(A/N: I thank you so much for your very good reviews! I knew that you would have found the previous chapter extremely interesting! Anyway, I don't want you to believe that from now on it's going to be all fluff and so! The story is slowly coming to an end, but it will be followed by a sequal, which I'm writing at the present moment. I'm happy to give you the title of the sequal, which is "SECRETS FROM THE FUTURE"! Any guesses? Now I leave you on the following chapter, hoping that you'll like it!)
Chapter 28. IN TROUBLE
...
How can a rock-cliff
Embank the sea?
Even if I don't want to
I start flying again...
...
"I'd like to, no I won't like to, but if you want to..." by Lucio Battisti
The room was half wrapped by darkness, illuminated only by the feeble moonlight filtering in through the dismantled windows.
"Finally, we meet again, Mark!"
The Dark Lord was standing in the middle of the room, glaring satisfactorily at his prisoner, who was forcibly bent in front of him, his wrists and ankles tied. The most curious thing was that Mark kept staring directly into Voldemort's eyes, as if he didn't have any fear of him.
"I was deeply disappointed by your behavior fifteen years ago. Running away like that wasn't a nice to do!"
"Too late I realized the horrible mistakes I made, but I did my best to find a remedy."
"How? BETRAYING YOUR LORD?" thundered Voldemort; the others Death Eaters in the room jumped in their places.
"I should kill you right now, Mark! But I've got other plans in mind."
Mark stared at Voldemort with endless hate.
"I want you to do something for me..."
"NEVER!" Mark shouted, trembling in anger.
"You're forgetting that I can change your mind in many different ways."
The Dark Lord pointed his wand toward him and said an unforgivable magical word.
"CRUCIO!"
Mark fell to the ground shouting, writhing from the unbearable pain he was feeling throughout his entire body.
"NOOOO!"
At the same moment, several kilometers away, a sixteen year old wizard had just woken up abruptly, panting heavily and feeling his scar throbbing painfully.
Instinctively, Harry put on his glasses and looked at the clock: five in the morning. Without waking up his roommates, he jumped out of bed and rushed to his trunk. When he found the two-way mirror, he exited the dormitory and hurriedly reached the deserted common room.
He pointed his wand at the fireplace. "INCENDIO!"
A crackling fire appeared, lighting up the room. Harry sat on the sofa and stared at the mirror with trembling hands.
"MARK! MARK EVANS!"
He pronounced the name several times, but nobody replied. Disappointed, he forced himself to remember every detail of his dream, but he couldn't. It was as if his mind has become cloudy and the only thing he recalled was that Voldemort had just cast the Cruciatus Curse on Mark Evans.
I'm sure about what I saw! It happened for real. I must tell Dumbledore about it!
Harry stood up immediately and exited the common room heading down the stairs to Dumbledore's office.
He had just arrived in front of the gargoyle's statue when he found himself face to face with a furious Professor Snape, who was coming from the opposite corridor.
"Why are you wandering around the castle at this time of the morning, Potter?" he asked with a disgusted look in his eyes.
"I need to speak with the Headmaster... Sir," Harry replies nervously.
"How fascinating! But it's impossible to bother Professor Dumbledore at the moment. Do you believe that your foolish matters are so important as to warrant disturbing the Headmaster at any time of the night?"
"These aren't foolish matters!" Harry replied, starting to lose his temper.
"Of course they are!" Snape insisted threateningly.
"Why don't you let me judge it myself, Severus?"
Harry turned, and was deeply surprised to see Dumbledore in person peeping out from behind the gargoyle's statue.
"Both of you come to my office, please" said the Headmaster, leading the way.
Soon Harry was standing in front of Dumbledore's desk, with Professor Snape at his side, still frowning at him.
Albus Dumbledore sat in his huge armchair and stared at Harry from above his half-moon spectacles.
"I'm ready to listen to you."
"I just had a vision!" Harry's words rushed out of his mouth, mostly because he was still feeling deeply worried. "I saw Mark Evans, and Voldemort was torturing him! You should do something immediately, otherwise..."
"Are you sure that your vision was authentic?"
Harry was astonished by that question. He thought a few second about it, then he replied energetically.
"Of course it was!"
"Potter, control your temper!" Snape scolded him, and then the teacher turned to the Headmaster.
"If I may share my opinion, Sir, I'd like to point out the fact that this boy still keeps getting odd dreams and visions about the Dark Lord. The only meaning of this is his short attention span during my Occlumency lessons, and his lack of practice."
"It's not true!" affirmed Harry angrily, glaring at him directly in the eyes.
