Someone pounded on the door of Severus' office early the next morning. Groggily, he got out of bed and went to open it. Minerva stood there, accompanied by Claire. The Headmistress' lips were so thin they were almost invisible.
"You need to come with me, right now," she said.
"What happened?" he asked.
"You should have listened to me," Claire said, shaking her head.
"I... what?"
"Claire, that's enough," Minerva said, and, directed at Severus, "Put on some clothes and come with me."
When they arrived at the entrance to the Headmistress' office, he was surprised to see Mette stand there. His heart sank at the sight of the newspaper in her hand. She gave him a pained smile.
The four of them walked up the spiral staircase and the three young people each took a chair in front of the Headmistress' desk. Minerva shot Mette an expectant glance, who, in turn, handed Severus the newspaper.
"This is today's issue of the Daily Prophet," Minerva said accusingly. "Read the headline!"
SNAPE WILL STOP AT NOTHING ON HIS WAY TO POWER
"Oh no..." his eyes raced over the article. It ran,
Severus Snape, risen from the dead last October and former Death Eater who allegedly swore loyalty to Dumbledore, has apparently hatched a plan to grasp power over the wizarding world. He will start with the most vulnerable – our children.
Sources close to the Daily Prophet have revealed that the former Potions Master of the school is developing a magical concoction that will give him the ability to bend everyone to his will. Snape went to London several times in the past months, likely to visit Knockturn Alley to buy dangerous and illegal ingredients for his potion. As if that wasn't enough, he is also rumoured to repeatedly have travelled to a part of Germany linked to dark, medieval witching rituals.
He has apparently been using Muggle Studies teacher Matty Vestenguard as a guinea pig to test his potion. The young woman has been known to disappear into Snape's office within Hogwarts on numerous occasions and stay there for hours at a time. The visits might not have been voluntary. Reporters monitoring the situation at Hogsmeade village have confirmed that Snape even went to Vestenguard's accommodation on Sunday evening and did not reappear until the next morning.
Snape, as former head of Slytherin House and Death Eater, very likely regards Vastenguard as a lesser human, given that she is a Squib, and therefore has no scruples experimenting on her. We must assume that the development of his concoction is in its final stages and will soon be ready to use on the students of Hogwarts to force them to join him in his plea for power.
Many now demand that Snape be handed over to the authorities and removed from Hogwarts. It is an atrocity that Minerva McGonagall, Headmistress of the school, still holds a protective hand over a known supporter of You-Know-Who.
With every line, he read faster and faster. His hands had started tingling again and his throat was tightening. He crumpled up the paper and threw it into a corner with a frustrated yell.
"It's obviously all nonsense!" Mette said soothingly. "We should not even pay attention to this idiocy!"
"Of course you would say that!" Claire interjected coolly. "Why are you so keen on letting those reporters carry on with this?"
Mette's eyebrows shot up her forehead; she let out a shrill, mirthless laugh, but seemed lost for words.
"Claire!" Minerva said sharply. Turning to Mette, she said, "I'm afraid it's not as simple as ignoring it. The Daily Prophet has a lot of influence with the wizarding community and other newspapers are echoing it. People are pulling their children from the school as we speak."
"Let me talk to those reporters," Claire demanded, "I know how to handle these people, trust me."
Minerva said, "It won't be enough for someone to speak in Severus' stead. We need to dispel the mystery surrounding him. The people from the press have taken up camp in Hogsmeade. I'm afraid they won't leave until they see and hear from him personally. Therefore, I suggest we invite them here and put an end to this straight away." She looked at him over the rim of her spectacles.
Severus wanted nothing more than to remain in the shadows. But if he did, Minerva would be in the cross fire.
"I suppose it's worth a try," he said. "And... I think it's a good idea if Claire is present for this as well."
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Mette's head snap around to him. He didn't look at her.
Minerva stood up, saying, "I will go down there myself and invite them to my office. Stay here."
Between the three of them that remained, an unpleasant silence settled. Severus looked neither left nor right. Mette gave up staring at him after a moment, but he could feel her agitation. Claire hummed a little tune to herself and studied her glittering fingernails.
About twenty minutes later, the door opened again, allowing a stream of people to flood in. Severus, Claire and Mette got up at a sign from Minerva and went around to join her behind her desk, where she conjured chairs for them. While the reporters arranged themselves, they chatted and laughed among each other, ignoring Severus – the alleged subject of their interest. It made him feel even more like a piece of news, something to be gutted and bled dry of all the drama and sensation it had to offer, and then left to rot.
Minerva cleared her throat. "You may indicate your wish to ask a question – one question – by a show of hand. I reserve the right to veto any questions I deem inappropriate," she said while letting her stern gaze travel across the assembled members of the press. "Begin."
