Albus settled back in his chair and faced an unpleasant task. He’d put it off as long as possible. In theory he loved all his students; in practice, some challenged him just a bit. Still, there was nothing for it. Everything else was in place to snatch prey from Tom Riddle’s jaws. It would just require the cooperation of one more person.
Sadly, this one person was not renowned for cooperation.
He wrote a hasty note and sent it on to Horace. The Snapes had been tricky to make disappear, but the Order did that when it was needed, for whoever needed it. They waited now in the kitchens, being plied with a late afternoon tea by the house elves. Still, Severus needed to know what was happening. Albus tried to dream up a way of dealing with the boy, then decided straightforwardness would probably work best.
The tap at the door, rapid and diffident, signalled that the note had done its work. “Come in,” Albus called.
At thirteen, Severus was still small, still almost painfully shy “ and still impossible to feel any closeness with. His expression was already defensive, ready to deny any accusation, certain that accusation was coming. He had a carefully cultivated nastiness and vindictiveness that Albus found worrying, and an unfortunate number of opportunities to use it. In the long run “ well, perhaps tonight would shift that course. Perhaps not.
“Severus, it’s about your parents,” he began. The boy’s black eyes narrowed slightly, betraying little worry and no love. “The Death Eaters tried to recruit your mother. She heard them out, made some promises, and fled with your father the moment she was free to do so. And, being a sensible sort, she came to me.”
The boy dipped his chin in the faintest of nods to show he was following, and perhaps even to agree that his mother had done something right. His expression, faintly pinched, suggested that if she had, it was the first time he’d noticed.
“If Voldemort were to find her now, or to learn of your father, he would kill them both.”
That merited a change of expression. “Would he?” The voice was even, smooth as wet silk, but the black eyes flashed. Albus had seen that expression before. Severus had very little to call his own, but what he had “ whether books or dignity “ he held fiercely to himself. Anyone who threatened something belonging to Severus had earned a poisonous and lifelong grudge. Now, no matter what the boy thought of his parents, they were his to love, dislike, or hate as he would. Albus suppressed a smile at the thought that Tom Riddle now had something in common with James Potter and Sirius Black.
“Quite certainly, especially considering your father is “ somewhat contrary to Lord Voldemort’s politics. This puts you in a dangerous position. We could, theoretically, transfer you to another school, but Durmstrang is less safe than here and I rather doubt Beauxbatons would be to your liking. For one thing, the robes are light blue.”
That earned a faint hardening of expression. Severus, much like his father, did not care to be teased at serious moments “ or, most likely, any other time.
“Or we can keep you here, if there is no reason to expect anyone to disbelieve that your parents might flee without you. If they did so, you would not be leverage to use against them. Have you spoken of your family at all to anyone here?”
The slightest headshake. A half blood in Slytherin probably would not mention the nonmagical parent, and if he had, it certainly would have set off a commotion audible to the Headmaster’s office. Still, not speaking of Eileen, not even referring to her, was more than a little unusual.
“You’re quite certain?”
“Yes.” Again, the voice gave away little but a heavy contempt, but the eyes still glittered with that lasting enmity. Yes, if Severus were determined to take the Dark path, he would do it alone, not as any creature of Tom Riddle. Several of the Slytherins that age seemed to be already aiming for the Death Eaters as though planning to audition for a popular band, and Severus had been one of those boys. Now, Albus thought perhaps not even peer pressure would shift this solid and silent opinion.
“Severus, are you a good liar?”
That merited a very faint twitch of the boy’s thin lips and a level, “No.”
Dumbledore nodded gravely, though he had doubts. “Neither am I.”
To his surprise, that worked. The scowl lightened a bit. “Good.”
“The real question is, can you keep a secret? Publicly, your parents are abandoning you, fleeing the country as so many have. In fact, they have come here to replace two of our retiring staff members -- if you can keep that secret.”
Severus shook his head once. “We look too much alike, I and either of them.”
