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Harry stared up at his Head of House, wondering what the penalty was for getting caught raiding the kitchen and out after hours in one's first week of school. Probably fairly dire, he decided, while the rest of his brain was busy working on a decent excuse and coming up empty.

Snape's eyes drifted down to the basket he was carrying.

"Stealing sweets?" he asked, raising an eyebrow. Harry felt his insides wither a bit.

"The house-elves gave them to me," Harry said, and then, desperately and possibly stupidly, reached inside. "Er...apple?"

"You, Mr. Potter, are out of dormitory after hours," Snape said darkly, accepting the offered apple and considering it, long pale fingers turning it over and over in his palm.

"Yes, sir," Harry agreed, thinking frantically.

"In the kitchens, which are not -- strictly speaking -- a permitted area for students, especially first-years."

"Yes, sir."

"Have you had enough time to formulate an appropriate lie?"

Harry stared up at him. "Nearly, sir," he blurted.

Snape gave him a slightly sardonic smile.

"You will not get far in this world, Harry, if you cannot lie convincingly. I am sure your godfather has taught you as much, though perhaps not as explicitly," Snape continued. "I hope you have risked a somewhat severe punishment for an appropriate purpose."

Harry bridled a little at the mention of Sirius, which, as always, was spoken in a somewhat belittling tone. "Would you like the lie first or the truth first, sir?" he asked.

The smile broadened just slightly. "The lie first, if you please."

"I found a valuable dish in Theodore's trunk and was bringing it back before it got broken, and the house-elves gave me a reward," Harry said, feeling that for a twenty-two second excuse it was rather a good one.

"Incriminating a rival, performing a good deed, and excusing your theft. A decent beginning. The truth now, if you please."

Harry bowed his head. "We were going to meet Neville in the infirmary and bring him a treat."

"We?"

"I -- "

"We, Harry?"

"Draco and Padma and me," Harry said wretchedly. "But it was my idea -- "

"I'm certain it was," Snape drawled. "While your originality is laudable, your purpose is questionable. Bringing a reward to the boy who blew up your first assignment?"

"We rather felt the boils and your shouting were punishment enough for that," Harry answered, looking up defiantly. Snape met his gaze easily, and Harry knew if they got into a staring contest, here and now, he would lose badly. Snape's cool, dark eyes gave nothing away.

"Five points from Slytherin for an unconvincing lie and another five for having abominable timing. Run along then," he said finally. Harry tightened his grip on the basket.

"What?"

"If you're caught by Filch you've only yourself to blame," Snape said, and turned, continuing down the corridor, robes billowing, apple still in his hand. Harry was left standing outside the kitchens entrance, dumbly staring after him.

Then, before Snape could change his mind, he ran.

***

Minerva McGonagall's quarters, like most of the Heads of House, were not too far from her House dormitories, Gryffindor Tower. On the one hand, her windows afforded a truly splendid view of the wilderness around the school grounds; on the other, the trade-off was a three and, depending on the castle's mood, sometimes a four-storey climb to get there.

She also shared a wall with the narrow stairwell that led to the roof, one of the few access points in the castle, hidden behind a painting of Galileo. Few people knew it was there and even fewer knew the password, so when she heard the portrait-door open, squeaking slightly, she pulled her robes on and peered outside. She heard light, swift footsteps on the stairs, as the portrait swung shut.

Probably some seventh years climbing up for a reunion tryst after a summer apart. Well, they could bloody well have their reunion somewhere other than the roof over her head. She found her wand and stuffed it into her pocket, locking her door behind her.

"Password, magistra?" Galileo asked.

"Eppur si muove," she said, and he bowed and swung open.

She climbed quietly to the roof, putting her head out the open trapdoor. A single dark shadow sat on the tiles, legs bent, elbows on knees. A little too well-grown to be a student, a little too thin to be anyone other than Severus Snape.

"Severus?" she asked curiously. He turned to her, the three-line mark on his cheekbone livid on his pale face, a souvenier of his part in the battle with Peter Pettigrew.

"I'm on your roof," he said, voice carefully even.

"Yes, although I confess you're the last person I expected to find here."

He had an apple. Curiouser and curiouser.

"Are you all right, Severus?"

"Quite," he answered shortly, and neatly cut a slice from the apple, eating it with tidy grace.

"Er...you're not going to fling yourself off the roof, are you?" she asked carefully. She was aware that she wasn't well-known for her tact, but tact, she felt, was highly overrated when one wasn't dealing with employers or foreign governments.

