Severus paced the halls of Hogwarts with a scowl on his face. He knew the paintings on the walls (or most of them at least) were loyal to the Headmaster and would inform him of any suspicious or interesting activity going on in the castle but luckily him walking around looking displeased was not at all abnormal. It was perhaps the most interesting thing happening at the moment given that aside from the ghosts, Peeves, Filch who never seemed to leave the damn place, and Hagrid out in the forest attending to one of his… pets, Severus was utterly alone within Hogwarts castle at this moment. All other faculty were taking their summer break elsewhere, and even Dumbledore himself was at the Ministry attending to the duties he outright neglected during the school year for once.
Severus of course had a residence outside of Hogwarts, but the castle had his best brewing stations and most complete ingredient stores, not to mention the summer months were perfect time to get work done on his potion research, uninterrupted. Even Dumbledore left him alone on the most part, knowing he'd be in an even worse mood if possible if the one time of year he got a break from all human contact to just brew potions in peace was interfered with. This was his vacation and thankfully everyone who would bother interrupting him knew it and so thankfully didn't.
Potions was a complicated, intricate art though. The amount of times he'd needed a break from his work to take a short walk and clear his thoughts before making his next breakthrough were extremely common, so there was nothing suspicious about what he was doing at all. The most interesting probably as nothing else was happening in the castle, but not suspicious at all.
He was a spy, a marvelous actor, and an accomplished Occlumens who could protect his mind from both Albus Dumbledore and Lord Voldemort—no one would ever be able to tell he wasn't stalking down the halls frustrated about a potion right now.
Which was good, because if anyone ever did realize what he was up to, he was going to be in a world of trouble.
He wanted to be mad at Lucius for interrupting him during the summer holiday but when the blond had explained himself, Severus really couldn't fault him. He could be frustrated and annoyed to hell that he'd chosen to get the potions master involved in this seriously complicated situation, but as a Slytherin he also couldn't fault Lucius for actually being extremely clever about this.
The thing was… the dark lord was not entirely gone.
Severus might've been young and stupid and ignorant of a lot when he joined the Death Eaters once upon a time, however he'd learned and he'd learned fast through pain and blood and a simply absurd amount of loss. By the time the dark lord was 'defeated', yes he'd had a lot on his mind and had not immediately concerned himself over his position as a spy for the dark and the light, but eventually he'd come out of his fog of grief over losing Lily and recognized that his role at Hogwarts wasn't something he could just disregard even if he was no longer a spy in an active war.
Because he used to be young and stupid. That had passed, and now he was under no illusion that the war would not come back in full force one day. Call him paranoid or war torn, it didn't matter—the fact Quirrell had been possessed by a piece of the dark lord only a couple months ago proved every fear Severus had ever had entirely right.
And to be totally honest, that was a terrifying, uncomfortable thing to learn even if he did feel validated for keeping his cover all this time even as everyone around him celebrated a "victory" and pushed the war into the backs of their minds like it wasn't important anymore. Even people like Minerva and Filius who were some of the more practical fighters back then had put down their battle shields, so to speak, and embraced peace like there would never again be war.
It was incredibly stupid, in Severus' opinion, but he'd been the paranoid one with no proof for his fears.
Well now he did.
And still they acted like that was a one-off incident and there was still no way the dark lord would ever return.
Ha.
He would laugh in their faces if he weren't so stressed out.
The things he knew: the dark lord was confirmed not gone and if Severus knew anything about the monster of a man, he would be coming back someday. There was no way of knowing when exactly or how many years it would take, but with Harry Potter—the boy the dark lord will want dead above all other people—now at Hogwarts and learning to become a full wizard, that would only complicate things (he wasn't sure how, all he knew was that it would). Luckily Severus could easily predict that the dark lord would want to kill the boy himself and so he could easily say he was just keeping tabs on the boy for when his master came to enact his revenge. He would have to come up with some clever information to provide that would not actually kill the boy while still somehow proving he was loyal to the dark lord, which would be a headache but he'd have to think of something sooner rather than later, preferably.
