A Rose By Any Other Name

Once again he woke up to the slightly tickling sensation of bushy hair in his face, and his arm locked underneath the neck and shoulders of a certain witch. Yes, I really could get used to this, he mused and pulled her closer, fitting his body to hers. She mumbled something in her sleep but didn't wake. After a while his bodily needs made themselves known and he carefully disentangled himself and padded off to the bathroom. A quick Tempus showed that he still had several hours before needing to get up to start the day. When he got back he saw her looking at him.

"You were gone, it got cold," she said.

"Go to sleep again, we still have time before we need to get up."

She yawned and slipped off to the bathroom as well. When she came back she put her head on his shoulder, half supported by the pillow. Her leg nestled neatly between his and her hand stroked his chest gently. He pressed a kiss on her forehead.

"This is nice," she murmured and fell asleep again. He rather agreed, and his inner Slytherin seemed to hum with contentment.

He didn't think he would be able to sleep any more but apparently his body had other ideas, and the next time he opened his eyes they had nearly missed breakfast in the Great Hall already. They had a quiet breakfast in his chambers instead, brought by Winky, before she went off to study and he prepared lessons and corrected essays.

"Thank you," she said before leaving his room. She traced his jawline with her hand, and he brought his lips down to hers, gently.

"Always," he simply replied.

~x~x~x~

He decided against dressing up for the meeting with whoever Aemiliana Prince might be although he skipped his outer teaching robes. At three o'clock precisely he threw some Floo powder in his hearth and called out "Prince Hall" before stepping into the flames. A short journey later and he was thrown out from a large hearth into a foyer where a frail-looking house elf was waiting. The room was dark and shabby with dark wood panelling on all walls and a dark wooden ceiling where a dusty half lit chandelier hung. Oblong in shape, the fireplace was almost in the middle of one of the long walls, with what looked to be the entrance door at the short end to the left and another set of large double doors opposite the entrance.

"Master Snape is to follow Tinsel!" the elf squeaked and waved him towards the set of double doors which opened to what once had been a grand hall. Here a frail old witch stood to greet him. She was short and skinny, with white hair in a tight bun, and dressed in black robes that looked to have seen better days. Her black eyes were clear, however.

"Welcome to Prince Hall, Master Snape," she said in a clear voice.

"Thank you, Madam Prince."

She led the way through a drawing room next to the great hall into another room, a study with a small wooden table where a tea set was already prepared. One wall of the room had floor-to-ceiling bookshelves filled with dusty tomes. Gaps in the shelves showed where books had been taken away, probably to be sold. There was another hearth opposite the bookshelves with two large burgundy leather armchairs next to it. The table was situated near the windows where a patio door led to a terrace overlooking the gardens.

They sat down at the table, Tinsel poured them tea and uncovered the plate of sandwiches, crumpets, cake and some biscuits.

"Do call me Aemiliana, I'm too old for titles. Now I guess you wonder who I am, why you're here and why I haven't reached out to you before."

Severus merely raised an eyebrow, not fond of showing ignorance, and took a sip of the fragrant tea after cautiously sniffing it for poisons. The witch cradled her teacup in her hands and looked out the window.

"Where to begin … I assume your mother hasn't mentioned me. I'm her great aunt, my elder brother was her grandfather. I remember Eileen well from when she grew up here in these halls, scaling the trees in the garden and sliding down the bannisters. I was the youngest of four siblings and as such I wasn't important enough to marry off until my siblings started dying off without children, by which time I was already past childbearing age. As such, I've lived here my whole life and never married."

She reached for a sandwich while Severus helped himself to a crumpet. They sat in silence until she had finished the sandwich.

