Snape sat slouched at his desk, absently tapping a knuckle against the wood. “Straying from the syllabus, huh?”

His gaze flicked to the bottle with the wrong colour. Pale gold instead of deep green.

He held it up, watched it catch the torchlight. It didn’t separate.

When had he last taken a base formula and spent a week tearing it apart? Not for necessity, not for publication, just to prove it could be better.

A decade. No. Twelve years ago, maybe. Something about the number sat wrong in his chest. He closed his eyes. A flicker of light moved behind them. Thin, elegant. A white serpent, curled in the air like smoke.

Right.

That proved it.

Not James. Not Lily.

“Who are you?”

***

The gargoyle guarding Dumbledore’s office slid aside. The headmaster was already standing at the far window, fingers folded behind his back, eyes somewhere on the dark horizon.

“Severus.”

“Albus,” Snape said, stepping inside.

They didn’t speak straightaway.

Snape crossed his arms. “I told you Lupin was sheltering Black.”

Dumbledore glanced toward him. “And you were correct. Though not at first.”

Snape’s lips curled. “No?”

“Not until Christmas,” Dumbledore said, voice mild. “Before then, he believed Sirius was a murderer. As did most.”

Snape’s expression soured.

Dumbledore stepped away from the window. “But I believe you didn’t come to gloat.”

He moved to the cabinet, poured two fingers of something amber into a glass, then held it out. Snape waved it off.

Dumbledore set the glass aside. “I’m more curious about Rosier’s spell.”

Snape’s shoulders stiffened. Shaking off the taste of the memory with snort. “At first, I thought it was a level seven containment hex. With blood price. But it wasn’t.” He folded his arms. “Looked similar to Basilisk petrification but felt different.”

Dumbledore said nothing.

Snape’s mouth twisted. “Rosier’s been pulling spells from nowhere. Things that don’t exist in the archives. It’s like he’s found a source that predates formal casting. Or a new, unknown line.”

“There are always older sources, Severus. Older than either of us care to admit. Or those lost to us.”

Snape frowned at the answer. Not commenting.

“You think he’s inventing them?” Dumbledore asked, his gaze was sharp.

Snape hesitated. “No.” He looked away, jaw tight. “He doesn’t invent them. It’s not experimentation. It’s recollection.”

Dumbledore sighed, eyes fixed on the lights of the castle below. “You think it is him?”

Snape frowned as he turned for the door. “I don’t know.”

***

Neville sat in the corner of the Gryffindor common room, staring at his wand. The noise around him was a blur, music, laughter, clinking butterbeer bottles, but he couldn’t really hear it. He was still trying to make sense of it.

A glass appeared in front of him. Hermione’s voice followed. “Neville.”

He blinked, finally looking up. She was smiling.

“Come on,” she said, pressing the glass into his hand. “They’re celebrating you and Harry.”

He hesitated. “Right.”

Hermione gave him a little push as he stood. He took a small sip before joining the chaos.

The common room looked like someone had set off a party bomb, streamers in the chandelier, someone’s cat wearing a hat.

Fred and George had, of course, declared it an official Gryffindor victory. They’d hung a banner above the fireplace that read:

YOUNGEST EXPECTO PARTY-ONUS – HISTORY MADE (AGAIN)

Harry stood near the fire, looking sheepish but grinning. Ron had him in a one-armed chokehold, shouting something about “bloody unbelievable,” while half the room raised mugs in toast.

Neville found himself smiling.

Harry had technically beaten him to it, by a single day. They’d cast at the same time, but Harry was a day younger, so the record went to him. The papers would love that. Neville didn’t really mind.

He felt Hermione’s hand on his arm. “You’re the youngest after the youngest,” she teased.

He laughed quietly. “I’ll take it.”

Across the room, Ron’s voice cut through the noise. “Um, Hermione!”

She turned, wary.

Ron rubbed the back of his neck, awkward. “Er… about Crookshanks.”

Hermione’s brows lifted.

“I was wrong,” Ron said quickly. “About him. And Scabbers. You were right. I was a prat.”

