A/N:

I'm sorry about how badly I really have been updating. I have problems with ear pain and my hearing and some days it's just so hard to get up out of bed at all; but well, chronic pain will do that to you. Thank you so much for your lovely reviews, and oh wow I was not expecting as many favourites and follows as I got! I'm so happy, honestly! You're all great. Again, I apologise about the massive gap in between the chapters. Life is hectic, and I have Gay Pride this Saturday and that'll more than likely end up with me passed out in a ditch until next week, so I'm sorry in advance if there's another gap after this chapter too (although hopefully there won't be). (Also just as a point of shameless pride, any dates I use in this fic will be accurate because I love doing stuff like that). On with the show!

This fic is rated M for violence, swearing (a LOT of swearing), touchy subjects including domestic abuse, miscarriages, attempted suicide and self mutilation. You have been warned. This is not a cheery fic, and I beg you to remember that as we go on. Thank you.

I do not own any characters who's names are recognised from the Harry Potter series. I do, however, own some of my own. I do not profit from writing this fanfiction, so don't go suing me like an asshole.

Chapter One: Peter

"I have always wanted to write a book that ended with the word 'mayonnaise."
-Richard Brautigan

Professor Severus Snape sat at the Head Table in the Great Hall of Hogwarts, watching as his porridge slowly turned from breakfast into cold mush. He thought it fascinating how the longer he left it, the more it looked like pig-feed. He cut an intimidating figure at the head of the room. No student dared to meet his eyes during breakfast, or any other time of the day for that matter. Only the foolhardy and reckless gave Professor Snape any reason at all to take House Points or give detentions.

He reached with a sallow, thin hand to rub the aching scars that wrapped his neck, hidden under his high-collar teaching robes. Red and still very raw, the Scottish September weather was making them flare up again. They had been given their time to heal, but Nagini's poison was not something to take lightly. It was a miracle he wasn't dead. The damp and chill weather seemed to ache through the scars, leaving a dull, tight pain that urged him to stretch his neck. He wouldn't, obviously. He had no desire to advertise his injuries to the masses.

The date was Sunday the nineteenth of September. School had been in session for two and a half weeks so far, and Severus was already tired. A year and four months since the Final Battle and the castle was finally in a functional state again, and once again the halls could flood with eager students without the looming threat of the Dark Lord and death in their distant future. The students were again free to annoy their Potions Master.

There was a near unmanagable number of First Years this year; all students who had attended Hogwarts during the Death Eater's occupation of the castle were required to repeat their school year, and there were also the incoming first years who should have started September 1998, and the one's who were supposed to start in this September of '99. All-in-all, there were eighty-four new first years ranging from the age of eleven to thirteen, and the castle and its staff were exhausted. The very stone of the establishment seemed to sink away in fear from the noise of First Year footsteps. Classes for the First Years were being taught only a house at a time, and Severus did have to aprecciate the lack of Gryffindor-Slytherin dynamics in class. He found it strenuous to supervise twenty-ish cauldrons at once instead of the usual fourteen or fifteen, but he was noticing less of a competition for points now that the houses didn't share classrooms, and there was less inter-house drama to attend to. Merlin knew he was sick of arguing with Minerva over Griffyndor-Slytherin Potions classes.

What was left of the Seventh Years that had participated in the Final Battle had been given a choice to resume their schooling, or to try and journey straight into the working Wizarding World. Practically all of them had elected to come and finish their education. As much as Severus found it stressful to have to act as a Professor over students like Longbottom and Finnegan after the dispicable acts he let the Carrows escape punishment for, he was reluctantly impressed with their initiative. Staff-room rumours had it that Longbottom was planning to apprentice under Sprout when he concluded his final year and N.E.W.T.s. Severus supposed Finnegan would be best off choosing to go to work in a firework's emporium.

The youngest of the first years being eleven, and some of the oldest Seventh Years being nineteen, there was the largest age-gap that Hogwarts had seen since it catered to adults back in the 1320's.

