Chapter the Fifth: …and Begins Losing his Mind

Disclaimer: I don’t get paid for this, so please don’t charge me.

Warning: You never know when a chapter may be nominated for the Tomato Soup Award. (Somewhere in my body of work is an explanation of that reference, but suffice to say ‘tis better to eat AFTER reading.)

Things had gone about as well as could be expected at first—which is to say, rather poorly.

“Well, boy, this appears to be your room,” Severus said when Wormy landed them safely at home. He had to peer out the window to confirm by the view that this was, indeed, the top floor of his tower. It now resembled nothing so much as a magical toy store.

“’Tisn’t my room. My room is at home with Mummy,” Draco sulked.

Severus sincerely hoped that was a general reference to sharing a house with Mummy and not a room—or worse, a bed. He then proceeded to have a silent panic attack lest the child would decide that he needed company in order to go to sleep. If that were the case... would Wormy suffice?

“Would that were still true. As things stand, you are contractually bound to remain here until you are a fully qualified master of the art of Potions-making," Severus said. He even quelled his anxiety enough to keep his voice in the proper octave.

“When will that be?” Draco asked. He craned his slender neck to look at an animated clock literally crawling with unicorns, dragons, and other gilt-and-enamel figures. Severus made a mental note to have the thing relegated to some distant store room at the earliest opportunity, unless he could successfully hock it.

“You may not stand for examinations until you are one and twenty years of age. If you are a quick study—”

“YEARS? How many is that from now?” The child’s voice changed from a sulk to shrill panic in an instant.

“Fourteen,” Severus answered. He immediately managed to wonder three things simultaneously: one, what manner of maths had the boy been taught; two, what manner of insanity-producing substance he had been brewing when he had agreed to take on an apprentice for a minimum of a decade and change; and three, whether he would ever regain his hearing.

Draco’s screech set the windowpanes quaking in their frames. Severus felt certain that the crystal animals in the spinning mobile cracked, along with his eardrums. “No! No no no no no no no no no! I want to go HOME, NOW!”

“SILENCE!” Severus roared, quite a bit more loudly than even Draco at the whiniest height of his vocal powers. Draco cowered, sobbing. Severus felt a slight twinge of guilt—but mostly of laryngitis. He wondered how the brat managed to scream so without splitting his own throat. “Ahem. Believe me when I say that nothing would please me more. However, your father and mother prevailed upon me to enter into a binding contract, and we must both make the best of it.”

“M-mu-mummy w-wanted to send m-me away?”

A softer being would have broken down at the wibbly, blotchy face and plaintive tone. Severus manfully resisted the urge to do something ridiculously sentimental (like actually patting the child on the head, or some similar inanity) and summoned all the cunning of a native Slytherin. “She wanted you to become an accomplished wizard—a brewer of glory, a bottler of fame! Come now, boy—only a dunderhead would turn down the opportunity to learn to stopper Death. I can teach you all of this, and more.” He attempted to rearrange his features into a winning expression despite his suspicions that it was a vain effort.

Draco whimpered, blew his nose on the trailing sleeve of his robe, and squeezed his stuffed dragon. Severus wondered if it was his imagination, or if the child’s already long hair had grown visibly since they’d begun this discussion.

Apparently another tack was called for. “Don’t you wish to make astonishing things from the most virulently poisonous plants on earth? Unlock the secrets of Dragon Blood? Shred the wings of flies and mince wonderfully slimy insects and animal parts?” Severus tried to recall all of the major attractions of the potions-making process that had impressed him as a small boy. He managed a more sincere smile of nostalgia this time.

Draco’s tiny, pointy nose wrinkled in disgust. This was going to be even more difficult than Severus had feared.

Severus cast about the room for inspiration and was nearly blinded by the gilding on the massive toy chest. “Eventually, once you have mastered the essentials of the craft, you will learn to make costly and rare potions. You will grind gemstones into fine, glittering powder with a mortar and pestle. You distill a thousand roses into a single, tiny vial of purest fragrance worth more than its weight in gold. Someday, you will even make potions that must be stirred with a silver rod and simmered in a golden cauldron.”

Draco cocked his head. He sniffled, but it seemed almost an afterthought. “Is it a real golden cauldron?”

“Half an inch thick at the bottom,” Severus promised. As soon as I write to your parents and tell them you require it. He even managed a slight smile, having realized the potential—literal—silver lining to this living raincloud. While Severus made a respectable living, it was by no means a luxurious one. I’ll wager I can squeeze a set of crystal alembics out of them for the brat’s Christmas. Fourteen years, at least, of birthdays and Christmases… Hmmm…

Draco heaved a sigh all out of proportion to his small size. Severus was shocked to notice that the boy’s hair grew another visible fraction with the sound. It now reached the middle of his back. “Is it tea yet?” a small voice came from behind the platinum curtain. “I think I should very much like tea. And a nap.”

With a sigh of his own, Severus summoned Wormy. Would a dose of Calming Draught in the tea be out of order? “That makes two of us,” he said.

Wish me remarkable writing luck if I'm to find time and inspiration to complete this long-neglected fractured fairytale... :-\