AS GREEN AS HIS EYES - Rakina.doc

http://www.hpfandom.net/eff/viewstory.php?sid=16943

As Green As His Eyes

by Rakina
 

Summary: Harry Potter is pretty clueless about sex. Severus Snape is not. This is different from what really happened in Harry's 5th year. Well, it would be… Umbridge? Works at the Ministry, doesn't she? (let Fudge keep her). Features a manipulative!Snape and veryinnocent!Harry. I hope it hits your smut-spot, sweetie.



It was a simple Revitalising Potion that gave me the epiphany. One Saturday at the beginning of October I was making an extra-large batch to hand out to the staff prior to the Christmas build-up. Christmas at Hogwarts is an experience, to put it diplomatically. To be blunt, it's Hell on wheels. By the time we wave the little brats off to the train station in the last days before Christmas, we're all holding ourselves up on the power of sherry, mince pies and regular draughts of my potion.

Revitalising Potion contains (amongst other things) nettles and coltsfoot leaves:

Nettle (Urtica dioica), is one of the commonest, most mundane plants in the British Isles, and yet so useful that it appears in many recipes. Dark green, unfriendly leaves. As prickly as I am.

Coltsfoot (Tussilago farfara), is not uncommon either, the shape of its large leaves resembles the hoofs of horses, hence its rather pleasant name. Soft, downy, and tender with mid-green leaves.

Separately, they did nothing to me, as on many previous occasions when I have stood and chopped them up, mechanically. Everything was going as it should; all was routine and unremarkable. It is an easy potion to brew, even in large quantities, and so it was on this occasion… until it came to the part where the finely chopped leaves of nettle and coltsfoot were combined. The leaves have to be mixed together before being added to the cauldron, and I gathered the two piles of chopped leaves and mixed them in a basin into one larger mass. One larger pile that now looked different – the two greens had combined into a different colour, a subtle change of hue which now filled my vision and made me stop what I was doing.

For some minutes I couldn’t add the basinful of leaves to the cauldron – I was too busy staring at them.

This green is magical: jewel-bright and just like… his eyes. Potter’s eyes.

Finally, I pulled myself together and added the leaves, all the while cursing myself for a maudlin fool while continuing with the rest of the process automatically, my hands once more working with their usual efficiency while my mind tried to work out exactly what had just happened.

It didn’t take much consideration because I’m too wise to try and deny the obvious. I’m attracted to the boy. I want him.

The problem is that he’s just started his fifth year – he’s fifteen.

I’ve had boys before. I’ve done so after due consideration and proposing an alliance with the young man of my choice. They’ve always been seventh years – officially adult wizards – and nearly always Slytherins. They’ve been as attracted to me as I was to them, and they had already made that plain to me before I approached them. We would work out some basic rules, including the fact that I wouldn’t favour them in their Potions lessons (if they were taking Potions), nor in my role as Head of Slytherin. Those alliances had left pleasant memories, but none were meaningful enough to continue once the boys left Hogwarts.

I haven’t had a boy since Justin Twillgood three years ago. I suppose it was time I fell for an attractive boy again. But this… this can only be a mistake.

Harry Potter. When I make a mistake, I make a big one, I thought, reflexively rubbing my left sleeve.

Harry Potter is too young. He’s a Gryffindor (and I’ve never made a pact with one of those before) and more than that, he’s the bloody Boy Who Lived.

And so this will go no further. This will never happen.
 

"Honestly, Mione… he's clueless. Neville was… well, you know what boys do at night in the dorms…"

"I'm sure I do not, Ronald," Hermione denied. "And I'm equally sure I don't want to."

"Oh, don't be like that. How can I tell you about Harry if you're going to go all coy?"

Hermione pondered. "Go on then, if you must. I presume you mean that Neville was pleasuring himself?"

"Er… yeah. That's it. Well, Neville was wa–, er – pleasuring himself behind his curtains, and however hard you try, it's impossible not to make some noise, isn't it?"