"Anyway, as you know, Eileen's grandfather who was Lord Prince at the time then disowned her and cast her out of the family when she married Tobias. I never met the man myself as she didn't bring him around to the family, probably for good reason. My brother wiped the memory of her marrying a Muggle from the whole family, ensuring that we all thought she had died, and that no one would remember her new name or the fact that she bore a son. The spell held when he died and Iodocus became the new Lord Prince. He never had any children, however, but the spell held probably because he as a male had the potential to beget an heir even as he got older. He never talked of you or her so I don't think he knew about it. Then when he passed recently, I became the new Head of the line, and since I'm well past childbearing age the enchantment disintegrated and I became aware of you and your background. Of course I had heard of you but I never realised the family connection we had. So, here we are, I wish to reach out to you and get to know you better as the one surviving relative I have, and that I may answer any questions you have regarding this part of your history."

Severus was quiet for quite some time, finishing off the crumpet and pouring some more tea. It made sense, in a backwards sort of way. "You know of my more recent history then, and what side of this damnable war I was on and what my actions were. I also know what side Iodocus was on, having seen him at plenty of meetings. You are probably correct in thinking that he never knew of me, he was not clever enough to keep such a thing a secret. I must ask you, what side did you take?"

Aemiliana sighed and looked at him directly, suddenly seeming as old as she actually was. She must be well over a hundred, maybe nearly a hundred and twenty? Eileen had been twenty-five when Severus was born, and she was the youngest of three siblings.

"During the first war, I too was seduced by the charisma and sheer power of Tom Riddle. The fact that the rest of the family also supported him didn't help much either. However, I never bought into the whole Muggleborn being our enemy and stealing our magic nonsense, and Riddle was after all a halfblood. I met him twice when my brother arranged special dinners here at the Hall, and although he immediately dismissed me as too old and too female to be of any interest, his aura was hard to resist. I assume that you know of what I speak?"

Severus merely nodded, agreeing with her. He gestured for her to continue.

"Furthermore, Iodocus was most certainly convinced of Riddle's greatness and mourned him greatly when the first war ended. My brother was killed during those final days, by the way. I don't miss him, well either of them. My brother was a vicious bully, and Iodocus was a stupid bully. He ran the last of the Prince legacy to the ground, pawning off most of the valuables to pay for his gambling and drinking. Trying to keep up with Malfoys on a bar tab is always an exercise in futility, which he never understood. He tolerated me living here mainly because I made myself nearly invisible, especially after the deaths of the others. They wasted away one by one by more or less plausible causes, the last few of them a year or so ago during the second uprising. Iodocus, as you might know, was killed during an Auror raid recently."

"Yes, I was quite relieved to hear it," Severus replied.

"Indeed. Anyhow, during the ten years between the wars I had done some serious thinking and realised that Riddle's philosophy was utter rubbish. I was shocked to hear of his return and I did contact Albus Dumbledore after thinking about what I could do. I mainly ended up sheltering some Order members while they were on missions in this region which was rather risky since I had to ensure that Iodocus didn't bring word back to Riddle."

Albus had not mentioned anything about help received from the Princes which probably wasn't much of a surprise. He hoarded information like his damnable candy and never shared more than he had to. Nevertheless, the revelation stung since Albus knew all about the Princes and what it might have meant to Severus to hear about them. Undoubtedly, that was precisely why he had kept silent.

"I must head back."

Aemiliana smiled briefly. "I see. Next time I hope to show you Eileen's room, and the Potions lab where she often spent time with her mother who let her assist with brewing."

He nodded briskly and made his way back to the foyer, Aemiliana following behind him.

"Before you go …" she began as they stood by the fireplace. She held out a hand expectantly to him. Manners had him respond automatically by clasping her hand in his, and he was taken completely by surprise when she somehow managed to slice his palm open and slam it against the mantelpiece in half a second flat, leaving a bloody handprint there while he swore and pulled his hand back.

"What did you do? Tell me!"

It felt as if his head was expanding, bursting out of his skull. Somehow an awareness settled behind his temples, of a large space and the wards contained within. Gradually the awareness coalesced into the Prince estate, with the Hall, the outbuildings and the surroundings. He could probably mentally count all the rooms, should he wish to, or reset all the wards.

