Statues are always getting smashed—like Hogwarts' fawning Gregory the Smarmy.
Since there's a secret passage behind it, careless little wizards have cast more repair charms on that statue than they can count.
And just now, Professor Snape is much the same: shaking off a long, sullen standstill to watch the little wizard who's broken it.
But sometimes, silence is relative.
Snape's shadowed eyes were frigid; Sean, oblivious, felt a flicker of excitement.
He lit the cauldron with practiced ease, then carefully plucked ingredients from the glass cabinet of oddly shaped specimens.
A white slip of paper lay tucked inside Advanced Potion-Making, soon veiled by rising steam.
"Ingredient prep… heat… stirring… ritual…"
Sean ran through every note in his head—steps and details he'd refined again and again.
It is this scientific, quantifiable approach that lets him reliably brew Adept-grade potions—and today, the quality of his Scalp Tonic might rise again.
That alone fired him up.
"If you have any brains left, Sean Green—handle that dried nettle with care and add it the moment the bubbles just begin—"
Snape cut in.
Before he finished, Sean dropped the dried nettle into the bubbling cauldron—and, beside him, the Quick-Quotes Quill scribbled the point down—apparently unfazed by the sneer.
Snape's grim gaze faltered a fraction, but lightning cracked outside and his voice returned with it:
"Fool—do you not know that more than two and a half counter-clockwise stirs will leave this potion worse than the grime in your cauldron?!"
Sean stopped stirring at once, counted seconds, and added the slugs.
When mockery meets no response, the dungeon holds only filtered rain and the delicate clink of Sean's spoon.
Snape's barbs dwindled to the occasional icy "correction."
Until—
"It's time—"
Sean's eyes gleamed. Libatius Borage's revised ritual is a complete arc: laid in from the first simmer, but only at the end do its hidden threads pull tight.
The brew was at its crux; now every tiny motion in the ritual could swing the potion's quality wildly.
As Sean spoke the incantation and traced the signs—
Snape's pupils tightened. He strode forward, black robes billowing like thunderheads, and in a heartbeat stood over the cauldron.
In his broad hand, two slips of parchment were clenched tight—yet not creased at all: they'd been layered with protective charms.
Sean, lost in the work, didn't notice.
He was once more the wizard hunched over Scalp Tonic, the tide of feeling lifting him clear and showing him the faint currents of magic—
Yes—
He felt the shift in the cauldron's power, sensed how to guide it into a cleaner fusion—and bring the potion home.
But the storm in the dungeon roared as fiercely as the one outside.
Snape stared into those green eyes, at that achingly familiar method:
"Where did you learn this?!"
[You have brewed a Scalp Tonic to expert standard. Proficiency +50]
The system's prompt and Snape's strangled growl hit at once—so hard Sean jumped.
"Have a Fiesta in a Flask!, Professor."
Sean couldn't fathom the fury.
"Give me the slip."
Snape's voice scraped out of his throat.
Sean slid a neat strip from Advanced Potion-Making—the one with the heat notes.
At its outermost edge, almost invisible,
a pale "3" was written.
Noticing it, Sean flicked a glance at the slip he'd taken from Have a Fiesta in a Flask!.
On it, a faint "2."
In the dim light, Snape's expression was unreadable. Rain hammered the dungeon so hard Sean could barely tell if the professor was murmuring—if he was speaking at all.
"Sean Green, get out of my dungeon—now! At once!"
His anger felt decades deep.
Sean sensed the menace and turned to go—
—but a slip fluttered from Advanced Potion-Making.
He froze with it in hand, meeting a murderously cold stare.
"Idiot! Get out!"
Sean clutched the slip and ran; even so, he eased the door shut.
What had just happened?
What did those numbers mean?
The number of people who knew?
If Snape knew the heatwork notes, who was the second who knew them?
And why did he—or she—not have the ritual?
Sean's questions beaded like rain on a Gothic window, then streamed down into a riddle that seeped into the stone.
In the dungeon:
Chill walls sweated perpetual damp, laced with the bitter, sharp reek of old ingredients—an air that belonged to Severus Snape alone.
He hunched behind the great black oak desk like a bat in a cleft of rock. Staring at slips of paper was all that was left to do.
In Advanced Potion-Making, two slips lay together—marked "1" and "3."
The missing slip held the only days he'd ever glimpsed bright sun—the secret he once… guarded with another.
In Have a Fiesta in a Flask!, the slips read "1" and "2."
This shrinking of the number came from his mistake, and his alone…
His fingers slackened a fraction; the paper didn't bend, but the motion was slow with fatigue.
His gaze fixed on the missing one—as if through the wall he could see that long-ago rainy night—and the break.
Hatred and a wordless, tearing rage crashed together in his chest.
He heard the word again—the sin he could never atone for.
The past closed its fingers round his throat like a ghost.
He'd thought he would clutch that slip forever—until that fool blundered in.
His face was complicated.
He knew the notes would be found by the next hand…
Truth does not die—
no more than love or hate.
…
In the corridor, torchlight glinted off suits of armor.
A squat, chubby knight bustled between portraits, now and then knocking a witch's goblet askew to earn a swat from a bouquet.
Sir Cadogan muttered, unbothered:
"Aha—thought the old tale would never change. He's clung to hate so long he forgot he once loved potions.
"And now a new, faint tale's begun—hope, they all say…"
As Sean swept past,
a figure under a thundercloud of mood appeared before him.
Snape again—Sean tensed.
Those dark eyes caught a glint of green.
"Every Thursday, the three days after—I want you in the dungeon. Don't make me regret this."