The Golden trio hadn't come back. The two buffoons playing man-dress-up had fared straight into Auror training the July after the Final Battle, and courtesy of newly appointed Minister for Magic Kingsley Shacklebolt, would be taking their final exams to become Dark-Wizard Catchers in the next four months. The girl was dead.

Severus tried to tell himself that he didn't care.

Try being the operative word.

Severus himself, however, had not come back to Hogwarts of his own volition. Headmistress Minerva McGonagall had guilted him into coming back, which he mistakingly thought was just until she could "find a replacement for Horace". Well apparently she did find a replacement, as not hours later she then manipulated him into a wand-oath, pledging himself as Potions Professor for another five years. Slughorn had resigned not ten minutes after receiving his Order of Merlin: Third Class, and Minerva had not found another English-speaking Potions Master to take his place. The eldest Weasley brother, William, had stepped in to take the Defence Against the Dark Arts position, feeling he should stay in Britain seeing as his French half-Veela wife was pregnant and couldn't travel the world with her curse-breaking husband. Severus supposed that they would determine whether the position was still jinxed by the year's closing.

Severus took a gulp of strong tea, grimacing as the heat irritated a sensitive tooth, and continued to ignore his breakfast. He used his tongue to prod one of his molars on the right side. He assumed there was a hole, even if he couldn't feel it right away. Years of neglect and sugar-filled food had left his teeth in somewhat of a state. Severus didn't know what the general public would do if they found out just how much he loved sweet food. Still, he would sooner amputate his left leg than be seen in Honeydukes.

In truth, he was glad that the Chosen One and his ginger parasite hadn't come back to Hogwarts. It was infuriating enough to hear Potter speak on his behalf during his own trial, and Severus had no doubt that Potter would have taken his hero worship into the school to further educate the students on why they shouldn't be afraid of their Potions Professor. Because, really, he's squishy on the inside. Severus would never have been able to run a class with any semblence order again. He had spent a considerable amount of time dodging Potter and his inane questions at Order meetings and Ministry gatherings. Severus had burned every letter bearing his signature without reading it. He had no desire to discuss the boy's mother, whether he had loved her or not.

Loved. Past-tense.

The owls were heralded by the cacophony of beating wings and Severus turned his head up to watch them swoop into the Great Hall from the ceiling's Owl-Post holes. A copy of the Daily Prophet was dropped with a thud in front of Severus, narrowly missing his untouched bowl of goop. Severus shook the paper free from crumbs and rolled the rubber-band from it.

"Any word on the escapees, Severus?" on his right hand side Minerva leaned towards him with raised eyebrows. Severus didn't reply until he opened the paper to the second page, becoming quickly angry and slapping the paper down on the table in front of Minerva. Three weeks ago, an attack on Azkaban Prison had taken place which resulted in the break-out of twelve Death Eaters, three of which had been inner-circle members in the time of the Dark Lord. A couple of students glanced up at the noise of Severus' outburst and quickly stared back into their food when they saw the expession on his face. Minerva took her spectacles and perched them on the end of her nose to read the Prophet. "Well honestly Severus, I'd say you look quite handsome there." She handed the paper back to him.

He snarled at her, but calmed somewhat at her humour, took the toilet-worthy rag and perused the page again. Under a heading that read "ESCAPED DEATH EATERS SPOTTED IN DIAGON ALLEY" there was a picture of the side of Gringott's Wizarding Bank, his own face displayed on a large poster stuck to it. Over the poster written on the wall in what looked to be blood, was "Undersireable No. 1". Three goblins stood fidgeting at the edge of the photograph with buckets and sponges.

Severus sneered before tapping the paper with his dark wand, watching with satisfaction as it burst into flames and the ashes floated themselves into his porridge. He pushed the bowl to the side and turned to Minerva on his right. "They seem to have chosen their target against whom they'll rally supporters." he drawled, wiping ash from his robe's black sleve. It left a grey mark and he frowned at it, as if he could intimidate it away. "Should I be flattered that I am apparently more undesirable than Potter?"