"HOW DARE YOU, YOU IMPERTINENT LITTLE..."
"Severus, please!"
Snape forced himself to regain control, and then spoke again with a light tremble in his voice.
"Potter has been taking private lessons with me for over a year, but he isn't making the slightest effort to closing his mind to the Dark Lord's intrusions. It's for this reason that I'm asking you for permission to stop with..."
The Headmaster cut him off with a sign of his hand, then sighed deeply and spoke with an almost unnatural calmness.
"Harry, I'm going to ask the wizards from the Order to immediately start searching for Professor Evans and I'll keep you informed about future developments."
It wasn't a case to argue over and Harry nodded reluctantly.
"Severus, I'm strongly requesting that you carry on with your Occlumency lessons."
At this explicit request, Snape couldn't do anything else but giving his consent. He lowered his gaze resignedly.
Out the window, the sun had already risen and was lighting the mountains' peaks with its golden rays.
"I believe that it's time to go back to your rooms now." Dumbledore brought an end to their brief meeting.
When Harry returned to his dormitory, he found his mates already up.
"What's happened, Harry?" asked Ron worriedly, but Harry was feeling completely lost and didn't want to speak.
Without saying a word, he slowly reached his bed and collapsed heavily on it. He couldn't believe that Mark was in Voldemort's hands at that very moment.
Neville, Seamus, and Dean peeped out from their bed curtains, staring at the scene deeply surprised. Ron slowly moved closer to his best friend's bed, fearing the worst.
"They've caught him, Ron! They've got Mark now!" Harry whispered, staring intensely at the ceiling.
***O***
Winter had already come to an end, leaving in its place spring and its beautiful sunny days, but Harry hadn't had the time yet to realize it. Several weeks had flown by since the night he had dreamt about Mark Evans.
Dumbledore had told him that the wizards from the Order were still doing their best to find Mark, even though they didn't know where Voldemort's headquarters were.
Harry was demoralized because of the whole situation and not even Hermione's lovely attention could make him feel better. He was always nervous and touchy with everybody.
It was unbearable for him to go on with his classes as if nothing had happened. In his brain he still saw Mark Evans, twisting and shouting from pain under the effect of the Cruciatus Curse.
On top of everything, Snape was doing his very best to make Harry's life a real hell. He kept punishing him in the most absurd ways and during their Occlumency lessons, he was unleashing his entire resentment on the boy.
On a Friday afternoon in late March, during the last two hours of Potions, Harry was carefully reading Snape's instructions on the blackboard. As usual, he was sitting close to Hermione in one of the farthest desks at the end of the classroom.
It was a really complex Truth Potion and Snape had asked for his students' greatest care.
Despite his efforts, Harry wasn't able to concentrate and kept his mind somewhere else.
Right in the middle of the preparation, Hermione realized that Harry had just made a mistake. His potion was still too liquid and wasn't boiling at all, while hers had just started to crackle loudly.
"NO! You shouldn't have used the essence of moonstone, but the powder!" she whispered to him, alarmed, and Harry stared at his cauldron, motionless.
"Wait! Let's put some asphodel to let it reduce a little bit more."
Hermione raised her head and stared at Snape for a second; he was slowly pacing the room a few meters from them, critically observing his students one by one. When she was sure Snape wasn't looking in their direction, she poured the powdered substance into Harry's cauldron. He sighed in relief and smiled at her thankfully.
At that moment, Snape came closer to them, glaring at Harry's potion in disgust, but luckily it had just started to boil. The teacher didn't say a word and turned away.
Both glanced at each other feeling relieved and went back to work.
Another half an hour passed by and again Hermione noticed something wrong.
"Careful! Don't use the snake's eye yet, you should mix the potion three times clockwise first!"
Harry stopped just in time, his hand remaining in midair. He then put down the little vial and mixed the potion three times clockwise, while his forehead was starting to become sweaty.
"MISS GRANGER!"
Harry and Hermione jumped in surprise, hearing Snape's menacing voice coming from his desk.
"I don't remember telling you to help Mr. Potter! This is the second time it happened this afternoon. Ten points from Gryffindor!"
Harry frowned at the teacher, forcing himself not to answer him back. Evidently Snape realized his internal battle and he didn't like it at all.
"Potter! Take all your belongings and come to the front desk!"
Harry couldn't believe it; he turned to Hermione and stared at her with his mouth open, but she nodded in silence. Reluctantly, he slowly packed his things as Snape levitated his cauldron to the first desk.
When Harry was ready, he sighed deeply and stood up and then walked to the head of the class. He had just reached the first row, when something really unexpected happened.
