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Know Thyself
by Trismegistus
"It shows us nothing more or less than the deepest, most desperate desire of our hearts."
Three days had passed since the end of Summer term. He lay in his bed, light from the moon's final crescent streaming in through the window slits high in the walls. Sleep evaded him, as it had for the past week. Dozens of sleeping draughts and potions lined the shelves of his office, he could get out of bed and drink one whenever he pleased, but he felt as if that would almost, in a way, be cheating.
If sleep would not come to him, he would not call it. He stared dully at the dark flagstones in the ceiling, but did not see them.
He had been called into Albus Dumbledore's office ten days ago.
"Yes, Headmaster?" he said, stepping through the entrance.
"Ah, Severus, please sit down." Dumbledore motioned to an overstuffed and violently purple easy chair sitting next to the fireplace.
He wanted to remain standing, but sat, hating himself for the way Dumbledore cowed him so effortlessly. "Tea?" Dumbledore asked, gesturing toward the sitting table. He turned wordlessly to accept a cup and saucer and saw - what else? - Potter's Potions final sitting on top of the burnished wood.
"Headmaster," he began, the familiar tightening beginning in his chest and throat. Potter. Always Potter.
"That will wait," said Dumbledore calmly, holding up a quelling hand. "Please, enjoy your tea."
His lips tightened into an imperceptible line. The tea was both flavourless and a pointless waste of balm and ginseng, but he drank, dutifully, and tried to keep his eyes from sliding back toward the exam.
Dumbledore seated himself in his usual chair and appeared to drink his tea with relish. Snape stared into the fire, hating Dumbledore, hating the warm reds and golds of Dumbledore's office. Hating himself.
Hating Potter.
Hating the way they all made him feel as though he was just another first year, snot-nosed and powerless. The china shook slightly in his hands.
At long last Dumbledore set his cup and saucer on the table. "Headmaster," he began again, knowing all the while that it was pointless to even try.
"Severus-"
"Headmaster, Potter must learn that -"
Dumbledore's blue eyes focused on him from behind the lenses of those glasses. The words dried in his throat. He swallowed, tried again.
"The boy is a constant disruption in class -" Dumbledore's gaze never wavered.
Something settled over him. It felt, almost, like desperation. "The other professors may find Potter to be nothing short of a saint, but I will not be fooled into-"
"Severus, does the child deserve these marks?"
"No," he said, and despised himself.
"Then it is settled," said Dumbledore, as evenly as if they had been discussing the weather or the proper disposal of a boggart discovered to have taken up residence in the library. "I trust you will make the necessary corrections to your final report."
"Yes, Headmaster," he said.
He sat in the chair, an angry, black stain in the middle of Dumbledore's golden office, and wished that the Headmaster would bid him goodnight so he could return to his chambers. It did not occur to him to leave the office of his own accord.
But Dumbledore was not yet finished with him. "There is one more matter which we need to discuss," he said slowly, and the gentle sympathy in his voice told Snape exactly what that matter was.
He sat silently, without needing to listen as he was told that he had been refused, once more, as Professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts. And why? - because a more qualified applicant had, predictably, been unearthed. A more qualified applicant was always waiting in the wings, it seemed, when it looked as though they might actually have to award him the position.
And who might some of these previous qualified applicants have been? a voice in his head sneered. Ah, let us see. Lockhart, that prancing twit, who could no more have defended himself from the Dark Arts than he, Severus Snape, could remove the Dark Mark from his arm.
Lupin - a werewolf. Certainly appropriate, werewolves being intimately connected with the Dark, but an imminent danger to the students - not that anyone but he had noticed (and oh, didn't that wound still sting?).
Quirrell? the voice continued. Also appropriate, when one considered that no other wizard in recent history had been given such an...intimate...opportunity to study... But that name did not bear mentioning, even in the recesses of his own mind.
At any rate, they had only been the three most recent - and unfortunate - appointees to the position. The history of misguided selections stretched back decades, and no one appreciated that fact more than he.
