Chapter Text
Dark Horse*(noun)*: A candidate or competitor about whom little is known but who unexpectedly wins or succeeds.
“I’m a man of constant sorrow.”— The Soggy Bottom Boys, “Man of Constant Sorrow”
Harry moved in step with Draco Malfoy, his stride steady but cautious. The contrast between them was almost laughable—two silhouettes cut from entirely different cloth.
Draco glided forward with the easy arrogance of someone born into sharp suits and sharper legacies. Head high, posture immaculate, every step exuding entitlement. A faint, predatory grin tugged at his lips, smug and knowing. Behind him, Crabbe and Goyle lumbered like dull-witted shadows, their low, grating laughter peppering the corridor like background noise.
Harry… slouched.
His gaze hovered just above the floor, watching his scuffed shoes mark the ancient stone. His shoulders curled inward, spine tight, fingers twitching minutely at his sides. His steps were deliberate—careful in a way that wasn’t quite submissive but very much… watchful. Calculated.
Strange, wasn’t it? Harry Potter, walking with wolves.
Then again… maybe not so strange.
All his life, he’d been surrounded by predators—just of a different breed. Not wolves, no… but hyenas. Creatures that laughed as they bit. That tore you down in the open, no dignity, no grace—just hunger and cruelty, endless and crude.
Perhaps wolves were preferable. Wolves were ruthless, yes, but precise. They hunted for survival, not sport. They protected their own. Even took in lost cubs, if stories were to be believed.
A lamb among wolves was still prey… but at least there were rules.
Harry’s lips twitched at the thought—a dry, bitter humor curling in his chest.
How fitting. His life was one long, biting irony.
Walking beside Draco, Harry felt every inch of his own wiry frame—small, underfed, unremarkable. His too-big robes hung awkwardly, his knuckles pale from clutching his books too tightly. Next to Draco’s polished sneer and easy grace, Harry looked exactly as he felt—out of place. Outclassed. Outnumbered.
His eyes flicked up in time to catch a simple, fluid gesture from Draco—two fingers, quick and dismissive. Crabbe and Goyle obeyed instantly, slowing their pace until they lagged several steps behind. Their expressions shifted—goofy grins gone, replaced by the blank, heavy-eyed stare of good soldiers awaiting orders.
Harry blinked.
Interesting.
“I take it you intend to stick by Potter?”
It sounded like a question—technically was—but Draco’s delivery wrapped it in quiet menace. Threat more than inquiry. Then again, Harry was starting to realize… everything Draco said sounded like a warning dressed up in civility.
They stopped. Abruptly.
Harry barely managed to halt himself, stumbling slightly before catching balance. His body moved instinctively—falling back half a step, shifting just enough so Draco stood slightly in front of him, shielding him from direct attention, from direct confrontation. A half-shadow.
Draco extended a hand toward him, steady, expectant. The same gesture as the night before. Cool, polished fingers, poised like they were offering something priceless.
“You didn’t get the chance to answer before,” Draco mused. His expression was carved sharp, impassive, but the edges of his voice curled with something… keen. Curious. Probing. “So I’m offering again.”
Harry’s throat felt tight.
This—this—was exactly what he’d tried to avoid. No statements. No alignments. No drama. But neutrality didn’t exist here. Not really. The castle, the world… it didn’t allow for quiet corner-sitters. Sooner or later, the game demanded players.
“I’d advise you to take this chance,” Draco said, his voice dipping—lower, smoother, more dangerous. “I don’t offer second chances often.”
A quiet shiver rolled down Harry’s spine. His scar pulsed, not sharp, but heavy—an oppressive throb like thunder before a storm.
Lemony’s voice echoed in his head—cool, amused, unapologetically strategic.
Harry’s hand moved, slow and reluctant, until his palm hovered above Draco’s. His fingers, thinner, rougher—scarred from chores, scraped from punishment—met the refined, manicured skin of someone raised untouched by hardship. The contrast was startling, visceral. A collision of two worlds.
This is a human hand, Harry thought vaguely, staring at the connection between their fingers. This is what human feels like.
It was strange… absurd, even. That someone as human as Draco Malfoy would reach out to him, who had always been treated like something less, something other. Stranger still… that Lemony had done the same. Though Lemony didn’t feel quite human, did he? Less flesh and bone, more… heat. Star-bright. Alive in a way that burned.
Their hands tightened in a brief, calculated shake.
His scar flared—Harry braced—expecting the stab, the agony… but it didn’t come.
Instead, the burn was softer. Warm. A low simmer, humming beneath his skin like embers. Not pain… something else.
Unfamiliar. Unsettling.
Harry didn’t pull away.