Hermione gave Ron a look. Surely he didn't think she was going to answer that?

Ron, cursing the difficulty of having a girl as his other best friend, gathered his Gryffindor courage and soldiered on. "Well, Neville was making these noises, see. We all knew what that meant. Except Harry. Harry gets up off his bed looking all concerned and gets hold of Neville's bed-curtain. I just managed to grab his arm in time, before he pulled the curtain back. There are some things that ought to be private, you know?"

Hermione fervently agreed with that. She rather wished all this was remaining private, but something was troubling Ron about Harry and it was her duty to listen.

"So I said to him," Ron continued, "'Leave it, Harry. Let the man wank in peace.' And Harry, he looks at me all confused. 'What?' he says. Well, that throws me, I can tell you… I just stared at him and said, 'You can't disturb him now, Harry. Think how angry you'd be,' But he still looks at me with this blank expression. Honestly, Mione, he'd got no idea what I was talking about!"

Hermione was having to concentrate to follow Ron's rambling discourse and she couldn't help feeling some sympathy with Harry at this point.

Ron hadn't finished yet: "So I said, 'Look, Harry, you don't disturb people when they're having a wank. Not if they're mates, anyway.' And suddenly he goes all red and starts panicking. He just pulled away from me and rushed out of the dorm. By the time I went after him, there was no sign of him. Damn, I know Harry's weird; he's had an odd childhood and all that, but this is just the latest sign that those Muggles did something to him. Muggles are funny about sex, everyone knows that, and they say sex magic is taboo to them-"

"What do you mean 'did something to him'?" Hermione interrupted. She was beginning to get alarmed now.

"Well, like I said, he's clueless. He doesn't know about wanking – or anything. Every time the word 'sex' gets mentioned by anyone in the dorm, he makes some excuse and rushes out. I've only just realised it!"

"Hmm. Perhaps Harry's family are embarrassed about sex. Not every family is open enough to discuss it. And Harry was kept alone as a child. I suppose if he'd shared a bedroom with his cousin that might have helped him to be less self-conscious. But he told me they didn't treat him like a family member at all, and he didn't have any close friends at school before he came to Hogwarts either."

"But everyone knows about sex! And there was the lesson we had third year."

Hermione frowned. "Yes… but was Harry there?"

Ron frowned too. "I can't remember."

"Perhaps you should try and talk to him alone. In confidence."

"Yeah." Ron sighed. He liked talking about sex with people who knew something about it – it was one of his favourite subjects when he was with Dean and Seamus. But teaching a clueless Harry about it? That would be even worse than this conversation with Hermione had been.

Ron briefly wondered if perhaps he'd been a bit harsh on his teachers in the past.

After dinner, Ron – full of grub and as comfortable as he was likely to get – made his move. "Can I have a word, Harry?"

Harry had been chatting with Neville who was seated opposite him. He turned and looked at Ron, seeing the serious expression on his friend's face. "What is it?"

"In private, mate," Ron whispered, trying not to draw the attention of the nearby Gryffindors.

Harry looked puzzled, but nodded quickly enough. "Sure. Shall we take a walk by the lake?"

"A walk by the lake?" Seamus cried gleefully, having picked up the last sentence. "That's romantic, that is. Are you two an item, then?"

Harry gave Seamus a puzzled look, but Ron glowered. "Don't be stupid, Finnigan. You know I'm strictly a ladies' man."

Hermione snorted into her pumpkin juice, nearly ending up inhaling it. "Ron Weasley, the lounge lizard," she chuckled.

Ron glared and went red. Harry, still looking puzzled, followed his rapidly retreating best friend out of the hall.

"Hold his hand, Ron," Seamus yelled after them, as Dean and Neville grinned.

"Honestly, Seamus, you're getting worse," Hermione chided.

"And how is that even possible?" Ginny asked.

"What's the matter with Seamus?" Harry asked as Ron led him out of the castle towards the lake.

"He was just being daft, Harry. You know what he's like, has to twist everything so it has a sexual meaning."