Minerva gave a little chuckle and slapped him on the shoulder before sobering and frowning at him. "This is a serious matter, Severus." The corner of her eyes pinched as she looked at him. "If they have chosen you as a target then they may try to manipulate students into couriering sinister objects, or letting them into the castle." He frowned at her this time. "YOu do remember, of course, what happened with Ms Bell, and Mr Weasley when Draco was commissioned to kill the Headmaster." She held up her hand to stop him as he was about to speak. "I'm not saying that Mr Malfoy isn't trustworthy, Severus," he calmed a little. "Just that students have come in harms way in situations like this before, and I'll be damned if I let it happen again." She set a steely look on her face and drank her tea forcefully. How one can drink tea forcefully, Severus didn't know, but Minerva knew the technique.

She took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes with the heel of her palm, and then sat back in her chair agin, looking in Severus' direction. "Report to my office at seven tonight and I will have a plan ready." he inclined his head in agreement. "Merlin, Severus," she shook her head in defeat. "I don't know how much fight I have left in me for these sort of things."

"Come now, Minerva," he drawled lazily. "You're only pushing eighty."

She slapped him with the buttered side of her toast.

Severus emerged from the Pensieve, sat behind his black oak desk and pinched the bridge of his nose. He had ten minutes before he had to meet the Headmistress, he reminded himself. He had skipped dinner in favour of taking another trip through a collection of memories yet again. Dinner was an event he often missed these days. Severus thought to himself for a moment that maybe he should be worried about that. He wasn't.

Grabbing his black cotton robe, he threw it on with a satisfying swish, and left his office. The memories, yet again, had not yielded any positive result. There had been no positive results at all since he started his project.

Having woken up two days after the Final Battle, lying in the crisp and white Hospital Wing, he had been both predictably surprised and less predictably pleased to find himself alive. To find out that his saviour was, of all people, Hermione Granger, had been shocking to say the least. He spent a whole half a day demanding with Poppy to see her before she finally gave in and told him the Granger girl was dead. Severus didn't know whether to be guilty for being the second hand cause of another young woman's death, or to be angry at her for being such an idiot as to go back and save him.

The Aurors and other members of the Big Cleanup had never recovered a body, however, and he began on his own quest for answers. At first, Minerva had tried tried to dissuade him by pointing out the obvious; if she had been captured by any remaining Death Eaters, they would have advertised their prey quite spectacularly in revenge for their defeat. Minerva also stressed how long it had taken to run the Acromantula away from the castle. So, Severus thought to himself, she was most likely to have been eaten by a giant spider while trying to save his life. That definitely made him feel guilty.

Still, Severus had no certainty as to whether she was dead or alive. If she was alive somewhere out there, then he owed her a life debt. The last life debt he owed was to James Potter, and since then the idea of one had been sickening. For purely selfish reasons at the beginning, he had to do something to find her. He refused to owe another life debt. He would find her, and he would make her revoke it.

Severus succeeded in convincing Minerva to let him and a handful of Order members attempt to track her four days after the Battle. Though everyone was sceptical, Neville Longbottom, Bill Wealey, Arthur Weasley and Ronald Weasley agreed to help. The youngest Wealey male was overly eager in his distraught state and had to sit out of the first day of plans on request from his father. Perhaps not so unfortunately, Potter was out of commission for a week and a half after the Battle, in a comatose state. Severus supposed that dying by the Dark Lord's hand, coming back from the dead, and then vanquishing the Dark Lord could have been a reasonable stress on the senses. Severus almost felt sorry for the boy. Almost.

