Chapter 6

The dungeons were rather draughty, not that Harry felt it. He'd cast a warming spell over himself to keep himself warm.

Still, as they waited for Draco's Godfather to come and admit them into the room, Hufflepuffs talked amongst themselves, while the Slytherins, who were similarly talking, tried to play off as cool and aloof.

However, the Slytherins kept casting looks at Harry and Draco. Subtle, they were not.

Personally, Harry put it down to them being first years, but there were two people from the Slytherin House that he was interested in.

While the two of them had given them curious looks, they weren't like the rest of the first years that looked disgusted just looking at Malfoy.

They were Blaise Zabini and Theodore Nott, whom Harry could see himself using.

Ron had, surprisingly, taken stance in front of Draco, blocking him from the views of the Slytherins, and though Draco appeared as if he couldn't care less, there was a slight fluctuation in his magic that made Harry smirk.

Not so surprisingly, the rest of the Hufflepuff first years took cue from Ron, subtly blocking Draco from view as well.

Draco gave them a tight nod, trying to come off as nonchalant, but there was the slightest tinge on his cheeks that gave him away.

Something inside Harry purred. They were already showing such House loyalty when they barely knew each other.

They would be all too easy to manipulate.

Harry didn't miss the intrigued looks on the Slytherin's faces, when they noticed that they were shielding Draco from their view.

After all, none of them knew each other. Well, the purebloods knew each other, but they didn't know the rest of them, which was why they were surprised at the protection Draco seemed to have garnered without doing anything.

Wisely, most of them backed off, but Harry kept an eye on some of them who seemed like they wouldn't, committing their faces to memory.

At this moment, Professor Snape glided down the stone cobbled path, appearing suddenly from behind the corner.

There wasn't a single sound to his footsteps, but Harry had felt him coming.

The man caused quite a few of them to jump as he suddenly spoke. "Inside."

Severus's magic quivered just the slightest bit in humour even as his face remained impassive as the first years jumped a foot at his sudden entrance.

Unfortunately, most of the upper years had gotten used to his entrance already, leaving him devoid of this amusement. He had to milk it where he could.

The first years quickly filed into the room, and Harry quickly claimed a table in the middle of the room, waving off Draco and Ron to get a table together.

Harry waved at Zabini, who stalled a little when he realized that he was the one being waved to.

The boy struggled with his curiosity as he maintained his pureblood mask, coming off as cool. At least, he came off as cool to everyone else other than Harry, who was able to discern what people were feeling through their magic.

Handy, that. Harry was rather using it a lot now, and he didn't think that anyone else could do it either. Otherwise, they would have done something about it – the purebloods hated to be caught unaware.

There was just half a step of hesitation before the Zabini confidently strode over, as if he meant to do it in the first place.

Under the watchful eyes of both Houses, Harry Potter and Blaise Zabini shared a potions table together.

Harry practically felt the curiosity in the room grow exponentially, but Harry just smiled at his new… partner, and he wondered if he should have gone into the Slytherin House in the first place.

The cores there were already rather dark, but none as dark as Blaise Zabini here. Harry was curious, and he wanted this boy here as one of his 'friends' to experiment with.

Zabini was about to speak, but the professor started talking.

He turned around, and his robe flared dramatically. His face severe as he talked about what Potions could do.

Harry listened with half an ear, instead electing to stare at the man's lovely core.

It was practically seeped in darkness, oozing it as it pulsed with his emotions. It was even darker than Lucius Malfoy's core.

Harry wondered how it would taste.

Other than that, there was something that puzzled him a little. There was a little strand of the man's magic that seemed to reach out to Harry's, which he couldn't for the life of him make sense of right now, but it didn't seem to do anything harmful. Harry would have felt it otherwise.

Severus started taking rollcall, his voice silky smooth, but devoid of much emotion, as if he couldn't wait for this class to end already.

"Harry Potter."

By the time he reached Harry's name, there was a visible change in the man's emotions, and his core practically came alive as his emotions flared.

Harry's finger twitched. "Here."

Severus opened his mouth as he was about to speak further, but Harry wasn't going to hold back anymore. More than anything, that core looked so appetizing that Harry almost felt as if he was salivating over it.

Harry's magic, unbeknownst to everyone else around him, stealthily reached out and brushed over the dark core. He didn't even have to mask his magic, sending it through the bond that their cores apparently had, causing Severus to choke back his words as the largest, most intrusive amount of sheer and utter pleasure coursed through his body.

By Merlin, the man was glad that his robes hid everything, or he would have been humiliated in front of a bunch of first years. Thankfully, his mask remained ever in place, and the man hurried through the rest of the names.

He only had the slightest pause, but none of the first years, bar one, noticed anything amiss.

Harry smirked inwardly, but his face only portrayed a wide-eyed innocence, like the rest of the Hufflepuffs.

