Severus Snape and the Twins
Chapter One: Spinner's End
Genre: Angst/Hurt/Comfort/Adventure/Family
Rating: K+
Warning: Death.
Summery: Severus Snape speaks to the girls and takes them home. Then they start their first day as 'family'.
..0..
Severus Snape looked down at the girls in front of him awkwardly. The grey man, whose name was still eluding him, had informed him covertly that he could Floo home in his office. The others, Mrs. Abbott among them, quickly gave him various contact information should the girls need him and with warm good-byes to the girls as they left. Walburga was the last to go, telling him they would need to discuss things later before giving each child a pat on the head. The girls had apparently been aware they were going elsewhere and the blonde informed him they had bags packed for the night waiting by the fireplace in the office. As he went there Severus realized he was off to a bad start when he didn't even now which was which yet.
"Which of you is whom?' he questioned as he opened the door to the office. The blonde didn't look up from her continued examination of the ground, while her sister ducked into her side.
"I'm Ashlinn, this is Alessandra." the blonde answered coolly. Severus stiffened a little at the tone, but ignored it and pointed calmly for them to enter. Ashlinn pushed passed him and went over, pulling her sister along gently, to pick up their bags. Despite her adult expression the childishly cartoon themed and sticker decorated backpacks reminded him that these children had just lost their mother. Severus tried to think of something to say, but decided against it.
Severus Snape was not the comforting type. And he was decidedly uncomfortable around children. Not even the most desperate of his first years would go to their taciturn Professor. If anything it was more likely whatever he said would make the situation worse.
"Have you used the Floo network before?" he asked curtly, and cursed himself for his inability to do this correctly when he saw Alessandra flinch at his tone. Ashlinn examined him coldly, looking up from the ground for the first time since her distrustful look earlier.
"No." she said, but as if to counteract her words she separated from her sister and walked towards the fireplace. She opened the snuffbox on the mantle and grabbed the silvery powder out of it and threw it into the ready fire causing it to turn green. Ashlinn looked away from the fire back to him.
"I've seen mother and the director do it before." she said in explanation. Severus's first inane thought was that if it continued like this he'd never learn the grey man's name.
"Where are we going?" Ashlinn questioned her dead eyes watching with an unnerving intensity suddenly. For a moment Severus thought he felt something brush his mind and locked his shields together. He looked at the girl sharply, but nothing showed on her face other than polite patience for his answer. Despite the lack of reaction and the absurdity of a five year old knowing Legilimency Severus did not relax his mind.
"Snape House, Spinner's End." He told her looking her over carefully. She nodded and went back to her sister. After a moments hesitation he gestured for the girls to follow him as he stepped into the fireplace.
"We will go at the same time. The fireplace is large enough and it is your first time." He said curtly and grabbed a hold on the back of both their shirts. "Snape House, Spinner's End!" The next second there was a dizzying movement around them and then he was walking out into his sitting room. The girls were pulled along uneasy on their feet. He paused giving them a moment to steady themselves. As soon as they had he released them and backed away.
Alessandra instantly ducked into Ashlinn's side as the blonde girl looked over the dirty room with a distance that was starting to worry Snape. Even Alessandra's constant hiding and scurrying was better than Ashlinn's almost complete lack of emotions. Surely it was unhealthy, but then again Severus only knew the rudimentary of child psychology due to his job. The entire incident would be traumatizing, so perhaps the girl was burying it instinctively until she was ready to deal with her loss. Severus decided he'd keep an eye on her and if she didn't start to recover from the shock of losing her mother he'd take her to Pomfrey.
"We're tired." Ashlinn told him looking at the book covered walls instead of him. Severus sighed and gestured for the girls to follow him as he left the room. He led them to the staircase beside the door to his Potions Lab.
"Go down the hall at the top of the stairs, the door directly on the end is the guest room. You two will have to share a bed until I can purchase correct furniture." Ashlinn gave a curt nod in reply, but before she began her ascent, she turned to him. Severus waited looking down at the girl blandly.