At long last Dumbledore finished with him. It was now his place to nod dumbly, and quietly leave the room before he could make a further fool of himself.
Bile, thick and bitter, rose in his throat. Had it been anyone other than Dumbledore in that office, he could have raged, could have intimidated, could have - reasoned, but he could no more express his displeasure to Dumbledore than he could to the Dark Lord. Wherever either of them was concerned, he could only do their bidding and hope to escape further notice.
He regained some semblance of internal composure as he stalked down the hallways back to his rooms. The corridors were deserted, no students had seen fit to wander about in the dead of night that evening. Unfortunate, as revoking a few house points would have gone a long way toward restoring his equillibrium.
Finally he returned to his chambers and lay down for the first of too many sleepless nights as the term drew to a close. Sleep evaded him, however desperately he pursued it, and in its absence his thoughts returned to one thing alone.
Potter. Potter who need merely mention that he desired something and it was handed to him. His lips bowed into a habitual sneer at the thought. Anything famous Harry Potter wanted, famous Harry Potter always got.
He couldn't imagine what such coddling must be like. He had fought for everything he had ever come to posess in all thirty-seven years of his life. He had fought, tooth and nail, for his job. Twenty-four years old, the youngest Professor ever to be taken on by the school. There had been naysayers, of course. Wizards had notoriously long memories. But to each and every wizard who had fought his appointment, had argued that he was a former Death Eater, that it was unheard of to hire a wizard who had yet to see his first quarter century, he had more than proven his worth and his ability. Every last one of them had been forced in the end to admit that they were wrong.
Of course, Lucius Malfoy had nothing to do with your appointment, a mutinous voice whispered in his head. Had no reason to want you, or anyone with a history like yours, teaching within Hogwarts...
No, he told it. NO. He had fought for the position and had been hired on the strength of his merit alone. Former Death Eater and twenty-four year old though he had been, he had shown them all what talent he possessed. Demonstrated that talent to such a degree that he had been appointed Head of Slytherin within a year of hire.
He came to the house to find its occupants a disorganised, backstabbing rabble. They had been the joke of Hogwarts. Within two years he had turned them into a dynasty, seven years as school champions. He had taken the disorganised, mutinous Slytherin students and taught them cooperation where others couldn't, taught them self-preservation where others hadn't, taught them the value of ambition where others would not. If any other Head of House had ever accomplished such a feat in the history of Hogwarts, he was not aware of it.
Self respect, self-confidence, self-assurance, these things all came hard won. After the first two pitiful decades of his life, he was beginning to win them for himself. Professors who had mocked him as a student began to see him not only as an equal, but as a force to be reckoned with. He had their respect, the respect of the Slytherins, the fear and respect of the rest of the students. He was capable and he would force them all to understand that.
And then along came famous Harry Potter, who need never work for anything, to take from him everything he had worked so hard to attain. And they all loved him for it. Nasty, idiotic little boy - why was he the only one who saw through it?
You know, Severus, Dumbledore had told him at some point during the boy's first year, Mr Potter was almost sorted into your house. He found the very idea sickening.
The last week of classes and revision had gone by in a blur, except for Potter's class. He found himself awaiting it each day with a sort of starved, exhausted anticipation. Potter. Just to see him, sitting in his classroom with his pure glowing skin, his vivid green eyes, his perfectly disarranged hair, looking every bit the angelic child saviour of the wizarding world... It embodied everything he despised about the boy.
They might all bow at Potter's feet, but he could still exact his petty revenges, and he had, hating himself all the while for doing it, but doing it nonetheless.
And ten days later, what had changed? Potter was gone for another two months, but had managed to make him the laughing stock of the school before he left - and wasn't that true to form? His innards lurched at the thought. Lupin was, thankfully, no longer teaching - a definite improvement if you asked him, but none of the other professors seemed to think so; he could tell by the way that they looked at him when he dined at the staff table, when he entered the staffroom, when they passed him in the corridors. Not that their opinions of him mattered in the slightest, but why couldn't they just see? Black, Black was still a wanted criminal, Potter's protestations to the contrary notwithstanding. That at least, was satisfying, knowing that Potter's inexplicable hold over the Ministry officials did not extend so far.
