AN: Oi, this is a nice slow burn, doesn't follow cannon but avoids unneccessary departures from the general story. Please please please review. I have no timeframe for the work, but can assure you I've tried to develop several facets. Incidentally, this is pre-DH, and Dumbledore is decidedly alive.

--------------------------------------

The sun has hanging lazily in the expansive Texas sky, illuminating a dusty patch of seldom used highway and the glinting red truck that was making it way across the scrubby brush of West Texas. Inside the inconspicuous car sat two people, clearly strangers to one another, or at least on very poor

terms. The driver was a young woman, possibly in her mid twenties, with a shock of strawberry blond hair and attentive eyes that seemed unable to stop scanning the horizon and equally incapable of deciding whether they meant to be blue or green. Next to her, as far away as he could be whiel still in the cab of the truck, was the sullen figure of a gaunt man, likely in his 40's, with a shock of black hair and hawks eyes that contrasted magnificently with his alabaster skin. His eyes were stormy, his strong jaw taunt, but the beauty of it was rather excessively marred by the disfiguring sneer of impatience that he wore like a mask.

Severus was pointedly examining the minutia of a buzzing fly as the pickup truck rounded a bend and his female...companion...insisted yet again on fiddling with that damned radio of hers. It really was the limit, he couldn't possibly be expected to survive such a droll assignment with such a lowly ward.

"Must you continue with the radio's incessant music?"

The corners of the girls lips twitched at this. Severus was quite taken aback. Was he losing his edge? The thought of a no-name witch like her not even fearing him was unnerving, left him vulnerable.

"My car, my music. Deal with it"

Severus again stopped speaking and instead drowned out the the next half-hour with a litany of words and hexes he would relish in using on the petulant child who dared dictate rules to him, Severus Snape, one of the most gifted and feared wizards of the age.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw her roll her own eyes upwards, and in that moment he had the curious sensation that she exactly what had been running through his head. Then again, too many years as a spy and under the torture or Voldemort and the scrutiny of Albus had made him see ghosts where there were none, and it was silly to believe such a insignificant witch could ever break into his mind.

Now that he thought about it....

"Ms. What was it again? Ash was it? Very well. Since I have been forced into this ridiculous plan with you, I must ascertain some facts."

He doubted she would respond, and she did not disappoint. Good, that meant he was beginning to understand her character, and he would need that familiarity to determine her use and trustworthiness.

Although, as a woman, there was very little likelihood of any trust developing from the start.

He cleared his throat again "Over the last 4 nights, I have been forced to be in your presence nearly the entire time. Yet I have never seen you perform even a basic cleaning spell, which this coach could use, or ever produce a wand. Just how, qualified are you for this? Are you even a witch?"

Still, she said nothing. At first he thought she would continue on in this catatonic silence, but suspected he may have hit a nerve as she pulled the car over and turned to look at him with a guarded coldness that reminded him rather unpleasantly of himself. He ached an eyebrow and prepared a disparaging sneer, already imagining the drivel that he was sure was about to proceed from her.

"I do not own a wand because I do not need one, nor do I believe I could ever use one as anything more than a hinderance. I do not need a wand because I am not a witch. I have never been to a school and spent years taught how to make this levitate and that sprout flowers." She paused for a fraction of a second, before continuing a a tone far too dark and dangerous for someone as young and innocent looking as she. "If however, you for a minute believe this makes me weak or vulnerable or unworthy of my position in the Order, you are making a dangerous mistake."

For quite possibly the first time in his adult life, Severus Snape was at a loss for words.