After three days of tracking spells and amateur foot-tracking, they came up empty handed. The tracking spells found nothing but dissipated magic in the classrooms that she used to frequently cast spells in, and eventually led the group to her wand. Potter joined in at the very last moment, and it was he who found Granger's broken wand in the grass in the grounds near the castle, beside where Severus himself had been found on the day of the Battle. How no-one had found the wand before that Severus did not know, but obviously it had been complete and utter idiots who had searched the grounds before them. The discovery of the wand had sent both Potter and Weasley into hysterics. Severus spent the day brewing Calming Draughts and wondering whether he sgould keep searching. He could not find a single trace of her base-magical signature. The abscence of base magic was indicative only of either extremely Dark magic, or death.

However, Severus kept searching.

Strolling through the stone hallways towards the Headmistress' office, Severus cloak flapped behind him like dark storm clouds on a grey sky.

For just a few moments, Severus let himself admit that he carried a very obsessive personality. First, there had been Lily. He very nearly winced remembering just how obsessed he had been with her, both when he was young and also after she died. He seemed to use her as a crutch, but he had finally managed after the Battle to drop her and walk free. He felt lighter for it, sometimes. Sometimes he just felt a little lonelier for it. But that was weak, and he would sneer at himself and snap out of those moods as quickly as possible without giving himself brain damage. Then, of course, he had obsessed over his Potions Mastery. He threw his whole body, mind and soul into his study and becoming the best in the profession. Even though at that same time he had just been enfolded into the Dark Lord's circle, he never gave You-Know-Who half as much of his attention as he did his apprenticeship. After the incident where his actions had the result of Lily being put on the Dark Lord's hit list, he had put his all into spying for Dumbledore to atone for his mistakes. Then when the Potter boy started school, it was time to obsess over his safety. He may also have accidentally obsessed himself with his hatred of the boy and his father, but of course, that was accidental. Severus snorted to himself in the quiet of the corridor.

So maybe it wasn't all that unnatural a reaction for him to have become slightly obsessed with Hermione Granger. Severus frowned internally. Somewhat more than obsessed, these days.

When the tracking failed, Severus turned instead to gathering memories. He approached most of the people who had seen her that night, asking for memories of those moments. Most had given him suspicious looks, but given in, in the end, because fortunately he could still utilise his frightening-professor image. It was hard to say no to someone who had harshly graded your homework during your school years.

The memories began with sightings during the Final Battle. Severus watched each and every one of them, and not a single memory showed the moment she disappeared, or even before it. He watched her fight Death Eaters. He memorised the colour of every spell she sent, and the movement of her lips on the incantations. His eyes trailed every bead of sweat the trailed down her forehead. He heard every gasp of pain or surprise, over and over again. He watched her fly from Fiendfyre and stab a Horcrux. He only watched her kiss the Weasley boy once. That particular memory made him feel slightly ill.

The more he watched memories of her, the more often he found his breath catch in his lungs, and his heart would situate itself inside his throat. He would find himself trying to grab her attention. Trying to grab at her, or her name would die behind his lips.

Severus rounded a corner and began to ascend the many staircases from the dungeons to the third floor. He expertly dodged trick steps and the stairs seemed to move with him, not trying to shift his path or dislodge him. The stairs brought him quickly to the Headmistress' gargoyle guardian.

Realising he was four minutes early, Severus moved further down the corridor and stood by a window, perusing the grounds. The sun was beginning to set, and the sky was painted gold.

Minerva placed her teacup back into the saucer with a clink. Severus never liked her tea set, it was too floral and delicate for his own taste. It was impossible to feel like there was any serious work being done when holding a tiny cup with pink flower patters on it. "Well," Minerva started. "I'm afraid you're going to have to go into hiding, Severus."

The teacup stopped just in front of his mouth. "Excuse me?" He lowered the cup when he realised it was muffling his words, and raised an eyebrow. "I hardly think that would be necessary." He put his cup on Minerva's ancient desk and she tutted at him and placed a napkin underneath it.