"You didn't know what Mom intended." It was a statement and she continued quickly. "We'll need to pick up are things from the house and Felicity from Mrs. Abbott's." At his questioning stare she elaborated. "Felicity is our raven, I asked Mrs. Abbott to take care of her before we left. Mrs. Abbott goes to the Leaky Cauldron a lot. Her and Mr. Tom like to talk a lot since her son married his daughter."
"We can do it tomorrow evening." Severus assured her. Ashlinn nodded again and looked down as Alessandra pulled at her sleeve clearly wanting to go. Severus ignored this and watched the blonde. For a moment she looked conflicted before her numbness was back.
"Thank you Mr. Snape." Ashlinn whispered and quickly turned pulling her sister up behind her. They practically ran up the stairs. Severus watched them go with conflicted feelings of his own.
..0..
"Al wants to know, when are we going to get Felicity?" Ashlinn said ignoring the slightly burnt scrambled eggs and toast in front of her. Beside her Alessandra stopped moving the food around her plate like she'd been doing since Severus had given to her. Severus, who'd been frowning at his, admittedly sad, attempt of cooking being ignored looked up at the girl only to have her look away.
He considered it. He wasn't very eager to see the bird or Mrs. Abbott again. The woman struck him as a battle ax and made it quite clear she didn't approve of his having the girls. He wasn't surprised though. Last night he'd placed why the woman looked so familiar.
Severus had gone to school with both John Abbott and Leslie Reynolds, who eventual became Leslie Abbott. John had been in his year and despite their basic neutral behavior to each other, neither had been particular fond of the other. Severus had found John annoyingly superior Ravenclaw and John hadn't thought much of Severus's half-blood status despite his family being openly pro-Muggleborn, Half-blood and Dumbledore. Leslie, two years below Severus, had been an easy target and rather terrified of him. He'd never actively picked on the little Hufflepuff, but she was a natural cheerful and sweet girl, but unbelievable sensitive, which meant on any occasion they were thrown together she found his humor and very Slytherin demeanor intimidating. He'd had the misfortune to be thrown together with the girl a lot and had spent most of his sixth year being forced to tutor her. They'd both hated the sessions. The girl had been so nervous about being around him that she kept messing up and Severus had even less patience for dunder heads back then meaning he snapped at the girl practically the entire time.
Mrs. Abbott had been notoriously fond of her timid daughter-in-law and had never forgiven Severus for his harsh treatment of the girl. Or his reformed Death Eater status. Hufflepuffs were rather stubborn and unchanging in their opinions.
The bird though just annoyed him. It had given him the evil eye the entire time and had pecked him before it had left.
"Mr. Snape?" Ashlinn said snapping him out of his thoughts.
"We can go after I inform my employer of your presence." Snape said trying his best not to grimace. Albus would no doubt be sickeningly touched and say something with the words 'dear boy', 'love', 'forgiveness', and 'Potter' in it. All of Albus's emotional spews came back to Potter and the Brat. Minerva, and probably the rest of the staff, would no doubt believe he'd gone mad. Minerva would be the most vocal about it though, unless Trelawney decided to come out of her cave. Which would mean he'd have to endure hours of apocalyptic predictions. No matter what his image as soulless untouchable dungeon bat was ruined forever.
Severus glanced at the clock. It was still early, if he arrived before nine he'd be able to beat the Professor coffee rush, which meant he'd be able to escape with minimum damage to his reputation. Or minimum damage until he was forced to add the extra bedroom to his quarters for the girls to stay in during the school year. Then everyone would know. He doubted he'd be able to keep his taking in two orphaned girls secret for long. Or that it was wise to try. He doubted it would help the girls self-esteem to act like they were dirty secrets.
