I would like to thank my beta, Kuilin.

Chapter 36.

The Bicentennial House-elf

4:43 pm, July 14th, 1993

Severus silently recounted things that he might need for his upcoming trip to Ukraine, and wondered where his sense of having forgotten something had come from. The black-haired man shook his head, and determined that it might have been caused by the many memory charms that the Boy-Who-Lived demanded for his various secrets.

-In the name of Merlin, not even Albus was this secretive!

Severus sighed, and strode toward the fireplace in his temporary residency.

As Severus was working on the security charms on the fireplace, his temporary roommate, Auror Bahry, commented from behind Severus, "Malfoy's place again?"

"And your junior female colleagues rather miss Lady Malfoy's cookies, I gather?" Severus replied sarcastically.

The Auror who had served the Department of Magical Law Enforcement for one hundred and one years gave a grunt. "Give it a break, you git! The girls hadn't been eating much of anything ever since Mad-Eye caught a hold on them."

Severus smirked, threw a pinch of Floo powder into the flames, and said, "Hogwarts Fireplace 394, one-time passcode: 022146."

As the black-haired man swirled into the Floo network, he silently admitted to himself: crazy as some of the Boy-Who-Lived's ideas might be, this suggestion of his, that every fireplace should be assigned with a random number and set with a password, is indeed quite brilliant.

When Severus stepped out from the fireplace in his old office, his godson was already waiting for him. The blond boy seemed to be under more stress than usual today.

-Draco can't be worrying about me going to the former Soviet states, can he? If that is the case, well, it is both touching and… Merlin, the new Lord Malfoy shouldn't be so soft.

"Anything you want to talk about, Draco?" Severus omitted the courtesies and asked directly.

"Yes, Godfather." Draco seemed to be a bit uneasy, "Would you apply some privacy spells?"

Severus nodded, and started to apply his common set of protection and privacy spells in the office-turned-living room, while explaining each of them in details to the blond boy. "Revelio. This is a more general form of Homenum Revelio and Specialis Revelio. Homenum Revelio, as you can guess from the incantation, only reveals human beings. It has no effect toward magical creatures, ghosts, paintings, etc. As a matter of fact, it is generally a good idea to hide a miniaturized painting of someone you trust at some places where you expect to hear some interesting conversation."

Draco's eyes moved uneasily toward where a painting of a sleeping hermit had been in this office-turned-living room. The boy had surely guessed the portrait of the same person might be hided somewhere in the Slytherin Common Room.

The ex-Head of Slytherin continued as if he hadn't noticed Draco's expressions. "Specialis Revelio detects spying charms and hexes, yet it has an unusually high failure rate at your age. Revelio, on the other hand, although it might be quite taxing for you, has a much higher success rate, and it covers more area than any sub-charm of Revelio."

Severus stopped, trying hard to remember something, and then said, "And you should practise powerful magic as much as possible. According to … something I remembered from somewhere, practising powerful magic increases your total magic level. Charms such as Protego Vitamaxima would do. Oh, and you can try to learn some Muggle magicians' tricks, those might help with wand movements."

Severus swayed a bit as he said the last sentence, and he had no idea where the "magicians' tricks" part came from.

The blond boy looked at Severus, a bit worried, "Godfather, are you alright?"

Severus nodded, wanted to curse Mad-Eye, but checked his tongue in front of his possibly-too-soft godson. "I really need to be harsher on Mad-Eye when it is my turn to memory charm him. Now try Revelio."

As Severus corrected Draco's wand movements, he pondered Draco's previous question: thanks to Mad-Eye and the Boy-Who-Lived, I have so many mental lapses! In my current mental state, it would be dangerous for me to wander into unfamiliar territories. However, why do I have a false sense of security? Where does it come from? What the hell has Mad-Eye or the Boy-Who-Lived done to me? Did they do something similar to Draco as well?

About half an hour later, Severus finished his last privacy spell, and allowed the sweaty and tired blond boy to sit down.

Severus reached into his pouch, drew out a golden locket, and tossed it to Draco. "If you open the locket, and press the button inside, then for the next fifteen minutes, within a radius of about two meters, it would be equivalent to around two thirds of the sequence of spells I just showed you. It can only be used about ten times. Don't rely too much on it."

"Godfather, thank you so much." Draco examined the locket admiringly, "Godfather, did you make it yourself?"

Severus raised one eyebrow and smirked smugly - if there were some leisure time, he wouldn't mind going into details on how difficult it was to combine and store eighteen powerful charms into one locket, and how there were only a limited number of wizards in the world who could do it. However, there might be more pressing matters. "Draco, what was the matter that you wanted to discuss?"

Draco put the locket into his pouch, looked a bit uneasy, and said, "Godfather, I had wondered if you might need a house-elf."

Severus raised one eyebrow, and suggested: "I gather, the Boy-Who-Lived's comments on this subject changed your view?"

Severus clearly remembered the Potter boy's weird questions toward Draco and him concerning house-elves.

The Boy-Who-Lived had asked about whether the house-elves would hurt other wizards or themselves upon commands from their masters. The answer was obviously yes and yes. While Severus gave several examples where house-elves were used as killers, and Draco supplemented with information on how the old families usually blocked house-elves of other families from coming in, Harry Potter frowned in a way that strikingly resembled Albus Dumbledore.

Then, Harry Potter asked how the house-elves processed commands given by various beings. Draco answered that house-elves would obey their masters' orders first, then other family members', other peoples' when they were the masters' guests, for courtesy reasons. They didn't give a dime about what other non-human creatures requested them to do - though he admitted that house-elves might take orders from the paintings of deceased masters.

Harry Potter pondered on this, and asked a really odd question: "Do the house-elves always know themselves as house-elves, and define themselves as house-elves?"

