Chapter Text
“Welcome back!”
Dazai took a step back before he looked around the room. Streamers were hung around the ceiling and colorful balloons were pooled up around the chairs. For all intents and purposes, the Gryffindor common room looked positively festive. He shot a bewildered gaze to Fred and George, who had their arms spread wide.
“What is this?”
“Aw, Snakey!” Fred whined, “It’s a welcome back party, obviously!”
“Yeah, didn’t you hear us shout welcome back? Want us to do it again?”
The yell still echoed in his ears. “Absolutely not.” He looked to Blaise, then back to their Gryffindor friends. Ron and Hermione stared back, sheepish. “And that doesn’t answer my question. You can’t welcome me back since I didn’t go anywhere.”
“You’ve been in the infirmary for a whole week now! I think that counts as being away.”
“Besides,” Fred chimed in, a teasing lilt in his tone, “Ronnie-kins here really missed having you around in class. He’s been talking about you nonstop—”
“Have not!”
“Au contraire—”
Dazai rolled his eyes while the siblings bickered and teased. Instead, he let his focus shift to the room around him. The Gryffindor common room was dressed up for a party. Even the other Gryffindor students, who held a general distaste for Dazai, seemed to be in good spirits. At the very least, no one was outright glaring at him. Even Angel had briefly stopped by to appreciate the festivities. True to character, the rat had watched with dark eyes for a short while before vanishing off to who-knows-where.
While Dazai was squinting down at a pile of neon pink balloons, he caught Blaise’s eye. The other snake looked amused.
“Where did you get this stuff, by the way?” Dazai interrupted Ron, Fred, and George.
“Ah, the party supplies?” When Dazai nodded, George explained, “A little magic here, a little sneaking into storage closets there...”
Fred cut in, “That doesn’t matter. Do you like it?”
Dazai blinked. “The streamers?”
“The party!”
Dazai looked around the room once again. Obnoxiously colored balloons and laughing Gryffindors filled the room. Finally, he let his eyes settle on his group of friends. They looked eager and excited, but most of all relieved. Although Dazai still wasn’t fully recovered (the ache in his whole body said as much), he was over the worst of it now. “I guess it’s okay,” he hummed. “I’ve never had a party before, so there’s nothing to compare it to.”
“What?!”
Instead of looking pleased with themselves, like Dazai expected, everyone’s faces had dropped into shock.
Hermione stepped forward. “You’ve never had a party before? Not even for a birthday?”
Dazai looked to Blaise for reassurance, but found only a blank, considering gaze there.
No... he’d never been to a party before. Was it that weird? He knew the Port Mafia often threw extravagant banquets and dances, but Dazai had never been allowed to attend. Father was rather insistent about keeping him locked up in his room, instead. Dazai tried not to dwell on it too much. When he asked Mori, the doctor would only describe stiff, formal affairs. Drinking wine, making connections, and talking business. Dazai thought parties sounded awfully boring. But this...
There was a warm feeling in Dazai’s chest.
...this was definitely something different.
“If we knew this was your first party, we would have put more ‘wow’ into it!”
Dazai mentally turned away from his thoughts to give the twins a flat look. “Wow?” He echoed. "Do I want to know what that is?"
“Yeah,” Fred clapped, “there would have been fireworks!”
“Presents!”
“Music!”
“Cake!”
Hermione cleared her throat. “You don’t need any of that to have a real party,” she tutted. Then, turning her full attention onto Dazai, she smiled softly. “All it takes to have a successful party is hanging out with good friends. Er... right?”
Ron nodded, emphatic.
“By that measure,” Blaise said, “I think this is a fine party. The streamers were a nice touch, though.”
Dazai hummed. He turned away to face the streamers when his cheeks started to unwittingly heat up. “You're the party experts,” he said, “so I’ll take your word for it.”
A second later, someone threw their weight around Dazai’s shoulders. He jumped slightly at the unexpected touch. Fred looked apologetic, but didn’t let up.
“We’ll just have to make this one extra memorable then!”
Giving him a gentle nudge, Fred guided Dazai through the Gryffindor common room. Dazai fell into a plush armchair with a thump. He blinked up at them, both confused and amused at the twin’s pushiness.
Ron plopped down int the seat beside him. He crossed his arms. “Fred, George, stop mother-henning my friend!”
“It’s our duty! As Boss’ self-appointed big brothers.”
“Would it make you feel better if we fussed over you too, Li’l Ronnie?”
Ron immediately turned beet red, flapping his hands out in a frantic dismissal. Of course, that only spurred the twins on in their teasing. They rushed to Ron’s side, worrying over him and mussing up his hair. Ron squawked loudly.
“They’re lively as ever.”
When Dazai smiled, Blaise’s lips quirked up as well.
“I’m not surprised,” he tilted his head back into the chair. It was far comfier than the leathers seats in the Slytherin common room. “Those two could find a way to laugh no matter what.”
That seemed to be the case at least. Dazai had seen Fred and George playing around while they were stealing the Philosopher’s Stone. More than that, they were laughing now. Now—while throwing a party for the classmate who had just days before murdered their teacher.
They certainly had a way of making dark situations enjoyable.
“ As admirable as that is, they need to take some things more seriously,” Hermione said, settling down on a long sofa. “Studying, for example.”
Dazai rolled his eyes. “Speaking of studying...”
Immediately, Hermione blanched. “Don’t tell me I forgot about a test coming up—”
“You didn’t,” Blaise raised a placating hand. The Gryffindor girl seemed to deflate at once. “Dazai just wants to be annoying, since he doesn’t have to study for finals.”
“Oh.” Hermione let out a breath, then turned a disapproving eye to Dazai. “I understand that it’s because of your health condition, but still..! You haven’t done any assignments, and the headmaster is just letting you pass first year?!”
“Ah, is Hermione jealous?”
“That’s not how school is supposed to work!”
“Sure it is.” Dazai waved her off, a wide smirk on his lips. “Maybe you’re just not trying hard enough.”
Hermione let out an obscenely loud squawk. Dazai, wondering how much further he could tease her, started to say something else. However, before he could get too far, the twins interrupted.
“Exempt from finals...” Fred trailed off, sloppily falling over the back of Dazai’s chair. Across the room, Ron looked deeply relieved to have their attention finally off of him.
“We were going to ask if you wanted to sneak into the professors’ offices and see what the finals were covering, but I guess that doesn’t affect you anymore, huh?”
Dazai shrugged. “Best of luck to you.”
“Thanks!”
Stealing test answers... Dazai wondered if they might be able to sell them to the other students. He humored the idea briefly, but quickly disregarded it. If Mori wanted him home early, then Dazai wouldn’t be able to supervise.
Well, maybe next year.
Blaise must have been able to read the mischief on his face, beccause the other snake let out a long sigh. Then, steering Dazai’s focus elsewhere, he casually said, “I just remembered. I have something for you, Boss.”
Dazai blinked, sitting up straighter. A gift?
Around him, the twins, Ron, and Hermione also looked somewhat surprised.
“He doesn’t need a present,” Ron butt in. “Isn’t being exempt from his finals blessing enough?”
“Ah,” Blaise hummed, “it’s not really a present.” At their confused looks, he reached into his cloak. After a second, he pulled out a small object and held it up to Dazai. “Here.”