Because another layer of complexity, is where Draco would fall in this. That would be… extremely unpleasant, however Severus had an idea of how to protect his godson from the dark lord, it was just… he wasn't sure the boy's friendship with the Potter brat would actually survive it.
More importantly, he wasn't sure Lucius would let him live if he put the Malfoy heir in that kind of danger. And priss or not, Lucius was a good fighter and could throw a nasty hex even Severus might not be able to reverse.
He shook those dark thoughts off quickly. It really just depended on when the dark lord came back—preferably it'd be after both of the boys graduated Hogwarts and they could handle themselves, but if it happened sooner (and Severus got a stomach ache just thinking about sooner) when they were both still children who'd need to be handled or guided through a full-out war, they would need help.
Draco would need help. He wasn't sure he could actually help Potter other than giving him a fair chance at not dying immediately should a war break out, and to be totally frank he wasn't 100% sure he wanted to do anything more than that. He probably would only ifit was convenient and no one he cared about was endangered for it, by Draco's request only, but he wasn't quite sure where his feelings would actually lay when it came down to it. He had a horrible feeling it was going to end up a choice between his godson and Lily's son, and frankly he'd be happy to save that fucking nightmare for his future self to deal with.
For today, he had other concerns.
Draco would need to be much better prepared than he currently was, and he was already great at potions. Not a prodigy but he was diligent and intelligent, he would fair very well if Severus pushed him a little more. He also showed a not-so-subtle interest in charms as well, which would be better suited for use in a fight, so Severus made a note to have a discussion with his godson this year about that as well. It was never too early to start learning practical applications for magic in a battle situation, after all, and he was sure Lucius wouldn't mind teaching Draco to defend himself a little more.
Narcissa might, but she could be swayed.
Severus fought down a wince that threatened to break his mask of annoyance as he passed some random hallway for the third time. He really was wandering with both his body and his thoughts, but he wasn't exactly finding any answers.
You see… Severus knew what now every Slytherin (or simply not stupid) family knew after Potter's incident several weeks ago. Quirrell had been possessed, the dark lord was still around, and everyone was now making plans just as he was for that inevitability. While Severus thought he was pretty safe in his role, most others did not.
His last order from the dark lord was to get close to Dumbledore, and his master had never once revealed or even hinted he was possessing Quirrell at all the entire year to him. On one hand that might make other Death Eaters sweat a bit, thinking they'd lost the trust or favor of the dark lord, and yeah it unnerved him a bit but Severus had also had far more trust and favor with their master than anyone else at one time. Being a spy and their only potions master had done wonders—he was self-aware enough to admit he'd had no heart when he first joined as well, so it'd only really been a shock to Lucius when he'd announced he was fully on board with killing the Potters. Everyone else, including the dark lord, thought he'd gotten over Lily after he'd convinced (tortured into him) him of the concept that muggleborns weren't worth their time.
Only Lucius and Narcissa were aware that he had indeed never gotten over her and their master going after her had caused his allegiances to switch. Sort of, as he didn't like Dumbledore any better to be honest, he reallywas just on his own side from then on out.
So no… others might worry their master didn't trust them for not revealing himself, but Severus was fairly certain he could get away with not only not recognizing it (he was the freaking dark lord and Dumbledore didn't notice, so he might get a cruciatus for it but the dark lord wouldn't actually blame Severus for not noticing what 'greater men' hadn't either) but he'd also probably get away with his 'bullying' of Quirrell too.
Severus had never actually liked Quirinius, and him acting off last year had obviously made it worse. Yes Severus was serving Dumbledore in protecting the stone, but he hadn't known the dark lord was around to even want the stone and so it could be seen as continuing to follow orders in his master's absence.
Also, he was pretty sure the dark lord didn't even like Quirrell either.
The man was an ex-muggle studies professor, a light-aligned coward, and pathetically weak. He was perfect possession material that could be disposed of, not an actual follower no matter if he'd easily been convinced of his servitude by the dark lord. Severus was confident that he and the dark lord were in agreement with their distaste of the man and so he wouldn't get punished (too badly) for threatening him occasionally when he was doing his stuttering, cowardly act. The dark lord probably got amusement out of doing the same thing.
