Hello! Oh golly, it has been an age since I updated...

I wanted to get something up for you guys. I know I posted that note several days ago asking patience, but I couldn't be patient with myself any longer and, while doing some editing, I found a nice spot in the middle of my (very long) chapter where I could split it. So, I'm doing that. It's actually pretty lucky because the beginning of this chapter has been very nearly where I wanted it for several weeks now. It's the second half that's giving me headaches. It's also the second half that I'm having to brush up on my book knowledge in order to complete.

Anyway, I do hope you enjoy what is now Chapter 37. I will do my best to get Part II finished up and posted soon.

MetamorphmagusLupin

**A/N: This chapter contains some exact quotes taken from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Chapter 33, "The Prince's Tale", by JK Rowling.

There are only a few and I make no money from this. All glory and praise goes to Ms. Rowling.

Previously...

Zoe discovered that her father had been the one to kill Dumbledore and, after talking with Portrait Dumbledore a bit and having a heart-to-heart with Harry Potter, she makes the decision to talk with her father about his past. She goes to his laboratory in the Hogwarts dungeons to confront him.

The Past Reconciles the Present: Part I

Severus studied his daughter. She still stood beside the door for several moments after he'd brought up the fire, which he'd meant as an invitation to make herself comfortable.

But it was an invitation she had not accepted.

"Are you afraid of me?" he asked softly, looking down at the large jar of dried nettles he'd placed on the workbench. His eyes, however, gravitated to Zoe.

Zoe slowly shook her head, but she didn't hold his gaze as she did so.

He watched her bite her lower lip timidly and wring her fingers into the loose fabric of the light blue robes she wore open over a pair of jeans and the jumper he'd brought her from Norway. Severus couldn't help but wonder if her choice of jumper was conscious. Had she worn it as a form of peace offering or, perhaps, was it a display of surrender?

Judging by the dark circles around her eyes and the way she slouched with fatigue, he was more inclined to believe that she'd merely grabbed the most accessible articles of clothing she could find. And, knowing his daughter, those were most likely the ones crumpled on the floor around her bed.

Now that he gave them a good look, her robes were rather wrinkled as well; she had probably worn them earlier in the week and discarded them on the floor, though she knew the house elves would not collect them for washing there. She was also wearing a pair of ballet flats on her socked feet, which was a fashion choice he knew she would typically not make when she was well rested and had less heavy thoughts weighing on her mind.

Another minute ticked by and still, father and daughter remained where they stood, neither sure exactly how to begin.

Severus internally berated himself. She's your daughter, for Merlin's sake, just talk to her.

He cleared his throat. Zoe looked back to him.

"Shall we sit?" he suggested awkwardly.

He watched Zoe's eyes shift between the chairs near the fire and back to him as if she was weighing that suggestion. She did move to the chairs, however, and sat tentatively on the edge of the one nearest the door.

She didn't relax, but sat stiffly perched upon the edge of the cushion, her hands clasped in her lap. And she watched him like a hawk when he came around the chairs and took a seat himself.

Still, for her declaration of being ready to communicate, she did not speak.

"Are you hungry?" Severus asked—anything to keep from actually addressing why they were there. "I could have breakfast arranged."

Zoe merely shook her head. "Not yet. But…maybe in an hour or two."

Severus gave a single nod of his head. That was perfectly all right with him.

More silence.

Eventually, her eyes met and held his for several moments. When she looked away, it was to readjust her posture in the chair. She pulled her shoes off individually and allowed them to fall to the stone floor. Then, she sat fully on the seat, facing him completely, and brought her knees up to her chest. She rested her arms atop her knees and placed her chin on her arms. She stared at him and bit her lip apprehensively.

"I'm, er, really sorry I called you a Death Eater," she said.

Severus's eyebrows shot up. That had been…surprising. Of all the things he'd been anticipating when this encounter finally occurred, he had not expected Zoe to be the one to apologize first—or even to apologize at all.

"I was a Death Eater," he stated numbly. "That is a role I played in my past."

"But you're not one now, are you?" she asked in earnest.

Severus shook his head once, definitively.

Zoe gave a single, conclusive nod of her head. "So, then, I'm sorry I called you one in front of all the other teachers. I shouldn't have done that."

Severus didn't know exactly how he was to proceed after that. He was surprised and proud of the courage his daughter had just conveyed in bringing forth an apology to him—especially one he didn't believe she should feel inclined to give. And, though he knew it probably made her feel better to begin that way, there were still several miles of muddy water to wade through before they put this situation behind them.