Palm up, Blaise held out Dazai’s old pocket knife. It had been a few weeks since he had last seen it. In that time, Blaise had kept it hidden in his own belongings, steadfast about worrying for Dazai’s well-being (or some other nonsense). It was a small pocket knife with a black handle. In the light, the blade shined up at them. It must have been cleaned since Blaise confiscated it, because Dazai was certain there had been flecks of his blood on it when he’d last seen it.
“You should take this back,” Blaise said, nudging the knife forward again. “Even if I don’t regret taking it away from you, it is still your knife.” He paused, then added, “And on the off chance that your dad does want you to go home early... you should have it back."
“When it comes down to it, I guess Blaise isn’t really a thief,” Dazai commented. He leaned forward to eye the blade. He could still remember how it felt in his hands—the coarse handle sticking into his palm and the sharpened blade slicing into his forearm. Looking at the knife now, Dazai was suddenly struck with a realization. He reached out to push Blaise’s outstretched hand back into his chest.
When Blaise opened his mouth to protest, Dazai beamed.
“You know, a lot of organizations—like mafias and gangs—have a sort of ritual,” Dazai explained, “that whoever brings you into the gang gives you a personal item of theirs. Something like a coat or a hat that says ‘I’m this person’s responsibility’ or ‘as long as I have this, I’m loyal’.”
Hermione blinked. “Is that real?”
“Sure!” Dazai chuckled, whirling back to Blaise. “Consider that knife my welcome gift for our gang. Now everyone will know that you belong to me!”
“Everyone already knows that, Boss.”
Dazai shrugged, flippant. “You’ll keep it, though, right?”
Blaise looked at Dazai, then down to the pocket knife. Then, he let out a fond sigh. He slowly lowered his hand, fisting the knife tightly to his palm. “You could just say ‘here’s a token of our friendship, so don’t forget me over break,’ you know?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Blaise.”
“Yeah, okay.” Blaise rolled his eyes. “I’ll hold onto it, Dazai.”
“Great!” Dazai clapped. He steadfastly ignored the flustered feeling rising up in his chest at Blaise’s words. Instead, he shoved his fingers under his thighs and kicked his feet out childishly.
“Hey!” Fred and George shouted. Dazai’s head immediately snapped over to them. “Where’s our welcome gift, Boss?! Don’t we get one too?”
Ron looked between them, smirking. “What about me?”
Hermione laughed. “Or me?”
A grin easily worked its way onto Dazai’s face as he passed over the many faces of his gang members surrounding him. “Ah, I don’t have that many belongings with me.”
“That’s no fair,” Fred teased, “go and grab something for us, Snakey!”
“Yeah, hurry up, Boss! We’re official members too.”
Dazai rolled his eyes, but mentally he was taking stock of what items he kept back in his dorm room. What items could he gift to his subordinates...
“I don’t have anything else,” Dazai said finally, racking his brains. And it was true—the only things he had brought from home aside from school supplies were his pocket knife and bandages. Even then, he had run out of bandage rolls a few weeks ago. The only ones he still had were the scratchy bandages he stole from Madam Pomfrey earlier that year.
Fred and George glanced to one another, then let out simultaneous and melodramatic sighs. “Well, I guess we can wait.”
“You don’t have a choice,” Dazai told them, amused. He turned to Blaise. “You’ll have to get something for Draco, you know. He’s your responsibility now.”
Blaise brought a hand to his chin in thought as their friends laughed around them.
“...A coat or a hat, huh?”
“Or something like it.” He tried to imagine Draco wearing either of those with a scrunched-up frown. “...maybe not a hat.”
Blaise shot him an amused look, seeming to have caught onto Dazai’s wandering thoughts.
“Speaking of Draco—"
“Children,” a new voice suddenly interrupted.
Their heads shot up. Dazai’s eyes immediately landed on Professor McGonagall at the entryway. Her hand was still poised on the painting frame, leading Dazai to believe that she had only just arrived a second earlier. When she spoke, everyone in the room snapped to attention, even the Gryffindors that weren’t currently celebrating Dazai’s return.
“Madam Pomfrey suggested that you may have all gone somewhere together after leaving the infirmary,” she said, “Though I question the choice of Gryffindor common rooms.”
Saying this, McGonagall’s eyes landed pointedly on Blaise and Dazai. Both snakes looked up at her, sheepish but unmoving.
“Good afternoon, Professor.”
“Good afternoon.”
A series of polite greetings rolled around their group. McGonagall nodded in acknowledgment before narrowing her attention.
“Mr. Dazai. May I have a word?”
Dazai shifted in place, already guessing at why the head of the Gryffindor house would be seeking him out. “I’m not in trouble, am I?”
She gave him an unamused look, evidently ignoring the how the twins tittered beside them. “Not this time, Mr. Dazai.” McGonagall cleared her throat. “We received a return letter from your father earlier today. It is his and the headmaster’s agreement that you will return home to Japan immediately.”
Dazai tilted his head, wondering just what Mori had written in the letter.
“Immediately?!” Fred and George shouted together.
Hermione frowned. “Is Dazai in some sort of danger staying here, Ma’am?”
The professor’s eyes passed over the gathered students. Seeming to see that their outbursts were only of a friendly concern, McGonagall sighed. “Madam Pomfrey is still worried for your health, Mr. Dazai. The fact that your father is a private practice doctor only makes this transition more practical. However, that is not our only reason for wanting to move forward quickly.”
Dazai’s eyes narrowed. There were a lot of things that could put both Mori and Dumbledore on edge like this. The Death Eaters seeking revenge, for one. Or... Dazai’s recalled his previous conversation with Snape and Dumbledore.
“The media caught wind of the story.”
McGonagall turned a discerning eye onto him, before nodding affirmation. “A teacher is dead and a student is reporting that the Death Eaters have returned,” she summarized in a low voice, “Reporters are already on their way here to speak with you.”
...which explained Mori’s investment in him going home now. Controlling the stream of information was one of Mori’s signature moves. Dazai suspected Dumbledore ascribed to the same technique.
Around him, Dazai’s friends paled at the mention of the Death Eaters (with the exception of Blaise, who merely glowered). “When am I leaving?” He pushed onward, more than eager to escape Hogwarts before the reporters arrived.
“In two hours,” McGonagall said.
“Wha—!” Ron’s mouth fell open. “That’s so soon!”
“It is out of my hands. Now, Mr. Dazai,” she said, “Severus is currently gathering your things from your room. I encourage you to make your goodbyes now. Find him once you are finished.”
“Oh...” Hermione deflated.
The twins shared a look before collapsing onto Dazai’s shoulders. “So by ‘immediately’ you really meant immediately immediately.”
Dazai worried a frown onto his lips. “Thanks, Ma’am,” he said, distractedly.
McGonagall let out a breath before taking a step towards to door. Opening the doorway, the professor spared them all a final glance. “...I look forward to seeing you next year, Mr. Dazai.”
With that said, McGonagall nodded a farewell. She shut the door behind her.
The gang was silent. After a second, Dazai was the one to break the lingering tension.
“I guess I should get going,” he said. “Thanks for the party. It was short, but I liked it.”
“Isn’t this all a bit too fast?” Ron interjected. He stood. “You only just got better!”
Hermione shook her head. “But he’s not better, Ron. That’s why he has to go home early. Right?”