Severus was pretty much alone in being relatively calm about the discovery the dark lord was still around, though. He had been paranoid and worried about it happening since the lord's demise eleven years ago, so while it was a large concern for certain, he wasn't shocked and had plenty of plans in place so that this didn't eventually kill him. The same could not be said for a lot of darker families who made a lot of questionable actions after the war—not reprehensible as they'd done it to keep out of Azkaban, but unfortunately there was no chance at all the dark lord would see it that way. A lot of people were playing catch-up now so that they could be in a position of advantage when the dark lord finally returned, in hopes he'd spare them for their usefulness and not killed for what they'd done in the face of his defeat.
One such family was of course the Malfoys, who'd gotten a close, detailed account of what had happened between Potter and the dark lord in that chamber via their son, who'd heard it straight from the Potter brat's own mouth.
And in exchange for this favor, Lucious had given Severus all the details he wanted and let's just say… things did not look very promising. That wasn't just a possession it sounded like, it was most likely far more twisted and dark and it was a piece of their master who remembered it all. Which meant he would probably remember that encounter when he returned, which means he'd remember everything he witnessed while possessing Quirrell…
Again, Severus thought he was probably fine. Even most of the Slytherins were probably fine, as while Severus still did not understand what had exactly happened, his house suddenly loved Harry Potter for some god's named reason beyond his understanding (and emotional capacity to deal with right now, he'd save that for September). Luckily, Quirrell had already fucked off to who knows where to try and get the stone by that point and hadn't seen the dime-shift that happened, so all he'd seen was Slytherin giving a lunatic Gryffindor the cold shoulder all year while he attempted to sit at their table. The Zabini and Greengrass heirs had shown more interest but they were probably safe enough for now given their family status… the only person who was a clear open target, was Draco.
Again, Severus had an idea of how to protect Draco regardless of what Quirrell did or did not see (though standing together in front of the entire Great Hall day one was a bad start to say the least) but as his godson was never going to forgive him for it, he was holding off on that for the time being.
He couldn't wait forever as you never knew when the dark lord would return but… he would probably hear whispers before it finally happened, so it wasn't like he wouldn't get no warning.
He hoped.
Luckily, Draco was also the top priority of both his parents. Lucius cared about his son, himself, and sometimes even his wife in that order. Occasionally he could be convinced that he legitimately liked Severus as a friend too, but the potions master never actually counted on that. Given Lucius now knew everything Severus did about the current situation, while Severus was plotting his own tactics to help protect Draco, the boy's father was clearly making his own precautions.
And the first step he'd clued Severus in on, was the tiny black journal Severus currently had stashed in his robe pocket, walking around Hogwarts halls like he wasn't hyperaware of the unknown, likely very powerful, likely insanely dark object he had on him.
Thankfully Dumbledore was a blooming idiot who hadn't put up dark item wards up despite one of his own professors being possessed just last month.
The plan was simple as it was bloody impossible at the same time. Whatever this object was, the dark lord had ordered Lucius to hide it, and Severus was vaguely aware that he'd asked other high-ranking Death Eaters do the same with other objects. That could only mean they were insanely important, even if they had no idea how or why.
Lucius had a perfect excuse: the ministry was picking closer at his assets and was now doing through checks of his properties, mainly for "audit" purposes but no one was stupid enough to think they weren't actively searching for dark or illegal objects to pin him with. In his "concern" it may be discovered in his personal vaults of dark objects, he bade Severus take it and hide it in Hogwarts.
It was perfectly logical, if the dark lord waited long enough from killing Lucius to hear it. The dark lord himself saw Dumbledore as the ultimate foe (prior to Potter, that is) and had never attempted to take Hogwarts. If the great Lord Voldemort didn't attempt to take Hogwarts, then there was no safer place to hide something precious to their master. And Severus had been building his reputation and trustworthiness under the headmaster for over a decade at that point, he was in a perfect position to sneak it into the castle and find a good place to stash it.