He snorted. "If I intended to kill myself I'd be much more efficient about it than this."

"Good to know, I suppose," she answered, sitting on the edge of the trap. He offered her a slice of the apple, and she accepted delicately. She waited; she found silence was usually as effective as active interrogation. It had worked on Severus when he was a student, anyway. And the night he'd come to her, before Voldemort's fall, asking for her help, though never explicitly.

He drew a breath, and ate another slice of apple, transfigured knife glinting in the moonlight.

"Have you ever..." he began, then sighed and started over. "The boy troubles me."

"Harry?"

"Who else?"

She was silent again.

"He is...very like his father. And yet at the same time, completely unlike."

"I think perhaps he's unlike what you thought of his father."

He gave her a sharp look. She shrugged. "You hated James, and he hated you. There's no secret in that. You don't hate Harry."

He didn't answer.

"Are you going to stay up here all night?"

"I'm not a student, you know, you can't give me detention for it."

"Well, if you're going to catch cold up here alone, at least try not to clatter about too much. Some of us sleep when it gets dark."

He nodded, once, and pitched the core of his apple off the roof. She descended the stairs, said a polite goodnight to Galileo, and returned to her rooms. If he did move, he was suitably silent about it; she heard nothing else before she fell asleep that night.

***

Harry arrived at the infirmary wing breathless and nearly ran into Draco, coming from the opposite direction.

"Kitchen -- house-elves -- hats," he gasped. Draco stared at him. Harry leaned against the wall, catching his breath.

"Padma's on her way, I saw her on the stairs," Draco said. "This is exciting, isn't it? Mrs. Norris was after me, but I doubled around the statue of the dog on the second floor, you know, the snarly one -- " he made fangs out of his fingers, holding them up to his mouth. "Then when she came up I jumped out and growled at her -- you should have seen her run. I'm sure she's got Filch scouring the second floor."

"She has," Padma said, as she arrived, so suddenly that Draco jumped. "I watched him from the third-floor for a bit -- nearly got caught myself."

Harry opened his mouth to gasp out something about Snape catching him, then remembered Snape's gaze, telling nothing and asking nothing, and he closed his mouth again.

"Now..." Padma said softly, peering through the crack between the infirmary door and the frame, "...we just need to know where Madam Pomfrey is..."

She fell backwards with a yelp as the door opened, and only Draco's quick hand over her mouth kept the sound from carrying; Neville stood on the other side, holding the door.

"Come inside," he whispered. "Madam Pomfrey's gone for the night, she said, since I'm not in any danger."

"Then why are we whispering?" Draco asked.

"Because it's fun?"

Harry gave Draco a light shove into the infirmary, and followed the rest of them. They arranged themselves on Neville's bed, and Harry began unpacking the food. Draco beamed with pleasure when the little wizard's hats were set out on one of the napkins, and Padma took the chocolate with quiet grace; Neville sliced the bread with a quick charm (shredding one of the blankets in the process, though Padma fixed it so that you almost couldn't tell) and buttered the slices, while Harry unpacked the apples.

"It's brilliant, isn't it?" Neville asked, biting into a large slice of buttered bread. "This, I mean. You going to show us how to get into the kitchens, Harry?"

"I'm not sure I should," Harry answered, rather wanting to keep the painting-entrance a secret. "We're not supposed to be in there."

"Imagine if someone had caught you!" Padma shivered delightedly. Harry, thinking reservedly of Snape's closed, expressionless eyes, said nothing.

Talk turned to a general discussion of the castle's twists and turns: Neville's difficulty discerning doors from walls with vivid imaginations, Padma's struggles with a particularly cranky bookshelf in the library, which Harry advised she try quoting Shakespeare at before taking down a book, and Draco's adulation of the Hufflepuff dormitory, which let out through a little stairway from the cellars into a small walled garden where his House ghost, the Fat Friar, could often be found wandering.

"He's an expert on Hogwarts history," Draco said, eating the brim off of a marzipan hat. "Well, he was when he was alive, and that was hundreds of years ago, so he's been hanging about since then and keeping current."

"He seems nice," Harry agreed. "The Bloody Baron's not much of a help with anything, he just wanders around being creepy. Theo Nott says it adds atmosphere."

"I asked Nearly Headless Nick how the Baron got bloody," Neville put in, scratching his arms. "He said he never asked. I think the other ghosts are scared of him."

"Peeves certainly is," Harry agreed.