Dazai shrugged, but even that slight movement was sluggish and uncomfortable. It must have shown on his face, because Ron’s fight died abruptly.
“Aww...” George whined.
“Our little Snakey is leaving already, huh?” Fred sniffled dramatically, “We’re going to miss you!”
Dazai sighed into the chair, wanting to rest there a little longer. It certainly wouldn’t hurt to spend his last couple of hours at Hogwarts with his gang.
He couldn’t. There were still a few loose ends to tie up.
He felt a nudge on his arm. When Dazai turned to see who had bumped into him, Blaise offered a small smile.
“I think I saw Draco hanging around in the Slytherin common rooms this morning. He’ll probably still be there if you hurry,” Blaise said. His fingers were wrapped tightly around his knife. The pads of his fingers brushed over the blade in a way that could only be described as fond.
Blaise always knew exactly what Dazai was thinking.
Grateful, Dazai got to his feet. When his head spun, Ron put a steadying arm on his shoulder.
“Off to do business?” George asked.
“Why don’t you keep enjoying the party? Leave the rest to us.”
Dazai shook his head, then brushed off Ron’s hold. “You’ve all done plenty for me.” And that much was true. True in a way that Dazai couldn’t really explain, because he had never felt so welcome anywhere before now. “And while I’m gone, you’re all in charge of keeping the gang together. Blaise will be interim-boss until I return.”
If I return—because that was up to Mori. And Mori had never been upfront with his plans in the past. Why would he start with this?
“Dazai...”
“We’re going to miss you!”
“Get well soon!”
“You better write me while you’re gone!”
Dazai stared, eyes wide, as his friends shot to their feet and drew him into one big hug. He gasped as their warmth wrapped around him. Slowly, he melted into the hug.
All the hands on him, all the smothering, caging touches... and somehow Dazai didn’t feel trapped at all.
“This is gross,” he said into Fred’s chest, the words getting muffled easily. “You’re all gross and sentimental and gross .”
Ron and Hermione detached themselves from the hug, but Blaise and the twins held on for a moment longer. Blaise was the last one to pull away, an impossible-to-read smile stretching across his face.
“Feelings are gross, ” Blaise echoed, stepping away, “I know, Dazai. Goodbyes are supposed to be like that.”
“Oh. I don’t like them,” Dazai whined.
The twins chuckled. “I don’t think you’re supposed to like goodbyes.”
“Well,” Dazai said, taking a deliberate step towards the door. He ignored the metallic pull on his chest drawing him back to the gang. “Goodbye, then.”
Blaise shook his head. “Until next year.”
“Right,” Dazai laughed, “Until next year.”
----
Dazai slipped through the door before it could close, an aching body and a deep exhaustion making him far slower than usual. Once he was in the Slytherin common room, the dungeon's cold air did nothing for his stiff joints. Dazai made a beeline for the fireplace. A quick glance around the room revealed no one was present. No one except...
As he was sitting, Dazai spotted a smooth bundle of silver-blonde hair peeking over the edge of another sofa.
“You look glum, Boss,” Dazai said, settling into his own chair.
Draco raised a brow. However, he quickly wiped the accommodating look from his face. “Don’t.”
“...Don’t tease you?” Dazai guessed. Meanwhile, he tried to rub some warmth into his fingers. He looked around the room again. Where was everyone? And hadn’t McGonagall said that Snape would be here?
Draco was quiet for long enough that Dazai sat up. He tried to peer into Draco’s half-mast eyes, but found a mask staring back at him there. Still, Dazai thought his expression looked more thoughtful than suspicious. The other snake’s brows were drawn together and there was a thin pull to his lips.
“Don’t call me Boss, " Draco said, voice strangely serious. Carefully, he pulled a familiar blue cloth bag from his cloak. Dazai’s eyes locked onto it immediately. “Not when you don’t mean it.”
Dazai stared at the bag. A thrum of power seemed to roll out of it. The magic buzzed in his ears.
The Philosopher’s Stone.
There was no doubt about it: Draco knew what secrets the bag was hiding. Dazai let out a breath as he mentally shifted track. Plan A (simply asking for the bag back) was clearly bust—Blaise’s trust in Draco hadn’t gone as far as the boy would have liked to think. Luckily, Dazai was adept at rolling with the punches.
“Seriously, Dazai,” Draco said, cutting him off mid-breath, “What in the world have you and those Gryffindor nobodies been up to all year?!”
“This and that,” Dazai said, eyeing the bag before turning his full attention to Draco’s face, “I see you opened the bag.”
“Of course I did! You’re my subordinate, after all. Or...” Draco trailed off, mumbling, “...or at least you should be.”
The cloth bag swung in the air, back and forth. A pendulum ticking down one second after the next.
“Ah... are you jealous that I didn’t ask for your help to get that?”
Draco whirled on him with a glare.
Dazai explained, “The reason I didn’t involve you... well, you're not very trustworthy, Draco. It’s nothing personal.”
“That’s incredibly personal.”
“Do you even know what that is?” Dazai redirected, tilting his chin to indicate the bag.
Draco stilled. Then, slowly, he lowered the bag to rest on his leg. He kept a hand hovered protectively over it. “...I do. It’s the... you stole the Philosopher’s Stone!”
Dazai carefully kept his expression blank. Still, he couldn’t help his eyebrows rising at the answer.
“Don’t give me that look. The Malfoy family is exceptionally well educated.”
Shaking his head, Dazai offered a half-smile. “It’s not about smarts.” He pivoted, “who told you about it?”
After all, Dazai had been forced to sneak around the Forbidden Forest and the restricted section of the library just to learn what the Philosopher’s Stone was. Not to mention the time he spent interrogating Hagrid and subsequently dodging interrogations from Snape. All the trouble that Dazai had to go through, there was no way Draco had done the same and escaped suspicion.
Which meant, once again, this Philosopher’s Stone business was significantly more complicated than Mori had led Dazai to believe.
Joy.
“Like that’s any of your business.” Draco looked down to the stone on his lap before Dazai could catch his expression. When he looked up a moment later, there was nothing distinguishable on his face to read besides a mild discomfort. “Would it kill you to act like a normal student for once?”
“Probably,” Dazai said, distractedly. His mind was elsewhere; still dissecting Draco’s words.
None of the professors would tell a student about the stone, Dazai knew. And he was fairly sure he would have noticed if another student was looking into the stone, too. But that only left someone outside of Hogwarts to have filled Draco in one the Stone’s location. Hmm....
The only other person Dazai had ever heard Draco talk about was his father.
“Are you taking it, then?” Dazai asked. “Giving the stone to your—for a lack of a better word—boss?”
Draco noticeably jumped at the word ‘boss.’ Not in a way that made Dazai think he had hit the mark, but more like Draco hadn’t considered that particular phrasing before.
If Draco wouldn’t give the stone back... Dazai’s fingers instinctively reached for a knife that wasn’t there. Would he fight... no—kill Draco for the stone?
...Could he?
Mori wanted the stone. He had instructed Dazai, under no uncertain terms, to retrieve the Philosopher's Stone for the Port Mafia. Obviously, if Draco didn't want to give him back the stone, he would have to take it by force. But... but the idea curdled in Dazai's stomach. It didn't sit right at all. The disconnect between what he should do and what he wanted to do was so staggering, it felt treasonous to think at all.