"I accept your apology," he said slowly, hoping that accepting was not somehow sending the message to Zoe that he felt he had been wronged by her, because he genuinely didn't feel as if he had been. But, if it took a weight off her conscience, he'd accept.

Zoe nodded again, then looked away and sat in silence once more.

And nothing was being accomplished through silence.

For the second time in so few minutes, Severus found himself clearing his throat.

"Is there a specific question you wish to begin with?" he asked, thinking it best to let her focus the course of the conversation—at least at the start.

"Yes," Zoe said simply, still gazing into the fire. "Why couldn't I see it before? Evangeline said it's been there all along."

She turned her head and eyed his arm.

"The Mark?" he asked. "I've had an elaborate, semi-permanent concealment charm upon it—one of my own design. The charm would only render it visible to a blood relative that sought it out, as you did."

"You used blood magic? Like the door to your quarters?" she asked.

"A similar concept, yes."

Zoe wrinkled her brow then and surprised Severus once again when she vacated her chair and walked toward him. Standing in front of him, she reached for his left arm and started to unbutton the cuff as she had that day in the staffroom, but with far less force and desperation. Severus noticed her hands shaking slightly as she did so, so he reached up to help her with the buttons before pulling the sleeve of his coat and shirt up to his elbow to allow her to glimpse the faded Mark.

He hadn't reestablished the concealment after their encounter. There was no reason to now except to appease his own revulsion to it.

"After the fall of the Dark Lord," he continued without prompt, "the magic within the Mark that called the Death Eaters to him no longer existed. Now, it is little more than a simple, gruesome tattoo, but nonetheless a permanent symbol of my elective servitude—my horrible adolescent decisions."

"Did Mum ever see it?"

"Yes. She did. But she did not know its meaning."

He watched the expression on Zoe's face visibly drop.

"So…you just hid it from me."

Her tone was defensive, though her voice was soft, and Severus knew he needed to navigate this explanation cautiously.

"Yes," he stated, resigned. "But…if it's any consolation, by the very nature of blood magic, you were the only person on this Earth with the power to reveal it. I did that intentionally."

Zoe's expression sharpened as she clenched her jaw in agitation. Clearly, that sentiment was far from a consolation to her. He should have known better than to think that would placate her.

He sighed heavily. It needed more explanation than that.

"When you were born… when you came into my life, I did not wish for you to live with the stigma of my past actions, to have to defend them. I did not want it to be a symbol for others to rally around and throw in your face as if you were somehow at fault. But I knew, eventually, that you would want to know about it which is why I made the concealment only semi-permanent and with the aforementioned specifications."

Zoe met his eyes briefly, but did not respond emotionally to his words. She touched his arm tenderly, running her fingers over the curved lines of the Mark.

"It's not so bad, I suppose," she said after several moments, though she didn't sound as if she believed her own words.

Severus raised an eyebrow. "It is not the look of it that I find reprehensible."

"It's what it means?"

"Yes."

"But it doesn't mean anything now," she said, meeting his eyes.

Severus paused.

"I think these past weeks have proven that there is still a very great deal of meaning in it."

The girl blushed then and released his arm. She walked back to her chair and settled into it once more with her knees bent up to her chest.

"How come you never told Mum your middle name when she asked? Don't you like Prince?"

Severus wrinkled his brow, confused. "It's sufficient," he said. "But forgive me if I find that question to be considerably off-topic."

Zoe visibly tensed at that observation and she looked away. "Well… er, I mentioned Mum… and that made me remember the story about how she tried to guess your middle name. She wrote about it in her diary, too; she said that she couldn't wheedle it out of you."

Severus merely nodded his head at her explanation.

"But you never told me your middle name either," Zoe continued, her brow furrowed with agitation as she met his eyes. "Minerva told me what it was. I remember."

Her tone had changed in a blink. Zoe's words were now very deliberate, almost rehearsed, her voice more betrayed than he'd ever recalled it sounding before.

"How on Earth did such a subject even come up?" he asked her, perplexed.

Zoe shook her head, her frustration palpable. "Who cares? Minerva knew it, but you didn't tell Mum or me. Why?"

"I—"

"Everyone knows things about you that I didn't!" she shouted over him then, standing once more, her fists suddenly clenched at her sides. She started to pace in front of her chair.

"Even your stupid middle name," she continued. "Other people knew it, but not me. Not. Me. And all the stuff about being a Death Eater and the war…" She turned to look right at him, stopping her pacing for a moment. "You never told me any of that! It's like… It's like I don't know who you are at all, but everyone else knew! They all knew…"

As she paced, she shook her head and threw her hands in the air.