"You'll give the desk rings, Severus." She frowned at him and grew serious. Her fingers steepled in front of her, her elbows resting on the desk. "I do think it will be necessary." She sighed and leaned back in her chair. "I am sorry, but the safety of the children in this school cannot be compromised. The students have been through enough, now is time for things to go back to normal again."

Severus bit the inside of his cheek. Minerva was his superior, both as Headmistress of the school, and as the head of the Order. On the inside, Severus thought that she was highly overreacting, but he could not question her orders. He very much doubted that a couple of rouge Death Eaters necessitated a stint in hiding. He rubbed his chin. "Who will you find to take over my classes?"

"I have already been in correspondence with Horace, and he has agreed to come back for the necessary time, but only for a large pay rise." Minerva huffed a breath, cheeks ballooning. "That man is one of the most greedy and gluttinous that I know, but he is the best for the job, after yourself, of course." She rubbed her hand across her brow. "I do hope you understand why I am doing this, Severus."

"I still think it an overreaction, Minerva." He replied, and the corners of his mouth twitched as she got agitated. "However, I do realise that the safety of the students is... important... and I recognise that you, as my superior, are free to dictate what I do." He knew he was being unfair and vindictive with that comment, but he was more than mildly annoyed at being uprooted over such a minor threat.

Minerva pursed her lips, looking like she'd had something unpleasant spread underneath her nose. "You will be leaving now," she took a quill from her drawer and began writing on the parchment laying on her desk. "There is no need to pack anything," his eyebrows rose in surprise, she was shipping him off tonight? And where was he going that he couldn't pack his books or clothes? "And, I'm afraid you are not going to like this part, Severus." His eyes narrowed in suspicion.

"Minerva..." his tone was warning.

"I'm afraid I'm going to need your wand." She sighed, and Severus' anger increased to dangerous levels. He could feel it bubbling under the surface of his skin like boiling water, red hot and dangerous.

"Would you like to explain to me, exactly why I will not be able to bring my wand?" he bit out between clenched teeth.

"You will be going to live in a Muggle home." Minerva replied calmly, looking over her glasses at him in a disturbingly similar way to how Albus used to.

A vein in Severus's temple throbbed to the beat of his temper. "You mean to tell me, that I will be going into hiding from Death Eaters, without. My. Wand?"

She puffed and rubbed her mouth. "You will be perfectly safe Severus, you are leaving the country," she supplied, "and no Death Eater would think to search for you in the Muggle world. You will do this Severus." her face became hard, her tone turning to cold steel. "I will not be sending letters, but do not worry about being protected. You will be fine Severus."

"Where exactly am I going?" his anger deflated as he realised there was no winning this time. Minerva would take no compromise, and Severus's body seemed to sink further into the chair. He was annoyed, but defeated.

"Dublin, Ireland." she answered crisply. "I have a letter here, for the homeowner -" she gave him a stern look as she handed him the brown envelope. "- do not read it." He quirked an eyebrow at her.

"What gives you the impression that I would do such a thing, Minerva?" he teased smoothly. She smiled a thin-lipped smile and fished something out of her desk drawer.

"Only your manner, dear." he smirked, and she handed him another envelope. "This is your money, and this is the address." She shook his hand in reassurance as she handed him the last slip of paper with the address on it, the other two envelopes secure in his trouser pocket.

"How am I to get to this destination?" Severus queried, reading the address and examining the money she had given him.

"Floo through to 'Clancy's Pub, Dublin' and get one of those tack-see cars to take you to the address." she smiled at him reassuringly again. "Your wand, if you would."

Severus took the wand reluctantly from his pocket, but help it out of her reach when she went to take it. "What will you do with it?" he kept his face expressionless, but really it was worrying him to leave his wand behind.

"Don't worry, Severus." she pat him on the shoulder and he looked at her incredulously. "It's going behind Albus's portrait until you come back." he relented and handed her the wand and watched it as she opened the portrait of a sleeping Albus Dumbledore and locked it in a hidden hole behind it. "Hold on a moment."