But still, he hadn't managed to get the man's mask to crack just yet. Was it because he had that much control over himself, or was it because Harry wasn't doing enough?

Severus quickly turned around as he re-oriented himself, getting himself back into the proper state of mind.

'Merlin, what was that?' he couldn't help but think to himself. What in the world had overcome him?

With the amount of dark magic that washed over him, it felt like someone had been caressing his core, and in turn, sending vast amounts of pleasure throughout every nerve of his body.

In a room full of first years!

He would almost have suspected the Dark Mark, but the Dark Lord didn't do pleasure. He only doled out pain and punishment.

Hiding the precarious state of his body, Severus took up a piece of chalk and wrote on the board, only for his fingers to tighten on the chalk as the pleasure came again, just as intensely – no – more intensely than before.

Now, more than ever, Severus suspected that someone in the room was doing it. But who? And how?

The pleasure abruptly retreated, and the man had to steady himself as his body staggered a little. His breathing was slightly heavier than usual, but nothing that he couldn't hide.

Severus' dark eyes scanned over every child in the room, but he could see no way that they would be the ones doing something like this.

He knew all his Slytherins, and the pureblood Hufflepuffs. He had been stunned when Draco went into Hufflepuff – his father was rather in a snit about it, calling him to complain over supper yesterday.

If it wasn't the Slytherins, and it wasn't most of the Hufflepuffs, then…

Severus' eyes stopped on one bloody menace. Come to think of it, hadn't it first happened when he was about to talk after saying Potter's name?

Harry was rather entertained watching the man try and hide his reactions. It was just as amusing as it had been watching Lucius Malfoy hide his reactions in front of the goblins and other wizards.

He took an inordinate amount of pleasure in it, but he couldn't be more pleased. The mask might not have broken, but there were the faintest traces of hairline fractures that he could see.

For now, Harry didn't do anything else. He met the professor's eyes calmly, innocently. The glare that the man gave him would have sent a real first year into tears.

Severus looked at the boy suspiciously, but he had to carry on with the class in the end lest anyone seem to catch on.

By the end of the class, Severus was more than ready to just collapse there and then. There hadn't been any other pleasurable feelings, but he felt disgusting. He would have to change his clothes before he did anything else.

Severus sent the first years out of his room with a thunderous look on his face. Things hadn't happened like he'd expected at all!

Outside the room, Draco shouldered his bag with a strange expression on his face. "He was being weird."

"Weird how?" Ron raised a brow. From everything he heard from his brothers, this was the man's normal.

"Well… I don't know. He's just not like that usually," Draco said with a confused expression. "There was something off."

Harry smothered any amusement from showing on his face. The man probably needed to change his clothes as soon as possible. Well… his pants at least.

-

Dumbledore didn't know where it all started going wrong.

He sucked on a lemon drop to fend off the headache now. While he would usually have asked Severus for a headache potion, the man had been in a terribly foul mood for the entirety of the day, and he had no reason why.

Why, just during dinner earlier, Severus' face looked like he was about to murder whoever talked to him next, and no one dared to talk to him.

While Dumbledore would have spoken to him had he been his normal, genial self, the headache was truly a menace, and he just knew that speaking to the acerbic man at with it would make it worse.

So, no, Dumbledore nursed his headache, waiting for it to pass. The lemon drops made it better, anyhow, laced in calming potion as they were.

The reason for his headache was the one and only Harry Potter.

It was only the second day, yet things had already started unravelling. Just why? Just how?

Why was Harry Potter a Hufflepuff?

What he needed was a brave, foolish Gryffindor that listened to orders, not a meek Hufflepuff!

The damned muggles must have beaten on him too hard, causing him to become completely meek instead.

Dumbledore's anger started to boil, but nothing uncontrollable. It was just a low flame; with the calming potions he was taking, there was no way it could be anything big.

They must have actually, physically hit him instead of just verbally and mentally abusing him.

Dumbledore seethed at the unexpected kink in his plans.

Not only that, the headmaster had to hastily rearrange his plans for every year because the damn boy had gone into Hufflepuff instead of Gryffindor.

How else could he ensure that the boy thought of Slytherins as the scum of the earth? He surely wouldn't think that with almost all his classes with Ravenclaw!

'It's alright,' Dumbledore calmed himself down. 'Everything's fine. I can rework this.'

Though, there was something about the boy that niggled at this mind. Something that felt suspiciously like… no.

The calming potion on the lemon drops must have expired, that's what it was. There was no way the boy was anything like Tom Riddle.

Calming himself down, Dumbledore stroked his phoenix, sighing. He took off his half-moon spectacles, rubbing his eyes.

The headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry pulled on his fluffy, woollen socks, then lay down on his bed.

He would have to call Harry to him to put his mind at ease.

Tomorrow.