Severus knew this behavior well; it was very similar to the reaction he'd had once Dumbledore had finally revealed to him the whole plan regarding Potter—regarding the sacrifice Potter would have to make to rid the wizarding world of the Dark Lord's evil. He understood being left in the dark about important matters, he really did.

And, as much as he felt compelled to reprimand her for the histrionic way in which she was expressing her displeasure, he knew this had been coming. She was entitled to her upset about his secrecy and, if the Occlumency incident had taught him anything, it was that he might fare better if she was allowed to convey her anger and disapproval to him unhindered, as she was doing. She had every right to rage at him if she saw fit and he couldn't deny that he had earned it.

"Zoe, I know. I understand your frustration—"

"Why wouldn't you just tell me?!" she raged, cutting him off. "Why did I have to find out from other people? Why did I have to find out from bloody Cecilia?!"

Tears were running down his daughter's face now as she slumped back into her chair.

"Why did I have to read about you in books when you could have told me any day?" Zoe asked, downhearted, as if to herself. "Why couldn't you just tell me?"

Severus looked away from her and tried to organize his thoughts. It was killing him to see his daughter so distraught and he wanted nothing more than to pull her into his arms, to show her some kind of fatherly affection—as if that alone could fix everything.

But he didn't dare. He knew Zoe was unlikely to tolerate physical contact in her current state. Such a bold act on his part would possibly hinder any progression toward an understanding between the two of them.

"Other people knew of the role I played…" he began, still looking away, "…because they had first-hand knowledge of the events themselves, they were alive and paying attention when the wars were happening. Many of them, such as Professors Longbottom and Lupin, and Minerva, were themselves nearly as involved as I was."

He turned and looked back to his daughter who was watching him, a frown on her face.

"As for your peers, they are the first generation born to those who stood up against the Dark Lord and their parents have seen fit to apprise them of those events—many have elected to describe it all to their children in great detail."

Zoe's frown deepened.

"As for my middle name…"

He couldn't help that his tone turned exasperated.

"Minerva has known me for many years—since I was your age, in fact. She has been privy to my school records, my Hogwarts employment records… We've spent time as Heads of House together and we fought in the wars alongside one another. She just knows it. I wasn't intentionally keeping my middle name from you; it… it was never a subject that came up. You've never asked me what it was," he concluded.

"You kept it from Mum," Zoe stated succinctly, offended, crossing her arms over her chest.

Severus sighed heavily. "I didn't. It was… a game, of sorts, for your mother and I—her trying to guess it and my refusing to tell her. It was for our…amusement, you could say."

"A game?" Zoe asked, her brow and nose wrinkled. "How was that a game?"

Severus shifted in his seat uncomfortably.

"It was meant as…affectionate teasing, I suppose. There was no malicious intent toward your mother on my part and she enjoyed in the guessing."

Still, Zoe's forehead remained wrinkled with confusion. Eventually, she shook her head and leveled him with a serious gaze once more.

"You didn't tell me about any of the other things, though," she muttered. "Everyone else's parents told them stuff."

"That's correct," Severus responded. "I have elected to keep much of it quiet from you. It may not seem like it, but I assure you, I did so mostly for your benefit."

"Sure you did."

She didn't believe him and Severus could tell that she resented his stance. The girl slouched, and looked away from him again, seething silently, as small tears continued to flow from the bottoms of her eyes.

This was difficult. And he knew it was always going to be—knew the secrecy was likely to make it worse—but yet he had also felt that he'd needed to keep it all from her. He'd needed to protect her from these revelations so as not to damage her as he had been damaged. But, perhaps, he'd been misguided in some of it.

"Zoe," he said softly, trying to get his daughter to lift her head and look at him.

When she didn't, he reached across the space between their two chairs and placed his hand on her knee.

"Zoe, please look at me."

The girl sniffled and did as he asked, but pushed his hand away from her in the process. Severus merely sat back into his chair and started to speak.

"I know there are elements of my past that I've kept from you," he stated. "I have been telling myself that you weren't old enough for this information, but I must now concede that if you're old enough to consider and ask the questions, you're old enough to hear some of the answers."

He sighed heavily, resigned. "I cannot guarantee that I will reveal everything, but I'd like to try to be more honest with you now."

Zoe huffed, agitated. "That's what you said last time and you didn't tell me hardly anything important then."

Severus pursed his lips, trying to keep the instinct to grow irritated with her peevishness at bay.