If the dark lord wanted to hear their logic, he might approve of it. Severus was fairly certain he'd at least torture a location from Lucius before killing him for everything else he'd done, and once he learned that only Severus actually knew where it was, the spy would be in an even better potion to protect Draco. The potions master had pointed this out and Lucius was fully aware of it—he knew he was going to have to take other drastic measures to ensure he wasn't killed outright when the dark lord returned, but this one was for Draco.
The dark lord might like that Lucius took action to protect it even after publicly denouncing the dark, and selling out a lot of other Death Eaters in return for his own freedom. He might like the position Lucius was in, being an otherwise dark family who made steps to go grey and succeeded slightly so they now had the ears of most of the Ministry as well as all their old dark contacts. And of course, money fixed a lot of things so being able to bankroll the dark lord when he returned would also probably help.
Still, Lucius would have to do more, but this was a decent start. And predictably, it helped Draco's position first—and Severus was certainly not complaining about it helping his own either. Even if the expectation was that he'd use it to protect his godson, but he'd been planning on doing that anyway.
That didn't help him now though as he walked the halls yet again trying to think of what to do with this. Hogwarts was huge, and full of secrets no one man would ever know, so it should be simple to find one secret place in amongst a million other secret places this castle had. It was turning out not to be so simple at all, as he walked and walked and walked and really just couldn't think of anything. He'd lived in this castle for literally the majority of his life, given his time here as a student combined with being a teacher, but even he wasn't sure he knew of a place he was sure no one else knew of.
Dumbledore might, but asking him absolutely defeated the purpose.
It was almost time to call this task quits for the night (although he really didn't want to keep this thing on him longer than absolutely necessary) when he passed a door that sent alarm bells off somewhere in the back of his mind. He was a spy, he never ignored those types of instincts and automatically categorized everything he knew about this door, this hallway, and this floor to try and ascertain why type of threat it was.
The only thing he could come up with though, was that he didn't recognize it.
Which was extremely suspicious to the point he whipped his wand out to point at it warily as he'd just spent the better part of the afternoon and all evening combing this school and considering each and every door, alcove, and tapestry he passed for a hint of what he might need. Why didn't he recognize this door? Did it just appear?
…actually, I wouldn't put it past Hogwarts. He admitted after a couple seconds of considering that.
Still, not putting his wand even an inch lower he walked to it carefully… a few diagnostic spells revealed it was, predictably, a door.
Which didn't mean shit when it came to Hogwarts. Also, given it's current headmaster who didn't seem to care about lethal things wandering his school and its groundkeeper who didn't understand what classified as a lethal thing or not, there was no guarantee whatever was behind here wasn't incredibly dangerous if not outright deadly.
So Severus was on guard for pretty much just about anything when he opened it, in hopes this would actually be the answer he was looking for.
He was still surprised by what he found, but figured this actually might be a pretty good answer to his troubles. And he really, really hoped the dark lord agreed.
000
It took too long, it took way too long, but eventually Harry made progress.
The shed was well made, unfortunately, which meant finding a gap that wouldn't take a week and his entire soul to carve out was pretty difficult, but he eventually settled for an area at the back corner that when cleared of wood would give him just enough room to squeeze out, and he wouldn't have to cut through joists to do it either. The problem, he figured, was that the back and the one side were up against the garden fence and he'd have to cut through not only the shed wall, but the neighbor's fence and that was bound to be noticed long before he could actually get enough wood cleared to get out. The front and the other side faced the Dursley's back yard, and if they happened to look out of their back window at the shed they'd locked their nephew in for any reason, the jig would be up before you knew it. And one would think they'd be hyperaware of the shed they'd locked someone in, so the chances were more than he was willing to risk.
Also, annoyingly enough, the entire thing was set on a concrete slab to keep it level and prevent it being waterlogged so he couldn't cut the bottom and dig out quickly either.
He settled for a compromise and aimed at the back corner of his little area—still kind of visible to the back yard but also right up against the neighbor's fence, so neither would be that noticeable. He also saved the edge closest to the Dursley's house for last.