"It's not fair!"
Harry heard Hermione's comment behind his back and felt his blood freeze. He took a seat quietly, desperately hoping that Snape hadn't heard her.
In that instant, Snape stood up and pointed his long noise dangerously in Hermione's direction.
"I'm sorry, Miss Granger, what did you say? Could you please repeat it aloud, so that the whole class will be able to hear?"
Harry turned to Hermione abruptly, making "NO" sign with a light shake of his head. She looked around and felt her classmates' eyes on her. Not at all intimidated, she stood up and frowned at the teacher.
"I said that the way you always treat Harry Potter isn't fair!"
Harry feared the worst; horrified, he turned to Snape, noticing that he had become paler than usual.
"Ten points from Gryffindor!" Snape said with extreme satisfaction, but Hermione didn't move a muscle.
"Is there still something you'd like to share with us, Miss Granger?"
A minute of silence passed by in which all the students remained motionless, with their gazes going in turn from Hermione to Snape.
Clearly, he was provoking her, but instead of stopping there, as Harry had warmly hoped, Hermione reinforced her words.
"We weren't doing anything bad, and you know it!"
Harry widened his eyes and looked at her, as if to say "Please stop it!"
"Another ten points from Gryffindor! Is there something else?" A devilish smile lit up Snape's face.
Malfoy and the others from Slytherin were sneering while the Gryffindors were staring at Hermione furiously. Nevertheless, she spoke a last time.
"With all that is happening out there, I thought that you'd have changed your attitude. On the contrary, you keep treating Harry and the other Gryffindor students badly!"
"Miss Granger, detention! Tomorrow night, in my office."
Hermione lowered her gaze and slowly got seated, mortified. Harry turned to face Snape, glaring at him with deep hate.
How could you treat her like that, you clammy poisonous snake! he thought.
Snape seemed really satisfied with himself; he turned to the other students, who in the meantime had stopped working and were still staring at him, deeply shocked.
"What are you looking at? Go back to your potions, ALL OF YOU!"
At Snape's order, they started to concentrate on their cauldrons again.
Harry tried to go on with his work, but it was almost impossible; he was feeling upside down and his hands were trembling in anger.
When the bell rang, most of the students had obtained awful results. Instead of being transparent and crystalline, their potions had taken on a wide range of colors, from the dark gray one of Seamus Finnigan, to Ernie Macmillan's glowing red.
Harry's potion was acid green, but he didn't care at all. He was just worried about his girlfriend and wanted to comfort her.
Hermione had rushed out of the classroom before anyone else and Harry was pushing everybody with his elbows, trying to reach the door as quickly as possible. Passing in front of the Slytherins, he forced himself not to turn toward Malfoy, who was sneering at him.
"Has your girlfriend gone mad, Potter?"
"Run to her, Potter! She's probably hiding in a lost corner of the castle now!"
Those were the kindest comments that came to Harry's ear. Without wasting time, he exited the class in a fury.
Hermione was already at the end of the corridor when Harry came to her side.
"Hermione, wait! Hermione!"
"I'm trying to put as much distance as possible between me and that CLAMMY, DULL, DISGUSTING sort of teacher!"
Hermione was still walking fast and Harry was doing his best to keep at her side.
"I've only one question for you! Why? You know that it's useless arguing with him, he's never going to change!"
"I couldn't help myself!" Hermione tried to justify her actions, but Harry wasn't able to understand yet.
"But why didn't you just stop it?"
"Since I was already in trouble, I wanted to tell him what I really thought!" she explained, crossing the Great Hall's entrance as Harry rolled his eyes.
They sat at the Gryffindor table, but Hermione was still mad at the Potions teacher.
"I can't believe that he put me in detention!"
"What were you expecting from someone like Snape?" Harry asked, giving her a stern look.
"Hey, what's up? Did you get a bad grade?"
Ron had just taken a seat at their side and was looking at them amusedly, but when Harry and Hermione frowned at him, he became silent and lowered his gaze to the empty plate in front of him.
"I-I'm sorry! Please go on with your quarrel, don't pay attention to me."
"Snape just gave Hermione a detention!" Harry told him in detail what had just happened and Ron made a disgusted grimace.
"DETENTION WITH SNAPE? I'll never forget when he put me in detention. I remember that he made me clean a thousand dirty cauldrons, full of snake's entrails and without using magic. I wouldn't want to be in your place Hermione." Ron sighed deeply and stared at her with pity.
"Thank you for that information, Ron. I'm feeling much better now!" she said, even angrier than before.
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