How terrifying can a person be when they lose their reason? Professor Snape was kind enough to provide a vivid demonstration.
With his heart filled with hatred, Snape had already lost the ability to think rationally. In other words, he was being controlled by hatred.
Snape was a master of Occlumency. Even though Eda had briefly taken advantage of his loss of reason to slip into his mind, he still broke free of that control very quickly.
And Eda's interference only magnified the flames of hatred in Snape's heart once again. Seeing Eda standing on Sirius's and Harry's side made Snape feel betrayed and deceived.
Although Eda was not Lily, Snape could not shake the feeling that he had seen this scene somewhere before.
Adding fuel to the fire, making a bad situation worse—driven by anger and hatred, Snape had decided to make his move against Eda. Sirius and Lupin would be next.
The sudden turn of events came so fast that no one in the room had time to react. Harry and the other two did not even manage to cast their trademark Disarming Charm before a loud bang rang out, mixed with what seemed to be a faint sigh.
By the time everyone came to their senses, Snape had already been blasted backward, slammed into the wall, and then slid down onto the floor, while Eda still stood where she was, wand held straight out before her.
In all street fights, speed is supreme—and that saying applied just as well to duels between wizards in the magical world.
Eda had already been able to fight Snape to a standstill, and from the moment she entered the room, she had been prepared to make a move. Snape, on the other hand, had only just developed murderous intent toward her.
A prepared strike against an unprepared opponent—and on top of that, Eda had shamelessly chosen to launch a sneak attack.
With wandless magic in her left hand, she cast Tarantallegra (The Dancing Feet Spell) to fuck his balance, while with the wand in her right hand she used the Disarming Charm. The two spells were cast simultaneously, swift and clean, not only disarming Snape but sending him flying backward in one blow.
The ability to multiple tasks at once was something Snape himself had trained Eda into mastering. This was what it meant to lift a rock only to drop it on your own foot.
Caught off guard, Snape had no time to defend himself. This was the weakness of wizards—high attack, low defense. A mere Tarantallegra was enough to rob Snape of the ability to continue fighting.
The intense pain left Snape unable to move, yet in his deep eyes the fire of vengeance still burned. He glared hatefully at every person in the room, as if he wanted to drag them all down into hell with him.
Eda waved her wand again. From the tip of the yew wand shot a long red ribbon, flying straight toward Snape by the wall and binding the Potions professor tightly.
Knocking him down and tying him up in one smooth motion left everyone in the room stunned. Was this child really only sixteen years old? She was absurdly capable in a fight.
Everyone's eyes followed Eda as she walked over and crouched beside Snape. For a moment, they all forgot what should have mattered more at that moment.
Looking at Snape's miserable state, Sirius unconsciously swallowed hard, and the wound on his shoulder began to ache faintly. He deeply empathized with Snape's suffering and felt that the injury Eda had given him before had been completely deserved.
Thank you, Big Sis Eda, for sparing my life?
"Professor, I know you hate them, but please endure it. Just for a little while—a little while is enough," Eda said. Her ring glimmered faintly again, but this time she was not trying to interfere with Snape's mind; she was sincerely trying to soothe him.
Under Eda's continued calming, Snape let out a piercing wail like a wounded beast. Helplessness, pain, and confusion all appeared on his face one after another.
After that cry, Snape made no more sound. The fire of revenge vanished from his eyes, and there was no more struggle. At last he had calmed down. Yet that calm only made his suffering deeper.
The sitting room was in complete disarray. Overturned sofas, toppled bookcases, and shattered objects were scattered everywhere.
"All right, now you can explain everything to Harry," Eda said. She did not return to the others' side, but instead sat down right where she was beside Snape.
Snape had once protected Eda and taught her, so today Eda chose to protect Snape in return, choosing to sit beside him and stay with him. This was what she owed him.
The room fell silent for a while. Only after everyone had sat down on the sofas did Lupin begin to speak slowly, starting from the day he became a werewolf.
At Hogwarts, every full moon night, Lupin would hide alone in the Shrieking Shack. He would bite himself and claw at himself, and when the villagers heard those noises and screams, they believed it was some especially violent ghost.
