Chapter 149

After the night "show", seven in the morning, Snape and Nagini returned back to Hogwarts, but not alone, they were also followed by a kitten, who had to temporarily acquire a collar so that he would not be accidentally confused with a street kitten.

The wizard wasn't particularly worried about Witold's words, because he had everything under complete control: Bella was looked after by Tobby and he himself, Regulus, under the supervision of the school, and Jose was watching the Black house.

Severus, even at night, also contacted Shafiki and ordered: not to leave the store and turn on the defensive charms, which were updated and strengthened from last time, as for the McMillans, he personally met with them only once this entire year, so it is unlikely that the "Black Star" "will touch them at all, and in normal times they used owls for communication, sending them mainly at night so as not to attract much attention.

 The prince was ready to welcome uninvited guests, although he still doubted that Alegria would act so rudely, because he intended to first try to negotiate peacefully, so most likely he would begin the capture operation only after he received a negative answer, but just in case, Severus decided to prepare in advance, if suddenly the leader of the "Steel" branch gets something into his head and wants to start implementing his plan ahead of time.

 But still, after tonight, the Slytherin decided to change his plan a little, because earlier he intended to capture Witold's mind and through him get to the leader of the organisation, but now he had another idea, but the main goal, of course, still remains - to get the person wearing a mask.

No, he was not afraid of him.

 Yes, he possessed an interesting and, in certain hands, even a very dangerous artifact, but Snape doubted that he would even have the skills to simply approach him and take out a weapon or wand to attack, unless of course the power of this "unknown" is equal to " A "master" at the peak or a warrior at the same level, which of course was very difficult to imagine, but this possibility was not worth denying, because in the world of magic almost anything is possible.

---

Having put on a school robe and a pointed hat, the wizard left the room with the animal, leaving Nagini alone to sleep.

Walking out of the room three students were standing outside of his room, heeding them no attention. 

"Let's go," Snape patted the largest of them on the shoulder and headed towards the stairs. 

"Yes!" Having come to their senses and seeing that he was already a few metres ahead, three students quickly caught up with him and surrounded him in a "triangle" formation.

Severus himself had nothing against these three brothers and what he liked about them was their restraint and taciturnity.

They belonged to the Austin family, a pureblood family, but not part of the twenty-eight sacred pureblood families, since it had spent all its wealth and influence in the last century, and at the moment only these three remained alive, who one day, just came to him and said that they wanted to become his vassals and follow him. 

Of course, at first, Snape thought that these three were just spies from the Ministry or the Death Eaters, because it was too suspicious, but after examining their memories and checking just in case , whether they were "purged", everything turned out to be much simpler, these three were simply his fans. 

After all, a wizard, the same half-breed, much poorer than themselves, earned a fortune in a couple of months and almost all of Britain was talking about him, and this is not to mention the fact that he created a school subject from scratch and became the youngest potions master in Britain, and All this at the age of seventeen. 

Yes, they envied him like any other person, but the respect was much stronger, for this reason, the three brothers wanted to serve him, because the young people understood that they alone would not be able to return the former glory to the family, especially with their meagre minds, but having become vassals of a more powerful and richer man, and even headed by the same half-breed as them, the Slytherins were confident that they would definitely succeed. 

Besides them, of course, there were several more students who thought exactly the same, but some pursued completely different goals: wealth, fame, influence and much more.

 And at the moment, unofficially, three families have sworn allegiance to the Prince: the Austins, the Beckers and the Daumans. 

Snape himself was neither hot nor cold from this, although Nagini was a little amused by this, and the house elves, having learned that their master now had vassals, threw a real feast.

In the Slytherin living room, he met with Regulus and together they headed to the great hall...

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The next part of the day until lunch passed in a fairly calm atmosphere, although he was still a little annoyed by the fact that they were constantly pointing fingers in his direction, but nothing could be done about it, so the wizard simply ignored it. 

As for the kitten, since the very morning he had never seen it, which was very strange, but at the same time, Snape was glad that it did not cause problems and he could calmly go about his business.

And now, it was just lunch, after which he was going to go to Professor Slughorn and tell him about the new pet, in order to quickly get all the permits and he could calmly walk around the castle grounds. 

And as usual, sitting at the table, he chatted with Regulus, who had recently become much more open and acted more intelligently, and although it dawned on him that serving Voldemort was not a good idea, he did not give up his dream either but still the aristocrat agreed with the words of "Severus" that: until he leaves an heir, so as not to even think about such a dangerous "profession", although hearing that the "young man" choked on soup, but he understood his worries well, because if he dies, then there will simply be no one to continue the family line, since all the women of the family have been married or engaged for a long time, of course, not counting Bella, but knowing the character of his "teacher," the cousin's limbo will not last long.

 And now he was torn between serving the Dark Lord and his family. 

Although Snape tried, in the literal sense of the word, to knock all the "youthful maximalism" out of him, but everything was unsuccessful, so from that day on he did not raise this topic again, because he understood that until the "boy" got burned once, he would never realise. 

Therefore, at the moment, they were talking about magic, or more precisely, about the "Fire Whirlwind" spell, in which he succeeded quite well and almost without the help of a wizard, while trying not to touch upon the topic of Tom.

 But as they say, when you remember a ray, here comes the sun, and a woman's scream swept through the hall and all the students looked in surprise towards the teacher's table, or more precisely at Minerva McGonagall, who with a mixture of amazement and indignation, pursing her lips in displeasure, looked at the grey the kitten, who at that second was eating her lunch - a fish casserole, which she specifically asked the house elves to prepare this morning.