With the plan in place, it still didn't help actually doing it. It was simple enough concept, to cut a hole in a bunch of wood, but in reality when you only had a silver blade which equated to nothing more than a fancy kitchen knife that was designed to cut plants and beetle shells up against well made, pressure treated wood and some kind of plastic/rubber/tile-like siding (?), things didn't go well.
He packed everything he could into his bottomless bag, the only thing not fitting being his trunk which he emptied and abandoned—he could get another one in Diagon easily no matter how nice it was. He kept out his atmosphere bulb and his muggle-repelling ward stone just to ensure no one came too close to where he was working to stop him, which gave him a lot of relief as he got started actually. He then got to work, but it quickly became apparent this was not a couple hour project, and he was right because by the time he was anywhere near close to being done, a couple days had passed.
If he could get a firm grip on the knife with his too-shaky hands, that'd be one thing. If he could continue gouging the knife into the wood with some amount of force for more than five minutes without need to catch his breath, that'd be another. He was eternally exhausted and alarmingly weak with all food now officially gone, and eventually he had strips of one of Dudley's old shirts wrapped almost entirely around his hands to stop the bleeding from dozens of cuts as he slipped in his grip on it and cut himself. That only slowed it down though as the cloth made it almost impossible to properly grip the slippery silver blade handle, even if he could use more force than a someone with arthritis, but he was pretty sure any passing grandma would be able to best him in thumb wrestling pretty easily judging by his laborious pace.
By the second day the blade was also dulled to almost nothing, since clearly it was not designed for this kind of work, and he was only about halfway done. With a blunt knife, the second half took another three days easily, with things only slowing down as he did.
He was almost done, and despite being sick to his stomach and desperate to get some sleep (he'd taken too many naps during this project already, he needed to get out of here already) he kept at it even as his arms shook weakly and his grip on the knife slipped uneasily here and there. He was almost there, and the cuts had stopped bleeding so he took off the cloth to get one last good grip on it—
—and immediately slipped and cut himself.
Because of course he did.
"Shit," he hissed, dropping the knife and clenching his fist as the new slice across his palm bled deeply and freely down his wrist, also re-opening about four others while it went. He was so done with everything he barely cared, disregarding the sting of it entirely at this point, so he just reached into his bottomless bag with said bloody hand as he picked up the knife again, searching for another of Dudley's shirts to use as rags for it.
He was still looking for it and absently picking at the last area of wall with the now super-dull blade, so it was the shock of his life when a tiny little pop sounded right next to him, and some kind of creature was staring at him with too-wide, entirely inhuman but eerily still human-ish eyes.
"Bloody hell!" He gasped, reeling back and dropping the knife once more immediately as he pressed himself into the corner of the shed with his eyes wide. He did have his wand in his sleeve finally in preparation to leave and immediately had it pointed at the creature, although his palm was still slick with blood so he almost dropped it. "Who are you!?" He demanded.
"Harry Potter sir!" It squeaked, looking just as alarmed. "Dobby is here to help you sirs!" It told him in a high pitched, shaky voice.
"Dobby? What's a Dobby? Who are—what?" he gaped openly, still not lowering his wand.
"Dobby is a house elf sir! Master Draco sent hims to help you sirs!" The creature—now identified as a house elf—had huge ears and was dressed in a filthy tea towel. Something about it twisted Harry's stomach even if it was already knotted from hunger. "Ah, and Dobby cames to tell you sir not to go to—no! Bad Dobby!" The creature seemed to scold himself, and to Harry's utter horror, started banging his head on the side of the shed wall.
"Stop! Stop that, what are you doing!?" He balked, dropping his wand to shove the tiny creature away from the wall. "Don't hit yourself—are you an idiot?" He cried incredulously.
"Dobby disobeys so he must be punished," The tiny thing told him morosely and Harry about had a seizure at what the statement did to his brain.
"Oh my god Dobby no bloody way is that true. Listen to me," he grabbed the elf from where it was about to go for the wall again and shook him gently. "No hurting yourself, am I clear? You're a house elf, I'm told you're supposed to follow orders so do as I say and don't hurt yourself, got it!?"