"Last time—if you're referring to when we were at Budhmor Firth—we focused our conversation on current, specific dangers to the both of us," Severus countered. "The elements of my past were marginally relevant to that situation, but I did not necessarily see an opening in which to discuss them. Though, I will concede that there have been opportunities over the past year that I could have told you, and have chosen not to."

Severus watched his daughter's expression as she processed his explanation. She had a small, vertical wrinkle between her eyebrows that conveyed deep concentration and a subtle hint of her anger. The real display of her displeasure, however, were her eyes—currently a yellow-orange hue that swirled within the confines of her irises.

"Why won't you just tell me everything?" Her words were bitter, but subdued. She was frustrated, for sure. "You don't let me keep secrets from you," she said softly then, looking down at her hands.

Severus heaved another sigh.

"That statement isn't…entirely accurate," he said after several moments of thought. "Secrets have a variety of different forms. There are private matters in your life that are yours and yours alone. In the future, there are likely to be many more. I cannot force you to tell me such things. This is why we make use of our pensieves at the outset of every Occlumency lesson—in order to respect each other's privacy."

"Everybody has secrets, Zoe. There are day-to-day experiences that are not worthy of sharing, embarrassing experiences, or moments that we wish to keep and savor for ourselves. What I prohibit from you are lies or deliberately-omitted, pertinent information—especially when the information you have or an event you have witnessed needs to be expounded to me so that I can assess it and react to it for your benefit or protection."

Zoe wrinkled her nose, clearly disliking his answer. She shook her head in disagreement.

"You've lied to me my whole life. You deliberately-omitted information," she stated, her tone sour. "But it's only wrong when I do it, apparently."

Severus shook his head.

"That isn't what I mean at all," he said softly. "The fact that we are having this conversation should be proof to you that I know that it was wrong to keep much of this information from you—that you should have been equipped with enough knowledge to deal with certain questions or disparagements from your peers. At the very least, I must acknowledge that you are a citizen of the wizarding community and, as such, have the right to certain information regarding its general history..."

Zoe huffed as he saw her roll her eyes.

"I don't care about the history," she grumbled lowly. "I want to know about you."

Severus closed his eyes briefly and shook his head.

He looked back to her.

"Zoe, being my daughter does not necessarily entitle you to any and all information about events in my life that took place decades before you were born. I understand that it may seem hypocritical but, as your father, it is my duty and privilege to see to your needs—even your desires—and often that involves my acquiring information from you. The relationship does not work the opposite way. It is not… well, it is not a two-way street, so to speak."

Zoe's frown deepened. "What does that mean?"

"It means… It means I am not your friend and you are not my confidante. I am your father, your parent. I am tasked with looking after you, providing for you, guiding you, and that requires a certain running knowledge of what you're up to, what affects you, and how you're feeling. That is not something that must be reciprocated from me to you. You need not know everything about me—about my past—for this dynamic to function."

The girl was scowling at him now, but she didn't say a word. Perhaps she didn't know what to say.

"I know you don't like that answer," he conceded openly, "I would have hated it at your age too. And it is not my intention to come across as duplicitous in this regard. I am merely concerned for your wellbeing and trying to help you to understand by reservations about this information. I'm afraid this may be a concept that you will not fully understand until you have a child of your own."

"That's a long way away," Zoe groused.

He couldn't help the subtle smirk that took over his lips. "I should certainly hope so."

He chose not to react to her rolled eyes. His features sobered.

"Additionally, as I stated before, there are moments that have occurred in my past that are mine and, just as you would want my respect allowing you your privacy, I ask that you be understanding and respect me enough to allow me to hold onto some of my secrets as well."

After that, he sat silently waiting for her to process everything he'd said so far and, perhaps, start the conversation again.

And then he saw it—a slight softening of her features. Though, her stubborn frown line was still evident between her eyebrows.

"So what are you going to tell me, then?" she asked, her tone far from non-combative.

Severus sat back in his chair, thinking.

Merlin, how could he explain it all? How could he possibly make her understand his innermost turmoil when it came to these matters? How could he make her see who he was—who he'd been—without her losing complete confidence and trust in him now? Was it even possible?

Does it matter? he asked himself internally. She's asking to be told and you've as good as told her that she has a right to know certain things.

And it was only in that moment that he truly made the decision to explain almost everything to her and hope beyond hope that she'd understand—that she could find it within herself to forgive him. There was the very real possibility that she'd likely never truly trust him implicitly again, and the almost certainty that she'd never grow to see him as a pillar of integrity, conviction, or candor. There was also the likelihood that, in her adolescent years, she would use his past actions as shining examples of hypocrisy to spew back at him in the heat of an argument; he could already envision her using his mistakes to justify poor decisions on her own part at some unspecified future time.

