to be some sort of- of scarlet
woman!"
Hermione stopped looking astonished and snorted with laughter. "Scarlet
woman?" she repeated, shaking with suppressed giggles as she looked around at
Ron.
"It's what my mum calls them," Ron muttered, his ears going red.
"If that's the best Rita can do, she's losing her touch," said Hermione, still giggling,
as she threw Witch Weekly onto the empty chair beside her. "What a pile of old
rubbish."
She looked over at the Slytherins, who were all watching her and Harry closely
across the room to see if they had been upset by the article. Hermione gave them a
sarcastic smile and a wave, and she, Harry, and Ron started unpacking the
ingredients they would need for their Wit-Sharpening Potion.
"There's something funny, though," said Hermione ten minutes later, holding her
pestle suspended over a bowl of scarab beetles. "How could Rita Skeeter have
known . . . ?"
"Known what?" said Ron quickly. "You haven't been mixing up Love Potions,
have you?"
"Don't be stupid," Hermione snapped, starting to pound up her beetles again. "No,
it's just. . . how did she know Viktor asked me to visit him over the summer?"
Hermione blushed scarlet as she said this and determinedly avoided Ron's eyes.
"What?" said Ron, dropping his pestle with a loud clunk.
"He asked me right after he'd pulled me out of the lake,"
Hermione muttered. "After he'd got rid of his shark's head. Madam Pomfrey gave
us both blankets and then he sort of pulled me away from the judges so they
wouldn't hear, and he said, if I wasn't doing anything over the summer, would I
like to -"
"And what did you say?" said Ron, who had picked up his pestle and was grinding
it on the desk, a good six inches from his bowl, because he was looking at
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Hermione.
"And he did say he'd never felt the same way about anyone else," Hermione went
on, going so red now that Harry could almost feel the heat coming from her, "but
how could Rita Skeeter have heard him? She wasn't there ... or was she? Maybe
she has got an Invisibility Cloak; maybe she sneaked onto the grounds to watch
the second task. ..."
"And what did you say?" Ron repeated, pounding his pestle down so hard that it
dented the desk.
"Well, I was too busy seeing whether you and Harry were okay to-"
"Fascinating though your social life undoubtedly is. Miss Granger," said an icy
voice right behind them, and all three of them jumped, "I must ask you not to
discuss it in my class. Ten points from Gryffindor."
Snape had glided over to their desk while they were talking. The whole class was
now looking around at them; Malfoy took the opportunity to flash POTTER
STINKS across the dungeon at Harry.
"Ah . . . reading magazines under the table as well?" Snape added, snatching up
the copy of Witch Weekly. "A further ten points from Gryffindor ... oh but of
course ..." Snapes black eyes glittered as they fell on Rita Skeeter's article. "Potter
has to keep up with his press cuttings. . . ."
The dungeon rang with the Slytherins' laughter, and an unpleasant smile curled
Snape's thin mouth. To Harry's fury, he began to read the article aloud.
"'Harry Potter's Secret Heartache. . . dear, dear. Potter, what's ailing you now? 'A
boy like no other, perhaps. . .'"
Harry could feel his face burning. Snape was pausing at the end of every sentence
to allow the Slytherins a hearty laugh. The article sounded ten times worse when
read by Snape. Even Hermione was blushing scarlet now.
"'. . . Harry Potter's well-wishers must hope that, next time, he bestows his heart
upon a worthier candidate.' How very touching," sneered Snape, rolling up the
magazine to continued gales of laughter from the Slytherins. "Well, I think I had
better separate the three of you, so you can keep your minds on your potions rather
than on your tangled love lives. Weasley, you stay here. Miss Granger, over there,
beside Miss Parkinson. Potter - that table in front of my desk. Move. Now."
Furious, Harry threw his ingredients and his bag into his cauldron and dragged it
up to the front of the dungeon to the empty table. Snape followed, sat down at his
desk and watched Harry unload his cauldron. Determined not to look at Snape,
Harry resumed the mashing of his scarab beetles, imagining each one to have
Snape's face.
"All this press attention seems to have inflated your already over-large head.
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Potter," said Snape quietly, once the rest of the class had settled down again.
Harry didn't answer. He knew Snape was trying to provoke him; he had done this
before. No doubt he was hoping for an excuse to take a round fifty points from
Gryffindor before the end of the class.
"You might be laboring under the delusion that the entire wizarding world is
impressed with you," Snape went on, so quietly that no one else could hear him
(Harry continued to pound his scarab beetles, even though he had already reduced
them to a very fine powder), "but I don't care how many times your picture
appears in the papers. To me. Potter, you are nothing but a nasty little boy who
considers rules to be beneath him."