Aemiliana smiled. "It is done. I have cancelled the disownment of your mother and yourself. You are the Prince heir and have a right to use the name if you wish, and you will own the estate and all surrounding buildings, to do with as you please."

"No! I don't want anything from you or the Princes! You have no right to foist that upon me!"

"It is already registered with Gringotts and the Ministry, Ignis will bring you a copy of the deed. Remember that you always have a choice, you could sell the whole lot once I'm gone and give the money to the seagulls if you wish."

"Enough! I do not accept this attempt at manipulation, I have had enough of that treatment for two lifetimes! You will not contact me again!" Scowling blackly at her he spun around and Flooed back to his quarters at Hogwarts.

~x~x~x~

He was completely infuriated with her meddling and it didn't help matters that his head still hurt with the weight of a full manor bearing down on it. How dare she take it upon herself to unilaterally make decisions about his future? Hadn't he had enough of that with nearly twenty years of servitude to two fickle masters pulling him in opposite directions? Most of all he wanted to go blast something into tiny pieces but unfortunately it was time for his office hours with Draco and Hermione. He stalked to the classroom and slammed the door open, startling the pair who were already there.

"What has you all in a snit?" Draco asked.

"Daft meddling old bints messing with my life! I thought I was free of manipulative masters!"

Draco was more used to his foul moods than Hermione and quickly assessed the situation. "This won't work. Do you want to duel? Granger and I against you?"

He considered this. That might be a good way to rid himself of some residual frustration. "Yes, let's do it."

The students quickly packed up their gear and Hermione put a notice on the door that there would be no office hours that day, before Draco led the way deeper into the Slytherin quarters. They passed the dormitory and a few empty rooms before opening the door to the Slytherin duelling and training room, outfitted with both training dummies, various gear and several obstacles such as boulders, benches and wooden structures. Draco quickly reorganised the layout of the room, shuffling the obstacles around into new positions and pushing the other training gear to the side.

Severus discarded both his robes and the frock coat and started rolling his arms and shoulders to warm up the muscles a bit. He was starting to feel better already, battle anticipation kicking in on top of the bubbling anger. Hermione and Draco also discarded their heavy robes and school cardigans, and she put up her hair in a messy ponytail.

"Alright, us two against you, no Unforgivables or permanent hexes? You're in until you lose your wand?"

He nodded and the three of them fanned out into the room. Hermione set an automatic countdown charm. As soon as the bell chimed they were off, all of them throwing hexes and diving in different directions. He nearly hit Draco with a Stunner while the blond tried to fire off a Jelly-Legs Jinx at him, only to have to leap out of the way of Hermione's Incarcerous. He threw a barrage of Stunners in her direction and quickly hid behind a wooden obstacle. His mind raced with possibilities for how to take them out, feeling more alive than in a long time. Quickly he Disillusioned himself, cast a Silencing charm at his feet and dashed across the room, only to be caught by surprise by a sudden snowfall of sticky black particles. He managed to take out Draco by a quick Expelliarmus followed by an Incarcerous before his form was outlined in black flakes, completely visible despite the Disillusionment. Scanning the room for Hermione he nearly got caught by a Tripping jinx before getting a shield up in time. She was quick at evasive maneuvers but didn't quite have the power to take him out, and he started blasting all the obstacles in the room before pinning her with a combined Expelliarmus, a Stunner and a Jelly-Legs Jinx, taking her out.

"Well played, and thanks," he told both of them after releasing them from their bonds.

"What was that black snow, Granger?" Draco asked after he got up from the floor.

Hermione was breathing heavily and wiped some sweat from her forehead, leaving a black sooty trail in its wake. "I got the idea from the Weasley twins and their Peruvian Instant Darkness powder, but in reverse so to speak as the idea was not to conceal but to show what was hidden. I haven't had the chance to test it before but it was nice to see that it worked."

Severus was rather impressed, both by the idea and the execution. "Come, let's go to my quarters," he said to them and started putting the room back in order.

"Nice room by the way, I didn't know Slytherin had this sort of space available," Hermione said.

