Arithmancy for Muggles

Chapter Six: Of Shoes and Ships and Sealing Wax

Albus Dumbledore was waiting for Snape at the gates of Hogwarts. Feeling the cold gravel poking through his socks, Severus had to suppress a smile. “Well? I’m here.”

Dumbledore looked down at the professor’s stocking feet, his eyes twinkling noticeably. “Severus, you appear to have forgotten something this morning, in your haste to dress.”

Severus Snape wiggled his toes, but his expression remained carefully neutral. “You did write that it was an emergency.”

“So I did.” The Headmaster of Hogwarts sobered. “Mr. Potter has had another one of his episodes. He checked himself into St. Mungo’s this morning. I am going to offer what support I can. I need you to look after things here for me.”

Now Snape’s expression did change. He lifted his eyebrows. “Are you certain that’s wise?”

“Without Minerva, you’re the only teacher with the authority to keep the students in line.” Albus Dumbledore gazed into the middle distance.

Snape hated these constant reminders that he was only the Assistant Headmaster because Minerva had relinquished the position forcibly during the war. The poor, stupid woman should have lived so she could keep Albus in line. Severus found himself increasingly irritated by the old wizard’s vaguer moments. “Not that. I mean, does Potter even want your support?”

Dumbledore shook his head slowly. “I don’t know. But I have to do something. Merlin only knows what the press will make of this. I heard the Quibbler ran another article comparing Harry’s life with Tom’s. I think the slant of the article was favorable to Harry, but it feeds in to the fears, and yes, hopes of another Dark Lord rising to unite the magical world.”

Remembering what Hermione had said about Voldemort’s reign of terror having some positive effect, Snape asked, “Why would Harry have to be a Dark Lord? Couldn’t a strong figurehead be a force for, lacking a better word, the Light?”

“Possibly, possibly.” Dumbledore scratched his beard. “Alas, I have tarried too long. You know what to do.”

“Yes, Albus.” Snape gestured and the gates of Hogwarts opened.

“Oh, and Severus?” Dumbledore added, the twinkle returning to his eye.

“What?”

“Good luck finding another pair of shoes.” With that ambiguous parting shot, Dumbledore apparated.

Shaking his head, Snape refused to dwell on how much the old man did or didn’t know about the affair. His socks were wet and fraying by the time he reached the castle. Impatiently, he peeled the sodden wool from his feet and padded through the corridors barefoot, his long robes sweeping to erase the damp footsteps behind him.

However, walking so quickly, his robes did not hide the sight of his naked toes peeking out from under the front hem. A couple of 5th year Ravenclaws on their way to the library saw his bare feet and sniggered, earning a 20-point deduction, each. Snape reached the dungeons without further incident, relaxing his scowl once he achieved the safety and solitude of his own rooms.

By this time, his toes had gone quite blue with cold. Snape cast a warming charm on his feet. With any luck, he would have no academic emergencies to contend with before Albus returned and he could enjoy a peaceful Sunday luxuriating in his loneliness. He’d rather have had a peaceful Sunday luxuriating in Hermione’s flat, but out of her intoxicating presence Snape was now uncertain he could have borne all that happiness at once. If one night with her made him this giddy, imagine what a whole weekend would do to him! It was probably better that he left when he did, Severus concluded regretfully.

Finding the shrunken copy of Hermione’s report in his pocket, he returned it to its proper size and set it on his desk with a certain degree of reverence. He contemplated it a moment before turning away to put the kettle on the hob.

Tea brewed and sweetened to his tastes, Snape took Hermione’s book of arithmantic predictions and settled into the comfy chair by the fire. Leafing through the report idly as he sipped his tea, he realized he didn’t understand the theory behind the report well enough even to understand the summations at the end of each section. He wanted to read this, he wanted to know the knowledge contained on its pages, the fruit of beloved Hermione’s brain. But, Snape concluded, he had not sufficient background to comprehend this very specialized branch of magic.

Snape tucked the report under his arm and stuffed his feet into a pair of ugly purple carpet slippers he’d gotten one year at Christmas. As temporary acting Headmaster, Severus would abuse his authority and make Vector explain it to him.

Professor Snape and Professor Vector had an uneasy relationship. Though united in their disdain for the overemphasis on “foolish wand waving” in the Hogwarts curriculum, the two teachers had little else in common. Snape and Vector had called a truce rather early in their relationship, but this did not mean they were friends. It merely meant they did not fight. And to achieve this, it meant that they did not often speak beyond what was necessary to pass the salt and organize the duty roster.

Snape, wearing the hideous slippers and hefting the enormous book, found the arithmancy professor in her office. She was sitting on a tall stool behind a raked worktable, grading papers.

“Vector,” he said, opening the conversation.

“Snape,” she replied, throwing the conversational ball back into his court.