Dazai’s friend watched him for a moment, seeming to contemplate something deeply troubling. There was a discomfort on Draco’s face when he spoke. A silent war going on in the pit of his stomach and rising up in his throat. Dazai wondered that the same expression wasn’t on his face, as well.
Finally, Draco shook himself. “I should.”
Should.
“ I should take the stone for myself,” Draco repeated, just as Dazai was thinking, “I should be able to kill you, but...”
But I kind of like you, I guess?
“ But Blaise said I’m a member of your gang now. So I’m unfortunately loyal to you,” Draco sighed, the tension all but melting from his body as he made his decision. The quirk to his lips was shaky, but the teasing bite in his tone was not, “Right, Boss?”
“...Oh.”
Draco tossed the bag across the gap, and Dazai caught it with unthinking hands.
“That’s all you have to say? 'Oh’ ?! I just professed my loyalty to your stupid friend gang and you don’t have anything inspiring to say? Your group is full of blood traitors! I’m really making a sacrifice here.”
Dazai had to blink himself free from his thoughts. These Hogwarts kids would never stop surprising him with their ugly sentimentality. With a burst of warmth in his chest, Dazai wondered if he hadn't caught some feelings as well.
The bag in his hand burst with power. Dazai was careful to hide it in his cloak, hesitant about accidentally nullifying the stone. “I’m just surprised the high-and-mighty Mr. Malfoy just admitted to being my subordinate, is all,” he lied. “You were bossing me around just last week.”
“Maybe I’m just resigned to the fact that you’re never going to actually do the things I tell you to do,” Draco said with a huff. “You made an awful subordinate.”
“Aww, thanks!”
“That’s not a compliment and you know it. I’ve poured too much of my incredibly valuable time into you to just drop you no matter how horrible you are.”
Dazai laughed. “Welcome to the gang, regardless.”
“Yeah,” Draco breathed out, briefly averting his gaze, “thanks for having me. Now are you going to tell me why in Merlin’s name you stole the Philosopher’s Stone?”
Dazai tilted his head, considering. “Because I wanted it,” he said. Spreading his fingers out, he added, “if you want me to tell you about it, you have to answer my question first. You already knew what the Philosopher’s Stone was. Why?”
When Draco was silent, Dazai hazarded a guess.
“Did your father tell you, by chance?”
Draco’s head shot up, shock written clear across his face. “How did you know?”
“You talk about him often enough,” Dazai reasoned, “and if anyone was going to know about the stone, it would be someone rich and connected like him. I know the type.”
Taking a moment, to collect his thoughts, Draco leveled him with an assessing look. Only after a few seconds did he admit, “My father... didn’t exactly tell me that the Philosopher’s Stone was being kept here. I...overheard him talking about it on the phone with someone one day. A few weeks before school started.”
Dazai blinked. Draco must have read the confusion on his face.
“I was surprised too! Someone sent Father one of your muggle cell phones. He would take calls from it every so often and always seemed especially tense afterwards.” Draco drew in a breath, then let it out like he was spilling secrets from his lips. Like once they had started to come out, the truths just wouldn’t stop. Still, Dazai got the feeling that Draco was holding something back. "My father...”
He trailed off, clearly fighting with himself over whether or not to continue.
Dazai tilted his head, appraising. “I trusted you with the stone, the least you can do is to trust me with whatever else it is you’re thinking about. I’m your boss, aren’t I?”
Draco bit his lip, then shook himself. “I’ll tell you, but only because I’m feeling generous today.”
“Sure.”
“It is about you, anyway. I suppose you have a right to know.”
Dazai sat up straight.
...What?
“ During one of my father’s phone calls, I heard him mention your name.”
Seriously: What?
Dazai felt his eyes narrow as he tried to work through what that could mean.
“My father didn’t explicitly tell me to keep an eye on you, but I figured I would do the Malfoy family a favor and keep watch,” Draco explained, drawing a vague shape in the air with his hand. He looked tense and upset. Dazai sympathized—it was an awful feeling when your superior didn’t loop you in on their plans. “When you were sorted into Slytherin despite being a muggleborn, I took it upon myself to keep our housemates from murdering you.”
Processing the information, Dazai said, “Thanks, I think.”
“It was mostly for my father, but your welcome.”
Dazai fell back into his chair, a puff of air escaping from his lungs as he did so. As per usual, he was wrapped up in someone else’s plot. Thinking Draco’s explanation over, Dazai couldn’t help but to feel more annoyed than worried.
After all, there was only one person Dazai was familiar with who both knew about magic and frequently made suspicious phone calls. It was the same person who, without fail, refused to tell Dazai anything about this job.
Mori.
What a bastard.
“Of course,” Draco was still talking, “you’re impossible to keep an eye on. I look away for one second, and you run off to start a gang, steal an ancient artifact, and kill our professor.” He looked to the floor at the mention of Quirrell, but only momentarily.
Dazai ignored the slip. He didn’t care one-way-or-the-other about what he had done to Quirrell and he was too focused on the current topic to bother putting on a mask. “Have you been reporting back to your father about me?”
Draco shifted in his seat. Then, surprisingly, he shook his head. “This is more of a—”
“Pet project,” Dazai filled in.
A grin stretched across Draco’s face. “Exactly.”
Laughing lightly, Dazai wrung his hands together before letting them fall slack on his lap. “Okay,” he said after a second. “What a mess.”
“...that’s it?” Draco asked, smile dropping just as soon as it had come, “I’ve been spying on you all year and you give up just like that?”
Dazai raised a brow. “That’s it. I would barely call what you did spying, anyway.” He couldn’t find it in himself to feel betrayed. Not given their situation. Especially not, considering... “Besides, I have a feeling we’re in the same boat this time, Draco.”
Just another item on the list of things Mori wasn’t telling him. Dazai couldn’t even find it in himself to feel annoyed now. He just felt tired. Pinching the bridge of his nose, he tried to massage some of that stress away.
In the end, it always came back to Mori and the dozens of things he wasn’t telling Dazai.
Draco’s brows furrowed, clearly not knowing what to make of Dazai’s answer. However, Dazai brushed off any more of that conversation with a wave of his hand. “Hey,” he said, looking around the room once more, “Where is everyone, anyway? It’s the middle of the day during the weekend.”
Not that he didn’t appreciate the solitude. He and Draco wouldn’t have been able to have this conversation otherwise. Still, compared to the bustle of the Gryffindor room just shortly before, the difference was quite jarring. Dazai was used to this sort of quiet in the Slytherin rooms only during the late, late nights and early mornings.
Draco stared at him for a moment, brows pinched together in thought. Whatever was bothering him, he shook it off with a sigh. He puffed out his chest. “I asked them to leave.”
“...you can do that?”
“I can. They wouldn’t listen if you tried telling them where to go.” Draco lifted his chin.
Dazai smirked. “And it doesn’t also have anything to do with Professor Snape being here, does it?”
Draco twitched, “No.” He scowled. “How did you even know Professor Snape was here? He’s in the bedrooms.”
Glancing to the side, Dazai saw that the bedroom doors were still pressed firmly closed. Snape was just beyond it, probably picking up some of the textbooks Dazai had left lying around from the other night. He briefly worried that Snape might find something damning, but didn’t think so. Dazai was always proactive in keeping his space clean and nondescript. Besides, Dazai didn't have many belongings to begin with.