He stopped moving towards the fireplace and drew back when he saaw her fingers reach for him. She scolded him; "I was just going to remove your frock coat, it looks decidedly un-Muggle."

He frowned and flattened his lips at her as if she was a small child that had just knocked over a glass of water, and began to unbutton his frock coat. Taking it over his shoulders, he left it on the back of the plush, wing-backed red chair he had just vacated. He shifted where he stood, only feeling more exposed as he lost another layer of protection. He felt that he didn't look all that Muggle in his black shirt with the high-necked collar and dragonhide boots anyway, what difference would the coat have made?

Reassuring himself that he had all envelopes and slips of paper secure in his pocket, he let Minerva pat him on the shoulder once more before he disappeared in a rush of green flames.

Severus stepped out of the dark car displaying the word "taxi" on an illuminated sign on the top, along with a list of numbers he did not know the significance for. He took out a £5 note with a nun on it to pay the driver, and told him to keep the change. Turning away from the moving car, Severus' admonished himself for his weak stomach. It had been nigh on two and a half decades since he had been in a car, and he certainly did not miss it. Obviously apparition and Floo had their dangers, btu he trusted fireplaces and his own magic infinitely more than a bald taxi-criver piloting a lump of welded metal fueled by dinosaurs.

He examined the building in front of him. it was a part of a surrounding apartment complexes, three floors. The sign outside displayed numbers 12 to 18, and Severus examined the piece of paper with the address on it again. Number 14, he needed. He frowned at the brick building; Severus had no idea what was the apartment building was laid out. Did 12 start at the top or the bottom? Left or right? He wasn't aware he looked lost until someone walked up to him.

Severus smelled the man coming before he saw him. Some sort of rancid body-spray that reminded him of what his mother would spray around the house if they had guests coming. Severus turned towards the sound of the footsteps and faced the man. He wore a blue jacket that looked to almost be made of plastic, and baggy, grey trousers, with assaultingly white shoes.

"Yer not lost, are ya?" he looked Severus up and down with amusement. "What tha fuck are ya wearin'? You one-a dem emos or sumn like dah?" he laughed to himself as if he'd made a brilliant joke, Severus sneered at him and was about to tell him exactly where to go when he began talking again. "You're probably lookin' for Milo's place, yeah? Number fourteen?" when he saw Severus nod hesitantly, a look of arrogant pride came over his greasy face. "Second floor, man. The one on de left."

"Thank you..." Severus said sarcastically and began to move towards the building. The greasy creature stopped him with a hand on Severus arm, and he pulled out of his reach with a sneer.

"You haven' goh a spare smoke, have yah?"

"No, unfortunately." the man nodded his head and gave Severus a piercing look as he walked away. Severus turned and made his way towards the building again, lips pursed in disgust at his surroundings. "Ungrateful prick." he heard distantly behind him.

The buildings were made of red brick, and as he came to the staircase in the middle of the building he noted an abundance of graffiti on the inside of the stairwell. He eyed the particular pieces of the male anatomy spotted here and there on the walls as he ascended the stairs with particular distaste.

He finished the stairs quickly, letting his long legs take them two at a time. As hesitant as he felt about being forced to stay with a total stranger (a Muggle stranger at that), he found that being on his own in the unfamiliar environment was making him tense. He had not succeeded in completely turning off his spy-senses, and everything he had learned from his experiences suggested that everything was wrong about his current situation.

Severus finally found himself in front of a peeling, grey door displaying the number fourteen. He fished the envelope with a letter and the money from his pocket and raised his hand to knock on the wood.

His hand stilled an inch from the door as he heard voices from the other side.