Severus remembered that he and Draco had exchanged some worried glances, and Draco had hesitantly answered, "I suppose, yes? Dobby used to say, 'Dobby is such a bad elf', or something like that."

Then, there came the really worrying question: "Can the house-elves be ordered to harm human beings as a whole?"

Severus had responded, "Mr. Potter, I wonder if the house-elves are capable of understanding complex concepts such as 'human beings as a whole'. If the house-elves can foresee their actions might hurt their masters, they would not do so, however, their masters can explicitly demand them to. I have heard that a certain house-elf was forced by its master to assist in her suicide. The poor house-elf became mad and attempted to kill itself several times before our respectable Aurors could put it into Azkaban. Therefore, if someone commands his or her house-elf to conduct some act that might bring an end to this world, it probably would obey."

Finally, after discussing in secrecy with Granger again, the Boy-Who-Lived asked Severus if he could try to figure out how to make house-elves, and especially, how to alter the predetermined rules that these conjured creatures would follow.

During the past week, besides practising his bribery skills with the help of Lucius on officials in the German Ministry of Magic, and doing something that Severus couldn't remember now, he had spent almost all his spare time on this question.

-Too bad that I can't even share my progresses with my godson or Lucius.

The proud black-haired wizard regrettably thought.

Severus eyed his godson who was looking at him with worry and concern, and smiled reassuringly, "Draco, you don't need to give me a house-elf. Maybe, I would be able to conjure some for you later."

"Godfather, I know that we shouldn't rely too much on house-elves, but it is always good to have more security measures, isn't it?" Draco said, "If you would like to, I can temporarily transfer the ownership of any Malfoy elf - besides Dobby - to you."

Severus smelt something odd in Draco's words, and asked: "What about Dobby? Isn't it the house-elf that your Father used to bring everywhere? - If this concerns some privacy issues, you don't need to answer."

Draco's lips twisted, and his eyebrows frowned. "After Harry asked those weird questions, I observed the Malfoy elves more closely. And I found that all the elves were happy beyond themselves upon Father's return, except Dobby. It seemed that Dobby wasn't happy at all. I knew Father wasn't generally nice toward house-elves, but he wasn't deliberately cruel, either. Dobby, Dobby might be a special case for Father. Dobby was actually assigned as my personal elf when I was born. After Mother was taken away, Father might have blamed every cough I had on Dobby, and, err, punished Dobby accordingly. Father might think taking Dobby everywhere was a good training program for Dobby, so it would later serve me better. After I observed that Dobby was behaving oddly upon Father's return, I demanded a true answer from it. Besides almost knocking itself into concussions, it said that 'Old master is bad person', and 'Dobby is to running to the Boy-Who-Lived, and warn him of the return of the bad wizard, if the bad master didn't turn himself in'. In the name of Merlin, this kind of treason shouldn't even be possible for house-elves!"

"What? Where is Dobby now?" Severus almost rose from his chair. "Have you demanded true answers concerning loyalty to your family from other elves?"

Draco answered: "I have subdued Dobby, tied it up with multiple methods, and it is currently being watched by other elves in the Manor. As for the other elves, they are all cleared of everything."

Severus nodded, "Bring it to me. I need to check it for various mind controlling magic. Hopefully, this is the cause… Oh, don't look at me like that, Draco. If a house-elf is genuinely capable of treason, the wizarding kind is in much greater trouble than a single house-elf being controlled."

Draco's face turned white.

Twenty minutes of busy wand works later, Severus admitted that he didn't find any signs of mind controlling magic on Dobby, and Legilimens seemed to suggest that this little creature genuinely resented Lucius, and it also desired the gravest punishment for house-elves: freedom.

-Damn it!

Severus took in a deep breath, and said to his godson: "Draco, I think we need to notify Potter - and bloody Mad-Eye - that this kind of thing is even possible. We need to check every single house-elf in this castle!"

Five minutes later, when Severus began to explain how Dobby might be capable of treason to Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, and Mad-Eye, the Girl-Who-Revived seemed to have taken much delight upon the news that house-elves might want freedom. The girl radiating purity and innocence was looking at the new Lord Malfoy expectantly, as if it was a sin not to give Dobby his freedom.

Severus knew he shouldn't let his godson appear to be the bad guy in front of the Boy-Who-Lived and the Girl-Who-Revived, so he himself snapped, "Miss Granger, the majority of house-elves in Hogwarts are probably descendants of those conjured by Lord Salazar Slytherin! If the house-elves are capable of betraying their supposed mistress Headmistress Minerva McGonagall, why wouldn't they decide to rid Muggleborns from the school? Or, enlighten me, why can't a free-spirited house-elf just decide that it wants to steal the Stone from Hogwarts?"

Although Mad-Eye pretended that he was busy casting spells on Dobby to avoid commenting on this issue, Severus knew the paranoid old Auror agreed with him on this point.

While the girl with amazing grace, speed, and physical strength stared angrily at Severus, and Severus stared back without a blink, the Boy-Who-Lived murmured, "The Bicentennial Man, no, The Bicentennial House-elf."

Severus looked at Harry Potter in bewilderment, "Mr. Potter, the house-elves do have a life expectancy of two hundred years, but Dobby is quite young for an elf. Does this has something to do with the age of elves?"

Harry Potter shook his head, then hesitated, and sighed, "Yes, we should check all the house-elves in Hogwarts for any original thoughts. And, err, Draco, AFTER we make sure that it is safe, could you give Dobby its freedom?"

Before Draco could respond, Harry yelled with panic: "Oh, wait, forget my last sentence for now!"

The Girl-Who-Revived immediately directed her stares toward the Boy-Who-Lived.

"Hermione, I can't say it! I really can't say it!"

This proclamation sent chills down everyone's spine.