Harry Potter and the Gift of Memories [Harry Potter Fan Fiction]

Chapter XVII: Befriending the Claws

Harry frowned as he read the book titled Legal Guide to Proper Use of Magic. According to this book, using Legillemency was illegal unless you were a member of the Auror forces under the jurisdiction of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, and using Legillemency on a minor could earn someone a ticket to Azkaban provided the minor could give solid proof that Legillemency was used on them.

This was both useful and useless information at the same time. He was pleased to discover that what Snape had done was illegal and could get him arrested. He was less than pleased to discover that he needed to have documented proof of Legillemency being used before Snape could even be brought to a trial.

What was he supposed to do? Convince Snape to sign a magically binding contract stating he had used Legillemency on a minor?

Not that it mattered anyway. Harry may have a lot of influence due to his status, but Dumbledore had more. Not to mention the man had been on the political scene for upwards of 100-years. Going up against a man like that was political suicide, even for him—especially for him since Harry was still learning the ins and outs of wizarding politics.

Even if he could theoretically humiliate Snape, or at least get him fired, it would take far too much time and effort, which could be better spent furthering his goals. He had no desire to fight with Professor Dumbledore trying to get the Head of the House of Slytherin kicked out, and Harry knew he would have to fight the man. There was no doubt in his mind that the Headmaster would defend the Potions professor should Harry try to charge Snape of committing a crime. He wouldn't have hired such a loathsome man if he wasn't willing to side with him when trouble came up.

That did leave him with a problem on what to do about Snape. The man clearly had very little in the way of moral compunctions if he could delve into a student's minds without regard to their privacy. He needed to be dealt with somehow. At the very least, Harry needed to find some way to neutralize the man's power at Hogwarts.

With a sigh, Harry decided to shelve his thoughts on Snape for the moment. He snapped the book shut, shrunk it, then pocketed it, before standing up and making his way over to Neville, who had just entered the Gryffindor common room.

The two friends shared a greeting before walking down to the Great Hall for breakfast. It was around nine o'clock when they arrived. Today was Saturday, which meant they didn't have any classes and could sleep in. Even Harry had slept in, or at least, he had lain in bed for an extra hour while organizing his thoughts.

That was one of the many disadvantages to being so well versed in Occlumency, he figured. When someone slept, their mind was usually busy filing away everything that had happened and been learned that day while the body was recovering. That was the reason people generally needed around eight hours of sleep. One half involved resting the body, the other half involved the mind.

Harry was different in that he did not need to rest his mind much, if at all. He organized and cleared his mind every night before he went to bed. If anything the act of sleeping made his mind more disorganized than it did when he was awake, which explained why Harry's body only needed four hours of sleep to run at peak efficiency.

Sometimes he cursed having such a well-organized mind.

Since it was Saturday, Harry had taken to wearing muggle clothes: blue jeans, a white undershirt and a dark green button up shirt combo. While he wouldn't deny that he did kind of like the cloaks, as they reminded him of his favorite space opera trilogy, he still preferred muggle clothing. Mainly because his non-magical clothes didn't restrict his movements like those heavy cloaks did.

They were soon joined at the Gryffindor table by Hannah and Susan, and Harry was pleased to see they hadn't needed any prompting to join them. That meant they were growing more comfortable about not following the crowd.