"You lived with Muggles, Harry, what are Muggle ghosts like?" Padma asked. Harry shrugged.

"Never met a Muggle ghost. They aren't all that common. There's lots of stories about them, but you almost never see one. Lots of Muggles think they don't exist."

"Weird," Neville said.

"That's Muggles for you," Draco said, a trifle contemptuously.

"They're not so bad," Neville said. "My 'dopted dad Ted's Muggleborn, you know."

"Well, Muggleborn," Draco answered, sneering a little. "I'm talking out and out non-magical Muggles."

"Some of them are awful," Harry agreed, thinking of the Dursleys, now not much more than a distant bad memory. "But they're a nice enough lot on the whole. They have to do a lot more work than we do, you know."

"Is it true you can ride a bicycle?" Draco asked.

"Sure, it's not hard once you get the trick of it. Sirius taught me."

"Ever been on a broomstick?"

Harry hunched down a little, and was grateful for Snake, twining around his neck affectionately. "Once," he said softly. "The day Peter Pettigrew attacked me."

Neville's hand drifted up to his own collarbone, and his matching scar. The four of them shared a quiet moment lost in their own thoughts, before Draco shrugged.

"I never have. Mum said it was dangerous and a sloppy way to travel, besides. Then again she thinks that about every way to travel," he added.

"Malfoy, don't take this the wrong way, but your mum's a nut," Neville said flatly.

"Yeah," Draco agreed. "She is, a bit. Anyway," he said hurriedly, "You've been on a broomstick Neville, haven't you? And Padma has."

"I've fallen off of them quite a lot," Neville grinned. "Flying's all right, but it's no great shakes if you ask me. I like the Underground much better."

Harry sat quietly, listening to the others talk. Of course he had been thrilled to get the Nimbus 2000 as a gift; it was the best broomstick out there, and everyone knew it. What he hadn't considered was that broomsticks were meant for flying on. The last time he'd been on a broomstick, he'd been chased down and slashed by Peter Pettigrew -- and Sirius had nearly died.

"You play Quidditch at all?" Draco asked Neville, who shrugged.

"Dora and I throw around a Quaffle once in a while," he said casually. "You, Padma?"

"Nah," Padma said. "That's Parvati's game. I like football."

"Football? That's a Muggle sport, isn't it?" Neville asked.

"Yeah. S'brilliant," Padma said, picking up an apple and biting into it to clear out the sugary taste in her mouth.

"Only one ball though," Harry put in. "You can't use your hands, see."

"Yep. You pass it around with your feet, and try to kick it through the goalposts. Have you played, Harry?"

The conversation devolved into the comparative merits of football versus Quidditch, with Harry in the middle; he kept silent, still considering the fact that next week was their first flying lesson, and he'd have to decide whether or not he wanted to sign up. Flying meant Quidditch, which was brilliant; Harry had fond memories of throwing fake Bludgers for the Weasley twins and going to school games with Professor Snape -- the taste of sweet roasted nuts the professor had bought for him, the roar of the crowd, the fascinating speed with which the game was played.

But he also remembered the terrible moment when Peter's curse had hit his broomstick, the fall to the ground and Remus' panicked heartbeat as he ran with Harry in his arms for safety. The splintered remains of his racing broom tumbling out of the sack Alastor Moody carried, and the frightened, closed looks on the adults' faces.

"Guess we should be going," Padma said, when the food was mostly gone. "Bet it'll be a lot harder to sneak back into the dorms than it was to sneak out."

"Might be, but everyone's gone to bed by now, I imagine," Draco yawned. "Have fun at breakfast tomorrow, I'm going to sleep all day."

"We should have a study group," Padma said, and the boys all groaned. "Well, we should. We're in all the same classes, just at different times, and it'd be loads more helpful to have four brains working on things than just one."

"Is that an offer to do my homework for me?" Harry asked with a grin; Padma stuck out her tongue. "All right, why don't we meet in the library after dinner."

"I'll do your Transfigurations for you if you write my Herbology essay," Draco offered, as they cleaned up the apple cores, bits of marzipan, and stray breadcrusts, and Harry tucked the basket under Neville's bed. He had a feeling the house-elves would come for it on their normal cleaning rounds, but if not, Neville could always bring it back to him tomorrow.

"Nah, I'd better do it myself," Harry sighed. "Might beg a few hints off you, though."

"Some Slytherin you are," Padma teased. "Won't even cheat when someone offers to do your homework for you for real."