Severus shook his head. His imagination was getting away with him.

Despite his reservations, he would take his chances with as much of the truth as he could muster. And he'd show her in the same way that he'd shown Potter—made Potter understand—all those years ago.

He took out his wand and flicked it, turning their chairs inward toward each other while simultaneously pulling the small table between the two chairs forward to position it closely between them.

Zoe eyed him curiously.

"What are you doing?"

"You asked what I intended to tell you," he stated, "and I intend to tell you—to show you—as much as I'm comfortable with. Frankly, some of these events should have been out in the open from the beginning. I see that now."

He then summoned his pensieve from its resting place in his quarters with a swirl of his wand, positioning it on the table between them.

"You're going to show me with Occlumency?"

Severus gave a single shake of his head. "I shall show you the memories themselves—my memories from long ago. I believe it to be the most honest and efficient way of conveying everything. Then…" Severus paused, conflicted. "Then, you can come to your own conclusions."

Zoe watched her father put his wand to his temple over and over, depositing the long, pearlescent strings of memories into the pensieve for several minutes. She remained as quiet as possible to allow him to concentrate.

She was still incredibly upset and hurt by all this of course but, at the moment, those feelings were making way to curiosity. How, exactly, would she be viewing all these memories? Would the swirling tendrils create some sort of television-like experience? Or, perhaps, they'd be projected above the surface of the pensieve in some way?

She didn't know. Mind magic and pensieves were still quite new to her. In fact, it had been weeks since she'd even laid eyes on her own pensieve residing in her father's quarters upstairs, much less discovered any new uses for it.

Roughly twenty minutes passed before her father finally deposited the last memory strand and looked up at her, his eyes oddly glassy and distant. After a few moments, he gave his head a shake, as if trying to clear it. He looked into her eyes.

"If you will recall," he began gruffly, as if he'd forgotten how to speak in the last twenty minutes. "When we first started our Occlumency lessons, I explained to you the purpose of a pensieve…"

Zoe nodded her head.

"You'll remember what I said then, as well as from a few minutes ago, that sometimes people have thoughts or memories that they wish to protect from others—events of which they are embarrassed, events which may still be horrifying to relive. Yes?"

Again, Zoe nodded when her father met her eyes. He only did so briefly before looking back down into the swirling liquid in the pensieve.

"I want to caution you, then… That's what many of these memories are for me. Some are horrifying and many of them are shameful. Some of them may be difficult for you to understand, even in context. They represent the very worst of me, some of the most desperate and depraved times of my life."

Zoe wrinkled her brow, suddenly feeling anxious about what she was about to see.

"I'll need to preface these images with a bit of backstory, I suppose—give you a bit of knowledge of the players…"

And then her father was off, telling her about how he didn't have a very happy childhood, that he was bullied in his neighborhood, and then more once he got to Hogwarts. He explained that he was rather lonely as a boy and how his parents couldn't help, or didn't know how to help, or perhaps didn't wish to help…Zoe wasn't sure. He was going through everything so fast.

But then he was explaining about how, when he was about nine years old, he'd met a girl in the park—the very same park near Spinner's End that Zoe played in from time to time. He told her that he and the girl—Lily—had become fast friends, best friends, and how he had spent their time together detailing aspects of the wizarding world to her during their playtime.

He moved on to telling Zoe about how, as a Slytherin student during the rise of the Dark Lord, he'd fallen into a crowd of less-desirable older students who brought out the worst in him, but also bolstered his confidence and made him feel like he could be powerful in a way he'd never been before.

And he talked about how all that had lost him his friend—the girl named Lily.

"These may go by rather quickly," he said then, pausing his explanation, "but watch as closely as you can and ask questions if you feel inclined."

Zoe didn't respond. She followed her father's gaze down into the pensieve and moved to the edge of her chair.

She watched the memories swirl and blurry images started to take shape within the bowl. Squinting, Zoe leaned forward getting very close to the surface of the liquid. She couldn't quite make anything out, but as she came a bit closer, she felt her nose touch the liquid and, suddenly, she felt as if she were falling.

Before the sensation could register within her brain enough to elicit a scream or any other reaction of fright, she was no longer falling.

Instead, she was standing at King's Cross Station. She recognized it immediately, of course, for there was the Hogwarts Express, steaming at a standstill as children buzzed about preparing to make the trip to Hogwarts.