Hermione stared for a second, then smiled. “Yes. You were.”

Ron grimaced but smiled back, and that was that.

Someone shoved another butterbeer into Neville’s free hand. “To the lion and the snake!” Dean shouted.

The room echoed with cheers. “The lion and the snake!”

Harry raised his mug, grinning at Neville over the firelight. The whole room was glowing gold from the flames, laughter ringing in every corner…

Neville laughed back.

***

Sirius Black sat on the edge of the bed in St Mungo’s, shoulders hunched, hands limp in his lap. Outside the window, the moon hung fat and pale, waning, thank Merlin, but still too close for comfort.

He let out a long breath.

The room was quiet, save for the faint clink of potion bottles from the corridor, and the occasional wheeze of some poor sod two doors down. His cheek still ached where Cassian had cracked him one, and his fingers kept drifting up to prod at it like he couldn’t quite believe it’d happened.

He’d deserved it, probably.

The confrontation played back in jagged bursts, Snape’s barked accusations, the kids trembling with their wands up, Peter’s reedy voice spilling filth like it might excuse anything. Then Cassian stepping forward, looking like he’d come straight from a pub brawl, nose bleeding, coat still dusted with dirt, and casting a spell that locked a werewolf mid-lunge.

And Harry.

That bloody snake Patronus.

“What would you do, James?” Sirius muttered, thumb tracing the edge of the bandage on his hand. “A snake Patronus…”

He leaned back against the wall, staring at the ceiling.

Patronuses were never random. The form said something, about you, about what you were built from, what you clung to when the dark closed in.

And Harry’s was a snake.

A snake.

Sirius scrubbed both hands over his face. “Brilliant. Could’ve been a dog. Or a stag. Hell, even a bloody owl. But no, he gets a snake.”

He laughed under his breath, the sound dry. “Lily would’ve been proud either way.”

He didn’t believe in coincidences anymore. A snake meant something, heritage, power, darkness maybe, but Harry wasn’t that. He was too bloody bright for it.

Sirius pushed to his feet and paced to the window.

If Patronuses reflected the heart, then what did it mean that the boy who carried Lily’s eyes and James’s grin had a serpent waiting under his skin?

He let out a shaky breath. “You’d tell me I’m daft,” he murmured, glancing at the empty chair by the bed. “You’d say it’s nothing. Just a shape.”

But even he didn’t believe that.

Sirius pressed his palms to the glass, jaw tight. “Whatever it means, kid… I hope you never have to find out.”

He thought of the tree. That absolute beast of a Patronus.

Sirius had never seen anything like it.

And that was saying something. He wasn’t exactly a scholar, but he was still a Black, and the Black library was less a bookshelf and more a private Dark Arts museum with family drama shoved between the pages. He’d seen spells older than Merlin, curses handwritten in dragon blood, a collection of Patronus forms dating back to the druids.

But a tree?

Not just rare. Unheard of.

Burst out of the ground as if it’d been waiting there, roots cracking stone, branches clawing the sky. Alive. Silver bark glowing like moonlight soaked into wood. Shielding the kids. Holding the line. A barrier. A warning.

Something about it had felt ancient, not in a dusty, historical sense, but deeper. Like something forgotten remembering itself.

The thing had reached out and grabbed the Dementors like they were weeds, ripped them off the bloody ground.

Sirius let his head fall back against the hospital wall with a thump.

“Who even casts a tree?” he muttered.

The more he thought about it, the more it made his skin itch.

***

Lucius hurled the glass into the fireplace. It shattered with a crack against the iron grate, fire hissing as the drink hit coals. He kicked the table hard enough to rattle everything on it.

“Dob—”

He stopped, lip curling in disdain. Right. The bloody elf was gone. Freed. Because of Potter.

He turned on the sofa and kicked that too.

Reports littered the floor, half-read and creased where his grip had tightened too hard. The Prophet’s headline still sat crooked across his desk.

BLACK CLEARED OF CHARGES – MINISTRY CONFIRMS PETER PETTIGREW ALIVE

He paced, then snatched the nearest scroll and flung it. The ink bottle followed.