But the child had helped Black to escape, he was certain of that.
"Order of Merlin, Second Class," Fudge had told him. "First Class, if I can wangle it."
Potter had aided Black - a convicted criminal - to escape Hogwarts, taking his Order of Merlin as he fled. Potter was determined to rob him of everything before he left Hogwarts. Everything. Everything...
He drifted off into an uneasy sleep.
His dreams were often uneasy, usually involving episodes from his own life. His dreams this night were no different.
One afternoon near the end of the term, forced from the comfort of his dungeons by a lack of tormentil, he emerged onto the school grounds. His mood that day had been relatively benign, all things considered - he had turned in Potter's failing Potions marks, which was quite a satisfying exercise, and as the flying potion for which the herb was an ingredient needed to simmer for several hours as it was, the disruption was not as unwelcome as it might otherwise have been. Blinking slightly in the powerful afternoon sunlight, he headed toward the intersection of school lake and Forbidden Forest, tormentil preferring to grow in moist, damp locations.
Some inexplicable sensation, some sixth sense of the sort which Sibyll Trelawney merely
dreamed about, had caused him to glance at the sky over the Quidditch pitch. And there, of course, had been Potter.Silhouetted against the setting sun, soaring over the fields and castle turrets with breathtaking ease, so much talent and grace. His heart stuttered faintly at the sight. The boy had never been on a broom before coming to Hogwarts. He knew it.
Everyone knew it. It had been the talk of the staffroom for weeks -"Remarkable. Stunning, really. Did you know the boy had never set eyes on a proper wizard's broom before starting classes this year?"
"That would be James's blood coming to the fore. The father was a brilliant flyer as well."
He hadn't wanted to hear it then, and he didn't want to see it now.
Of course, sneered the all-to-familiar voice in his head, that would have nothing to do with the fact that you've been on a 'proper broom' - oh, once - in the past five years? What self-respecting wizard is afraid of his own broom? He turned on his heel and fled back to the comfort of his dungeons, and overhead Potter soared toward the clouds on a sudden updraft of wind.He was inside his office before realising he'd neglected to gather the tormentil at all. Heading back out to the grounds was absolutely out of the question, and he finally resorted to sending for a quantity of the inferior dried herb by owl.
He awoke in a sweat, his heart racing.
Potter. Bloody, damnable Potter, who haunted his waking thoughts and now hounded his dreams as well. The term was over, had been over for three days, and in another four he was returning home. There was no reason why thoughts of Potter should still occupy him to distraction.
There is a name for that, his mind told him.
Hatred, he answered it, because the other word which might name it was...abominable.
Abominable, yes, it answered, But quite possibly accurate, nevertheless.
Hatred, he told it firmly. I despise the boy.
Why? Why him and not someone else?
Because.
Because?
Because he is so disgustingly perfect. Because everyone licks the hems of his robes. Because-
Come, now. Draco Malfoy is perfect. Perfect as Potter is perfect, with his fine features and golden hair. Better than Potter, even - take that impeccable lineage. If people don't lick the hems of Potter's robes, then they are certain to lick the hems of Draco Malfoy's. And would you say that you hate Draco Malfoy?
Of course not.
And why, do you think, is that?
Because Draco Malfoy respects me.
He could hear, if such a thing were possible, the voice laughing at him. ...And if Potter 'respected' you, what would you do?
"ENOUGH!" He rose from the bed in a flurry of nausea, tore his cloak from the wardrobe and fled his chambers as quickly as he could.
He traversed the corridors instinctively, automatically. Feverishly. This would end tonight. The solution...the solution was so eloquent, so simple, and it had been in front of him the whole time. He would go tonight, and end this, once and for all.
Coward's solution, his mind laughed, as he tore now down the darkened hallways, cloak billowing behind him in some grotesque parody of bat's wings.
No, he told it. An eloquent solution. A simple solution. Just as I make my potions, eloquently. Simply. Under my very nose this whole time.
