AN: This is one-shot of what I imagine would have happened if Harry had gone to Snape regarding his detentions with Umbridge. Obviously, it is AU set during fifth year. The timeline is intentionally vague, because I haven't read the book in a while and don't recall exactly when what happens. Also, I don't own Harry Potter.

Nothing at all

He's wading through the latest stack of first-year papers, somewhat absent-mindedly, scribbling correction after similar correction in the margins. First-year papers generally fall into two categories: muggleborns and muggle-raised children have superior writing skills, having been taught the basics of essay composition in muggle primary school, while pureblooded children tend to be better at articulating the details of magical theory itself, having received basic lessons prior to attending Hogwarts. Either way, Severus sees the same mistakes over and over again, and it is easy for his mind to wander.

A knock at the door draws his attention back to the present. "Come in," he says, thinking it is one of his Slytherins come to talk, as it is rare that students from other houses voluntarily approach him outside of class. When the door stays shut, he repeats himself, something he always finds aggravating.

"Come in!"

Now the door opens, just a crack, just enough to reveal Potter's nervous face.

"Er, are you busy?" Potter asks awkwardly. He has one hand on the doorknob, and the other is gripping the door frame so tightly his knuckles are turning white.

"Of course I am busy, Potter," sneers Severus, "but I wouldn't have told you to come in if I weren't intending to listen to whatever you have to say. So, come in and say your piece, or go away and stop wasting my time."

"Er, right, sorry."

The boy closes the door behind him, but doesn't venture further into the office. He nervously shifts his weight from foot to foot as he looks around, avoiding the potions master's eye as though he thinks Severus will eat him. Which, Severus thinks, he might, if he were a dragon, and if Potter weren't guaranteed to give even the toughest stomachs indigestion.

There is a long silence as Severus stares Potter down, quill still in hand. Finally, he cracks and, still avoiding Severus's gaze, asks, "I was, um, well, I was wondering if you know of a quill that makes you write with your own blood?"

Although he feels something inside him go cold, Severus forces himself to merely raise an eyebrow. "And why might you be wondering about such a thing?"

Potter hesitates, and Severus's sharp eye goes to the boy's left hand. Potter is fidgeting with it as though trying to massage a pain from it, clenching and unclenching the fist and wiggling the fingers. The fingers have a slight tremor to them, a nerve-damage-type tremor that Severus usually only sees in victims of the Cruciatus.

"Show me your hand," Severus orders, his mind already racing to put the pieces together. His voice is quiet, but leaves no room for argument… and yet, Potter tries.

"What?" he barks out with a half-laugh. "No, I won't, there's nothing to-"

"I said show me your hand," Severus repeats more sharply. "I assure you, Potter, I am not above using force-"

"All right, all right!" Potter snaps irritably, and Severus is about to scold him for his interruption, but the sight of Potter's wounded flesh stops him. He rises swiftly and is across the room in moments. He ignores Potter's flinch as he grabs the young Gryffindor's wrist and closely inspects the torn flesh. Bright red, inflamed, and oozing pus, a sure sign of infection, are the words I must not tell lies. The letters are small, but Potter's messy handwriting is unmistakable.

"Who has been using a blood quill on you?" he all but whispers.

"Umbridge," Potter says, shrinking a bit under the intensity of Severus's stare. For once, Severus does not comment on the omission of the honorific.

"And for how long?" He has had enough experience Dark Magic, injuries, and healing to know that Potter's hand did not come to its present state overnight.

Potter looks at his shoes and doesn't reply.

"Potter!"

"Since the start of term, okay? She makes me do it during detention."

Severus lets Potter's arm fall back to his side as his stare turns incredulous. They've all heard Dolores bemoaning Potter's insolence in the staff room, and, much as it pains him to agree with anything the sorry excuse for a witch says, he secretly agrees with her assessment of the boy's character. Still, even he wouldn't assign lines with a blood quill as punishment.

"And you thought it not important enough to mention to anybody? You thought you may as well martyr yourself like the Gryffindor you are?"

"I tried to tell McGonagall," Potter retorts, familiar defiance sparking in his eyes.

"Professor McGonagall," Severus corrects smoothly.

"Professor McGonagall. She told me to keep my head down."

This makes Severus pause. That does not sound like the Minerva McGonagall he knows. "You told her about the blood quill and she told you to 'keep your head down'?"

Potter flushes slightly. "I mean, I didn't actually tell her about the quill," he clarifies, "just the detentions."

This admission makes Severus want to bang his head against a wall. It never fails to astound him, truly, just how thick Harry Potter is.

"Then of course she didn't listen to you, Potter," says Severus exasperatedly. "We all have enough to worry about without students complaining about detentions."

"Well then I'm sorry to bother you," Potter says, scowling. He makes to leave, but Severus clamps a hand down on his shoulder.

"Stop being petulant," he says, rolling his eyes. "If you had shown her the mangled excuse for skin on the back of your hand, she would have listened."

He cuts off whatever Potter has to say in response with a wave of his hand. "Sit," he orders, and moves to retrieve a couple potions from a drawer in his desk. He is aware of Potter's distrustful eyes on him.

"Sit," he says again, when he looks up to find that the boy has come to stand beside the chair without actually taking a seat in it.

Once Potter has sat down, Severus takes his hand again and begins to apply a thick cream to the wound. Potter flinches at the first contact, but quickly begins to relax. The cut is already looking less raw by the time Severus conjures a bandage.

