Lockhart's Duelling Club was announced with the particular fanfare of a man who views every situation as a potential opportunity for visibility. Kevin arrived with reasonable expectations and was met by a platform, a crowd, and Snape standing at one end of it with the expression of a man who has agreed to participate in something and has made peace with his choices.
The Snape-Lockhart duel lasted approximately four seconds and produced a Lockhart who was lying on the floor claiming he'd anticipated everything.
"Students will now pair up," Snape said. "And you — " he pointed at Kevin with the precision of someone who has been planning this since Tuesday " — you're with me."
Kevin climbed the platform.
He was aware of Hermione below, going white.
"Professor Snape," Lockhart said, with a laugh that was meant to defuse the room, "surely a student against a teacher is a bit — "
Snape ignored him.
They bowed. The countdown happened.
Kevin opened with Sectumsempra at the same moment Snape did, and the two cutting hexes met in the space between them and became a shockwave that knocked the surrounding first-years back three steps. Kevin staggered. Snape didn't.
Kevin had been in the training room with Snape twice a week for six months. He knew how Snape fought — the economy of it, the way he created opportunities through patience rather than aggression. He also knew that Snape was holding back, which meant the gap between them was still larger than the restricted display suggested.
He buffed his speed and charged.
Snape produced fire across the full width of the platform. Kevin's water shield met it, and for two seconds they were locked in the steam — and that was where Snape sent the invisible cutting curse through the cover and through the shield, and Kevin went back off the platform and landed with enough control to be upright but not enough to pretend it hadn't happened.
Four exchanges. He'd lasted four exchanges.
He stood up.
Hermione was already there, wand out, checking him over with the rapid professional attention of someone who has been reading Healing books since age ten.
"Professor!" Her voice at Snape had a quality Kevin had not heard from her directed at a teacher before — not defiant, just furious in the way of someone who has decided that the social contract does not currently apply. "He's a student!"
Snape looked at her for a moment. "He'll recover."
"That's not the — "
Kevin winked at her.
She went silent. Looked at him. Looked at Snape.
She dropped him.
"Kevin —"
He caught himself. "Didn't want you to feel better yet."
She walked away. He followed, calling after her.
Behind them on the platform, Snape's voice: "Potter. Malfoy. On the platform."
Kevin and Hermione made it to the corridor before the snake.
Word of the Parseltongue reached them at lunch, delivered by Ron in the specific tone of someone who is telling you something that is very bad but also very interesting.
Harry had hissed at the snake in a language nobody else could hear, and the entire school had decided, by the logic of twelve-year-olds in a frightened building, that this made him the most likely heir of Slytherin.
Harry sat at the end of the table looking at his food.
Kevin watched the dining hall. He counted nine separate groups looking at Harry in the time it took to eat half a piece of toast.
He put down his fork and walked to the nearest table that had been doing it.
"Fascinating," he said. "Staring at someone who solved the troll problem last year, sorted the Philosopher's Stone, and just came third in a Quidditch match on a broken arm." He looked around the table. "Keep it up. I'm sure it's helping."
He walked back.
Professor Babbling, monitoring the hall, opened her mouth. Kevin sat down before she had to decide whether to say anything.
Harry was looking at him.
"You're going to get detention," Harry said.
"Probably," Kevin said. "Worth it."
Hagrid crossed their path by the greenhouses, a dead rooster under each arm, looking distressed in the specific way of someone whose animals are being targeted.
Kevin stopped. He looked at the roosters. He looked at Hagrid. He looked at Harry.
Someone's removing the roosters, he thought. Someone knows what they repel.
He caught Hermione's eye. She'd read the same books he had.
"Uncle Hagrid," Kevin said, "the Chamber attacks — do you know anything? Anything from before?"
Hagrid stopped walking. He looked at Harry's face — the tired, weathered look of a twelve-year-old carrying a public accusation — and something in him gave way.
"Fifty years ago," Hagrid said slowly, "they blamed me. Said I was the one who opened it. Dragged me to Azkaban." He looked at the dead roosters. "I didn't. But I couldn't prove it."
Harry stared at him. Ron and Hermione too.
"Someone else opened it," Kevin said.
"Yeah." Hagrid's voice was heavy. "Someone else."
"And your roosters — "
"Twelve this year. All dead. Necks wrung." He looked at Kevin with the expression of someone beginning to make a connection. "You think it's related."
"Roosters repel serpents," Kevin said. "In magical folklore. Something doesn't want the noise."
Hagrid was quiet.
"If you wanted to find the Chamber faster," Kevin said, "who might know something? From back then?"
Hagrid hesitated for a long time.
"There's Aragog," he said finally. "My spider. He was there. He might know what I don't." He held up one hand. "But he's in the Forest, and he's not — he's not safe for visitors. I'll ask him myself. Promise."
They took that.
Harry grabbed Kevin's arm as they turned away. "Thank you," he said. Not about the dining hall, not about anything specific. Just the weight of a word used to mean several things at once.
Kevin patted his shoulder twice and kept walking.