Severus nodded. "Yes, that's the main benefit of being down here, lots of empty rooms around. There has been a Slytherin duelling club some years, there's even a magical plaque over by the door showing who's the current champion."

Hermione and Draco looked over at where he pointed and walked up to the bronze plaque that hung on the wall.

"Looks like you're in the lead, Severus," Draco called.

"Really? Well I guess no one but us has been here in a few years."

Once they were back in his quarters, seated by the fire, Severus called for Winky to bring them some refreshments. While Draco poured tea for them all, there was a flutter of wings from the fireplace and a disgruntled raven shot out from it, clutching a parcel. Severus immediately felt his mood darken again at the sight of Ignis. Before he could hex the damnable bird into cinders, Hermione had stepped in front of him and gently pried the parcel loose before releasing the bird into the corridor so that it could escape through the main hall.

"Do you need something stronger?" Draco asked with an eyebrow raised at him.

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, calming himself down again.

"No, let me tell you what has happened," he began and started recounting the story of the letter and today's visit with Aemiliana Prince.

Draco whistled in surprise at his story, and Hermione seemed to be bursting with questions as usual. Before she got going, however, Draco prodded the parcel that Ignis had brought and pushed it towards Severus.

"Go on, open it. It's probably spelled to your magical signature."

Severus grumbled but checked it for curses and tapped it with his wand. The parcel immediately enlarged, and opened up to show a couple of dusty old tomes and two sealed parchments. Frowning, he took out the parchments. One of them had the Ministry seal on it and the other one had a Gringotts seal. He opened them and briefly scanned the contents before tossing them to Draco who was better at legalese. Hermione was eyeing the books, and upon inspection they turned out to be about the Prince family. One was Aemiliana's diary with short entries spanning quite many years, another was a published treaty on the Prince history and the final one turned out to be a slim notebook by Norene Prince, Eileen's mother. He handed the published book to Hermione before opening his grandmother's book himself. It was a diary too, of sorts, with short notes on the children but also on the Potions experiments she had been conducting with Eileen especially. He felt his chest constrict upon reading about it, seeing his mother's name in that sort of context. What if he had been able to meet Norene?

"This looks watertight, Uncle," Draco said once he had looked through the documents. "You are apparently the new Lord Prince, effective immediately. The Ministry document was magically stamped and registered today, roughly at the time of our duel by the looks of it. The Gringotts document states that you have full access to the Prince vaults and lists their contents, not that there seems to be much in them. Your new legal name seems to be Lord Severus Prince Snape, and you can use either surname."

Hermione started giggling, in shock he presumed. He shot her a mock stern glare, thinking it over.

"Does it say anything about Aemiliana's status?"

"Yes, she has granted you full rights to the whole Prince estate already with the exception of the groundskeeper's cottage which will be hers until her death, apparently. But you are fully within rights to sell the rest of it today if you wish, or to donate it to house-elves in need or something." Draco said the last with a smirk at Hermione who sniffed at him in response.

"This calls for something stronger," Severus said and walked over to his bar cabinet. "Anything for you?"

Draco accepted a small Firewhisky while he poured a larger one for himself, but Hermione declined.

"Apparently the Princes were once known for their Potions business, Severus," she said after leafing through the book. "It seems like they had labs and a distribution central of sorts on the estate."

"Really?" Draco said. "Think they're still there?"

"Probably," Severus admitted. "I would guess most of the equipment is either sold or outdated, but the rooms ought to still be there." His mind started spinning with ideas, but he would have to go back to the estate at some point to look at what was there. It would save him the trouble of hunting down a suitable building, and he could ditch his family's sad house at Spinner's End finally.

"I want to be there when you tell Father of your new status, Uncle Severus," Draco said with a grin.

He started chuckling at that thought, and soon the utter ridiculousness of the whole situation had him laughing. Combined with the very promising encounter with Hermione last evening, it felt as if his whole existence had been upended. For once things seemed to be going his way rather than the opposite.