"Oh."

"That's sort of what I wanted to talk about," Ron continued implacably.

"Seamus?"

"No… sex."

"Oh."

As they reached the large log that made a decent bench overlooking the shallows of the lake, Harry added: "I'm not Seamus. I don't want to keep talking about sex."

"Well, I'm not that interested," Ron began, knowing that he wasn't being truthful and shifting uncomfortably on his section of the log. "But everybody talks about it sometimes. It's natural. I mean, a bloke's got to be sure he's doing it right."

"Doing what? You're not having sex, are you?" Harry sounded a bit more panicky now.

"Well, not as such…" Ron admitted. He hadn't actually done it, but he'd had plenty of practice with wanking, and he'd tried humping various things – his pillow, the greased neck of a butterbeer bottle (that had been weird, cold and hard) and, most recently, a charmed nightdress case belonging to Ginny. This was normally in the shape of a white rabbit, but Ron had improvised a charm to turn it into 'Hermione's privates' and it had been a satisfying but very odd experience to fuck it. The case morphed into something that looked like a segment of Hermione's body (or so he imagined) and even while it felt pretty accurate (again, he could only imagine that part, but it felt a damned sight more pleasant than the rigid neck of the beer bottle) it was disconcerting to still be able to see the outline of the original item – the fluffy white rabbit – all the while he was 'on the job'. The morphed privates – unattached to anything like a convincing replica of Hermione – was an experiment he wouldn't be repeating, but having cast the spell, he hadn't wanted to waste the thing. Ron had to admit that Transfiguration had never been his best subject.

Returning to the matter at hand, Ron continued: "But blokes have to discuss it, so we're ready when the big moment comes. And wanking is just about the best practice; everybody does it."

"Um…" Harry looked lost.

"I mean, you do know about wanking, don't you, Harry?"

Harry didn't answer. He stared at the lake and refused to look at his friend.

"It's just, when you nearly disturbed Neville last night, I got the oddest idea that you didn't know what he was doing. If that's true, well… there's no need to worry about it. I can help you. Er… that is, I can tell you and everything." Ron was going red; he could feel the hot tide of blood filling his cheeks. It would be embarrassing if Harry was looking at him, but Harry was still resolutely looking anywhere but at his friend. "Would you like me to do that? Er… explain it, that is."

Harry swallowed. Ron could see his Adam's apple bobbing up and down in his throat.

"I mean, you don't have to be shy; I know those Muggles don't look after you properly and all."

Harry jumped up off the log; his sudden movement was jerky and uncontrolled. "It's nothing to do with me! Just leave me alone!" he yelled.

"Wait, Harry! I'm only trying to help you. We all have to know about it…"

As Harry strode away he threw one last comment over his shoulder. "I know everything I want to, everything I need to, thank you very much. Just leave me alone! Not everyone is obsessed with sex, you know."

Ron watched as Harry picked up speed, jogging away towards the castle. He sighed. That didn't go well. Really, who wanted to have to give a sex education talk? That was a job for someone like his dad; Ron had never wanted to be in this position. Anyway, you couldn't teach someone who didn't want to know, could you?

Harry couldn't help wondering why all his mates kept on about sex. He'd never been at all interested in it. Ron had blamed the Dursleys for Harry's attitude towards sex, but Harry doubted it had anything to do with them. The Dursleys never even mentioned the word 'sex' and they wouldn't let the nature programmes stay on the telly once the animals got near to mating. Aunt Petunia used to flick the remote and suddenly the family would be watching something like ballroom dancing or gardening. Sex just wasn't a subject at Number 4, Privet Drive.

Harry didn't even know what sex was, not really. He knew it was something to do with the bits of the body that were considered 'rude' and had to be kept covered up. But what had it got to do with girls? Harry didn't even want to think about what Hermione had underneath her uniform.

