would never do it anyway. I mean, his dad must hate me. And now—
Now it seems like he won’t have to spend part of the summer with the Dursleys at all.
If he can trust a follower of Voldemort. Harry rubs his scar unconsciously, at least until Hermione notices and leans forwards in concern.
“Does your scar hurt, Harry?”
“Not because of Voldemort,” Harry says, and doesn’t even feel amusement as he watches Ron leap up and sit down again, muttering at him. Everything is changing so fast, and he feels as if something is going to shatter any time now. Or toss him on the ground, or turn around and laugh at him, or something. It’s not possible that this can be his life, that he’ll actually manage to get away from the Dursleys before he turns seventeen. “Just because of a headache.”
“Is living in Slytherin that way?”
“Not all of them,” says Harry, and watches Hermione pluck grass and not look at him. “Blaise and Theo—Zabini and Nott, sorry—are sort of nice. They’ll talk to me and listen. And I go to bed when Malfoy starts bragging.”
Hermione laughs. She starts to say something, but Ron interrupts, eyes big and round as Aragog’s. “They gave you permission to call them by their first names? That’s huge.”
“I never heard of that,” says Hermione, in the tone that means, How dare knowledge hide from her.
“Well, a lot of people don’t keep that rule anymore.” Ron shrugs. “I mean, I call Malfoy by his last name and I’d never call him anything else, but it’s a big deal to certain kinds of pure-blood. And I know Zabini and Nott are both that kind of pure-blood.” He hesitates. “You know that Nott’s dad was—”
“A Death Eater. He told me.”
“Oh, Harry! Don’t talk to them! What if something happens to you?”
“He sort of has to talk to them,” Ron points out, the voice of reason for the first time in a while. “He lives in the same House.”
“I know,” Harry says. “I’m not—I’m not going to go along with him into the Forbidden Forest or anything.” He does wonder if he might have to to get away from the Dursleys, though. And honestly, he’d be willing to do that. “Anyway, Theo’s not bad. He’s so intense, sometimes. It’s a bit creepy. But he’s not like Malfoy.”
“And Mr. Zabini?”
Harry jumps. Professor Snape is standing behind him, arms folded and dark look on his face. That’s all Harry can call it, dark. It’s not really upset, and it’s not really disapproving, and it’s not really angry. It sits there and looks at Harry from Professor Snape’s eyes.
“Blaise is all right, too,” says Harry cautiously.
“I was wondering what you talked about with them,” Snape says, each words spaced as precisely as if he’s about to yell like Dudley, “that would lead to Mr. Nott mentioning his father was—a follower of the Dark Lord.”
“Stuff.”
Professor Snape narrows his eyes. Harry narrows them right back. He doesn’t think Snape is as bad as he used to, but he’s still bad enough to only care about Slytherins.
“You have possibly begun playing a game you do not know the rules of,” Snape warns him in a low voice.
“I know the rules of lots of games,” Harry says brightly. “I know a lot about Quidditch, for example. Do you want me to tell you, sir? You have this ball called the Snitch, you see, that the Seeker has to catch, and—”
Professor Snape shoots an arm out towards him. Harry is on his feet, ready to run or dodge, before he can think about it.
Snape stops. He watches Harry in a way that makes Harry’s face hot. Ron and Hermione are frozen beside the lake; Harry thinks he can see Hermione holding on to Ron’s arm from the corner of his eye.
“I am trying to keep you safe, you brat of a child,” Snape says.
“Lots of other people have tried, sir. Didn’t work too well.” Harry shrugs. “And I know Dumbledore is trying to keep me safe, too, and his idea is for me to stay with the Dursleys. I think lots of people have different definitions of safe.”
“You will not be going back there to stay. Do you understand me?”
“But I’ll still be going back for a few days. You said. And if there’s someone who can keep me from ever having to see them again, why wouldn’t I go with that instead? It only makes sense.”
Snape looks honestly staggered by his words, his eyes opening wide enough that Harry thinks he can see something new in the back of them, other than the dark look. But then he bends down and grabs Harry’s arm and says, “Come with me.”