Draco’s gaze lingered on their joined hands, a flicker of something unreadable crossing his face—something Harry was too lost in thought to catch. By the time Harry’s head lifted, Draco’s expression had already reset—blank, poised, distant.
His grip on Harry’s hand tightened—just for a second—before the corners of his mouth curled upward, sharp and knowing. “Good choice,” Draco drawled, satisfied, before releasing him with a final squeeze and stepping forward, smooth and confident.
Harry trailed behind, matching pace automatically, while Crabbe and Goyle hovered several strides back—silent shadows on their heels.
“It’s good,” Draco began, casually, “that you chose to avoid that dirty blood-traitor.”
Harry frowned, uncertain, until the memory surfaced—Ron’s scowling face, the snapped rejection after Draco’s first offer. His throat worked before he asked, voice quiet, cautious, “You mean… Ron?”
Draco’s sneer was instantaneous, curling like smoke around his words. “Yes. That pathetic Weasley.”
Harry blinked. “What’s a… blood traitor?”
The question earned him a sharp grin. “Merlin, you really are clueless,” Draco said, half-laughing, half-genuine wonder. “You weren’t raised properly at all.”
Harry shrugged, awkward. “I didn’t know I was a wizard. I didn’t know any of this existed.”
And just like that—the air shifted.
The hallway seemed to still, sounds dimming under the weight of Harry’s words.
Draco’s jaw flexed, an involuntary tic pulling at his eye. “You were raised by… Muggles?” he asked, voice low and vaguely disgusted.
Harry tilted his head. “You mean… regular people?”
The sneer that pulled across Draco’s mouth was venomous, sharp enough to cut through steel. “Fragile little things. Primitive. Weak. There’s a reason we keep them out of our world—they wouldn’t last a day.”
He exhaled, theatrical in a way that felt almost rehearsed. “Anyway,” he continued, “to answer your question… blood traitors like those filthy Weasleys are purebloods who waste their birthright. Who throw away their status, their power. They go about parading the idea that… mudbloods”—the word hissed out like poison—“are equals. That they belong among us.”
His voice dropped, all pretense evaporating, leaving behind something raw and cold.
Harry flinched, the sheer weight of Draco’s hatred sinking beneath his skin, festering somewhere deep—curling in the hollow places he thought long numb.
It was ugly. And it was loud.
Harry knew the things Draco said were cruel—rotten with prejudice, laced with entitlement. Yet… a quiet, unsettling part of him couldn’t entirely disagree with the notion that Muggles—non-magical people—were better off far away from this world. He’d seen what they were capable of. He knew their greed, their spite, their endless hunger to ruin what they couldn’t understand. Magic wouldn’t survive a week under their hands.
Draco glanced sideways, assessing. “A shame,” he said smoothly, “that your power was left to rot among people too blind to recognize it. A diamond hidden among rocks.” He smiled, sharp-edged and arrogant. “Don’t worry… the first time you cast magic properly—real magic—you’ll understand. You’ll never forget how it feels.”
They came to a stop in front of a tall, heavy door wedged between two looming suits of tarnished armor. The air smelled faintly of damp stone and something sharper—potion ingredients lingering in the walls.
Crabbe leaned forward, his breath far too close to Harry’s ear. “Snape doesn’t like mixed tables,” he muttered, tone laced with something sly and sneering. “Better remember that.”
It wasn’t a warning—it was a test. Harry heard it.
Goyle gave a short, ugly laugh—thick, piggish. The sound died abruptly as Draco snapped his fingers without so much as a glance back.
In eerie synchronization, Crabbe and Goyle fell silent, posture straightening like they’d been yanked upright by invisible strings—obedient, alert, waiting for their next command.
“It’s true,” Draco said, idly adjusting his cufflinks, “Snape prefers we don’t mix houses… but from what I hear, you and Antwork get on well, so you’ll be fine.”
That snapped Harry’s attention up, his eyes narrowing slightly. “You know Lemony?” he asked, voice low, cautious.
Draco let out a dry, humorless laugh—raspy, cutting, not the brash noise Crabbe and Goyle made. “Of course I do. Roan Antwork—Lemony’s father—is close with mine. Grew up alongside the sharp tooth.”
The nickname made something cold shiver down Harry’s spine, fingertips pricking with unease. “Sharp tooth?” he echoed.
Draco’s smirk deepened. “That’s what we call him.”
“Why?” Harry pressed, wariness creeping into his tone.
Goyle opened his mouth, eager to answer, but Draco’s glance was a blade—sharp, immediate. Goyle snapped his jaw shut, shoulders locking in place. Harry’s scar pulsed, a sharp burn ripping across his forehead, so sudden it made him bite down hard on his cheek to keep from reacting.
“Not important right now,” Draco dismissed curtly, pushing open the Potions classroom door with a sweep of his hand. “Come on.”