If that is what you wish to believe, the voice sneered, then fell thankfully silent.
To the third floor, down the trapdoor, to the restricted dungeons. Down, farther, farther, easier, now that the 'precautions' were no longer in place.
So simple. The solution to this whole mess, to two weeks of sleepless nights, and he'd known about it for three years.
Turn right here, and right again, now left, and-
He stepped, panting, into the room and found it-
Empty.
No. NO! But some small, rational corner of his mind whispered, Of course. Of course they would have moved it, now that it was no longer necessary to hide it here.
And then back through the dungeons, the way he had come, slower this time, calmly this time, through the trapdoor and back into the main castle corridors. Up to the fourth floor, the old classrooms, and into the one, there, yes, by the old suit of armor.
And it was not in that room, either.
He stood there, dazed, for - minutes? hours? - before returning slowly to his quarters. He had hoped that it would end there.
But it had not. Now that the question had been raised, however vaguely, in his mind, he could not let it rest, but worried at it like some insecure fourth year worried a blemish. He longed to get his arms around Potter, to strangle the boy. He was certain that if term had not already concluded he would have done Potter actual physical harm. That knowledge alone was disturbing.
But there were times, now that the question (however vaguely) had been raised, when he wondered if there was not something else, equally disturbing, in this equation.
In thirty-seven years, could he have truly sunk so low?
If he ever paused to look at his life, and he tried dearly not to, he would not put it past himself to experience that emotion by this particular permutation. Certainly his time with the Death Eaters, with Malfoy, had shown him that it was not beyond the realm of possibility.
Did he hate Potter? Or was this - ?
He didn't know. Damn Potter, to hell - to the Dark Lord, even, for doing this to him.
He called on Dumbledore's office the second evening before he was set to leave Hogwarts for the summer.
Dumbledore, by some sixth sense of his own, had been awaiting him at the threshold. He stepped inside, seated himself in the same horrid armchair and said simply, "Where is the Mirror?"
"The Mirror of Erised?" asked Dumbledore in his calm, even voice. "It has been moved to a place of safekeeping until it is needed again. Is there some reason you should require it?"
"Potter," the word came, hissing, from his lips.
"Potter?" said Dumbledore, clearly surprised, then stopped at the look on his face as he turned to face the Headmaster, blood draining from his lips.
"I see."
Silence, broken only by the merry crackling of the fire, descended over the room.
Something in his insides twisted viciously. Do not make me say it aloud. Please... But it was clear that Dumbledore - somehow - understood. Now, he wanted to ask. Now do you know me for what I am? But he could not.
"If you are correct, Severus, this is a very grave situation indeed."
He felt his lips twist into a tortured parody of a smile. "I cannot. Solve this. On. My. Own."
"And you believe the Mirror will be able to aid in that regard?" There was compassion in every syllable of the Headmaster's words.
"I believe having heard it mentioned that looking upon the Mirror will reveal one's deepest desires," he said, and couldn't quite keep bitter sarcasm from tainting his voice. "It will allow me to understand what this is."
Dumbledore's gaze never faltered. "And once you have understood it, Severus, what do you plan to do about it?"
He could have laughed. As if this was somehow different from concocting an antedote. Or countering a Dark curse. "Knowing what it is, it can be fought," he said. "I assure you it will not be a problem by the start of Autumn term."
Dumbledore released a long, heavy sigh and stared into the grate. "Very well," he said at last. "The Mirror will be returned to its previous location. If you believe that it is the tool you need, I will not withold it from you."
"Thank you, Headmaster," he whispered, sickened by the craven gratitude in his voice.
"Good evening, Severus," said Dumbledore, as he fled both the room and the pity in Dumbledore's eyes.
On the last night of his stay at Hogwarts he walked the halls yet again. Slowly, this time, as if he were being sent to his own execution. In a way he was. But knowing it, you can fight it, he told himself. The same way you have always fought for everything in your life. And he would win.
At last he came to the disused classroom by the empty suit of armor, paused for a moment and then stepped inside, preparing to see what the Mirror would show him.
これで以上です。