Getting right to the point, Snape dumped the huge binder onto Vector’s desk. Unfortunately, due to the angle of the desktop, the heavy report slid down the work surface, greased by student papers, to land on the ground below the professor’s dangling feet. “That.” Snape said, pointing at the book on the floor. “I’m acting headmaster and I want you to explain it to me.” Snape winced. He hadn’t meant to play that card so soon, but the failure of his grand dramatic gesture had rattled him.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Vector insisted blandly. “Besides, I haven’t seen Miss Granger in weeks.”

“Aha!” Snape pounced. “So you know it’s her Ministry report.”

It was Vector’s turn to wince. “I may have seen one like it, somewhere.” She refused to meet his eyes. “But I admit nothing else.”

Sighing, Snape realized he’d taken the wrong tack. Vector thought he was trying to rat her out. “Let’s say that there’s a report that the Ministry doesn’t want people to see, just as a theoretical case.”

“Yes?” Vector agreed dubiously.

“Let’s say that this isn’t that report, but an entirely different report on a different subject altogether,” Snape encouraged.

Vector eyed Professor Snape warily. “Why would we do that?”

Snape scowled, hating to admit his weakness. “Because I want you to explain it to me. I can’t follow the formulae. I haven’t the theory. You do. Explain it to me.”

“Did Albus put you up to this?” Vector frowned, pulled her wand from her robes and said, “Accio report,” clearing a space on the desk as the binder levitated into place.

Snape pulled a stool away from the wall posipositioned it near Vector’s. “I don’t think so, but you never know with Albus. He’s a crafty old bastard.”

“Hmmm,” Vector commented, refusing to commit herself to an indiscretion. “How much do you understand?” She cracked open the binder and began leafing through it.

“Only what Herm- I mean, only what the alleged author of the report told me. These are growth statistics and projections for Wizarding Society.” Snape settled himself on the stool. “But I don’t understand the theory. How absolute are these predictions?”

“Not at all.” Vector continued to turn pages. “How detailed an explanation do you want?”

“Pretend I’m a particularly dense first year,” Snape suggested.

Vector sighed. “Ministry level then?”

“I’m not quite that simple,” Snape scoffed. “The explanation for dense first years is sufficient.”

“Fine. Think of life like a road,” Vector instructed. “If you have a decision to make, it’s like coming to a fork in the road. You must decide which way to travel, by the left path or the right. The most basic arithmantic prediction is a mathematical equation describing that road. You then solve that equation in two ways: one that describes taking the right fork, one that describes taking the left. With luck, one path will show a more favorable outcome than the other, and you can use the result to inform your decision. It’s not prophecy. The results are not absolute truth. But they are a good indication of probabilities.”

Snape considered this. “What can be done?”

Vector nodded. “Well, if the right fork results show that you will be gored to death by a rampaging hippogryph and the left fork results show that you will fall into a patch of tangle vines and be strangled to death, you can try solving the equation again, but with an extra variable added. For example, you you remember to bring your wand and you cast a strong Patronus, these factors may show you defeating the hippogryph and reaching your destination, but the same factors applied to the other fork still show you strangled by the vines because a Patronus doesn’t help much against plants. However, if you are stronger in herbology than in DADA, you might have more luck on the left fork. It all depends.”

Peering at the open page where Vector’s hand rested. “So is that what this one says? Wizards have a choice of being gored or strangled?”

“Hardly,” Vector snorted. “And remember, I’m simplifying a great deal. This is a projection of an entire society, not just one person. What Herm- I mean, the author of this report has done, she’s described each possible path and solved each equation one hundred times, once for each of the ideal wizards.”

“The ideal wizards?” Snape frowned for a moment. “Oh, yes, the one hundred theoretical wizards that collectively embody every aspect of wizarding society. Iorgoorgotten that was originally an arithmantic concept.”

Vector smirked. “You’re a dense first year who has done his reading, at least.” She flipped a couple of pages over. “So, for example, she sends the one hundred wizards down the right fork of the path and 83 of them live, 14 of them die and three of them go missing, never to be seen again. She sends the same hundred wizards down the left path and 75 of them live, 18 of them die and eight go missing. By this we can conclude that the right fork is a marginally better choice than the left. And then she starts adding in variables.” The arithmancy professor turned to the back of the report and folded out a large colored report that looked a bit like a tree.

“I hadn’t seen that,” Snape admitted. “What is this?”

Looking smug, Vector smoothed the large sheet on her desk. “This is a variable projection. The path she has described is the path from here, the way the world is today, to there, the ideal vision of the future.” Vector shrugged. “An ideal vision of the future, at any rate. The Ministry approved ideal vision of the future.”

“And these branches?” Snape traced the lines on the page, some thinner, some thicker, some crossing and melding and dividing again.

“These are all the possibilities. The thicker the line, the more likely it is to occur, given what we know of wizarding society.”

Snape frowned. “You mean, the one hundred ideal wizards were sent down this path and you counted how many died and how many went missing?”

Vector thought about this for a minute. “Crudely put, but I suppose that’s as good an explanation as any. As you see, to get from here to there we have quite a few decisions to make, and in many places the thread is quite slender. Even if we make all the many decisions correctly, we have no guarantee of success.” She traced a big thick ugly line down the center of the page. It terminated abruptly, halfway to the goal.