Inside, the room was already packed. Gryffindors lined the front-left tables with Hufflepuffs behind, while Slytherins crowded the front-right and Ravenclaws settled in the back.
Harry slipped into the single open seat beside Lemony, who barely glanced at him before casting a bored look forward. “So,” Lemony drawled, “you didn’t devour him, then?”
Draco huffed a laugh, sauntering past. “Where’s the fun in that?”
Their shared glance carried a sharp, knowing amusement that Harry couldn’t decipher. He was about to ask Lemony about the nickname—sharp tooth—when the classroom door slammed open.
The man from the feast swept into the room, robes billowing behind him like smoke. Professor Snape—sharp-featured, sallow-skinned, with a perpetual sneer curling his mouth—stalked to the front of the classroom. His head held high, posture rigid, he radiated disdain.
“There will be no foolish wand-waving in this class,” he announced, voice low and venomous, each word sliding through the air like oil. His eyes scanned the room—cold, calculating—barely masking his open contempt for the sea of jittery first-years before him.
He curled his lip further, tone sharp enough to cut stone. “No silly incantations. No foolish heroics.” His gaze lingered longest on the Gryffindor section, pure disgust crackling in his expression.
Harry shifted in his seat, a heavy pit settling in his stomach. Everything about the man felt… wrong. His movements were too fluid, his words too weighty. It was oppressive.
A soft brush of quill feathers danced across Harry’s hand. He glanced sideways—Lemony, expression blank, eyes fixed forward like nothing had happened.
Snape’s voice coiled back into Harry’s head. “However… a few select students…” His gaze slid across the room, pausing to regard Draco with an almost approving tilt of his chin. “…possess the predisposition to truly appreciate… the subtle art of potion-making.”
Snape drew his cloak inward, wrapping himself in it like wings folding around a bat, dramatic and deliberate.
Lemony’s voice drifted low beside him, “Godfather,” he muttered, tilting his chin toward Draco. “Explains the theatrics.”
Harry blinked, deadpan. “Where’s the rest come from?”
Lemony smirked. “His father. Obviously.”
Snape’s voice boomed again. “I can teach you how to bewitch the mind… ensnare the senses… bottle fame… brew glory… even put a stopper in death.”
The words pressed down on Harry’s chest like weights. The power in them was suffocating. Revolting. But it steadied him—anger had a way of anchoring him when the world felt unsteady.
Quietly, methodically, Harry wrote down every word.
Snape’s gaze bore into Harry like a curse—dark, cold, dissecting.
“Then again,” Snape murmured, voice sliding oily through the quiet, “perhaps some of you arrived at Hogwarts already so formidable in your abilities… so impossibly gifted…”
Harry kept writing, jaw tight.
“…that you feel no need to pay attention.”
A snap.
Not a sound, not something physical—but inside. Something cracked. Slipped.
The quill stilled in Harry’s hand as he slowly looked up, heart pounding in his ears.
The room had gone silent. Utterly still.
Snape moved—his steps soft but cutting. He stalked toward the Ravenclaw section with predatory grace, eyes never leaving Harry’s face.
“Mr. Potter,” he drawled, voice clipped with carefully leashed disdain. “Our new celebrity.”
Harry’s eye twitched.
His fingers tightened around the quill.
Snape stopped just in front of him, casting a shadow across Harry’s desk.
“Tell me,” he said, condescension curling each syllable, “what would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?”
Harry’s blood thrummed like static.
Across the room, a hand shot into the air—Hermione Granger, proper and eager, her expression flushed with urgency. She waved her hand, practically vibrating.
Snape ignored her.
All his attention was locked on Harry.
Harry opened his mouth. Closed it. Shook his head once, curt. He didn’t trust his voice—not when it was so full of shards.
Lemony tilted his head slightly, observing with faint fascination, like he was watching someone tiptoe across ice just beginning to crack.
Snape’s lip curled.
“You don’t know? Hm. Let’s try again.”
He leaned in closer.
“Where, Mr. Potter, would you look if I asked you to find me a bezoar?”
Hermione’s hand again. Desperate. Ignored.
Harry grit his teeth. “I don’t know, sir,” he said, voice strained—barely forced through clenched jaws.
Snape’s eyes gleamed.
“And what is the difference,” he asked, voice soft but slicing, “between monkshood and wolfsbane?”
Another pause.
“I don’t know, sir,” Harry bit out.
A low, disappointed tsk.
“Pity,” Snape said, stepping back. “Clearly, fame isn’t everything… is it, Mr. Potter?”
There was a beat of silence. A breath.
And then—
Something broke.
All the carefully folded paper inside Harry—every page scribbled with fear, fury, pressure, grief—ripped.