Severus looked down at his plate and the brown and yellow eggs and mostly black toast. Ashlinn wasn't even bothering to pretend to eat just starring at the food actually showing emotion. It was disgust, but it was better then nothing. Alessandra had given up on moving her food around and was using the toast to build a small house with jelly as glue. Ashlinn quietly offered her sister her slices and the girl began slowly cutting out some tiling on the roof. Severus blinked and realized the girl was making Tudor style paneling. He didn't know rather to be impressed at the skill or to scold her for playing with her food. That was what parents did, right? Tell children not to play with their food. Not that it really tasted like food or was that edible.
Severus dropped his fork on the plate and stood. "We'll eat breakfast at Hogwarts and leave now. Scrap off the food you didn't eat into the garbage and place you dishes and utensils in the sink." Severus said and after checking to make sure the girls did, Alessandra hastily abandoned her creation and copied her sister who obediently obeyed, he left to go get the Floo ready.
When the fire in the sitting room was ready he went back in the kitchen to get the girls only to find them washing the dishes. He froze for a minute not quite sure how to take this. Wizards did not do things by hand. They were famously lazy. Even Severus, who'd grown up without magic, preferred having house elves clean up after him, though he did try to clean up his own messes and take care of his home when he wasn't too stressed or busy with work. His students, Slytherins especially, believed physical labor was something equivalent to having your toe nails ripped out. Even Muggle children didn't particularly take to chores as Severus could attest from his own upbringing. Yet the girls were washing and drying with a practiced efficiency that would have made house elves weep with pride.
When Ashlinn dried the last plate and set it aside on a towel they'd dug out from who knows where he realized the girls hadn't just done the dishes but wiped off the table and the counters while he was gone. His kitchen looked clean and smelt faintly like lemons.
"What are you doing?" Severus said, more sharply than he intended his surprise finally breaking. Both girls jumped and Alessandra gave him a blatantly fearful look before jumping behind her sister. He barely stopped himself from flinching, cursing himself mentally for using such a harsh tone with the little girl.
Ashlinn gave him one of the coolest looks he'd ever been on the receiving end off, grasping her sister's hand reassuringly as she did.
"We were cleaning up after ourselves Mr. Snape." the little blonde said, sounding so much like Regulus Black when he was offended that Severus saw the resemblance to the slender handsome Slytherin for the first time. "We did it for Mom when she was tried from work."
Severus was surprised yet again by the odd maturity of this child and at the thoughtfulness of such an action. He nodded stiffly feeling awkward under Ashlinn's disapproving stare.
"The Floo is ready, follow me to the sitting room." And then because it felt to abrupt. "Please."
Ashlinn gave him a narrow eyed look, but obeyed yet again making Severus wonder why he thought he could be a parent. He couldn't cook breakfast, the children didn't like him, and he was as paternal as Hagrid's Fluffy on a bad day.
It wasn't until they were about to get in the fire that Ashlinn spoke.
"Where exactly do you work Mr. Snape?" Ashlinn said, eying the green flames with a frown.
"I am the Potions Professor at Hogwarts." he said and the girl looked up clearly surprised despite her still bland facial expression.
"Why?" she asked incredulously. Severus's lips almost twitched at the tone. That reaction was the usual one to discovering he willing worked with children on a daily basis. Well that and horror if the person was a parent.
"Because it pays well, has excellent benefits, and there are not many positions that a Potions Master can achieve other than Healer or apothecary owner." Severus said calmly, not mentioning the fact that no one else would hire a reformed Death Eater, without any political power anyway. The girl blinked.
"You would have a horrible bed side manner and you wouldn't have any return customers." the girl said so bluntly and as a matter of factly Severus could only stare. Ashlinn seemed to sense his surprise. "Mom told us about you. Shouldn't we be going."
Severus nodded and reached down to grab the girls' shirts only to have Ashlinn intercept his hand to grab it instead. She linked her other hand with Alessandra's and looked up at him expectantly. Severus swallowed hard and prayed silently that this wouldn't end horribly, which of course made him suspect it no doubt would.