HP's Lost and the Lighthouse

To be honest, Snape was a little surprised by the arrival of this note - for some reason, Dumbledore, who had interviewed him from time to time last year, had not sent him such a note since the beginning of school in September Little note.Even though they usually wouldn't talk about anything in this kind of meeting, the sudden change in the habits they had maintained for more than ten years still made the Potions Master a little uncomfortable.

But he didn't worry about why Dumbledore suddenly broke this habit and sent himself a note at this time, Snape just arrived at the principal's office on time according to the time written on the note.

As expected by the potions professor, Dumbledore was already waiting in the headmaster's office.Seeing him come in, the old man put down the Phoenix he was teasing, stretched out his hand and pushed his glasses.

"Why don't you sit down, Severus?"

Seeing this, Snape really raised his eyebrows, and sat down on a chair opposite Dumbledore.

The man subconsciously crossed his fingers and looked up at Dumbledore. His sharpness had already made him aware of something: "What do you want to talk to me about?" Snape asked, careful not to express his speculation first.

Looking at the potions professor subconsciously hiding his thoughts, Dumbledore smiled, but there was not much smile in his blue eyes.

"I think you've already guessed it, Severus." The afternoon sun cast from behind the headmaster, making the old man's expression a bit blurred in the shadows, "I'm afraid I was wrong when I told you at the beginning."

Snape's fingers crossed on his knees trembled slightly, his eyes fixed on Dumbledore.His Adam's apple rolled slowly, and he said cautiously: "I don't think so."

"Oh, Severus."

Dumbledore really smiled at this moment, and even his eyes couldn't help but bend.

"I didn't know you trusted my judgment so much." He said, lowering his eyes to look at a pen holder carved with patterns on the table, "You know, I'm just an ordinary person, and I can be blinded by the surface of things. A normal thing. But - with all due respect - given that I'm a bit more perceptive than most people - I may realize some connections before others."

"Relationship?" Snape repeated.

"Yes, the connection—so clear—" Dumbledore paused, "The petrification incident may still be related to Voldemort."

Snape narrowed his eyes, and went through the details of the two petrification events in his mind - although he was not at the first scene the second time, he would inevitably not get many details that Dumbledore knew, but the man couldn't find them at all. Find out where these two things are related to Voldemort.

Dumbledore knew what Snape was thinking at a glance, and he didn't let him think about it, but directly stated the reason for his judgment: "More than 50 years ago, Hogwarts expelled a student—because another The death of a student, but as I speculated decades ago, the expelled student is most likely innocent."

Snape was taken aback - he couldn't think of a situation under which Dumbledore would allow an innocent man to be expelled.

The Potions Professor's expression was too obvious and easy to understand, which made the old man a little helpless: "Severus, just like I told you, I am just an ordinary person, and there are things that I can't do anything that can't be more normal. .”

"Fifty years ago..." He chewed on the time, and suddenly raised his eyes to Dumbledore, "Hagrid?"

—Hagrid's expulsion was no secret among the professors at Hogwarts.

The old man nodded and sighed heavily: "Hagrid is a good boy."

Snape frowned at the principal's guilty look, and just as he was about to say something, Dumbledore pulled himself together and returned to his usual state of being in control of everything.

"What I want to tell you today is——Voldemort, he was also a student of Hogwarts back then. It was the Hagrid he identified."

"But no students died this time..." Snape said, "Why did the Dark Lord have trouble with these students?"

"That's why I didn't think of him first," said Dumbledore, bringing his fingertips together out of habit.Snape saw a thoughtful flicker in his eyes, and after a while the old man looked up, "Then it occurred to me that petrification doesn't have to be caused by a spell - just like the death in the first place. You know what that means What are you doing, Severus?"

Snape hooked the corners of his mouth and showed a mocking smile: "If the greatest white wizard in the world doesn't know what it means, how can he force me—how can an insignificant potions professor know?"

After he finished speaking, he turned his head to look at the portrait of a winking headmaster behind Dumbledore.

"You know that's not the case," said Dumbledore. "I think this means that there is a life in the castle - it can kill people or petrify - we can't yet tell what it depends on, and at the same time I think Voldemort doesn't seem to be able to fully control it yet—maybe it means he's weak in some way..." He lowered his voice as he spoke, seeming to be lost in thought again.

"By the way," Dumbledore snapped back to his senses after a while, and smiled apologetically at Snape, "Ghideroy mentioned to me the other day that he plans to organize a dueling club before Christmas— —I think it’s been about two days.”

The Potions Professor's expression twisted in distaste, and he looked at Dumbledore questioningly—Snape didn't believe that Dumbledore wouldn't be able to see the true face of that idiot, so the old man's purpose of bringing this up at this moment was To be discussed.

"I agreed to his application." The old man said with a smile, his eyes flickered mischievously behind his glasses, "However—for safety's sake, Gilderoy has agreed to you to be his deputy."

The disgust on Snape's face was almost undisguised: "Why me?"

"Professor Flitwick is a good duelist - and -"

"Because I trust you, Severus." Dumbledore said with a smile.

It was such a simple sentence that Snape's words of resistance were blocked in his throat.

The speechless young man glared at Mr. Principal angrily, snorted coldly, with a look of disbelief on his face.Dumbledore just looked at him with his blue and clear eyes that didn't look like an old man over a hundred.

After a while, Snape's shoulders slumped, his mouth still pouted unhappily, the corners of his mouth twisted a few times, and he squeezed out a sentence through his teeth.

"When?"

——As it turned out, Dumbledore always had a way to make Snape compromise.

The author has something to say:

Hey everyone, your lovely author crawled back from the exam week Shura field, and said loudly if you missed me!

[I know I'm late QAQ my fault]

After that, there will be another two days of interruption. Poor thing, I want to go back to China QAQ