And, though the scene was familiar, it was obvious that she was not in the present time for the Muggle clothing many of the children and adults were wearing were quite outdated by current standards. Not that Zoe was exactly up on all the latest fashions, and not that wizards tended to know exactly what constituted present-day Muggle attire anyway, but Zoe could still tell that many of the styles of trousers and dresses surrounding her were from a different time.

She was turning around, trying to figure out what to focus her attention on when a hand rested on her shoulder. She startled and looked up to see her father standing beside her.

"There," he said, pointing toward a point a few feet away where a scrawny, black-haired boy wearing too-short trousers and secondhand robes sat. The boy was sitting upon a worn, wooden travelling trunk. He fidgeted, his feet tapping, as he looked around at the people rushing about. He raised a hand up to his mouth and bit at the fingernail on his thumb, his eyes never ceasing to dart about the platform.

"That's you?" Zoe asked curiously, looking up to her father. He merely nodded.

"Your clothes…" she began to ask, but stopped, suddenly very uncomfortable, embarrassed for him.

"Yes," he said, his tone somehow conveying to Zoe that it was all right to ask. "I grew up very poor. My wand was the only item I owned that wasn't secondhand."

Zoe nodded.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm waiting for Lily," he said succinctly.

Zoe turned and watched as a young girl with auburn hair and stunning green eyes bounded toward her father—well, her father as a child—and nearly mauled him in a brief hug.

"Isn't it exciting, Severus?!" the girl—Lily—asked him. "We're really going!"

"Lily was a witch?" Zoe asked.

Her father nodded, looking almost wistfully toward the children as they walked away.

"Muggleborn. We had been the only magical children in Cokeworth."

As he said that, the images before Zoe shifted. She saw shots in quick succession: a group of Gryffindor boys laughing as her father attempted to wipe what was obviously eggs out of his hair, a series of childhood jinxes being fired back and forth, her father sitting in what was obviously a detention, a great, walrus-looking man giving her father a jovial slap on the shoulder while they stood before a cauldron.

Then, her father was with Lily again, walking through the snow on the grounds of Hogwarts, talking and laughing.

Then he was in the hospital wing, a much younger Madam Pomfrey attending to his arm, which was in a sling.

Another image swam past of her father being tripped by a familiar-looking boy with messy black hair as another boy kicked his books far down the corridor.

At last, her father, as a boy, was sitting near the fire in the Slytherin common room, talking to an older boy with slick blond hair.

"You say you know some Dark hexes?" the older boy asked the eleven-year-old.

Her young father nodded and appeared to wipe tears from his eyes, bolstered by the interest this older, aristocratic student had taken in him.

"Of course, those are best practiced on Gryffindors and Mudbloods…" the older boy stated, smirking maliciously.

"Who is that, Papa?" Zoe asked.

"Lucius Malfoy," her father answered.

Zoe's eyes widened, but she didn't comment. She'd only met Scorpius's grandfather once and she had gotten the distinct impression at that time that he was highly prejudiced toward non-purebloods. She hadn't liked him at the time of their meeting. He'd sneered at Zoe and made a comment about her mother that had caused Zoe's father to stiffen and give a very cold retort. Lucius Malfoy had apologized to Zoe's father, but he hadn't seemed genuine.

Zoe wished now that she could remember exactly what had been said, but she couldn't remember. She only recalled the emotions the encounter had elicited.

She'd heard rumors about old Lucius's Death Eater status as well in the last few months, so his comment in her father's memory didn't really surprise her. The fact that he seemed to be taking her father under his wing back then, however, didn't sit well with Zoe.

Suddenly, she was looking at her young father more clearly, but several years older than the previous scene. He was sitting in the Hogwarts library, pouring over two or three different texts, and writing notes in the margins of another. It seemed very late in the evening.

"I'm fifteen here," her father said beside her. "Lily and I were separated into different houses when we arrived at Hogwarts, but we did our best over the years to remain friends."

Zoe watched her teenaged father for only a few moments before Lily entered the library, spotted who she was looking for, and made her way to the table beside which they were standing. She'd grown considerably, too. She was taller and shaped less boyishly than she'd been at eleven. Her hair flowed, full and auburn around her shoulders, and her almond-shaped eyes were bright and green. Zoe thought she was very pretty.

Lily looked to Zoe's father kindly, friendly, as she sat down in front of him.

"Rewriting Borage's instructions again?" she teased.

"Hello to you, too, Lily."

The teenaged version of her father looked up at his friend, his expression a bit annoyed.

"Borage is an imbecile. Besides, it…takes my mind off things."

"Is it Potter and Black again?" Lily asked.

Potter? Zoe thought. As in Harry Potter? No… her father was older than that. He'd been Harry Potter's teacher…

Her teenaged father merely gave Lily eye contact as an affirmative answer.