"Milo?" a male voice called. Severus gathered that he was definitely in front of the door the greasy Irishman had directed him towards earlier. He didn't know how this Milo person knew Minerva, but if she found them trustworthy, then at least a miniscule amount of Severus's worries were assuaged. He still had many reservations on how well this person was going to be able to hide him, and was more than doubtful of how well they could protect themselves (never mind him) from escaped Death Eaters. Severus resolved to wait outside the door and listen before knocking.

"Peter, what do you want?" One of Severus' eyebrows rose. So Milo was a woman, then? Severus began to wonder whether it was actually the Peter fellow that Minerva was aquainted with.

"Will you sing me my song?" Severus had to suppress a snort. He was becoming more and more doubtful of these two's competance by the minute.

"No Peter, I'm in the middle of making your fuckin' sandwich."

"Milo pleeease," Severus sneered at the childish pleading. He had half a mind to turn around and live on the street instead; it almost seemed preferrable to whatever sort of place this was. However, he had no idea how long he was going to be in hiding, and this would obviously be where Minerva would come looking for him. Severus stayed quiet as "Peter" began to speak again. "C'mooon, I'm sick!"

He heard a feminine sigh over footsteps, then the sound of couch springs. Severus was about to knock when she began to sing. He paused to listen; the sound was pleasant and sweet. He began to listen with more attention when he realised there was an English accent.

"Oh, Peter,
Can I go back home?
I flew here under false pretense
I thought it would be fun,
But the lost boys have all flown away
And one of them's locked up.
I know I think you're still a child,
But I couldn't give a fuck
You're twenty-one."

Severus's hand hit the door by accident, having stopped paying attention when he the girl start singing.

"What was that?" Peter.

"The door, I think." Severus heard couch springs again and readied himself, schooling his features into an intimidating expression, prepared to look down his nose at whoever answered the door. "I'll go finish your sandwich, you get it."

Couch springs once more, and the lock on the door began to jingle. Severus heard the "Ughhh" behind it as it opened.

Severus's eyebrows rose yet again at the person who opened the door. This was obviously Peter, but he was not the figure Severus was expecting. Peter matched Severus inch for inch in height, had dark hair, brown eyes, pale skin, and jewlery dangling from various facial features. The boy couldn't have been more than twenty.

Peter's eyebrows rose in surprise and looked him up and down. "Ehh, sorry, can I help you?"

Severus shoved the envelope at him and waited for the boy to open it. He took the letter and unfolded it. Eyebrows rising as he read. Severus regarded the strange appearance of the boy while he was busy. Noting the rings in his eyebrow, nose and lip, Severus also noticed that there were quite large holes in the boy's earlobes. He sneered again, finding the creature in front of him to be probably some sort of idiot.

Peter once again looked up at Severus, before calling out over his shoulder. "Milo, is' for you!" Turning back to Severus, he gestured for him to come inside. "So is your name Minerva then?" He looked at Severus suspiciously.

Severus near growled. Idiot, indeed. "It is not. My name is Severus Snape."

"Oh shite." The boy's mouth had fallen open in shock. "It is not." He shook his head in disbelief. "As in Professor Severus Snape?"

Severus nodded. He heard the girl shout out from the kitchen. "Peter, ask whoever it is if they want tea."

"Milo, I think you'd better get out here."

"I'll be out in a moment."

"No, really, Professor Snape is here."

Severus's skin jumped at the sound of smashing porcilean.

So, how was this chapter? Props to anyone who realised who Milo was.

"Milo" is pronounced My-Low just in case anyone was wondering. Also, if anyone has any urges to find out exactly what these people sound like in real life, I suggest watching the movie "Adam and Paul" (I'm sure you can find it online). It's set in Dublin around the same areas that this story will be set in.

The title and the song lyrics are from "Peter" by Daughter. If you want something to model Milo's voice off of, Elena Tonra is who I had in mind while I was writing.

Thank you so much for your reviews by the way! A special thanks to Shorty653 who pointed out a mistake for me in the Prologue that I have since corrected. Please do me the favour of reviewing again! Thank you.