"Why are you here?" he asks as he wraps the hand in gauze.

Potter gives him an odd look. "Because Umbridge is a-"

"Finish that sentence and I will have you scrubbing cauldrons for a week," Severus warns, although he suspects he would likely agree with whatever adjective Potter chose to apply. He himself has been privately insulting Dolores Umbridge since the moment she set foot in the castle, and as he has discovered that the English language lacks the capacity to truly express the depths of his loathing, his insults have become rather colourful.

"Besides," Severus continues, "that's not what I mean and you know it. I mean, why are you here? Why not go back to Professor McGonagall or to the hospital wing? Or to Professor Dumbledore?"

Potter looks uncomfortable again. "Well, ah, you see," he stalls, "I figured the quill was probably dark magic, and I thought if I led with that, that would get your attention, and then I thought that, er…."

"Spit it out already!"

"You see, I thought that maybe you hate Umbridge more than you hate me, so you'd be likely to do something about it, but you wouldn't make a big deal about it because, y'know, you hate me," Potter finishes in a rush.

Severus blinks. Potter showing up unannounced at his office and inquiring about a dark artifact had certainly gotten his attention, and it was true that his hatred for Umbridge outweighed his hatred for Harry Potter… but it seemed strange that Potter would bet on the strength of Severus's dislike rather than the strength of his head of house's caring, or Dumbledore's, for that matter, Dumbledore who has always favoured Potter beyond reasonable expectation. Expressing this doubt made Potter look even more uncomfortable. His face was flushed now, and he was looking anywhere but Severus.

"Yeah, but I mean… I guess I thought you might do something just because it would give you a good excuse to go after Umbridge."

Severus isn't sure whether to be amused or insulted at Potter's faith in his vengeful nature. "I assure you Professor McGonagall would have been sufficiently outraged if you had simply led with 'Dolores Umbridge is making me write with my own blood during detention,'" he says, and then adds, "but that is no matter now. We are going to the headmaster."

To his surprise, Potter's eyes widen in panic. "No!" he blurts. "I mean, I don't want to bother Dumbledore with this. I think… I get the sense he's especially busy this year… He's been avoiding me."

"Professor Dumbledore," corrects Severus automatically. "And busy as the headmaster is, he is hardly one to ignore the safety of his students. What did you expect me to do?"

"I dunno," Potter mumbles, sophisticated as ever. "I thought maybe you could just handle it in your, like, subtle Slytherin way or whatever."

It is definitely amusement that tugs at him this time, but Severus pushes the feeling down and scowls. "This is not up for debate, Potter. At the very least, Professor Dumbledore would be thoroughly displeased if he heard I knew about such abuse of his Golden Boy and did not bring the matter to him." He would prefer not to drag Potter kicking and screaming through the floo, but he will if he has to.

"Potter gives Severus a scowl of his own. "Don't call me that," he says sullenly, to which Severus merely sneers.

"To the headmaster, Potter."

It is perhaps one of the fastest times he's seen the omnipresent twinkle in the headmaster's eyes die.

"This is very serious," Dumbledore says, as though it weren't obvious. He is looking at Potter, who is looking at the floor.

Severus lets his thoughts wander. He's never actually seen a blood quill before—well, technically he still hasn't—but he's read about them. If he remembers correctly, they used to be used in the same way as an Unbreakable Vow, until it was discovered they could be used for torture in combination with the Imperius Curse. They were supposedly all destroyed. He wonders how on earth Dolores got her hands on one, and if the Minister had sanctioned it or not. More improbable things have happened with Defence teachers than Ministry-approved child abuse.

"I must ask you, Harry, why are you only now coming to us with this?" Dumbledore's question pulls Severus's attention back to the conversation at hand, as he has been wondering the same thing. He would have thought Potter would leap at the chance to play victim.

Potter is still looking at his shoes. He shrugs. "She started threatening other students," he mumbles. "I couldn't let that happen. Even if I agreed to let her take it all out on me if she left my friends alone, I don't think she'd really hold to that promise. But when it was just me, I could handle it."

"Yes, the infection on your hand really speaks to handling it well," Severus sneers, but falls silent when Dumbledore gives him a frown over his half-moon spectacles.

"Blood quills are illegal," Dumbledore tells Potter, without any admonishment in his tone.

"Oh," Potter says eloquently, and Severus snorts.

Dumbledore ignores Severus this time and instead looks thoughtfully up at the ceiling. "I will have to consider how best to handle this," he says after a silence. "With the Ministry involved, it is a political conundrum as well as a scholastic one. But," he adds, looking back at the boy again, "it will be dealt with, have no fear."

Perhaps it is the gravity of this promise that makes Potter look up and meet Dumbledore's eyes for the first time since they'd arrived. Dumbledore holds his gaze for only the briefest second before shifting it to Severus.

"Severus, if you have no urgent tasks waiting for you, we should talk," Dumbledore says.

Potter takes the dismissal for what it is. He is halfway through the door when he stops and turns. "Er, Professor?" he says awkwardly.

Both men look expectantly at him, and his gaze flickers up to Severus, who raises an eyebrow. "Thanks," Potter spits out, and he is gone before the potions master can register his own surprise. They can hear the thud of Potter's footsteps as he practically runs down the stairs.

Severus begins to roll his eyes, but stops when he catches sight of the amused quirk of Dumbledore's lips.

"What?" he snarls.

"Nothing at all, Severus," says Dumbledore mildly, that twinkle returned, "nothing at all."