“Where does that line go?”

The arithmancy professor pursed her lips. “To hell in a handbasket.” She paused, her hand on a junction of lines just above the thick line. Squinting, she leaned forward. “On the other hand, even if we make all the wrong decisions, the theory says we always have a chance to forge a new path. How recent are these new projections?”

Shrugging, Snape replied, “I’m not sure. I got the report yesterday from the, er, source.”

Not looking up, Vector asked. “How is she?”

The answer was out before he could censor it. “Incredible.” A stupid grin tugged the corners of his mouth.

Vector looked up, saw his smile and shuddered. “Stop that. It’s not natural.”

“What?”

“Smiling. You have a dark and dangerous reputation to maintain, for Merlin’s sake! How are we to frighten first years with detention with Snape if you persist in grinning like an idiot?”

Snape cleared his throat and attempted to assume a more sober expression.

“And why are you wearing those hideous carpet slippers?”

Looking down at the ugly purple things on his feet, Snape found himself grinning again, thinking of his shoes lurking under Hermione’s bed. “I’ve gone soft,” he admitted.

“You’ve gone daft,” Vector insisted.

“I’m losing my edge.” Snape stared at the wall. “It’s going to be the death of me.”

Vector folded the large chart and tucked it back into the report. “Just make sure it’s not the death of her.” Under the cover of shuffling paper, Vector asked quietly, “Did you hear about what happened to her wand?”

Snape nodded. “I met her at Gringott’s just after.”

“The ministry is trying to hush it up. They don’t want anyone to know.” Vector closed the report with a thump. “Well, if that’s all?” she resumed in a louder voice.

“Is she right?” Snape asked his question softly, but Vector jumped as if scalded.

“What do you mean, is she right? I trained her. She has one of the best arithmantic minds of her generation. Her work is indisputably good.” Professor Vector looked up. “I can find no fault with her arithmancy. But that doesn’t mean we are without hope.” She paused before adding quietly, “Yet.”

He took a deep breath. “Is there anything I can do?” Snape avoided Vector’s searching gaze. “To help, I mean.”

Professor Vector opened the report again. “The report is only half the work. She has to keep it current. This will require constant recalculations, based on current events. As people make decisions, some paths are closed off, new ones are made available, hidden paths disclosed and obvious paths reach abrupt dead ends.” She sighed. “I’ve been making some calculations of my own, but I don’t understand all the variables she’s used, I h I haven’t the time to keep current on all the changes.”

“I can’t help you with that, I’m afraid.” Snape regretted the fact.

But Vector continued, as if he had not spoken. “I wish I could see her results, but she won’t be able to post owls and I’m not about to alert the Ministry to my interest by trying to contact her via muggle means.” Vector closed the report and handed it back to Snape. “Unfortunately, I doubt she will be able to continue her inquiries. Even if she has access to the Daily Prophet, she has no way of hearing about things under Ministry ban, or even an idea of how people are really responding to new policy decisions.” Her eyes met his, open wide and full of meaning.

Snape’s mouth opened in silent epiphany. “It’s such a shame,” he began, “that there’s no call for a man of my talents during peacetime. I spent so many years spying for the Order that I hardly know how to live any more. Maybe I should retire and move to some tropical island teeming with nubile young witches. What do you think?”

Vector snorted. “But if you retired, how would we frighten the first years? Still, maybe you should get out more often. You’re a wizard in your prime. It’s not too late to find a nice young witch of good breeding and settle down.”

“So, you think maybe I should start dating?” Snape asked, loud enough foopleople to hear him in the corridor, should they be walking past at that particular moment. Hurried footsteps confirmed this.

“The Ministry thinks it’s a good idea.” Vector raised her eyebrows. “They’re talking about offering incentives to magical couples who choose to start families now that the war is over. Minister Weasley wants a new boom in Wizard growth, if he has to coach each pregnancy himself.”

Another snort escaped him. “I’ll bet Molly just loves that idea.”

Shuddering, Vector shook her head. “Why the poor woman didn’t just keep her legs crossed, I’ll never know.”

Snape shrugged and tucked Hermione’s report under his arm once again. “Well, Vector, I’ll take your advice under advisement. Maybe I should get out more. Heaven knows I don’t meet many single women here at Hogwarts.”

Professor Vector raised her eyebrows at him. “I beg your pardon?”

Bowing low, Snape amended, “None I am worthy of, at any rate.”

Vector shook her head. “You have gone soft, Snape. Get out of here. And don’t come back until you’ve gone out and had a little fun.”

Snape nodded acknowledgement. “Vector.”

“Snape,” she replied, and went back to her grading.

He took a moment to plaster the scowl back on his face. The few students he saw on his way back to his rooms all appeared appropriately terrified of him, despite the carpet slippers. Snape enjoyed a peaceful afternoon contemplating how best to begin his new campaign of espionage.