He shook himself from his thoughts. “I’m going home today—I'm sure Blaise can fill you in on the details. Professor Snape is supposed to meet me here.”
“Today?! "
Dazai snorted. “That’s exactly how the others reacted, too.” Maybe Draco would fit into the gang better than Dazai had initially suspected. Thinking this, Dazai continued, “Don’t make trouble for the gang while I’m gone. I don’t want to hear that you and Ron are fighting again.”
“As long as he and those blood traitors stay in line—”
“Blaise is second in command, so just do what he says,” Dazai said, a puff of amusement on ghosting over his lips. “You aren’t ranked high enough to issue orders.”
Draco made a face, but didn’t press the issue. Still, Dazai got the distinct impression that Draco’s condescending attitude couldn’t be tamed just like that. Maybe giving Draco something concrete to work on for the gang would settle him down a bit.
“Say, your nosey old man is freakishly rich, right?”
Draco frowned, but nodded affirmation.
“Fantastic. I’ll need you to do me and the gang a favor, then. Consider it your first assignment.”
He waited for Draco’s slow nod before explaining.
“I need you to take care of a dragon for me.”
Draco blinked once, then twice. “...a what?”
“Just until summer break is over! I can’t exactly take it home with me, and Ron’s parents will probably throw a fit once they realize I let one of their sons keep an illegal dragon as a pet. Rich people get away with worse things than illegal dragon ownership all the time.”
“Merlin’s beard, you really do need someone to supervise you. You have a dragon?! ”
Dazai pouted. “Don’t just say that so casually to your boss! You’ll take care of Egg, won’t you?”
Draco blinked once, then twice. Falling back into his seat, he raised a hand to cover a laugh. "That’s an awful name, Dazai.”
----
Everything moved very quickly after that. Dazai only chatted with Draco for another few minutes before Snape returned from the bedrooms. There had been a suitcase in his hands and an odd look in his eyes, but Dazai quickly wrote it off. He was far too busy worrying over this latest turn of events to care what trivial thing Snape was hung up on today.
Thoughts about returning home—about Mori and Malfoy Sr.—carried Dazai out of Hogwarts castle and all the way to the owlery to pick up Featherbrain. Dazai clutched the bird’s cage in both his hands, straining every few seconds when it flapped and shook. He struggled with the cage for long enough that Snape, after a few minutes, let out a grievous sigh and took hold of the bird cage himself. Dazai gratefully grabbed onto the smaller, less obtrusive suitcase in return. Holding a case that didn’t fight back made the walk across the bridge to the train station much easier.
Dazai looked around, noticing a few other passengers boarding alongside them.
Snape caught his eye. He gestured for Dazai to board the train, only speaking once his student obeyed. “Hogsmeade Village is within walking distance to Hogwarts. Seeing as this is many wizards’ daily commute, I expect you not to bother the other passengers.”
Dazai stopped at a compartment and looked to Snape. When the professor made a noise of agreement, Dazai took a seat. Snape sat across from him. He slid the compartment door closed behind them and Featherbrain’s cage beside Dazai.
A few moments passed, but Dazai didn’t release his grip on the suitcase. Mindlessly, he clenched and unclenched his fingers around the handle a few times.
“I’m always a pleasure to be around, Sir.”
Snape raised a brow, clearly not enthused.
“Featherbrain, less so,” he continued, motioning to the owl. As expected, it hooted loudly in response. It was an obnoxious cacophony of coos that had yet to stop since they had picked the awful thing up. “But that can’t be helped.”
Snape glanced at Featherbrain. There was annoyance written clear across his face that Dazai deeply sympathized with.
The mafioso jumped when, within the minute, the train abruptly started beneath them. It chugged slowly forward before picking up pace. The steady rhythm of rails echoed around the compartment. Glancing out the window, Dazai watched as Hogwarts grew smaller and smaller in the distance. It wasn’t long until it was nothing more than a speck of sand to squint at.
It all felt so... final. Saying a wordless goodbye to the life Dazai had come to really appreciate. A life away from home. Where he had his own friends and his own objectives. It was something Dazai had never had before. Something he never thought he would have. He almost felt sad to see it go.
Almost.
There was a bigger picture at play. Mori, the Philosopher’s Stone, the Death Eaters and Voldemort, and now with the Malfoy family... Dazai could appreciate sentimentality only while he had sentimental things in his grasp.
Or maybe this cold feeling was just a product of having to see Mori again so soon. Regardless...
Those dark thoughts swirled and mingled in his head, drawing a long frown across Dazai’s features. His fingers dragged across the suitcase.
When Dazai finally turned his focus back inside the train, Snape was watching him with narrowed eyes.
“...What?”
Snape’s frown deepened.
“...What, Sir?”
The potion’s professor sighed, and Dazai felt himself tense up unwittingly.
“Have you thought any more about what I said?”
Dazai paused, mentally sorting through all of their previous conversations.
…Nothing. He couldn’t remember Snape having asked him to think about anything important recently. After all, Dumbledore had lead the Philosopher’s Stone/Quirrell interrogation.
“You’ll have to remind me, Sir. What was I supposed to be thinking about?”
Snape stared at him. Dazai met his eyes head on, only looking away a moment later when Snape let out another weary breath. There was an odd look on the professor’s face. He almost looked...
Sick?
Snape seemed to bodily steel himself, silently warring over how to phrase his next sentence. Dazai felt himself frown in anticipation. He wasn’t too worried—there was no way Snape had found out about the truth behind the Philosopher’s Stone, right? Which meant this was probably something worse.
One of Snape tedious, sentimental, protective things again.
“Are you safe at home?”
Dazai’s spine snapped straight, momentarily shocked at how blunt the question was. Snape’s attention held strong as he refused to look away for even a second. Quickly, Dazai scrambled to cover up the astonishment on his face. A pleasant, if shaky, smile replaced it.
The thought echoed again in his head: What sort of question is that supposed to be?!
“Oh,” Dazai hummed, playing up his childish persona. He looked to the window, where a blur of winter branches were nothing more than grey smudges outside. “That again?”
“Yes, that again,” Snape said. “Answer the question, Problem Child.”
“Uh—”
Old scars stung beneath his bandages, but...
But Mori would never let him die. The good doctor would always patch him back up. Dazai was just as safe at home as he was anywhere else.
Featherbrain made a too-loud sound, as if reading Dazai’s thoughts and calling him on an obvious lie.
He shot the bird a glare. It chose to flap around stupidly rather than look at all intimidated.
“Mr. Dazai.”
“I’m fine,” he said hastily. “I don’t know where you get all of these ideas from, Professor. Are you sure you aren’t just missing me already—”
“This is serious,” Snape said. He was wearing that ill-looking expression still. That tight pinch between his brows seemed only to have darkened. “Regardless of what the headmaster may have led you to believe, the safety of my students is priority. I will be as blunt with you as possible, because I believe both of us have been avoiding some important topics for too long. ”
Dazai nodded mutely. His fingers fell from the suitcase, searching blindly for his bandaged wrist to scratch at.
Instantly, Dazai realized doing this was a mistake.
“That being one of them. I have avoided forcing you to discuss your self-harming tendencies because it clearly makes you uncomfortable.” Dazai opened his mouth to protest, but Snape cut him off. “And that is my fault. It is my responsibility as you teacher to keep you safe—including from yourself. I put my own hesitance to have this conversation above your safety.”