Harry told himself that it was just stupid blokes like Seamus who kept on about sex because they were not doing very well in their school subjects. Naturally, Hogwarts' professors didn't mention sex at all. Harry was certain Professor McGonagall would have a fit if she heard anybody talking about it, and Professor Snape would probably hex the blabbermouth into the lake.

No, sex had nothing to do with Harry Potter. He had tried going out with Cho Chang, just because everyone else was going out with someone and he didn’t want them to think, yet again, that he was different, and because it was Valentine's Day and all. It had been awful, and so he had decided that no, sex had nothing to do with the Boy Who Lived.

Harry told himself he wouldn't worry about it. He'd just keep working hard and concentrating on the important things – like learning how to defeat Voldemort.

Potions class again. Harry hated Potions. The only good thing about Snape was that Seamus had to shut up in this class. Since the other evening Seamus had been making all sorts of stupid comments around Harry and Ron. Ron was getting so uncomfortable that he daren't sit next to Harry in class or at mealtimes any more, and Harry was just confused. Hermione had been great, sitting between the two boys and glaring angrily at Seamus. Harry didn't understand why Seamus went on about him and Ron – didn't Seamus realise they were both boys?

Today's lesson was on the Calming Draught. It didn't look too awful to brew. Harry, sitting with Hermione, was about as happy as he could be in a Potions class; he was fairly sure he'd be able to hand in a decent sample at the end of the lesson.

Snape had glared at Harry as he took his seat, and glared again as they started their practical, but there was nothing new there. Snape always glared at Harry. Harry stared at the Potions professor, wondering just why Snape was so hung up about him.

"Harry, pay attention!" Hermione nudged Harry in the ribs, which was painful because her elbow was sharp, and he jumped.

At that moment Harry had been about to weigh out two ounces of Billywig stings in his small, brass balance. The stings flew out of the pan as if they were still attached to the live insects and the pans clanged into each other like the finger-cymbals of a belly dancer.

"Now you've bloody torn it!" Harry hissed angrily at Hermione as he saw Snape turn towards them.

The Potions master's eyes lit up with glee when he saw who had made the noise. "Mr Potter… disrupting my class again, are you?"

"I'm not doing anything," Harry muttered to himself as Snape advanced along the aisle. But he knew it was pointless to hope that Snape would give him a break. A detention: yes; a break: never. But if he had to be damned by the man, he'd go to his doom with his head held high. Harry had looked into Voldemort's eyes, he certainly didn't fear Snape (or so he told himself). He raised his head and looked right at the approaching figure.

Somewhat to Harry's surprise, Snape faltered. The swooping, confident approach, the gleeful hope of being able to persecute Potter, seemed to have deserted the professor. As he caught his gaze Harry saw the man's eyes flicker with some nameless emotion and decided he would defend himself. If Snape was unsure for once, Harry was going to take advantage of it.

"Potter! What is the meaning of this?" Snape pointed a long, bony finger that wouldn't have looked out of place on sale at Borgin and Burke's, at the scatter of Billywig stings that surrounded Harry’s worktable.

"I'm afraid I don't know, Professor," Harry replied in a mock-regretful tone. "I can only read tealeaves, but perhaps Professor Trelawney understands Billywig stings."

Harry could just hear Hermione's anguished moan of 'Harreee…' from his right side.

"What's that?" Snape roared. "You inane waste of space! Not only are you incapable of following instructions that a six year old could understand, but you compound your error by acting with blatant disrespect. Ten points from Gryffindor, and stay behind at the end of the lesson. I will teach you something before you leave this class, if it's the last thing I do!"

Harry gave a little smile, as if to say it would suit him fine if it was the last thing Snape did. He was quite surprised how effective his smile proved to be though, as Snape spun on his heel and stalked back the way he'd come, only pausing to terrorise Seamus as he passed.

Seamus had taken the opportunity to doodle a rude picture on his notes while Snape had been occupied with his favourite game of 'Persecuting Potter'. He was trying to show it to Dean, who was determinedly ignoring him, and Seamus was oblivious to the fact that Snape had returned from Potter's bench rather more quickly than he usually did.