Every word. Every insult. Every hungry eye. Every hand that grabbed. Every slap. Every scream behind cupboard doors. Every echo of freak and worthless and you deserve it.
All of it snapped loose.
And the boy-who-lived—the boy-who-survived—sat very still.
Then he spoke.
“I was writing down what you said, sir,” Harry said flatly—cold, razor-edged. His tone mirrored Snape’s own cutting sharpness. “I’m a first year. The fact you’re targeting me openly… that’s the real pity.”
The room stilled.
Harry’s words landed like ice shards, cracking through the quiet.
“And Hermione Granger,” Harry continued, voice steady, eyes like flint, “clearly knows the answers to every question you’ve asked. It’s… telling… that you’d rather humiliate someone who’s here to learn than acknowledge the student who has them ready.”
No laughter followed.
No whispers.
Just stunned, sharp silence.
That voice—so cold, so detached, laced with something feral beneath the surface—was not the tone of an eleven-year-old boy. It was too cutting. Too honest. Too dangerous.
Snape’s face stayed carefully blank, but something shifted beneath the surface. The usual sick satisfaction—gone. In its place, a tense flicker of something unreadable.
He moved—smooth, quiet—until he stood directly in front of Harry’s desk.
Beside him, Lemony’s fingers tapped rhythmically against the wood, slow and measured, like counting heartbeats in a drowning man.
The air warped.
Thickened.
Darkness seemed to pulse through it—coiling, suffocating, pressing in from all sides.
Even those too young, too untrained to understand magic felt it.
“Since you’re so eager for the answers, Potter…” Snape’s voice returned, lower, calmer, laced with frost. “Asphodel and wormwood, when combined, produce a sleeping potion… a draught so potent it is known as the Draught of Living Death.”
His gaze dipped briefly—eyes scanning the notebook on Harry’s desk.
The entire earlier speech—every word—neatly written, annotated, organized.
Snape’s jaw flexed.
His eyes lifted again, hard and assessing.
“A bezoar,” he continued, voice clipped, “is a stone taken from the stomach of a goat. It will protect you from most poisons.”
Harry didn’t react. Just watched. Listened. Absorbed.
From across the room, Draco stared openly—lips curled in something darkly pleased, but eyes… intrigued. Like Harry had stepped out of some neat little box Draco had placed him in.
“As for monkshood and wolfsbane…” Snape’s lip curled, “they are, in fact, the same plant, which also goes by the name… aconite.”
Harry dipped his head slightly. Pen in hand. Writing again—silent, clinical, detached.
Snape continued.
His words stayed sharp, but the hostility… thinned.
Yet the air remained heavy—thick with something bitter, watching, waiting.
Snape’s cold gaze swept across the room, unimpressed, exhaling sharply through his nose. “Well?” he snapped, tone clipped and sharp, “Why aren’t you all writing this down?”
A flash of amusement ghosted across his face as the Gryffindors scrambled in a clumsy panic—quills scratching desperately against parchment, ink blotting in their rush.
With an elegant pivot, Snape returned to his place at the front—cloak billowing like smoke in his wake—settling onto his stool with an air of finality.
“And Ravenclaw,” he drawled, voice oily and deliberate, dipping his quill into the inkwell with slow precision, “five points taken… for your classmate’s cheek.”
The words struck like a hammer.
Harry tensed, muscles locking up beneath his robes, panic threading through his chest. The haze of fury from earlier was gone, leaving only nerves—cold, thin, frantic.
He knew what came next. Knew what to expect: ridicule, contempt, punishment.
He waited for the sneers. Waited for the cold jabs of words. Waited for the bruises.
But none came.
No jeers. No insults. No blows.
Instead… the Slytherins watched him, their usual scorn tempered into something calculating—curiosity sharpening their edges.
Even the Ravenclaws remained quiet—glancing at him not with disdain… but muted interest. A girl with wide, distant eyes leaned over briefly, whispering, “Your notes are very well organized,” before returning to her work like nothing had happened.
Harry blinked, stunned silent, hands still trembling faintly as his quill danced clumsily over parchment.
Beside him, Lemony wore a smile—sharp, knowing, and amused. “You’re a dark horse,” Lemony murmured low, barely audible. The words settled strangely in Harry’s chest—cooling, quieting. Like balm on scorched skin.
Confusion pressed tight against Harry’s ribs. The absence of punishment was its own disorienting ache.
His fingers shook, his gaze blurred, but he forced himself to write—forcing control back into the cracks splintering his composure.
From the front of the room, Snape’s cold stare lingered, watching, measuring, fingers twitching against the spine of his notebook.
‘He is no lion,’ Snape thought darkly. ‘No… not a lion at all.’
“He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become a monster.” — Friedrich Nietzsche