When Dazai didn’t make to counter this, Snape said, “You came to Hogwarts malnourished, covered in bandages, and clearly attempting to manipulate the people around you. I have seen you have panic attacks and flinch away from your professors. You understand that my concerns for your welfare and home-life are not coming out of nowhere.”
Dazai nodded thoughtless, then quickly corrected himself. None of those things were weird. That was just how things were in the mafia!
Some of the outrage must have been visible on his face, because Snape suddenly choked on a breath.
“This is exactly why I should have forced this conversation earlier.”
“You’re misunderstanding,” Dazai said abruptly. He had to turn Snape off of this train off thought before it got itself too wrapped up in the intricacies of Dazai’s criminal life. Before it wound up hurting Mori’s schemes.Or before Snape ended up being pulled into one of said schemes.
“Then explain it to me,” Snape said.
“I—”
Words caught below his tongue—the answer a peach pit lodged in his throat.
“You’re misunderstanding,” he repeated.
How come Dazai could spin a fantastic half-truth about the Philosopher’s Stone, but the second someone asked about him, Dazai could barely force out even one word? What a cruel twist of fate.
(You’re misunderstanding, something deep and dark and with a voice like Mori’s cooed, it’s supposed to be like this.)
The metal bars of Featherbrain’s cage rattled, sounding like claws on steel. Dazai felt the harsh clattering in his bones.
Snape let out another strained sigh. When Featherbrain finally settled down into a quiet hooting commentary, he said, “You don’t have to tell me everything right now. We can deal with all of that later.”
Dazai paused, waiting for the catch.
“All I need from you right now is an answer. I’ll take care of everything from there.” Snape sucked in a breath. “Are you safe at home?”
“Yes," Dazai answered immediately.
“Mr. Dazai—"
He stared forward, eyes hard. “Yes. I am.”
They lapsed into an uncomfortable silence. Even Featherbrain seemed to recognize the tense atmosphere and kept its bird beak snapped shut for once.
The train tracks clattered loudly underfoot. It was a steady heartbeat rhythm—just fast enough to match the tense air in their compartment.
“How far is the station?”
Snape jerked out of his thoughts, pinched brow going slack with some other emotion. The second he registered what Dazai had asked, however, a shadow fell across his face. “You can’t run from this conversation.”
“Can’t I?” Dazai asked with a flippant wave of his hand. “I told you it’s fine, so there’s no reason to keep talking about it, Sir.”
The barely suppressed growl in Dazai’s tone seemed to steal Snape’s voice away. The professor was silent for a long moment. Dazai considered distracting Snape with a joke, but decided that it wouldn’t go over well. Not with someone like Snape, who had demonstrated in the past an unwillingness to let things go. He remembered their previous interrogations with an unsmiling sigh.
In fact, Dazai recalled with a jolt, the only times Snape had ever let him off the hook for something of this magnitude was when something bigger was at stake. Like finding Quirrell. Or following behind Dumbledore like an obedient mutt.
“Problem Child—”
“Do you think the media will follow me back to Yokohama?” Dazai interrupted swiftly.
Snape startled back briefly, before scowling. Something told Dazai that Snape knew exactly what he was trying to do. Regardless, the potion master leaned back into his seat, deflated. “It is possible,” he said, “but unlikely. The public merely knows that a student is returning home early. Unless they break into Hogwarts to steal your records, they should have no knowledge of where you live.”
“That’s reassuring,” Dazai said, tilting his chin up.
Or, it would have been reassuring. Had Dazai himself not explored first-hand how lax Hogwarts security was. Sneaking around forbidden areas past curfew was a joke.
If the disbelief was on his face, Snape didn’t ask about it. He merely commented, “Hogwarts... I will do everything I can to protect you.”
Dazai raised a brow.
“In any capacity,” Snape continued. “Be it from the media or a professor. Or something at home.”
“...I’ll keep my eye out for any reporters.”
Snape stared at him for a second, then sighed. “Send the school a letter if anything happens.”
Dazai gave a nonchalant thumbs-up.
Having each said their parts, they lapsed into silence. Only the sound of owl screeches and railroad clatter echoed around the compartment.
Every few minutes, Snape would shoot Dazai a glance. The mafioso carefully kept his expression mostly blank, only letting some of his obvious discomfort show through when Snape’s gaze would linger too long.
He wondered what the potion master was really thinking. Just what had brought on his renewed onslaught of concerns, for example.
Finally (finally!) the train rolled to a slow stop. Looking out the window, Dazai saw the Platform Nine and Three-Quarters station come into view. It wasn’t nearly as bustling as when he had last visited, but there was no small amount of people present today. There were quite a few people walking around. Dazai didn’t recognize any of them.
“I thought Mori was going to be here,” Dazai said with a hum, searching the area slowly. He steadfastly ignored the tight feeling in his chest.
“Your father is a muggle. I expect he will be waiting outside the magic barrier.”
Pretending not to hear the snarl in Snape’s voice, Dazai nodded. Thinking back, he did remember that there was a magical brick wall separating the magical world from the non-magical one. He’d run through it face first at the time, following Ron’s guidance without a thought. Now, though, Dazai wanted to pick the spell apart piece by piece. He wanted to figure out exactly how it worked and—more specifically—how it interacted with No Longer Human.
When Dazai turned away from the window, Snape was still talking.
“I would like to have a word with you father before leaving you in his care.”
Dazai shrugged. He waited for Snape to stand before doing so himself. Thoughtlessly, Dazai let himself fall into step behind his professor. He ignored the small glance this earned him and instead focused on pulling his suitcase up to his side.
Snape sighed, but guided him out of the train regardless.
Stepping out of the train, Dazai squinted against the light. He raised a hand to shield his eyes and look around. Unlike at the other station, Station Nine and Three-Quarters was a lot more populated. It was no surprise—there were other magical trains here leading to other magical locations that Dazai could only begin to guess at. There were a few people milling about on the wall and even more impatiently waiting by the boarding area.
Dazai took a small step closer to Snape as the older man carefully guided him through a throng of strangers.
With a start, Dazai realized that he was getting a few odd looks. A glance here. A raised brow there. Something churned in his stomach.
“They recognize you as a Hogwarts student,” Snape said suddenly, jarring Dazai from his observations. He looked up to his professor, eyes asking. “You can imagine many of the wizards here are previous Hogwarts students themselves, and it is practically unheard of for a student to drop out part-way through the year.”
Dazai frowned. “Nosey.”
Snape smirked briefly before replacing the expression with a scowl of his own. “Indeed.”
They passed through the station quickly. Although Dazai could hardly remember how to navigate the station, Snape was clearly familiar. It wasn’t until Dazai saw a man run straight through a brick wall that he recognized where they were exactly.
“It’s the same way out as it is in, then?”
Snape spared him a glance. “Yes. You—”
Before he could get another word out, a voice called out over the crowd, “Severus Snape! Could I take your statement for the Daily Prophet?”
Dazai blinked, startled when Snape placed a hand on his shoulder and shoved him behind his back.
“Sir..?”
Snape ground his teeth. “The Daily Prophet is a newspaper,” he explained under his breath, “They’re faster than we thought.”