Harry lifted his nose in the air, haughtily. "Ambition requires knowledge," he replied, trying to sound like Professor Snape and only managing to sound as though he had a mild sore throat. Padma was prevented from replying by their emergence into the hallways again. They all stood there for a moment, studying their shoes, and then broke off to go their separate ways.

Professor Snape's door was closed, when Harry passed it on his way to the dormitory, but it looked as though there were candles lit. He considered knocking on the door, to ask why he had been let go and to...say thank-you, or that he hadn't been caught by Filch. He remembered Snape's words about time, however, and waiting for the proper moment; instead he withdrew to the Slytherin dormitory, where his fellow students were fast asleep, Crabbe snoring and Blaise mumbling about lemons and quilts in his dreams.

***

"Oh, Merlin," Andromeda sighed.

"What is it?" Ted asked, as he set the breakfast table. Remus and Sirius, who had their own kitchen but seemed to prefer the Tonks', looked up from their preparation of breakfast itself. A brown Hogwarts owl had swooped in the open window and dropped a letter on the table for Andromeda, flapping to the perch to share Hedwig and Boudicca's water dish. Andromeda had slit open what appeared, from the spidery handwriting on the front, to be a letter from Neville. "Neville's gone and landed in the infirmary," she announced.

"Infirmary?" Sirius asked, eating a slice of apple. Remus stole the rest of them from the bowl under his hand, and mixed in some bananas on his way to making a fruit salad.

"Yes...boils in Potions class," Andromeda sighed. "He isn't any good at cooking, I did worry about him in Potions."

"The boy could burn tea," Ted agreed, pouring himself a cup as he spoke. "I worry about him in every class. Smart as a whip, you know, but not in your regular conventional schooling ways."

"He always forgets when to put the ingredients in," Andromeda said. Then she nearly choked on a sip of tea. "Not to worry however as Harry has come to see me with Draco and Padma and he left Snake to keep me company and he says he's going to come back this evening because he knows where the kitchens are," she read aloud. "Sirius, your godson is corrupting the boy."

"Sounds to me like he's feeding him up," Sirius answered. "Not to mention teaching him run-on sentences. Did you tell him where the kitchens are?" he asked Remus, who froze in the middle of a bite of banana. "You did!"

"We knew early enough, and I never saw you yelling at Persephone Wellwright for telling us," Remus protested.

"I do hope Harry won't get into trouble for that," Andromeda said. "I suppose if you get a letter from the Headmaster you'll know."

Sirius sank into his chair at the table and rested his head in his hands. "I thought Dumbledore was done yelling at us when we graduated, and then I was sure he was done yelling at us when we moved to Wales..."

"He's certainly a product of your parenting," Ted said with a grin. "Oh, dish me some of that -- lovely, thank you Remus."

Remus set a bowl of the fruit salad in front of Ted and one near Sirius' elbow. He glanced at Andromeda, who shook her head. "He's all right though -- Neville I mean -- isn't he?" he asked.

"Oh, he seems cheerful enough," Andromeda answered. "Then again it's very hard to tell with Neville. He seems to take everything so lightly -- I don't know if it's to keep us from worrying, or because he really doesn't care that he's spent the night in the infirmary."

"Well, obviously Harry's looking out for him," Sirius said approvingly.

"That's true, though I think Harry narrowly missed the same fate, Neville says here they were partners," Andromeda said. "Ted, perhaps we ought to get him some sort of educational aide."

"Like a tutor?" Ted asked. "It's only been a week..."

"I was thinking more like a study guide of some sort. Oh -- perhaps a Remembrall. That'd be useful, wouldn't it? He could keep it with him when he's brewing potions and then if he forgets to add something it'll tell him straight off."

"Never thought those were very useful," Sirius said. "Now, a thing that tells you what you've forgotten -- "

"Desk calendar," Remus murmured.

" -- that'd be much more handy." Sirius took on a thoughtful look, as he meditated on the subject. "I'll bet it wouldn't even be that difficult. You'd have to modify the charms a bit, but the essential spell's already on the thing."

Remus saw the look in Sirius' eyes, and sighed. "Shall I pick up a handful when I go out, and you can have fun blowing them up while you try?" he asked.

"I almost never blow anything up," Sirius replied haughtily.

"Going shopping, are you?" Ted asked. "Pick up one for our Neville, then, we've an account at most of the shops in Diagon Alley."

"Job shopping," Remus answered with a smile. "But I'm bound to go into quite a few shops at any rate, so it's no trouble."