"Sev, I wish you wouldn't let them get to you."

"It's hard to ignore them when they're casting Aguamenti at the back of my trousers as I walk through the Great Hall."

Lily merely shook her head and looked away. "Gits."

She looked back to him.

"I wanted to see you, to ask you something…something that I'd heard…"

She seemed downright anxious; she wrung her hands in her lap. Her father wrinkled his brow, but he didn't hide his emotions from his face nearly as well then as he did now and, if Zoe had to guess, he was steeling himself for a difficult question.

"Did you really sign a…a… what did they call it? A letter of comfort, I think?"

Her teenaged father's shoulders seemed to slump. "Where did you hear about that?"

"People talk, Sev. Is it true? Do you really intend to sign up with that…that group? Those vile people like Lucius Malfoy and the Lestrange brothers?"

Zoe looked up to her real father again, but his eyes remained glued to the memory playing out before them.

Her adolescent father merely stared for several moments at his friend. He shrugged with nonchalance. "It doesn't mean anything. It's just a… a Slytherin thing. It's camaraderie."

"It's not," Lily said, completely serious. "Don't treat me like I'm an idiot, Severus. It may not be legally or magically binding, but that's a real agreement, with real consequences. You'd have no choice but to join with that… that wizard and his Death Eaters. Please tell me you didn't sign it."

Her young father's expression told the truth.

"Our friendship started to deteriorate exponentially after that," her father spoke beside her as the memory shifted. "Lily very staunchly opposed any views held by the Dark Lord. And she couldn't understand why I was so drawn to the Dark Arts."

"Why were you so drawn to the Dark Arts?" Zoe asked curiously.

Her father's eyes glossed over and his answer was spoken softly.

"As I stated in your first Defense class, the Dark Arts have a certain… allure. They make one feel powerful, invincible. But it's an illusion. It is a fabricated sense of superiority and infallibility."

"But that… powerfulness… that's why you joined the Death Eaters?"

Her father subtly nodded his head.

"Dumbledore once said that the Death Eaters were a group for the weak seeking protection, for the overly ambitious seeking glory. It was a place for the most prejudiced and thuggish of wizarding society to find a leader who could show them a more refined level of cruelty. You saw how I was viewed and treated as a young boy into adolescence… I joined because they made me feel powerful, yes—but for all the wrong reasons and in all the wrong ways."

Now they were outside on the Hogwarts grounds on a beautiful summer day judging by the blue sky. It must have been nearing the end of term judging by the relaxed attitudes of the students conversing in shady spots near the lake—perhaps it was just after exams.

"What you're about to see," her father started again, "is one of my very worst memories. But in the grand retrospection of my life, I view it as a catalyst of many events to come. It is therefore significant."

He looked down to her and his eyes conveyed remorse. Zoe merely gave him an understanding nod.

The scene went by quickly, but she saw how the group of four Gryffindors teased her father, called him names—Snivellus—and how her father attempted to defend himself by shooting a spell at the leader.

"Who is that boy?" Zoe asked, stunned by the whole scene.

"It is James Potter," her father stated succinctly beside her.

Zoe looked up to her father with wide, questioning eyes.

"Your friend, James Potter… it is his grandfather."

"Why are they being awful to you?"

"I believe the reason that day was that they were bored."

"Bullies." Zoe couldn't bring herself to say anything more than that.

Her father didn't respond and, right at that moment, the elder James Potter used a spell to lift her father upside down into the air. It made Zoe want to cry.

Suddenly, Lily was there defending Zoe's teenaged father and Zoe felt bolstered.

But it didn't last for, then, her father said the awful word—the forbidden word—Mudblood. He called Lily that and the way Lily had responded had been terrible.

"Why, Papa?" Zoe heard herself say as the Hogwarts grounds dissolved around them. She had tears pooled at the bottom of her eyes.

Her father shook his head. "It was a mistake," he said softly. "I was a stupid, angry teenager and I took it out on the wrong person. I tried to atone…"

The scene was her father standing in the corridor outside the entrance to the Gryffindor common room, pleading with Lily who simply didn't want to hear it. Zoe felt she should be on her father's side but, truthfully, she couldn't blame Lily for taking a hard line, especially when Lily brought up that she knew that her father had used Mudblood frequently to describe other Muggleborns in the school.

"We never reconciled," her father said. "My use of that word toward Lily—my oldest friend—was proof to her that I was lost from the Light forever. And my life grew considerably darker after that."

