DATE: July 1996
POINT OF VIEW: Generic Third Person

Keira Melanie Aurora Snape remained secluded from the conversation downstairs that was between her father and Professor Dumbledore. The only thing she could tell was that it was extremely intense. Keira just stared at the dark violet walls in her room. She played around with her emerald pendant. It was in the shape of a dagger and a platinum snake coiled around the "blade". It was the only thing Keira had that belonged to her mother, whom she has no clue is. Keira then decided to hop off her four poster bed and to go to the library. Keira got off of the purple silken sheets and strutted to her closet. She picked out a black woolen skirt and a white ruffled blouse to attire in. Black suspenders completed the look along with Keira's raven colored locks which were managed into a fishtailed braid with the exception of her over grown bangs that covered her right eye. She slipped on some black ballet flats and quickly walked out of her room.

Keira took easy light aired steps for she did not want to interrupt or to eavesdrop onto her father's conversation. Although the library was about five rooms down the corridor, and Keira's room was at the end of it, she did catch snippets of her father's conversation.

"Albus! Do you not realize this situation of a suicidal idea? This is completely outrageous!" Severus Tobias Snape snapped at Keira's Headmaster.

"Relax Severus, you do not want to scare off your daughter now," Professor Dumbledore said in a calm voice.

The elderly man's blue eyes stared down onto Keira Melanie's now frightened dark hazel ones. The chandelier's light flickered off of the emerald pendant on her white blouse. A quick awkward silence passed until Severus Snape's voice boomed.

"Keira Melanie Aurora!" Severus Snape's voice chided at his daughter. "What in Merlin's beard are you doing? Trying to eavesdrop on our conversation?"

Keira simply shook her head and was about to say something before she was caught off by Dumbledore.

"Now, now Severus, your daughter here was merely trying to go to the library," Dumbledore replied in a nonchalant tone.

"I'm sorry father. I did not intend to intrude your conversation with Professor Dumbledore," Keira replied in her usual respectful tone.

"Yes, now that that is settled, may you please go to the library now?" Snape said in a slightly stern yet calm voice.

"Of course, father," Keira replied and quickly scurried off to the library.

Once Keira was out of Severus and Albus' view, Albus directed his attention back onto his alumni.

"Severus, she is going to find out one way or another," Dumbledore said referring to Snape's one and only daughter, Keira Melanie.

"I am quite aware of so, but I need time," Snape argued with Dumbledore.

"Time is running out. You said so yourself, Severus" Dumbledore replied coolly.

Snape left an expressionless face but in his mind he truly wanted to scowl.

"Albus, I cannot simply walk up to my daughter and say, 'Keira, your mother is The Dark Lord's sister. You're his niece and his heir.'" Severus snapped in a sharp tongue. "That would just crush her demure fragile soul and everything she was raised to listen to. In fact, she barely remembers her own mother! And I intend for it to remain that way."

'Dumbledore's insanity may be equal to the one of Voldemort's but at least it is masked by kindness,' Snape thought sourly to himself.

"Severus, I see that your stubbornness was not changed by Thomasina," Albus said clearly unaffected by Severus' retort.

"I only knew her as Alisa and that is it," Severus said with a flash of hurt flickering in his obsidian eyes.

"You know her true identity, yet you won't admit it," Dumbledore said thoughtfully in a daze.

"I have my reasons," Severus stated bluntly. "Any who, shouldn't we not be discussing the future of what it is to come between Mr. Malfoy and your presumable departure?"

"Ah, yes, of course," Dumbledore replied. "Severus, I want you to kill me instead of the young Malfoy."

"ARE YOU INSANE, ALBUS?" Severus hissed.

"No, no Severus, it is only to take off the pressure from the young Malfoy," Dumbledore said wisely. "I would also like to request that you will be the Headmaster as I leave."

"I will do everything I can to protect the students," Snape said loyally.

"Thank you. Now, I suggest that I should leave," Dumbledore said before he Apparated.

Meanwhile…..

Keira Melanie was in the library. The library was beloved place of hers to escape. It had a very welcoming feeling with mahogany furniture and bookshelves galore. Keira was comfortable in her own loveseat that was brown. She curled herself around with a purple blanket and was currently reading another Muggle story, The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides. It was quite interestingly…depressing, just like her in her demure shell. She waited patiently for time to pass her by. The time seemed to pass extremely slowly. The ticking of the grandfather clock in the library seemed to mock her. She heard the muffled yelling of her father. Keira then shut her book closed and began to search the library for something odd. Of course, it was not something that appeared 'odd' to Keira. What Keira was searching for…was something about her mum, anything really. But, as always, Keira knew that she wouldn't find anything here. Keira simply gave up as she then opened the library's windowed door that had black curtains draped on it. She quietly shut the door and sensed that Dumbledore's presence was not in the house anymore. She then trotted back into her room. Keira prepared herself for bed as she used her thirteen inch basilisk fang core silver fir wand. She flicked it once to undo her plaited hair. Then she flitted it a second time to summon her silken black pajama pair. She quickly removed her ballet flats and switched them for her own fuzzy black slippers. The third time she moved her wand, she summoned a cup of hot chocolate. There was a marshmallow spider that happily hopped into her hot cocoa. Keira felt silly for having hot chocolate in the middle of summer, but it was a stress reliever. She sipped the hot drink, which nearly burnt her tongue. Keira then brushed her teeth and her extremely lengthy black hair. She then dismissed her hot chocolate's mug to the house elf's kitchen. She then crawled into her bed and tossed her slippers aside from her bed. She closed the velvet curtains and dismissed herself into a dreamless sleep.