"Detention, Finnigan. Report to Mr Filch at seven," Snape said as he swooped to retrieve the sketch from Seamus.

The boy curled up in embarrassment and the entire class was treated to Seamus' excellent impersonation of a snail that had been poked by a first year's finger.

Snape took his time studying the confiscated picture, turning the parchment around in his hand to view it from several different angles. "And I believe you need another detention tomorrow night with Professor Hagrid; he will be able to instruct you on the folly of proposing such… interesting… activities with the giant squid."

"I'll see you later, Harry," Hermione said regretfully as she left the class with the others. They were headed to their common room, Potions having been the last class of the afternoon.

Snape was clearing his desk. He glanced up at Harry as if he'd forgotten why the boy was lingering, but Harry wasn't fooled. Everything Snape did was for a reason and he never forgot anything.

"Go to my office," Snape snapped. "Wait quietly. And do not touch anything in there."

Harry sighed – as if he'd want to touch any of Snape's horrid ingredients anyway. He slung his bag onto his shoulder and went into the strange-smelling office, which was through the door at the back of the classroom. He looked around the room, but little had changed from the last time he’d been here. The phrase 'slimy stuff in jars' just about summed up Snape’s office. Snape’s desk held a heavy, glass inkwell – no prizes for guessing the colour of the ink, Harry thought – quills, parchment and several stacks of homework awaiting Snape’s tender mercies. There was a hard, student chair on the other side of the desk from Snape’s own comfortable-looking, leather, professor’s chair. Harry wasn’t sure whether Snape’s admonishment not to touch anything applied to the wooden chair, but in a minor act of defiance he sat on it anyway.

Harry heard the door open and close again as Snape entered. The man put another stack of parchment onto his desk and shrugged off his outer, teaching robe. Harry watched out of the side of his eyes as Snape stalked over to a hat-and-coat stand and hung the black robe up there before casting a charm over it. Harry didn’t hear the words of the charm, but he thought it might be a cleaning charm – or maybe it was to remove creases, or perhaps it was what made that funny, spicy smell that seemed to cling to Snape’s robes... He was still thinking about this, having resumed staring at the heavily-laden desk, when he realised Snape had moved and was standing behind him. Looming.

"Mr Potter…"

Snape’s voice was quiet and sounded a bit 'off'. Harry fought not to react. Snape hadn’t touched him, and he wouldn’t touch him, Harry was sure, but the closeness of the man standing right behind his chair made him feel a bit like he had in the graveyard when Voldemort had approached him. Which was stupid. Snape wouldn’t really hurt him, he knew that.

"Once again you force me to punish you. Once again you seek my… attention."

Snape’s voice was really odd. Harry squirmed a bit on his chair, fighting the urge to turn around and look at his teacher.

"Why do you keep doing that?" Snape asked, almost tenderly.

And now Harry did jump, for Snape's long-fingered hand landed on his shoulder and squeezed as he asked his question. Harry didn't know what to say. "I don't know," he managed.

"You don't? Forgive me, Mr Potter, but I think I know. You crave my attention, do you not?"

Snape's voice was so odd. It wasn't scary, really, but it had gone all deep and husky. Harry wondered if he'd hurt it earlier on with all his shouting.

Snape's hand stopped its squeezing and trailed off Harry's shoulder, down his right arm and then Snape was walking away to his own side of the desk. Harry felt a release of tension, though he wasn't quite sure why it had been there in the first place. Perhaps he was imagining things, which was completely understandable in this eerie office.

"I have no option but to try and satisfy you, Mr Potter," Snape continued as he sat in his own chair. "You crave attention, and so I will give it to you."

"I don't crave attention," Harry denied, frowning.

Snape's brow lifted and now he looked a little annoyed. "Manners, Mr Potter," he growled.

"I don't crave attention, sir," Harry repeated.