So Harry’s afternoon of relaxing by the lake with his friends is spoiled—not for the first time—and neither of them can even make a squeak as Snape drags him away. Harry looks back at them and shrugs as best as he can with his free arm. He hopes he’ll see them later.
But since Snape ruins most things he touches, probably not.
*
Severus does not bother trying to speak, or the read the truth out of Potter’s mind, until they are safely in his office, and he can turn around and stare at the boy as he stands by his chair. The boy doesn’t bother looking aside. Whatever Nott and Zabini told him, it didn’t include the information that Severus can use Legilimency. Then again, they may not realize it themselves; Severus has never been certain of the state of their parents’ knowledge.
A swift dip into Potter’s mind and he knows; it’s shining at the top of Potter’s thoughts as bright as an uncovered treasure. Severus actually staggers back and catches himself with a hand on his desk, and stares at Potter again. The boy’s expression has gone from confused and defiant to wary.
“What have you done?” Severus whispers. “You—have you asked something from Nott’s father that you will not be able to repay?”
Potter squeezes his fists together. “How do you know about it?”
“I know,” Severus says roughly. “Better than you, what the prices of such games are and what happens when one cannot pay them.”
His mind is reeling a little. He expected conflict with Malfoy, and the boy has been punished with detention for tumbling Potter down the stairs and breaking his collarbone. He expected the boy to have a slow time making friends, to remain aloof, to reach out to Zabini first if he did anyone. That boy is cleverer and quieter than he appears, and Severus knew he would probably see Potter as the way to change the power balance in Slytherin in his favor.
But he never expected this. For Zabini to reach out so quickly, for Nott to join in, for Potter to reciprocate. It still smacks of naiveté, since the boy has no idea what Nott’s father will demand in return.
It is undeniable, however, that Potter has cunning. That only infuriates Severus the more when he thinks of some past situations. So Potter thinks his cunning of use only in escaping his worthless relatives, not in saving his own life?
But it will only alienate the boy to speak that way now. Severus clears his throat and says, “You will be rescued from your relatives. I promise it.”
“But not as fast as they’ll do it.”
“Is it only speed that matters to you?” Severus lets his scorn through. “If it comes down to the choice between being in debt to the Notts for the rest of your life, and spending three days in the Muggle world, you will choose—”
“I know it’s going to be more than three days!” Potter is on his feet now, yelling, his face as red as a phoenix, his hands clenched. “I know Dumbledore’s going to interfere and leave me there, or you’ll change your mind because you don’t really care about anyone except people who were Slytherin all along, or something else will happen and I’ll end up staying there! That’s the way it is! That’s the way it’s always been! I don’t trust you, I never have, I never will! I think Nott’s dad is probably evil, but at least he’ll only care about what I can do for him, not that—that I look like my father, or that I’m living in the Muggle world, or that I have to be safe from Death Eaters, or that I used to be a Gryffindor, any of the rest of the things you do! I’ll be away from them! I don’t care!”
Severus has not locked the door, and Potter storms through it before he can speak. Severus is the one left standing, this time, and blinking over Potter’s words.
It is a good thing that the boy was once a Gryffindor, he thinks now. It has led him to be honest, and Severus will run with that honesty.
First to set some plans in motion, and second to correct Potter’s assumptions.
Because some of them—as little as Severus wants to admit this—are correct.
*
Kain: Blaise does want to be Harry's friend; it's gone beyond just wanting to use him to change the dynamics of Slytherin. But it's going to take him some time to admit that, even to himself.
Theo doesn't necessarily think there's something exciting about being a Death Eater; he thinks there's something important about being his father. His father is the one with power in the relationship. Theo wants that power. If being a dutiful son is the way to do that, and following the Dark Lord, then he will. But if Harry offers him another path, he'll take it.
In some ways, Mr. Nott has raised the ultimate opportunist. He thinks Theo is scared and loyal- and he is, in a lot of ways. But hell seize any chance that comes along, and that, his father doesn't anticipate. Of course, it would also take a lot for Harry to gain his complete loyalty.
If Harry beocmes a leader in Slytherin, it will have to be subtly. Right now, he's vehemently against all the attention being paid him.
Snape is having an internal conniption fit, but he's decided: action first, external conniiption fit later.
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