Dazai hummed. He peeked his head around Snape’s side to watch as a pale-haired, bubbly-looking woman pushed her way through a body of people. They didn’t seem to pay her any mind as she shouted and shoved. A pair of vivid red glasses were perched on her nose, but didn’t shake no matter how much she moved. She came to a stop inches from Snape’s face.
“Miss Skeeter,” Snape said, lip curling. “Hogwarts has no interest in giving your paper a statement at this time.”
“Well, I won’t tell if you won’t,” Skeeter said, a red-lipped smile splitting across her face. With a flick of her hand, a small notebook levitated up to her side. A feathered quill floated up behind it and began frantically writing something down.
Trying to read what the magic quill was writing, Dazai leaned further around Snape. However, the second he moved, the woman’s eyes snapped straight to him.
“Oh! This must be our student of the year. Attacked by a teacher then killed him before he could do worse... the people are very interested in your story!” Her teeth bared into a smile, snow-white below blood-red lips. She leaned forward until she was practically smothering Dazai. “Rita Skeeter—correspondent with the Daily Prophet. I don’t think I caught your name.”
Before Dazai could even think about responding, Snape stepped in front of him to block Rita’s view. “That would be because Hogwarts has yet to release a statement on the matter. You can wait for the official release like everyone else.”
Rita waved him off while the quill continued to write frantically. “You must have been very scared, poor thing,” she ignored Professor Snape, speaking directly to Dazai still. “Are the rumors true? Was Quirinus Quirrell associated with the Death Eaters? Did he say anything to you about You-Know-Who? Tell me, in his final moments, did Quirrell have any words to share with you?”
Quirrell had begged for his master.
Dazai’s eyes narrowed and his lips thinned. He didn’t respond to Rita’s prodding and was rewarded for his silence a second later when Snape growled.
“Miss Skeeter, cease this incessant questioning before I make you.”
However, rather than looking worried, Rita’s beam grew ten-fold. Her quill scratched out something with renewed fervor. “Hogwarts is being very protective of this incident. Am I to take that to mean there is a greater conspiracy at play?”
“No,” Snape said, shortly. He must have realized that arguing was a lost cause, because he didn’t try to push Rita away again. Instead, he tilted his head back. “Student,” he said, carefully censoring Dazai’s name, “The entrance to Platform nine-and-three-quarters is the same as the entrance. I will give Miss Skeeter a brief statement. I trust you can show yourself out.”
Dazai nodded mutely. When he focused, he could feel the magical entrance from where they stood. He thought about making some teasing remark to Snape, but held his tongue. He wasn’t sure how much influence the Daily Prophet had or if it was the type of paper to overemphasize and stretch the truth to dangerous extents.
“Actually, if I could get a statement from the kid as well—”
Snape grunted. He moved in place, stopping Skeeter from stepping around him.
Dazai took that as his cue to leave. With a whispered, “bye, Sir,” he hurried away from Snape and Rita Skeeter. By now, quite a few people at the station were watching the proceedings. This wasn’t helped by the fact that Skeeter was practically yelling for him to come back and answer her questions. Dazai skipped across the stone, trying his best to ignore everyone. He came to a stop just in front of a tall, brick wall. He could feel the magic oozing off of it and tickling No Longer Human.
He spared a final glance over his shoulder and saw that Snape was still attempting to block Rita’s view. Her expression was somewhere between furious and manic as she took Snape’s statement. Judging by her frantic looks Dazai’s way, Snape's interview was hardly the goldmine she was looking for. Dazai grimaced when they briefly locked eyes.
Turning away from them, Dazai launched himself through the brick wall portal. The sudden overwhelming waterfall of magic bit at him like a million hungry gnats. He scrunched his eyes tight in pain and discomfort. The sensation was too much and too fast for him to fully process any of the magical signatures.
Dazai only opened his eyes once more when the bustle of muggle society filled in his ears.
He pried them open slowly, squinting at the light and groaning at the sound of trains, taxis, and yelling pedestrians. Flashy shirts and harried businessmen were once a normal sight to him. Now, after having lived among robed wizards with pompous attitudes, Dazai almost did a double take.
And, for seemingly the first time in months, the constant scream of magic in Dazai’s head settled into an almost silent hum.
Unfortunately, he was unable to bask in the newly rediscovered peace.
A passerby bumped into Dazai’s shoulder, jarring him back half-a-step. He barely steadied himself from falling back through the portal before another, serious-looking person clipped his arm. They each shot him a sharp, judging glance as they passed. His spine snapped ramrod straight. A scowl drew itself across Dazai’s face, easily overwhelmed.
Unbidden, the thought shot through his head:
I want to go home.
Only it didn’t feel like “home” in this scenario meant Yokohama. No—It meant Hogwarts. With Blaise and the twins and everyone else that for some absurd reason stuck by his side no matter what.
Dazai bit his tongue. He could never voice that thought aloud.
Burying that feeling as deep as he could, Dazai quickly maneuvered himself around the swarms of people. He finally came to rest against the station walls, letting out a deeply aggrieved breath. Unlike the last time he had been here, there were no other confused Hogwarts students searching around. The sheer absurdity of his situation only fully settled in when a fifth passerby shot Featherbrain an odd look.
Right. Having a pet owl wasn’t at all normal in the non-magical world.
(Having a dragon was even stranger.)
Dazai took a deep, steadying breath as he folded himself slightly over the owl’s cage. It hooted noisily in protest, but he was mostly numb to the cacophony of sounds by now. Judging by the glances he received, everyone else here was not.
Not that Featherbrain cared to stop either way.
“I thought I heard a familiar owl’s screech.”
A cold chill ran down Dazai’s spine. He froze in place as the voice washed over him, fingers tensing harshly around his suitcase and cage.
“Ah,” Mori chuckled, “you don’t look excited to see me. I do hate to see what fraternizing at Hogwarts has done to you. If it weren’t to the Port Mafia’s benefit, I’d keep you at my side forever.”
Dazai’s entire body suddenly felt very cold and tense, but he forced himself to look up.
Mori smiled down at him. The man looked the same as ever: a knife-sharp smile, assessing red eyes, and shiny, dark hair. “Your hair has grown out,” he commented, raising a hand to twirl one of Dazai’s curls around his finger. He didn’t seem to notice when Dazai flinched. “It’s cute. Although I think your father would prefer the clean look you used to have. You’ll cut it before we return.”
The order snapped Dazai out of his stupor, jarring his thoughts around into something more familiar. He scowled and slapped the doctor’s hand away, earning a played-out pout in return. “Professor Snape wanted to talk with you, but he got held up. Let’s go.”
Mori laughed. He looked around the station for a moment, but didn’t seem surprised to hear about Snape. “Eager to get home, I see.”
“Eager to get out of the crowd,” Dazai countered. Then, before Mori could say something annoying, he continued, “Unless you want me to hand over a certain artifact in the middle of a busy train station.
The Philosopher’s Stone pounded steadily in Dazai’s pocket. But as eager as he was to give it to Mori and get away from the magic-induced headache, Dazai was actually more concerned with escaping the shoulders bumping into him constantly. Someone sent Featherbrain another odd look and Dazai shuffled uncomfortably in place.
Mori must have seen through Dazai’s deflection, but he didn’t press except to smile, amused. He placed a stiff hand on Dazai’s shoulder to guide the boy through the throngs of people. Dazai silently let himself be dragged along. He nearly tripped attempting to carry all of his belongings, but Mori didn’t offer a helping hand even when Featherbrain loudly protested the rough treatment.