"Forgive me if I do not believe that statement. Yet again you disrupted my class and called my attention to you. Yet again you were disrespectful. I cannot ignore this behaviour, Potter. I will have to deal with you."

Harry sighed and looked down at his lap. He supposed that, in Snape's world-view, it was the truth. Deep inside his own mind the honest part that nestled there admitted it as well – his behaviour in Potions class wasn't respectful at all. "I only dropped something, I wasn't craving attention. Sir."

Snape snorted. "Potter, you drop things more often than the rest of the class put together, and that includes Longbottom. If that's not a call for my attention, I do not know what it is. Well, now that you have it, I just hope you are man enough to deal with it."

Snape stood again and came around his desk to stand directly in front of Harry, staring with his black, implacable gaze straight into Harry's eyes.

"I will be kind, this time," Snape purred, and his deep, husky voice sounded like a big cat's purr.

Harry found himself staring, almost mesmerised, at the ugly Potions professor. Snape's voice was like a musical instrument, an endlessly-variable creator of moods. Hearing it as it was now, the mood it created had certainly captivated Harry and he just sat and waited, unable to look away.

Snape reached forward and put his hand over Harry's own hands which were clasped on the boy's lap. "I have punished you already by taking points. Now I am feeling oddly kind towards you, Potter. You may go. Unless, of course, you want to come…" The last sentence was spoken very quietly.

Harry felt weird. Snape was holding his hands… well, sort of. And what was he on about now? Harry definitely wanted to go – he wanted to get out before Snape changed his mind and gave him a detention after all. But Snape was still looking oddly at him; his dark eyes were full of some question or other that Harry didn't understand. "Um… I'd like to go, Professor," he said, though he still didn't move a muscle as Snape hadn't either.

"If you feel the need, Harry, you can always come… to me," Snape added in that deep, smoky voice that Harry had never heard him use in class.

"Er… okay," Harry managed, swallowing his uncertainty. He knew Snape meant something beyond the obvious meaning of the words he was saying, that his professor was asking or telling him something, and for once Snape had called him by his first name, so it was probably important. Harry just didn't know what it was. Why couldn't Snape talk plainly? Possibly it was because he'd been a spy for so long…

Snape stepped back, letting go of Harry's hands. Snape's hands had been cool and his long fingers had covered Harry's clasped hands easily. Harry took the chance to stand up, hefted his bag on his shoulder, and left while he was still winning. He was leaving Snape's office without a detention and that had to be counted as a victory.

As he headed back to Gryffindor Tower, he couldn't help thinking that Snape had been acting bloody oddly today.



It is beyond belief… and yet it seems to be so. Harry Potter plays the virgin more skilfully than any Shakespearian actor. Yet he is not a subtle boy and I cannot believe he can deceive me so well. Which leaves the probability that he really is just as clueless, just as unaware of sex, as he appears to be: he is as green as his eye-colour.

The boy's reactions to my proximity; the way he floundered at my voice when I lowered it to its 'sexual predator' register; his obvious inability to pick up on my hardly subtle double entendre about coming; all these points lead me to conclude that not only is he a virgin, he is unlikely to lose that condition for a good long while.

Unless, of course, I relieve him of it.

How can he be so ignorant? He lives in a dormitory with four other teenage boys. Admittedly, they're Gryffindors, and probably keep their sexual activities to themselves in some vague idea that it's 'honourable' to keep such personal matters private.

Potter should have learned the basics at least, in Minerva's painfully old-fashioned sex education class. All students receive her dry-as-dust lecture in their third year. But Potter has spent a fair proportion of his school career hors de combat in the hospital wing…

Yes, there might be a way.

Severus stood up and swept off towards the Staff Room and the records of attendance that were kept there for every student. All the pupils had to attend a set number of classes as well as pass exams if they wanted to qualify as Hogwarts-approved witches and wizards. It was simplicity itself to find Potter's third year record.

In the log Minerva kept for her lessons, Potter was marked 'Absent: excused. In hospital wing' for the one-and-only sex education lesson. Severus smirked down at the deputy headmistress' spidery writing. He had been right: Potter was woefully uneducated, a clueless virgin in desperate need of instruction.

