A/N: Still not mine, still broke.

Chapter 9 – Black

Dear Madame,

I will not be returning back to school for graduation. I will miss being able to celebrate such a wonderful event with you and my friends and classmates, but I just do not feel like I can return right now. No celebration would be one without my mother present.

Please owl my NEWTs results to Selwyn Manor when they are available. I will need to keep them on hand for St. Mungo's when I am able to begin my Apprenticeship. At this point at I will be taking a year off with an option to reapply for the position next spring.

Thank you so much for overseeing my education at Beauxbatons. I will be forever in your debt for the education that you tried to instill in me to make me a better lady. I just hope I can live up to your expectations of my future.

Regards,

Serena Cordelia Selwyn

Severus hid her in the Room of Requirement while the end of the school year played out for the rest of the students. Since the Beauxbatons students had taken their NEWTs previous to the Third Task, she would still be a graduate of the school, though she would not be able to use her education for some time to come. Maybe, when Lord Voldemort was defeated and she could come back to Britain, she would become a Healer as she had always planned.

He knew that Lia cried herself to sleep most nights. He was being Summoned daily, and when he wasn't bowing to the Dark Lord he was bowing to the members of the newly re-incarnated Order of the Phoenix who would never completely trust him or his intentions. On the days and nights when he was able to see her, share a meal with her, or just speak to her, he saw that her eyes always looked a little more distant, confused, and sad.

She missed her mother, desperately. But he knew it was even more than that. She also missed the freedom she took for granted before, freedom her mother was able to give her by the anonymity of their quiet life in the country, hiding behind their old, noble name.

Dumbledore was meeting with her, daily, to prepare her for the next step. According to his reports, she was beginning to recognize somewhere in her mind that the Dark Lord was her grandfather, but it was impossible for her to reconcile it on a daily basis. And how could she? She was the grandchild of one of the darkest wizards their world had ever known. The culmination of his most insane dreams.

The last, Pure-blood heir of Slytherin.

After a particularly nasty Summons that mainly consisted of the Dark Lord screaming his discontent over not finding the missing girl, Severus slowly walked back to the dungeons when he felt something just brush past him in the corridor. He looked around, expecting to see Peeves or maybe one of the house-elves scuttling about. But, there was no one. If classes weren't already out he would have assumed it was Potter in his father's cloak sneaking around again. Suspicious, he pulled out his wand.

"Lumos maxima," he said, filling the tunnel with light.

There was no one.

Then, as subtle as the steam above a cauldron of Draught of Living Death, he smelled the scent of lavender floating around him. He followed the scent out of the winding maze of the dungeon corridors back up into the main part of the school. The fragrance got a little fainter out in the expanse staircases and classrooms, but he could still detect it enough to follow it to the Astronomy Tower. He walked up the winding stairs, his robes and cloak now whipping around him with each step as he climbed the many stories up to the very top. And that's where he saw her, standing out by the outer railings, completely unafraid of the height and unaware the brisk night breeze cooling the air around them. She was barefooted and wearing her nightclothes; he could see the long, light green gown peeking out from underneath a grey dressing gown.

Slytherin colors, he thought with a little smirk.

"Why aren't you in your room, Lia?" he asked, watching to see how she would react to his voice. She didn't, and actually just the opposite happened - her body relaxed a little when he began to speak. It irritated him a little that he'd lost the ability to make her jump; she should be jumpy and on guard while wandering the halls against his and Dumbledore's specific instructions.

Lia glanced over her shoulder shyly at him, knocking the braid of her hair from her shoulder to her back.

"Why didn't you catch me when I touched your arm earlier?" she asked, grinning a little as she turned back to look at the sky.

"Albus has been teaching you Disillusionment Charms, I take it?"

She nodded. "Yes, but all I used tonight was a simple Notice Me Not Charm." She smirked. "Apparently it was good enough to fool you. How did you know I was up here?"

"Your perfume," he replied, as he walked up next to her. He lightly put his arms around her and buried his nose in her hair, inhaling her sweet scent. "No one else wears it, so it could only have been you."

"Are you upset?" she asked. She leaned her body against his and relaxed completely into him.

"Just be careful," he said. "I know you feel cooped up, but it's for your own protection."

Lia sighed. She put her hands over his on her waist, lacing their fingers together. "You just never know how much you miss the sky until someone tells you that you can't see it anymore."

"Your Uncle feels the same way, being in Grimmauld Place now. You're both under forms of house arrest, to use a Muggle term."

She grinned, but her face was sad. "I know that term, now," she said, tapping her head in indication of the memory modification charms Albus was already placing on her to catch her up with a traditional Muggle education. "I can't believe you just called Sirius my Uncle. What happened to spitting out the word "Black" like a curse word?"

Severus grimaced slightly. "I'll never like the man after what he and Potter Sr. did to me when we were in school. But, seeing him like this I suppose I pity him, especially with you going through the same thing. I doubt I'd care if it weren't for you." He looked at her thoughtfully. "Actually, I know I wouldn't."

"I wish I could meet him, Severus," she said, sighing. "I would like to have that link to my father, but it wouldn't be fair for him, with me having to go so soon."

"He doesn't know of your existence, Lia. Even though you will miss knowing him, now, it won't be any difference to him. Your grandmother disowned him before your parents were married, and she burned yours and your mother's names off of the family tree after your father died and your mother left," he said, tightening his arms around her.

"Sounds like a lovely woman," she said.

