Inner Demons and Icicles

They call kids like us vicious and carved out of stone,

but for what we become we just feel more alone

Fall Out Boy – 'I Slept With Someone In Fall Out Boy And All I Got Was This Stupid Song Written About Me'

Winter had come to Hogwarts, and the dungeons were freezing, not that Severus Snape noticed. He had grown used to the extreme variations of temperature characteristic of Hogwarts' lower levels, and kept a roaring fire going in his office all day during the coldest months of the year. Many of the students were excited at the prospect of the Christmas holidays on the horizon, but Severus was indifferent to the buzz of excited conversations that pervaded the school. He was busy, after all; he had plenty of sixth-year defence essays to correct. Besides, Christmas was hardly his favourite time of year. He had never experienced happy Christmases during his childhood, and his sole enjoyable memories of the season had been when Lily used to stay in school with him or bring him to her house for part of the holidays. There were too many old regrets there to make the season of love and understanding pleasant for him these days, and he had no wish to start reawakening his inner demons when he had work to do.

He finished marking Potter's essay with a sigh. Defence was one of the few subjects the boy had any real aptitude for, and he certainly had a better grasp of the core concepts than most of his classmates (although he had noticed an improvement in the general standard of work being turned in this year by most of the former members of Dumbledore's Army than was on file for them from past years), but his attitude of acting first and thinking several days later, if at all, spilled over into his homework. For Merlin's sake, his suggestion for what to do in the event of seeing a Dementor was to chase after it casting a Patronus "in case it attacks a bystander". Hero complex. Just like his father, and in the end that arrogant toerag hadn't been able to prevent the death of his own wife. He had trusted a known cowardly idiot and then rushed out to confront the Dark Lord without a wand because he hadn't planned or prepared for the worst or considered that he might be in the least bit vulnerable on his own turf. Moron.

He put Potter's essay (graded 'E') on the small pile of marked papers and pulled the next one from the stack. Granger's. Much as he hated to admit it, while she was a self-important, motor-mouthed know-it-all in person, he rather enjoyed reading her essays. She wrote at a higher standard than the textbook, always turned in more than the minimum required length of parchment, and gave detailed analysis to support her arguments. That was the kind of effort that he had put into his essays in school, and he expected the same from the good students of today.

He flew through marking her paper. She had not only grasped the theory, but had put a good deal of thought into the practical ramifications of fighting off Dementors, unlike Potter and his preferred tactic of 'hit and hope'. He should listen to his friends more: it was a miracle he had prevailed in his past encounters with the creatures if he followed his own advice.

He put Granger's essay aside and picked up the next one. Weasley. He groaned. It would be the bare minimum length of parchment and littered with elementary spelling, grammar and factual errors, as per usual. If the Potter-Granger-Weasley dream team had been in Slytherin (he snorted at the idea of Weasley lasting five minutes in the house, between his idiocy and his combative attitude), the sullen redhead would have been ditched by the other two as dead weight or tolerated as Crabbe- or Goyle-esque muscle, but sentimentality had kept the trio together despite their frequent public fights. He sighed, and stood up. He might as well have a stroll to clear his head before he plunged into Weasley's latest assault on logic, rationality and the English language.

He preferred to walk through the edges of the Forest: there was no risk of someone interrupting his thoughts as only a handful of troublemaking students would dare to go in there and they would have the good sense to avoid him. He had plenty to think about, unfortunately, between his dangerous role as a double agent, the problem of Draco, Dumbledore's increasingly incomprehensible plans, and the Lovegood girl's attempts to lambaste him in the media as some kind of child-traumatising monster. The last one made him smirk slightly. If she had ever had the misfortune to meet James bloody Potter she wouldn't think his own impatience with lazy students was bullying.

He was broken out of his reverie by the sound of voices around the corner. He ducked down beneath a tree and edged closer, operating on instinct. If people were muttering about something on the edge of the Forbidden Forest, they didn't want to be heard. That meant they were lovebirds, who deserved to have points docked for the sheer idiocy of not finding a broom cupboard given how cold it was out, or people plotting something, in which case he should listen in. He chanced a glance around the tree and saw Potter and Lovegood standing several metres away, petting a Thestral foal and talking quietly. Plotting it was then: either trying to find new ways to demonise him in the media or cooking up some hare-brained, moronic caper that would interfere with Dumbledore's schemes and get students hurt. Granger and the Weaselette were sitting nearby, presumably keeping lookout. Typical Potter arrogance, only posting lookouts on one approach. He snuck closer, sitting down beneath a bush and listening. Potter was talking.

" – they didn't like me having magic, I suppose. They were afraid of it, and she hated it. She was jealous, I think, of being the Muggle child."

Snape wondered who they were talking about. The 'she' sounded a little like his memories of Tuney, but presumably it was a common enough reaction among the siblings of Muggle-borns, at least until they got over the shock.

"So, yeah, they tried to squash it out of me. My bedroom was the cupboard under the stairs until my first Hogwarts letter came, and they used to lock me in there if I did anything wrong, y'know, accidental magic or anything. I thought my parents had died in a car crash until Hagrid came to forcibly deliver a Hogwarts letter because they'd been withholding them."

Severus froze. Dumbledore had never told him where Potter was living, just that he was safe. The location was apparently given to Order members on a need-to-know basis. He had assumed the boy was off being spoiled rotten by some of his father's relatives (did Potter have relatives? He had never cared about that before). Besides, the brat practically lived with Black (before his death) and the Weasleys anyway, and they were incredibly overprotective of him. He paused, and mentally reviewed that statement. Potter spent as much of his holidays as possible away from home. Surely that was a sign that something was wrong?

"Even after I went to school, they tried to lock me up to stop me going back for second year. Ron and the twins had to break me out. Dudley got all the fun, all the friends and all the praise, and I was his punchbag, so that's why I'd never built a snowman before."

An icicle was melting and dripping cold water down the back of Severus' neck, but he hardly noticed. What in Merlin's name had the old man been thinking? Who had he put Potter with? Had he really been so stupid as to place him in the care of that embittered cow?

His suspicions were confirmed a moment later when Lovegood hugged Potter and muttered "Your aunt and uncle are very mean. Saying her own sister had died in a car crash!"

Potter muttered something vague and hugged her back. Dumbledore had a point, those two were becoming close. Or sappy, more accurately. He smirked at the thought of what the Weaselette must think of that. He sat very still waiting for them to leave, thinking about his own childhood for the first time in years. It seemed that, while Potter might be impulsive, a sloppy thinker, and a bad student, he was neither arrogant nor entitled. And no wonder he defended his friends so hot-headedly. He must be so grateful to have any. It was good that Lovegood, despite her patent insanity, was looking after him.

He stood up, brushing snow off his robes. His walk had decidedly not cleared his head. He was going to have to find the time to have a word with the old codger, in defence of the most irritating student he had ever had the misfortune to teach.

It was going to be a long day. It was probably time he opened that bottle of Firewhiskey Horace had given him to congratulate him on getting the Defence job.

A/N: This was written for round one of Bex's Secret Battle Competition. I used all five prompts. It's also a missing moment from The Biter Bit, taking place during Chapter 17, 'Learning To Listen'.