Flashes of scenes flew past Zoe then: her father talking in a group of Slytherins, more hexes between he and the Gryffindors in the corridors, being dragged backwards down a long tunnel with an enormous beast at the end of it, her father standing before Dumbledore in the Headmaster's office, a group of Slytherins surrounding a bonfire on the grounds somewhere, flashes of Quidditch matches, then some sort of leavers assembly in the Great Hall…

The memories shifted again.

Now, Zoe was standing just outside a circle of people all in black robes and masks.

"Rise, Severus Snape," Zoe heard directly in front of her and she stepped forward to peer between two of the masked figures and watched as her father rose to his feet in front of a tall wizard with pale skin.

Despite being younger, her memory-father looked much more as he did now, though Zoe still glanced to her other side where her real father stood. His face was inscrutable, even in the recollection of this moment, which Zoe found horrifying. There was a sinister feeling in the air and the pale wizard—clearly the leader—had malice in his eyes.

The memory only played out long enough for her to see the leader of the group touch the tip of his wand to her father's left arm. As he began to scream in pain, Zoe found herself pushing against her real father, turning her face into his robes.

"Make it stop!" she shouted.

She squeezed her eyes closed tight, not wanting to see any of it, and clamped her hands over her ears.

A moment later, the screaming stopped, and Zoe opened her eyes.

They were sitting in her father's laboratory in the present once more. It took Zoe several seconds to orient herself but, eventually, she lowered her hands from her ears and looked to her father across from her. She had questions.

She took a deep breath, trying to organize them in her mind.

"Why were those Gryffindors such bullies to you?" she asked immediately, that particular query seeming the easiest to address.

Her father looked to her for a moment without speaking. She saw him anxiously tap the fingers of one of his hands on the arm of his chair. He took a deep breath.

"I must confess that you are seeing a very biased view of that aspect of my adolescence. Though you are certainly entitled to feel anger and upset by the way I was treated in school, I should acknowledge that as I grew older, I gave back nearly as much as I received, if not more on occasion. And often…"

He paused and grimaced before leveling Zoe with a resigned look. "Often, I was much more cruel in my retaliations. I was less inclined to let a petty thing such as integrity dictate how I reacted to the pranks and bullying waged against me. The Gryffindors, for their part, rarely aimed to injure me physically. I did not afford them the same courtesy."

Zoe frowned, disapproving of that. But her emotions on the matter overall were much more complex. She wanted to be on her father's side, just as she had with Lily, but if what he said was true, then she couldn't help but feel great disappointment in her father, despite the torment that he'd had to endure.

"You got your Dark Mark in that last part…that wizard… that was Voldemort?"

"Yes."

Zoe nodded. Another image she had seen floated to the forefront of her mind then.

"You had to run away from a werewolf?"

Her father inclined his head in the affirmative. "I'm one of the only people that knew of Remus Lupin's malady whilst we attended Hogwarts."

"That was Professor Lupin?" Zoe's eyes had grown big.

"It was."

"Who was pulling you away? I couldn't see his face."

"James Potter."

"But you hated each other."

"Nearly from the moment we met," her father responded.

Zoe had assumed that based on the bullying.

"But he still saved your life?"

Her father huffed then and looked away. "Of course, he did, after he and his insufferable friend, Sirius Black, lured me into harm's way. I suspect he feared that he would have been expelled otherwise."

Zoe wrinkled her brow, not entirely understanding. "He didn't do it to save your life then, just for himself?"

Her father looked back to her and shook his head. "I do not wish to speak ill of the dead but, yes, that has always been my belief. It was a selfish, dangerous prank orchestrated at my expense." He trailed off. "We'll never know what his true intentions were…"

"So…" Zoe began then. "Mr. Potter's father is dead?"

Zoe's father met her eyes then and his expression softened. He nodded.

"Harry Potter became an orphan not long after his first birthday. Surely you've read as much already?"

It dawned on Zoe then. "Oh, yeah, right. I have. I forgot about that. Voldemort went after all the Potters because he thought Mr. Potter was a threat?"

Her father simply nodded.

"Why did he think that?"

Her father looked haunted now, but he sat forward toward the pensieve once more and indicated to Zoe to do the same.

"For the answer to that, we should return to the memories. Are you up for it?"

Bravely, Zoe nodded her head.

Definition of letter of comfort: a communication from a party to a contract to the other party that indicates an initial willingness to enter into a contractual obligation absent the elements of a legally enforceable contract. The objective is to create a morally binding but not legally binding assurance (Wikipedia).

A/N: I hate to plea for reviews when I've left you waiting so long for an update... but... reviews? Pretty please?