Severus felt his balls tighten in anticipation.

"Potter, stay behind," Severus instructed as everyone packed up their Potions equipment after another routine lesson.

Harry mentally prepared himself for another odd encounter in his professor's office.

"What have you done?" Ron asked as he prepared to leave Harry to Snape's tender mercies.

"Nothing that I know of," Harry replied, and it was no more than the truth. He really didn't understand why Snape kept behaving like this lately. He was used to losing points or getting detentions, but this 'staying behind in Snape's office', what was that all about? Harry shook his head in perplexity.

"We'll wait for you in the common room," Hermione said with a meaningful look.

Hermione and Ron left and Harry found himself alone in the Potions classroom.

"My office, Mr Potter," Snape prompted, pulling Harry out of his reverie.

Harry soon found himself seated in the hard, wooden chair in front of Snape's office desk. Snape lifted another heap of essays onto his desk. Harry wondered why the man gave out so much homework if it meant he had to spend so much time marking. Perhaps Snape just gave everyone wretched marks; maybe he had a spelled quill that wrote rude comments over everyone's efforts.

"Now, Mr Potter," Snape began, "your recent behaviour has brought to my attention the fact that your education is lacking in some areas far more than it is in Potions, difficult though that is to believe."

Harry looked into the man's dark eyes, expecting to see contemptuousness. He saw something, but he wasn't sure it was contempt. He waited to see what Snape was talking about, because so far he had no idea and was as confused as he had been the last time he was here.

"I am talking about your sexual education," Snape added.

Harry's throat went dry. He tried to swallow but all he produced was an audible click. Snape had mentioned sex! Harry briefly wondered if he'd imagined it.

"You need to be proficient enough in the area of sexual behaviour that your Coming of Age can be achieved without problems."

Harry just stared at the Potions master. He couldn't think of a thing to say. Snape was implying he needed to know about sex. Snape was implying it! Snape who never discussed anything except his rotten old Potions.

Snape continued, "Did you attend Professor McGonagall's lecture?"

"Er…" Harry often attended his Head of House's lectures. Did Snape have a particular one in mind?

Snape was staring questioningly at Harry, so obviously he expected an answer. An answer Harry didn't have, because he still wasn't sure he knew what Snape was on about. Harry knew he looked bemused. Snape would no doubt think he was stupid. Nothing new there, then.

"No answer? Well, I will make some enquiries. It is imperative you know what you are about before the Coming of Age ceremony, or the Wizarding world's saviour will never become a full wizard."

Harry really had no idea what the man was talking about. He hadn't heard anything about a Coming of Age ceremony. "I won't come of age until I'm seventeen, sir," Harry pointed out.

"Indeed; for a while there I thought you had lost what few faculties you had to start with. I am relieved to see you are alive and functioning on a vestigial level. You are correct that you will come of age at seventeen; you will not be a full adult until then. However, this is a more ancient ceremony and is performed at a young person's sexual maturity, which both the Wizarding and Muggle worlds deem happens at sixteen. That does not give you long to sort yourself out. From your inept behaviour I believe you will need at least the time remaining until your sixteenth birthday, and an uncharitable judge might say you need the rest of your life."

Harry lowered his eyes and examined his hands which he'd clasped in his lap. Once again Snape thought Harry was pretty useless, which didn't surprise him. If only he knew what Snape was going on about, it might be a step to finding out more, but he was as bemused as he'd been during his first Potions lesson when Snape had asked him about monkshood and bezoars.

Snape sighed. "Go along to your little friends, Potter. I will look into addressing this… shortfall in your education."

Harry stood up, feeling very discomfited, which was not an unusual state of mind when he was alone with Snape. "Goodbye, sir," he said as he scrambled for the door.

"Ron!" Harry barrelled into the common room looking wild; hair sticking up at all angles.

Ron looked up and instant alarm...