Dumbledore had quietly encouraged those rumors behind the scenes. Even now, though the house had been quiet for many years and its owner had changed to Eda, the villagers of Hogsmeade still did not dare approach it.
Lupin's monthly disappearances naturally aroused his friends' suspicions, but the fact that he was a werewolf did not make James, Sirius, and Peter distance themselves from him. Instead, it drove them to become Animagi.
At last, in their fifth year, they succeeded. Each of them could transform at will into a different animal. James was a stag—Prongs; Sirius was a dog—Padfoot; and Peter was a rat—Wormtail.
Every month, they would sneak out of the castle under James's Invisibility Cloak. In animal form, they would come through the Whomping Willow to the Shack, keeping Lupin company through the agonizing nights of his transformations.
Lupin also explained why he had not told Dumbledore this year that Sirius was an Animagus. He had been afraid of betraying Dumbledore's trust. Dumbledore was the first person besides his parents who had ever accepted him.
To Lupin, Dumbledore's acceptance and trust were priceless.
Even though Snape gave no response, Lupin still thanked him for providing the Wolfsbane Potion. Well… in truth, the Wolfsbane Potion Lupin had been taking was all brewed by Eda.
After Lupin, Sirius also recounted what had happened twelve years ago, including the matter of changing the Secret-Keeper. Only then did Harry finally learn that the person who had betrayed his parents was actually Peter Pettigrew—the man everyone had hailed as a hero!
Everyone believed Peter had died twelve years ago—killed by Sirius. But in reality, it was Peter himself who had blown up half a street. He had cut off his own finger and, amid the chaos, transformed and escaped into the sewers.
Peter stayed hidden for twelve years, and Sirius was imprisoned in Azkaban for those same twelve years. The truth had finally come out, yet there were still people in the room who could not believe it.
If someone suddenly came and told you that the pet you had kept for years was actually a human in disguise—and not only that, but a murderer—it would be hard for anyone to accept. Ron's refusal to believe it was only natural.
In all his years of life, today was probably the hardest Ron's brain had ever worked. He came up with excuse after excuse, reason after reason, trying to prove that Scabbers was just Scabbers—a somewhat unusually long-lived ordinary rat, not some killer named Peter Pettigrew.
But Ron's excuses simply could not stand up against the truth. Every sign pointed to Scabbers being Peter, and even Ron himself was gradually beginning to accept it.
Meanwhile, Crookshanks, whom Ron had always regarded as a mad cat, strutted proudly back and forth in front of him. Crookshanks had recognized at once that Peter was not a real rat, and had also recognized Sirius immediately.
After building trust with Sirius, Crookshanks had even introduced his little follower Garlon to him. Thus, the two dogs and one cat formed a united front, determined to capture Peter—until Sirius was injured by Eda.
In Sirius's own words: "Other than my cousin Bellatrix, I've never seen such a fierce woman in my life." A sixteen-year-old student chasing a notorious escaped convict into the Forbidden Forest was not something any normal person would do.
After being wounded, Sirius had hidden in a cave in the Forbidden Forest. But there were neither medicines nor healers there, and inevitably his wound became infected. Burning with fever, he eventually lost consciousness.
When it came to how to treat Sirius, Crookshanks and Garlon had a disagreement, and the cat and dog even fought over it. The result was obvious: although Garlon lost, in the end they still went to Eda for help.
The cream-colored Garlon came up to Eda ingratiatingly, but Eda did not want to pay him any attention. Garlon tried to lick her palm, yet Eda disdainfully pulled her hand away and would not let him come near.
The cream-colored Garlon had no choice but to lie down dejectedly beside Eda, stubbornly refusing to move from the spot.
Another burst of footsteps sounded outside the door. Everyone inside reacted like startled birds; Lupin, Harry, and Hermione instinctively drew their wands and pointed them toward the doorway.
This time, however, they had worried for nothing. The figures appearing in the doorway were not enemies, but Dumbledore, along with Fred and George, who had hurried over.
Dumbledore said with a smile, "I am, after all, the headmaster of Hogwarts.. couldn't you show me at least a little respect?"
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Hi guys, I posted this chap on my Patreon way back. At this time, I was still grieving my dog, so this chapter and the next chapter turned out to be lackluster. Treat them as filler. It becomes good after chapter 350.
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Patreon: Dragonel