They’d made a public spectacle of it. Clearing Sirius. Celebrating him. The old dog even got his name reinstated. Which meant the will stood. Which meant Draco could kiss the Black fortune goodbye.

Worse still was the bloody tree. The papers wouldn’t shut up about it.

Unprecedented Patronus Spell Defends Students – Hogwarts Professor Rosier Stuns Experts

He yanked open another folder, flipping past diagrams and sketches, each one more ridiculous than the last. Shielded the students from a swarm of Dementors. Tore through the ground.

He snorted, pacing again.

And now Rosier’s face was everywhere. Magical Theory Quarterly. The Warden’s Dispatch. Even the more conservative circles were murmuring about it. The man went from a curious hire to a name in half a bloody year.

Power. Influence. Popularity. All handed to him on the back of some flashy, ridiculous tree.

Lucius stopped at the window, hands braced on the sill. He’d spent months laying groundwork. Gold, favours, strings tied across departments like spiderwebs. Got Dumbledore busy, with whispers and half-truths, hoping to delay him long enough for Sirius to get killed. He knew the old fool wouldn’t do so. Too pacifist. Too soft. And for what?

Cassian bloody Rosier stepped in with a nosebleed and a clever wand flick, and the entire school started whispering like he was Merlin reincarnated.

Lucius clenched his jaw.

“Enjoy it, Rosier,” he said softly. “It won’t last.”

“Lucius.” An old voice called from the fireplace, and the colour drained from his face. He straightened his robes and walked toward it with careful steps.

“I am listening.”

***

Peter Pettigrew moaned from the floor of his holding cell. His face was a mess, split lip, black eye, nose still swollen from Cassian’s fists, and he kept crying, soft little hitches in his breath that came and went like a hiccup he couldn’t shake. The guards had gone quiet outside. Maybe they’d wandered off for tea. Maybe they just didn’t care.

He wasn’t sure what he hoped for anymore. Maybe that his Lord would return, cloak sweeping in, hand extended, voice promising salvation. Maybe not even salvation. Just… use. Purpose. If he could be of use, he’d matter again. That was all he ever wanted, wasn’t it?

He sniffed and wiped his face with the back of his sleeve.

Voldemort had been strong. Terrifying, yes, but strong. He didn’t care if Peter was small or soft or overlooked. He just needed someone to listen, follow orders, do the things the others were too proud or noble or good to do. He didn’t ask for honour. Just obedience. And Peter could do that. He was good at that.

He coughed. His ribs still hurt. Probably cracked one in the scuffle. They should’ve healed it by now, but no one had bothered. Not when the man’s worth was measured by the friends he’d betrayed.

Was that so wrong? What was wrong with survival?

The strongest always ruled. He hadn’t invented that. He’d just followed it. Followed strength. Back at school, it had been Sirius and James, loud, sharp, dangerous boys who could break you with a grin and half a spell. He’d laughed at their jokes, nodded when they wanted nodding, pointed when they wanted blame shifted. If he kept close enough, he didn’t get burnt.

And when that stopped being safe, when Voldemort rose and everything tilted sideways, he’d just done it again. New names. New power. Same game.

People called it betrayal, but it was just the same old trick… Stay near the biggest fire, and maybe it won’t burn you and scare off wild animals.

He told himself that more often than he admitted. That it wasn’t cowardice. It was pragmatism. Cleverness, even. Everyone wanted to survive, they just weren’t honest about the price.

Peter blinked at the stone ceiling. Damp. Cracked. Just like Hogwarts’ old dungeons. He’d been down there before, during detentions. Always got caught when he was alone. Never when James or Sirius had dragged him into trouble. Back then, being around them had felt like armour. Even if they laughed at him, shoved him aside, they still protected him. He’d felt important, when they let him.

He’d followed them because it made things easier. Because no one messed with you when Black was grinning behind you, wand at the ready. No one asked questions when Potter had your back. Everyone wanted to be liked. Respected. Peter just found a quicker way.

In school he bullied who they bullied. When Voldemort rose, he did the same. Different names. Same idea. Get close, stay useful, survive.