Dazai felt it somewhere deep. He was under Mori’s thumb again. And although he had never truly been free, even at Hogwarts, Dazai had almost convinced himself that…
No. Never mind.
His expression was a familiar blank mask when Mori sat him down in a long, black limousine. The door shut with a bang, enclosing them in shadow. The limo’s engine was smooth and silent as it drove them towards something inevitably darker.
----
There was no major fuss over Dazai’s early departure from Hogwarts. Aside from a few curious questions, Severus was able to easily field his students' attention. It probably helped that his more troublesome students were already filled in on the situation. Merlin knew he didn’t have the mental capacity to deal with Dazai’s troublesome crew right now. Dazai meeting the Weasley twins was truly a match made straight in Hell.
But for all Hogwarts was relatively calm, Severus’ mind was in turmoil.
He held the letter in his white-knuckled hands. It was a wrinkled pieced of white parchment with swirling black ink dancing across it. Most of the page was illegible now. The edges of the page were blackened and burnt—a relic of whatever fire-breathing thing had wreaked the Slytherin room earlier that year. Holes were burnt across the page.
But there it was, held tight in Severus’ hands. Unreadable as most of it was, it still made his insides feel sick and sticky.
A burnt letter addressed to Dazai found forgotten under the boy’s bed.
Though most of the letter was unreadable, what he had been able to make out was...
Concerning, to say the least.
The first complete sentences Severus was able to make out had frozen him in place:
“After all I’ve given you, it would be such a bother for you to fail me now. This is no longer a request, Dazai. Neither your father nor I will tolerate failure. You won’t be returning home if you don’t do this, understand? Not in one piece, at least, and that wouldn’t be cute at all.”
Those words, despite being far too vague to draw meaning from, had sent a chill up Severus’ spine. They felt so cold and so demanding. They felt like a threat. The sick feeling in Severus’ chest was only doubled when he tried to guess at the meaning. “Failure...” was the writer talking about Dazai’s grades, or something different?
The rest of the letter was burnt and illegible until further down the page where the author seemed to completely change their perspective. The threats written above were replaced by looping letters and I’s dotted with hearts. It was jarring.
“It’s a bit too large for Elise, but that’s what I have you for. You always have looked adorable in white. You’re not pure like that at all.”
That sentence alone had filled Severus with such a disturbed feeling that he had actually needed to stop reading for a few minutes. It could be innocent—more than half the letter was unreadable, after all. Without context, he couldn’t be certain. But something in Severus’ gut was screaming at him wrong, wrong, wrong!
It was signed only “M.” Severus had squinted down at the initial for a long moment before remembering with a pang in his chest that Dazai’s father’s name was Mori. But... something about that didn’t make sense, either. Hadn’t the writer mentioned that they weren’t Dazai’s father? If so, then who was the author?
The rest of the letter was nothing more than a smattering of words and phrases without context. Large burns and claw scratches made any other full sentences illegible. Words like, “check-up,” “ability,” and “port,” all meant nothing without the presence of what was supposed to surround them.
What sort of vile person was Dazai involved with? And how had he been stupid enough to let all of his student’s red flags go ignored?
He was an idiot. And worse than that: Severus was too attached to the issue at hand. Attached enough that he was willing to let Dazai’s discomfort cloud his vision. Enough that he didn’t push for fear of hurting the boy—when not pushing was the reason things had ended like this. The Philosopher’s Stone missing, Quirrell dead, Voldemort in the wind…
Dazai in his abuser’s clutches without so much as a fight on Severus' part.
The sound of stone scraping abruptly cut his thoughts off.
He pushed off of the wall and turned to watch the door slowly open. A gargoyle statue stared him down with cobblestone eyes.
Albus was ready to see him now.
Drawing in a deep breath, Severus walked up the spiral staircase laid out before him. He entered Dumbledore’s office with a knock. The headmaster had brushed of Severus’ concerns for Dazai in the past, but looking at this letter now, he had no choice but to do something.
Right?
...What kind of awful school was Hogwarts that Severus had room to doubt that?
Albus’ back was to him, so Severus couldn’t read what sort of expression was written there. The various knickknacks on the shelf bounced and rolled around, propelled by a magic he couldn’t see. Whatever they were had captured the headmaster’s attention fully. Snape glared at a particularly colorful one before turning to shut the door firmly closed behind him.
A phoenix watched him from the desk with two shiny eyes.
“Is the boy safely returned home, Severus?”
“I saw him off myself. The Daily Prophet is as fast as always, however.”
Albus merely nodded, evidently having expected Skeeter’s obnoxious presence. “All the more reason we should be glad Mr. Dazai is no longer at Hogwarts, for the moment. No magical newspaper would dare to enter the muggle world so brazenly. He’ll be far safer there than in Hogwarts.”
Severus nodded stiffly. He gripped the letter in his hands more tightly.
Would Dazai be safer at home?
“Albus—”
“Severus,” Dumbledore interrupted. He spun around, a flash of his magnificent, starry cloak startling Snape back a step. His eyes were steely and sharp. “Neither Voldemort nor Hogwarts has the Philosopher’s Stone.”
“Some third party must be involved. I have heard nothing from any of my contacts about the stone’s current owner, though they must have someone planted inside the campus.”
“Perhaps."
“Perhaps,” Severus felt his eyes narrow. “What does that mean?”
His hands clenched around the letter. The curly, black ink pressed into his palm. It didn’t seep into his skin like snake venom, but Severus thought it must have been close.
“There is quite a lot about the theft that we are still unclear on. I merely wish to consider all of the possibilities and prepare for all alternatives.”
Severus recalled his interrogation of Dazai with a frown. Nothing about their conversation had really answered Severus’ questions. To say that Albus had been displeased would be an understatement. “Mr. Dazai—”
“Enough about the boy, Severus,” Albus snapped. “We need to focus our attentions on more important things. If Voldemort is not responsible for the theft, we need to work fast to get ahead of whoever did.”
Severus’ mouth dropped open. However, once his stupefaction had passed, rage split his expression into a harsh scowl. But before Snape could fully let loose his livid thoughts one Dumbledore, the man sighed.
The weary expression on Dumbledore’s face was most unusual. The headmaster carried with him an air of absolute certainty. He was an expert in his field, and his demeanor showed it. To see him now…
Well, now it was just making Severus angry.
“Though I suppose you are right. For Quirrell to take interest in him, Mr. Dazai may be of some value to us.”
“He is more than just one of your pawns.”
Albus didn’t acknowledge the point with any more than a tilt of his head. “Would it reassure you to investigate the boy yourself?”
“That isn’t what I meant.”
“I’m permitting you to keep an eye on him. Is that not what you are always asking me about?” Albus’ voice held little inflection when he spoke, as if the topic of a hurt child was nothing more than an annoying pest buzzing around his head. “Report back to me if you find anything of value.”
The letter in Severus’ hand crinkled beneath his suddenly fisted hand. A stranger’s inked words bled something damning into his palm. His teeth gnashed together.
“Now, onto the bigger picture.”
The phoenix turned a fiery head to the window.
“Severus,” Albus said, eyes dark, “Have you ever heard of Special Ability Users?”