Harry tipped the powdered beetles into his cauldron and started cutting up his
ginger roots. His hands were shaking slightly out of anger, but he kept his eyes
down, as though he couldn't hear what Snape was saying to him.
"So I give you fair warning, Potter," Snape continued in a sorter and more
dangerous voice, "pint-sized celebrity or not - if I catch you breaking into my
office one more time -"
"I haven't been anywhere near your office!" said Harry angrily, forgetting his
feigned deafness.
"Don't lie to me," Snape hissed, his fathomless black eyes boring into Harrys.
"Boomslang skin. Gillyweed. Both come from my private stores, and I know who
stole them."
Harry stared back at Snape, determined not to blink or to look guilty. In truth, he
hadn't stolen either of these things from Snape. Hermione had taken the
boomslang skin back in their second year - they had needed it for the Polyjuice
Potion - and while Snape had suspected Harry at the time, he had never been able
to prove it. Dobby, of course, had stolen the gillyweed.
"I don't know what you're talking about," Harry lied coldly.
"You were out of bed on the night my office was broken into!" Snape hissed. "I
know it. Potter! Now, Mad-Eye Moody might have joined your fan club, but I will
not tolerate your behavior! One more nighttime stroll into my office, Potter, and
you will pay!"
"Right," said Harry coolly, turning back to his ginger roots. "I'll bear that in mind
if I ever get the urge to go in there."
Snape's eyes flashed. He plunged a hand into the inside of his black robes. For one
wild moment. Harry thought Snape was about to pull out his wand and curse him -
then he saw that Snape had drawn out a small crystal bottle of a completely clear
potion. Harry stared at it.
"Do you know what this is. Potter?" Snape said, his eyes glittering dangerously
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again.
"No," said Harry, with complete honesty this time.
"It is Veritaserum - a Truth Potion so powerful that three drops would have you
spilling your innermost secrets for this entire class to hear," said Snape viciously.
"Now, the use of this potion is controlled by very strict Ministry guidelines. But
unless you watch your step, you might just find that my hand slips" - he shook the
crystal bottle slightly - "right over your evening pumpkin juice. And then. Potter . .
. then we'll find out whether you've been in my office or not."
Harry said nothing. He turned back to his ginger roots once more, picked up his
knife, and started slicing them again. He didn't like the sound of that Truth Potion
at all, nor would he put it past Snape to slip him some. He repressed a shudder at
the thought of what might come spilling out of his mouth if Snape did it... quite
apart from landing a whole lot of people in trouble - Hermione and Dobby for a
start - there were all the other things he was concealing . . . like the fact that he
was in contact with Sirius . . . and - his insides squirmed at the thought - how he
felt about Cho. ... He tipped his ginger roots into the cauldron too, and wondered
whether he ought to take a leaf out of Moody s book and start drinking only from a
private hip flask.
There was a knock on the dungeon door.
"Enter," said Snape in his usual voice.
The class looked around as the door opened. Professor Karkaroff came in.
Everyone watched him as he walked up toward Snape's desk. He was twisting his
finger around his goatee and looking agitated.
"We need to talk," said Karkaroff abruptly when he had reached Snape. He
seemed so determined that nobody should hear what he was saying that he was
barely opening his lips; it was as though he were a rather poor ventriloquist. Harry
kept his eyes on his ginger roots, listening hard.
"I'll talk to you after my lesson, Karkaroff," Snape muttered, but Karkaroff
interrupted him.
"I want to talk now, while you can't slip off, Severus. You've been avoiding me."
"After the lesson," Snape snapped.
Under the pretext of holding up a measuring cup to see if he'd poured out enough
armadillo bile, Harry sneaked a sidelong glance at the pair of them. Karkaroff
looked extremely worried, and Snape looked angry.
Karkaroff hovered behind Snape's desk for the rest of the double period. He
seemed intent on preventing Snape from slipping away at the end of class. Keen to
hear what Karkaroff wanted to say, Harry deliberately knocked over his bottle of
armadillo bile with two minutes to go to the bell, which gave him an excuse to
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duck down behind his cauldron and mop up while the rest of the class moved
noisily toward the door.
"What's so urgent?" he heard Snape hiss at Karkaroff.
"This," said Karkaroff, and Harry, peering around the edge of his cauldron, saw
Karkaroff pull up the left-hand sleeve of his robe and show Snape something on
his inner forearm.
"Well?" s