"B-but Master Harry Potter isn't my master! I disobey my masters, Dobby should be punished," He explained as if that made sense and Harry saw red.
"Who are your masters?" He hissed, then suddenly brought himself up short. "Wait… you said Draco sent you?"
"Yes sirs! Draco said your journals was covered in blood. I sees Master Harry Potter's hand is cut?"
Harry's stomach dropped and he quickly released the elf to search through his bag properly this time… in short order he found his enchanted journal and winced when he realized the edges of the pages had been completed dyed with fresh red blood he'd probably smeared there in his careless searching through his bag. He hadn't been thinking… no wonder, if Draco saw all that unexplained blood he'd have a right fit.
He was going to have a tough time explaining this one…
But his head snapped up when he realized the elf was still here, and that Draco had sent him. Self-punishment aside, this was probably a good thing.
"Wait, Draco sent you to help me… then can you help me get out of this shed?" He demanded, and Dobby blinked widely at him.
"Out of the shed? I's to help you with your cuts," The elf snapped his fingers and the blood on Harry's hands disappeared, the pain from the cuts instantly soothed leaving nothing but faint pink lines over where they'd once been. He didn't even care about the scars though, he was so far past caring actually, but he did note that it didn't make the bloody handprint he'd inadvertently left on Dobby's tea towel disappear. "Why is Master Harry Potter in a shed?" The elf asked the real question here, and Harry felt tension spike along his shoulders.
"Dobby, I'm stuck in here and trying to get out, that's all you need to know. I've almost cut a hole but if you could open it wide or better yet take me out to the street away from this house, it would be greatly appreciated. And if you could maybe not tell Draco, all the better…" He tried to explain as calmly as he could, but his heart leapt into his throat in hope. This could work!
But the elf just looked incredibly guilty.
"Master Harry Potter sirs… Dobby should tell you—ah! Bad Dobby!" He lunged for the wall again and Harry grabbed him automatically, annoyed.
"Stop that! Tell me what Dobby? And can you not tell me after we get out of here?"
The elf wailed a bit at being denied his punishment, but sniffled dramatically instead, wiping it on his tea towel. "Dobby only sent to see if Master Harry Potters is alright by Master Malfoy, and he fixes his hands. But—but Master Harry Potter must not go to Hogwarts this year! There's is somethings bad in the castle! Dobby hears of its!"
What on earth? Okay, whatever.
"Fine, I won't go to Hogwarts. Now get me out please?" He demanded.
The elf wailed balefully, and Harry was thankful for his muggle repelling stone. "Master Harry Potters is lying sirs!" He accused. "Wizards can'ts lie to house elves!"
Okay, good to know.
"Of course I'm lying, you can't demand that of me out of nowhere; I don't even know you!" Harry huffed back, and the elf shot him a tearful glare.
"No! Master Harry Potter will be safe here so he should stay here! He must not go to Hogwarts!"
The elf snapped again, and just like that he disappeared from the hold Harry had around him, and he was once again alone in the shed.
"What the hell?" He exclaimed to no one, glancing around incredulously at that quick, and ultimately zany, confusing interaction. The first real interaction he'd had in an undetermined amount of weeks, actually, and it'd been a really weird one.
But it was as he glanced around wildly after the elf, that he realized the shed wall he'd spent the last several days carving through… had been entirely, magically restored. Not even a single scratch on it.
He stared.
Minutes passed, and he just stared.
… huh.
That's… well. All that work… for…
…nothing?
The logical side of his mind told him he was too hungry, too tired for do this again. The knife was basically just a piece of metal in his hands instead of a real blade it was so dull, so it'd be at least a week now to re-do it all if he could work at his previous pace, and since it'd been a hot minute since he'd had anything to eat, that was never going to happen.
Yeah, I know. He told his logical side as his emotional side curled in on itself—and collapsed.
Only, it didn't collapse like a bridge blowing out or a tree falling in a silent wood. No… this went out like a supernova, and there was this quiet little moment where a giant star fell in on itself, where there was nothing but silence, and darkness.
And then in an instant, there wasn't.