"Looking for a job?" Andromeda asked. "Surely you don't actually need one?"

Sirius growled, and Remus grinned at him. "No, not really -- I've my savings from the past few years, which comes to a remarkably tidy sum when one isn't paying rent, but I like to keep busy."

"And your...condition?" Ted asked delicately. "It doesn't harm your chances?"

"Considerably, but then I'm fortunate in that I don't have to take the first job that comes along," Remus said, watching Sirius -- who had once nearly strangled him for starving himself when he couldn't find regular work. "Working as a shop attendant, you know, the hours vary. If all else fails I'll rob Sirius and start a new bookshop."

Sirius dropped his eyes to his breakfast, face carefully blank. "Dunno that I want another one," he said. "When Sandust burned..."

Silence settled over the table, until Remus finally rubbed his forehead and spoke again. "I'll pick up a Remembrall for Neville and a few for Sirius, and if the charm works he'll have the most unique little toy in school. Any other errands need running?"

"Oh -- I have a few things, if you're going by the grocer's," Andromeda said, rising to find the shopping list in the kitchen.

"Oi, Pads," Remus said softly. Sirius looked up at him. "You alright?"

"Useless worry. Must be turning into you," Sirius said, with a small grin, as Remus ate a grape and smiled back.

He returned from his expedition that day with three job applications and half a dozen Remembralls. He said the cost of the things was outrageous, but one of the applications was to Schaeffer's Scholars' Emporium where he'd purchased them, and they weren't the only items in the sack he carried up to the attic. While Sirius happily poked the Remembralls with his wand, muttered reverse-engineering incantations, and ran down to pilfer textbooks from Nymphadora's now-abandoned bookshelf, Remus quietly unpacked bookmarks that told you which page had that quote you wanted to reference, a packet full of sugar-quills to send to Harry, and a set of architecturally-shaped blocks which stuck to each other in whatever order you placed them and changed shape on request.

By the time he'd finished a rather good model of the Pantheon, complete with little statues, Sirius had blown up three of the Remembralls, lacerated himself twice, and gone downstairs again for some of Dora's leftover costume jewelery for some insane reason Remus couldn't fathom. He was just starting on the job applications when Sirius let out a whoop, and a few loose bricks in the Pantheon came undone.

"What've you done now?" Remus inquired, wondering if it was permissible to list one's landlord as a character reference. A small, glittering object arced through the air and he caught it, reflexes moving before his conscious mind had time to think. It turned out to be a little marble, much smaller than a normal Remembrall, with red mist just beginning to fill the centre.

"I kept trying to shrink it without actually thickening the glass any," Sirius said. "but it's all right, because the thick glass magnifies the projection -- see?" he held up another small marble-sized object, and pointed it at the wall. In hazy red letters, the words Your Anniversary appeared.

"Did I forget our anniversary?" Sirius asked.

"I didn't realise we had one," Remus replied. "Would you like one?"

"Not really."

"Me either."

Sirius shook his head. "The point is, what's the good of a Remembrall for Potions if you have to pick it up every time you think you've forgotten something? This way -- "

"Oh blast, I was supposed to get eggs for Andromeda," Remus exclaimed, looking down at where the red light was spreading across his palm.

"Moony, do pay attention."

"Deepest apologies, Padfoot," Remus said, setting the marble carefully in the centre of the pantheon and folding his hands to look up at Sirius. "You were saying."

"Quite. This way, see, I've put it on a chain..." he demonstrated, popping the little marble into a rather industrial-looking chain bracelet with one badly bent-out link, "It's always touching his hand and all he has to do is look down and it'll tell him what he's forgotten."

He strapped the chain around his wrist, and the smaller words "Haircut 1pm" appeared on the back of his hand. "Bugger, it's past one already, isn't it."

"It's a good idea, though I think the temptation to use it during one's final exams might be a bit much," Remus observed. "Still, can't hurt to send it to him, and if it's taken away, well, at least we tried."

"Trust Snape to spoil our fun from a hundred miles away," Sirius said, unstrapping the chain. "I'll throw in a note to be careful with it. Let's go show Andromeda," he continued, as excited as any child with a new toy. Remus gave him an indulgent smile and followed him downstairs, pocketing the other miniature Remembrall as he did so. It was difficult to imagine Sirius as an inventor of educational toys...and yet it would be an awfully interesting thing to demonstrate when he turned in his job application.

As he descended the stairs he heard Andromeda laugh with pleasure and Ted's dismayed groan of "I was sure I'd remembered that!"

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