Dumbledore smiled. That had been the real trick, but nobody looked closely at someone sufficiently ugly, and swapping just a few features around had done the job quite handily. Tobias no longer looked like Tobias, Eileen nothing at all like Eileen, and neither, if it came to it, much like Severus. “Not anymore. You may see them one more time as their son, but after that, they have to be Hogwarts staff who mean no more to you than to anyone else.” He suspected that as long as the pair resided at Hogwarts, the school would be as safe as Severus could make it. The boy showed promise; this might be a good alliance to have made.
At the slight indication of understanding, Albus rose. “Let’s go.”
He led his charge “ soon to be legally his responsibility in full “ to a painting of a fruit bowl and tickled the pear. The pear wriggled and giggled, provoking a sneer from Severus, and then turned into a green door handle. Albus pulled the door open and gestured. He watched the boy scan the kitchen, not worried that all of Slytherin would soon be raiding the place “ Severus liked to know things, but he also liked to be the only one to know. The house elves gave respectful little bows as they passed, but were busy preparing the evening meal. The Snapes, or former Snapes, waited in chairs by the fireplace. Their own son looked past them, then started and gave them a fierce and hawkish look.
“Not much to look at, is your old dad now?” Tobias said. He was going to be the problem, Albus suspected, if any of them were. He’d wondered if there would be embraces, or farewells, or some other unsuspected affection in this strange family, but the adults merely sat where they were while Severus stood guard over himself.
“Severus, I’d like you to meet caretaker Argus Filch and our new librarian Madam Irma Pince. They will be introduced to the school tomorrow at breakfast.”
Severus examined each from his safe distance once more, then stepped forward to shake hands dutifully with each. “Good day to you, Madam Pince, Mr Filch. I’m pleased to make your acquaintance.”
‘Madam Pince’ took this entirely in stride, offering her hand with exactly the distant formality of staff to student. ‘Filch’ hesitated, his now-pale eyes flickering over his son’s face. Then he nodded and shook the hand offered.
“I must remind you,” Albus told them, “that you have a choice. You may treat your son as you do every student at Hogwarts, or every student at Hogwarts as you treat your son. You cannot show any affection, favoritism, or special attention of any sort.”
Madam Pince shook her head, sighting down her newly long nose with a vulture’s expression, as if waiting for either her son or Albus to die. Filch pursed his lips and shook his head. And Severus gave Albus a sidelong conspiratorial look that said plainly that no Hogwarts student could expect affection of any sort from either of these two staff members, his hair curtaining off the exchange from his own parents.
“Very well. Severus, this ends your entirely fictitious detention. I presume you will invent some good reason to have had one.”
“Of course, Headmaster,” the boy said. Turning on his heel, he paced out of the kitchen. He would give away nothing.
Tobias “ Argus “ grumbled to himself. He’d never cared for cleaning, let alone for cleaning a castle this size, and he wasn’t sure why some magical spell or creature couldn’t do just as good a job or better. Not better, he decided. Never bloody well better. But sharing a roof with one young wizard had been quite enough, and now he had some two hundred freaks around him all the time, whether teaching or learning or making great horrible messes for him to clean up. Maybe magic was something he could learn, if he just worked at it. He had learned now that wizards used the word Squib as though it meant spade or wog, only they used it on those normal enough to be nonmagical in spite of their cracked parents. And yet Dumbledore had passed him off as a cousin of some sort, and Tobias could not do magic, so here he was.
Argus could not do magic. Maybe if he listened in on some of these classes, or read the right books, he could eventually. Not that he really wanted to be a freak, but here he was abnormal if he wasn’t. He would feel far less “ weak “ if he could just use a wand.
He paused in his scrubbing and listened. There was some sort of commotion going on just round the bend. The little monsters were at it again, tormenting someone by the sound of it, and there was another puzzle “ why would the freaks pick on each other? They were all freaks. He straightened his aching back and stomped off to find out what it was all about.
Two boys were teasing a third, making the floor shine with slipperiness and levitating a wand out of reach of his son, despite the lad’s solid refusal to grab for it or attempt to move. Severus glared at the boys as though they ought to die at his will, and why they did not, Tobias “ Argus “ couldn’t fathom. What good was magic, then, if it required the stick? “Well, well. Magic in the corridors? Picking on a classmate? We are in trouble, aren’t we? What’s going on here?”
