For Thine Is The Power

Chapter 7 For Thine Is The Power
a dark, angry expression, and instinctively he dropped the second biscuit back in and drew
his hands back to his chest, steadying the teacup when it began to quiver on its saucer.
Snape sighed slightly; after a moment his expression smoothed out to neutral blankness
again. Harry relaxed slightly, enough to sip his tea, although he could still feel the
man’s eyes on him.
“Potter.” The silky voice made him glance up again; the black eyes that met his
glittered strangely. “Go on.”
He blinked in confusion, and realized Snape was holding out a hand. Resting in the
palm were the two biscuits. “Are. . . you’re sure?”
Snape nodded curtly, tipping the pair into the hand Harry reached out uneasily. “Do
you wish more tea?” the man asked abruptly.
“Er—” Harry glanced into his teacup, debating with himself.
A hand closed on his teacup, making him start again. Thanks to Snape’s steadying
grip, the cup barely rattled. “I shall take that as a ‘yes’,” the man informed him. Taking the
cup out of Harry’s loose grasp, he filled it but then set it down on the small table instead of
giving it back. “You must take more potions shortly; you will want this to remove the taste
afterwards.”
“Waste of good tea,” Harry complained as he accepted the first vial from the potions
master.
Snape tapped his wand. “There is more where that came from.”
“Any luck?”
The Headmaster shook his head. “He is not downstairs in the kitchens or the dinining
room, and Molly has not seen him since lunch.”
Something in the Headmaster’s voice made Remus stop and look at him harder. “Is
something the matter?”
“Harry’s disappearance is insufficient?” Albus raised a hand and sighed, his other
hand coming up to rub his forehead, before Remus could reply. “There were a number of
Order members in the kitchen; I gathered that they had something of a confrontation with
Harry over breakfast.”
Remus groaned. “Just what he needed.”
Albus nodded shortly. Just then the two teenagers came around the corner; they
shook their heads in unison as they spotted Albus and Remus. “He’s not in the attic, not
unless he’s hiding in a crate or something,” Ron said.
“He is, similarly, not downstairs in the kitchen or dining room,” Albus reported. “I
even looked in on the old kitchen—Severus’s laboratory—but he was not there.”
“Did you ask if Snape had seen him?” Remus asked, thinking of his request to Harry
the night before.
Albus shook his head. “The door to the room he keeps was firmly closed, and he was
not in evidence; I presumed he was asleep and chose not to wake him.” To the two young
people he said as an explanation, “He was up the night brewing Harry’s potions.”
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