 All the students had difficulty holding back laughter at the sight of this picture, when the always strict lady simply did not know what to do and could only watch this animal, which had already eaten half of her lunch, and purse her lips.

"Whose cat is this?!" The vice-headmaster exclaimed with difficulty restraining her anger, looking at all the students with a cold gaze, and they, in turn, quickly hid their smiles and returned to dinner. 

"Well, well, calm down, Professor," Dumbledore said with a good-natured expression on his face, examining with slight interest the magical creature, the presence of which, to his sincere surprise, he did not feel at all, as if there was only an illusion in front of him, which confused the elderly wizard, of course, one would think that it was a simple Muggle kitten, but the way it emerged from the void immediately destroyed this theory.

"Hm?" squinting, he saw a thin collar on the baby's neck, on which were the initials "S. P.", and also on the reverse side - the slytherin sign and the headmaster almost immediately realised who the animal belonged to, because only one person in the slytherin house had such initials.

"Mr. Prince, you have a very interesting pet," lowering his glasses, with a grin. He looked at Snape.

"Thank you... " Severus nodded, getting up from the table, with a bit of embarrassment, "I beg your pardon, I wanted to write it down in my name after lunch…"

"Mister Prince, you...!" McGonagall exclaimed sternly, measuring the wizard with a stern look, from which any other student would have turned pale and was already drenched in cold sweat.

"Calm down, Professor, he didn't intentionally want to ruin your lunch, am I right?"

"Of course, why would I even do something like that?" Catching the headmaster's cheerful gaze, he nodded confidently again with a very serious face. "You see, so let's calm down and continue dinner," his soothing tone and good-natured smile almost instantly cooled the lady's ardour.

"Yes, Headmaster, but I still insist on punishment so as not to create precedents." 

"Let Professor Slughorn handle it then, what do you think about it?" 

"Fine."

 "Yes, Headmaster," the house head of Slytherin stood up and looked at Severus with a "stern" look, "Mr. Prince, after dinner I'm waiting for you at my place, and also in the next three days." After these words, almost all the Slytherins almost laughed out loud at such a "terrible" punishment, because everyone knew that "Severus" already spends all his evenings with the professor for additional classes, but the Gryffindor students openly gloated and laughed at the "snake", but the most joyful of course were the trio of idiots, the rest of the faculties remained almost completely neutral, although there were a couple of students who also laughed at him.

 At this, Minerva was slightly dissatisfied, but still nodded, agreeing with this "punishment", although, like the Slytherin students, she also knew about classes in the evenings and looked down at the kitten, who was simply eating her lunch all this time , she smiled slightly, although the woman did not openly admit it, but she was a cat lady and seeing this baby sweetly eating her lunch, she really wanted to pet and cuddle him, but she couldn't do it, McGonagall, didn't want to destroy my image of a "strict teacher." 

"Mister Prince, take your pet…"

"~ Meow…" the animal looked at the embarrassed witch and nodded to her, as if thanking her for the food, and then calmly jumped off the table and headed towards Snape, under the burning gaze of the entire female part of Hogwarts...

---

After lunch, the kitten, climbing onto Snape's shoulder, with a very satisfied face, licked its paw and ignored the looks of the students. 

"We shouldn't have taken you with us, you bring only problems," Snape muttered, sighing tiredly, because everything was just starting to get better, but no, again he found himself in the spotlight.

"Listen, do you have a name?" he looked at the animal, which puzzledly tilted its head to the side, as if not understanding what it meant, "This is what I will call you, for example, for breakfast, instead of - "hey" or "baby", I will call you , for example - "Tom". "

The kitten was not stupid and almost immediately understood what Severus meant and silently shook his head, since he had never even thought about it, because all his life he lived alone in the forest and he had no friends there, so that he was addressed by his first name.

" I understand you, do you want me to give you a name?"

"~Mrrr…" as if lost in thought, after a few seconds he nodded and looked expectantly at the man.

"Hmm... maybe "Glutton"?"

"~ Meow!"

"Why not? It suits you perfectly, I have a feeling that you have a real black hole in your stomach, because in the evening you ate as many as four fish, the size of you," noticing the unkind squint of the baby, he grinned, he still liked to anger this little one, after all, his dissatisfied face looked especially cute.

"Okay, okay, don't be angry, I'm joking, but what should I call you...?" and in his head, Severus began to go through the names of all the cats he knew from his past and this life,

"Maybe... "Lucky"?" as soon as this name came out of his mouth, the baby froze for a moment, which surprised Severus, because it was the first time he had seen such a reaction from him, "This word means lucky, because you are truly a real lucky one, to survive in that place and become so strong, not everyone could be strong," he explained, suggesting that the kitten simply did not know what this word meant.

" Meow!" Hearing his cheerful and joyful meow, Snape's face broke into a smile, not understanding where these strange feelings came from, but it seemed to him that this name was just perfect for this glutton.

 "Then... from this day on, you are "Lucky," patting the head of a rather closed Lucky, they continued towards the Slytherin living room, because before dinner, he wanted to continue working on the ritual and begin preparing for the quick strengthening of the core to the peak of the rank of "Master" "So that over the next three and a half years, it will stabilize and be able to withstand the breakthrough to the "Archmage"...

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