He looked at Severus automatically, and decided there was no harm in it. After all, it was what anyone would do in that situation. Severus glared back, tight-lipped. The other boys lowered the wand and undid the spell on the floor, looking a little wary; they weren’t sure what this caretaker would do, but there were legends left over from the last one.
“Chains, I think, and a whipping if I can get the Headmaster to sign the form.” He’d found that form just the day before, and liked the look of it. Something had to beat some sense and respect into these people. “We can’t have you filthy little monsters thinking you can shoot spells wherever you like and break whatever you like.” Or picking on his boy, but he wasn’t supposed to say that “ the way Severus was glaring through him reminded him of that.
“We were just…” the scruffy-haired one said, but Argus cut him off.
“Just what? You, what were they just doing?” He’d remembered not to know his own son’s name, and was proud of that, but the boy seemed to be striking sparks on sheer anger. “Come on, then, speak up.”
Severus looked from one boy to the other, and each wore the same half-pleading half-threatening expression: don’t tell, please, or we’ll make you pay for it later. Argus had to make sure they didn’t dare so much as look at his boy again.
“Go on, then, did you start it? I don’t think so, somehow.” His son wouldn’t be fool enough to start a fight with two wizards “ two other wizards “ and certainly wouldn’t if he were likely to lose. Severus also wouldn’t be fool enough to lie, not now, and face what always followed. Argus “ Tobias “ tried the two little horrors who now were doing their best to look sheepishly innocent. “How about you lot? How many rules would you say you were breaking?”
They stood hating him silently, pretending they’d done nothing wrong when he’d caught them red-handed. “Only two, sir,” Severus blurted.
“Only two? Each, that is? Come on, then, the lot of you are paying a visit to the Headmaster.” Argus was still uncertain of his authority, but he thought had enough to march the lot to the office. He ignored the glares of the other boys at his son “ with luck, he’d see they had a punishment that would make sure they never dared lay a hand on his boy again. Or point a wand at him, he amended to himself. Mustn’t forget he was in the madhouse now.
“Well, now we know,” Sirius told James as they left the Headmasters’ office in a group. The two of them would be cleaning trophies that night in the company of that foul new caretaker. He raised his voice a little to be heard properly by the skulking figure hurrying away. “He can’t keep his gob shut, the greasy little sneak.”
Snivellus paused and glanced back, his contempt plain, then scuttled on, spiderish and odd.
“Why d’ya think he ratted on us, though? He hasn’t before.” James wrinkled his forehead, watching their nemesis retreat.
Sirius shrugged. “I told you why. He’s a greasy little sneak who would sell out anyone rather than take a detention himself, a rotten coward, and a scum of the earth.”
James shrugged and pushed his glasses up his nose. Then he rumpled his hair to give his hand a better excuse for being up, as usual. “Don’t worry. We’ll pay him back later.”
“Well, of course we will. And this time we’ll make sure that troll Filch is somewhere else. Is he that much of a beast to everyone, do you think, or are we special somehow?”
“We’ll see. Dumbledore didn’t seem too happy with him, did he? ‘I expect you to deal with problems fairly, evenhandedly, and on your own.’ What do you suppose that was about?”
“No clue. Maybe he’ll get sacked.” Sirius started down the hall, not the same way as Snivelly. “We can only hope. Come on; we’ll need to stuff ourselves to have energy for that great lot of work tonight. How long do you think it’s been since those trophies were polished, anyway?”
“Years. Decades. Centuries. Who cares? And making us do it without magic!” James scuffed his feet, sounding annoyed. Sirius waited for him to catch up. “I still don’t understand why Snape couldn’t just lie to Filch the way he lies to everyone else. I mean, sure, he’s no friend of ours, but “ student code? Thou Shalt Not Rat?”
Sirius stopped and glanced back, though the corridor Snape had slithered down was some way off. “What does he know of codes? He couldn’t keep a bloody secret if his life depended on it, trust me. Not someone else’s, anyway.”
Greasy Little Sneak by Vindictus Viridian
Chapter Notes: Those who are used to the internally-consistent VV universe are going to be a little surprised.