He sniffled again and drew his knees in.

If the world didn’t want rats, it shouldn’t have bred lions that left the runts behind.

He curled tighter on the stone, the faint flicker of the containment runes pulsing around him like a heartbeat. No wand. No escape. No one left to lie to.

Only the truth, and even that didn’t want him.

Peter closed his eyes.

He pressed his palms to his ears like it might hush the thoughts crowding in.

What else was he supposed to do?

James and Sirius had always been sharp with their wands and sharper with their mouths. No one said no to them, because it was easier not to. Because if you stood beside them, you didn’t have to be them. You could praise them, throw a hex now and then, and as long as you aimed where they pointed, you were part of it. Pack rules.

They’d targeted people who wouldn’t fight back. Slytherin half-bloods. The ones already shoved to the edge by their own House. Quiet Hufflepuffs who just wanted to study in peace. James thought it was funny. Sirius would grin like it was a game. They weren’t bullies. No, never that. Pranksters, they said. Heroes, even. Marauders. Like it was noble, somehow. Like drawing blood with a smirk made it clever.

He’d watched James obliterate a boy in Duelling Club once. Snapped his wand clean out of his hand and flung him across the tiles with a spell so vicious it cracked a rib. The kid never came back. Dropped out, they said.

No one stopped it. Dumbledore turned a blind eye. McGonagall always sighed and moved on. They were Gryffindors, after all.

It wasn’t the sacredness of life that held James Potter back. Just restraint dressed up as morals. He could’ve done worse. He just… chose not to. Maybe knew the limits. Sometimes.

And Voldemort? Voldemort didn’t dress it up. He never pretended to be kind. He never smirked while hurting people and called it sport. He told you where you stood. Power, or no power. Serve, or don’t. Live, or die. There was no mask. Just fire and blood and a voice so sharp you could feel it under your skin.

Peter had chosen the obvious fire. Because at least you saw it coming.

He hadn’t done it for fun. He wasn’t cruel. He didn’t kill for pleasure. But he’d held the door open for those who did. Because someone had to. Because there was always someone worse, and if he could keep that someone looking the other way, away from him.

He wasn’t a monster.

He wasn’t brave, either.

He was good at being close to it, though. Just close enough to avoid the heat. Close enough to pick through the leftovers. To stay alive.

So when the war shifted, he’d made a choice.

Live or die.

And if Lily and James had to burn for that?

He pressed his hands harder to his ears.

They would’ve done the same, he told himself.

They would’ve. If they were small like him. If they hadn’t been born with that golden shine that made people listen, made the teachers laugh even when they cursed half the hallway.

They never had to survive. Not like him.

Peter turned his face to the floor. His cheek stuck to it. The runes pulsed again. That low thrum in the stone, constant now.

A whimper escaped his throat.

Footsteps scraped across the corridor outside.

Peter jolted, eyes wide, ears straining. He pressed himself tighter into the corner, as small as he could go.

“H-hello?” His voice cracked. “Who’s there?”

No answer.

The lock clicked. The door opened.

The figure stepped in, hood drawn low, face hidden.

Peter flinched. “Please… I didn’t-“

Still no reply. The figure raised a wand.

Peter’s breath caught. Something tugged behind his eyes, like a hook pulling memories from the back of his skull. His mouth opened, but no sound came.

And then it all came back.

The Burrow. Percy’s trunk, warm from sunlight. Scrabbling behind loose floorboards. School bags. Owl cages. Scabbers.

Before that…

Mud and rain. Cold fingers clutching a wand that wasn’t his.

That wand.

The one he’d picked up from the ruins. Still faintly warm.

He hadn’t dared use it. Just hid it. Deep, under stone, moss and bark, in a tree hollow north of the riverbend. Too far for dogs.

Then silence.

His breath seized. The memory held, frozen in place.

Peter’s lips moved. Nothing came out.

The figure flicked the wand again.

“Avada Kedavra.”

Green light filled the cell.

When it cleared, the door was swinging shut. The figure was gone.

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