"You should see her portrait, actually. She does nothing but scream at any of us when she's awake. But you look so much like her it's hard for me to hex the picture into silence," he said, snickering a little. "Although maybe I should to make up for the times I didn't place a Silencing Charm on you."

"Oh, shut up Severus. Really," she said, irritated, though her voice was kind.

"It would be nice for you to see the house. All the rooms are basically as they were left when she died, which was just a couple of years after your mother left. The Weasley's have set up camp there with Sirius, and they've all been trying to rid the home of all the Dark objects the family collected," he said, this time really laughing. "You'd think Molly would just ask me or Albus to help, but she's determined to do it by herself. It's the best part of the meetings – to hear her grumble about the 'progress' she's making."

Her hands squeezed his. "Would you do something for me?"

"Depends on what it is you want," Severus said.

"Thanks, Severus, I'll have to remember that if you ever need something from me," she said, now actually getting irritable.

"I'm sorry. What do you want me to do?" he said, turning her to face him. Lia's face was very serious, and there were unshed tears in her eyes. He felt like an ass.

"Can you bring me something of my father's? I don't care what it is. I have so many things of my mothers with me, but I never had anything that belonged to him or anyone on the Black side of the family."

"I'll try," he said. "I can't promise that I could manage it. Kreacher keeps an eye on everything in the house, whether or not anyone realizes it or not." He brought his hands to her face, trying to still the flow of tears from her eyes.

He hated seeing her like this. Severus actually hated seeing any woman cry. Before her, it was probably due to the nights of hearing his mother sob herself to sleep, as well as his extreme discomfort of the vacillating emotions of the teenaged girls in his care. The few who came to his office in tears never found comfort with him. It always made him wish he had a female co-Head of House to help with his charges, especially since Minerva and Pomona had no compassion for any Slytherin, female or otherwise.

As always, she sensed his unease in her tears, and she tried to brighten herself by attempting a feeble smile.

"I'm sorry," she said, sniffing. "I think all I do anymore is cry. It's so stupid."

"You've been through enough the past couple of weeks," he said. "Just ignore me. I'll go off and hex something later to work out how I feel about your tears."

"You could kiss me instead," she said, rubbing her hands up his chest. He felt her breath quicken against him, and even in the dim light saw her skin darken with pink heat as she flushed.

"If you insist," he said.

Severus lowered his mouth to hers, just moving his thin lips against her soft, full ones.

"Better?" he asked, knowing damn well it wasn't.

"No," she said, lift herself up on her toes to try to reach him. It was no use; she was five feet tall in her bare feet and he towered over her at several inches over six feet.

"What do you want?" he asked, lowering his head enough to where she was just out of reach.

"One of those kisses, Severus," she said impatiently. He half expected her to stamp her foot like a child. At least her mind was off the present and her tears had stopped.

"What kind of kisses are those again?" he asked, mocking her tone of voice.

"You could keep asking me questions, or I could show you," she said. She locked her hands around his neck and tried to force him down to meet her. He didn't need any more encouragement. He was just as ready for the intimacy with her as she was. He'd been leaving at dawn and not coming back until well after midnight for the last several days, and he missed even the brief time he could have with her.

What will you do when she's gone, Severus? This time his subconscious sounded more like Albus than like the elder Potter.

He ignored the voice as he lowered his mouth to hers again and kissed her, this time taking her lips with the intensity she wanted. He'd learned over the past few months that she liked him to take his time, so he kissed her until he memorized every soft curve of her lips before he licked her lower lip, asking her to open to him. She did, and her sweetness made him moan just like it did the first time – just as he did every time they shared this. He slid his tongue into the warmth of her mouth, touching hers gently, listening to her breath quicken and her own soft sounds of contentment.

All they had ever done was kiss. Before the Third Task, they'd spoken of their desire to wait until she'd graduated and they could be more open with their relationship. Severus had known from that first time they kissed that Lia was a virgin, and he didn't want to rush her until she was ready.

And now … now it was just a really terrible idea to start a physical relationship that would almost immediately have to be terminated, and that she wouldn't even remember. He tried to tell himself that they should hold back because of her, but if he were completely honest it was just as much due to the fact that if they did slept together, he wasn't sure he'd be able to let her go.

So he kissed her until he felt her go weak in his arms and he felt himself stiffen to the point of complete impropriety. He was suddenly acutely aware of the long walk back to the dungeons as he tried to shift his position in his trousers. He pulled his lips from hers and stared into her lust filled eyes, and, glutton for punishment as he was, when he felt her shiver in the night air, he pulled her back to him and wrapped his robes around them both. She tucked her head into the space under his shoulder and sighed.

"Will it always be like this?" she asked, her voice a little muffled by the fabric.

"I hope so," he replied.

Dumbledore was planting memory modifications within her mind daily now. With each spell he cast, each Confundus and Iniuriam Memoria Charm he placed to prepare her for the next step, brought with it the realization that this was really and genuinely happening. One day, she would wake up an American Muggle. And her life here with him would be not even a memory, because her memories would be gone - at least, for a little while.

The Room of Requirement, such an odd little creation of the castle, took care of her. Though it could not provide her with food, it provided her with anything else she could have ever wanted to pass the time. She had taken an interest Muggle Studies as her mind was filling with the new knowledge planted in it, and the room started providing her with books on American History, calculus, literature, and science.

It even provided her a wizard's chess set that was charmed to play with one player and an old wireless so that she would have music to listen to. It did help to pass the remaining time she had as a witch.