All hands shot up. Minerva indicated one of them, who asked, "Why and by what means did you come back to life? What is your aim? Do you want to rise to power? Do you—"
"I thought" Minerva interjected sharply, "that I'd made myself clear. One question at a time." Then, she looked at Severus expectantly. He took a deep breath and said,
"I did not plan to come back to life. It is something that happened to me, not something that I did purposefully. I have no intention to rise to power. I just want to live in peace."
All the reporters' hands were in the air again, some started asking questions without a prompt. Minerva called them to order, then allowed one to speak. This one asked,
"Is it true that you are brewing a potion that will make the drinker submit to your will? Did you use it on a teacher?"
"I am doing no such thing." Severus snarled, feeling the heat rise in his face.
"You," another reporter called to Mette, "aren't you that Muggle Studies teacher he was experimenting on? What did he do to you in his office?"
"That's none of your business!" Mette snapped. Severus noticed how some of the reporters smiled and started scribbling frantically.
Claire leaned forward, saying in a silky voice, "You are not seriously going to drag Severus' private life into this, are you? Surely, that would not be worthy of your esteemed publications, would it? You have your answer; he is not brewing any nasty potions. I can tell you" – she threw the crowd a coquettish look – "that these two have been dancing around each other for months. Our Mette here goes to his office because she enjoys his company. Don't you, honey?" This was directed at Mette, who briefly frowned at Claire, but then turned to the reporters and said "Yes." Some of them scratched out the last lines that they had written, looking crestfallen.
Satisfied, Claire continued, "See? There is nothing unsavoury about their relationship. Hence, it should be of no interest to you." She leaned back. Everyone behind the Headmistress' desk was staring at her.
Among the reporters, all hands were in the air yet again.
"It is true, though, isn't it, that you gave Harry Potter Occlumency lessons? Did you do this to give You-Know-Who access to Potter's mind?"
"I did try to teach him Occlumency but was unsuccessful. I had no intention to open his mind to the Dark Lord, on the contrary,"
Claire spoke again. "This is ancient history, You-Know-Who is long gone" she said, shaking her head, "I thought you were supposed to report, you know, news."
Murmuring broke out among the people of the press. A young man piped up, saying "Why should we believe you?" while he looked at Severus.
Claire tutted exasperatedly and said, "He helped us win the war! Isn't that enough evidence for you? Anyone else want to ask questions that have already been answered?"
Less hands rose this time. Minerva hesitated and threw a sideways glance at Claire before she prompted one of the reporters to speak.
"You killed Albus Dumbledore," an elderly woman said.
"What is your question?" Minerva asked.
"Why are you not being tried for his murder?"
"Seriously," Claire interjected, scoffing, "you should know this! It was all planned out beforehand by Dumbledore himself. You-Know-Who wanted a sixteen-year-old boy to kill Dumbledore. Dumbledore had been struck by a curse from a sinister artefact some months earlier and was already dying. Severus" – Claire gazed at him amiably – "at once ended a dying man's suffering and spared a young boy from becoming a murderer." She looked around at the reporters, turning her head from side to side. "Are you seriously telling us that none of you knew this?"
"Where would we have heard this? How do you know about it?"
"Harry Potter told everyone at the end of the Battle og Hogwarts!" Claire exclaimed, giving the impression that she couldn't believe how stupid they all were.
Minerva leaned across Severus to address Claire, murmuring, "All that were present that day were put under a magical oath not to make any of those things public. To protect the privacy of the involved parties."
The reporters' chairs creaked in unison as they leaned forward to eavesdrop.
"Oh, Minerva," Claire said, clearly audible and with a hint of condescension, "these people here are supposed to be journalists. They should have ways to get at protected information. They should know how to break magical oaths of silence." She turned to face the members of the press. "At least, if they held their profession to proper standards. Journalistic research is an art that these ladies and gentlemen apparently aren't familiar with." She sighed, "I don't know why I'm even surprised. If any of you were worth anything, you would have managed to dig up Harry Potter's whereabouts by now and scored an interview with him."
Parchments rustled and throats were cleared, but no one spoke.
"Anything else?" Claire asked offhandedly. No hands rose. "Good, you may go. And if I see any of you still hanging around Hogsmeade, I might just drop a line to your respective editors."
No one talked as they vanished their chairs, packed up their quills and cameras and filed out of the office. Minerva turned to Claire again, saying,
"I do not appreciate you taking over the chairing of this meeting in this manner. However... I have to admit your tactics were efficient. Next time, I would like to know beforehand if you have information that could help us."
"Next time?" Mette asked. At the same time, Severus said,
"How did you know about how Dumbledore died?"
Claire addressed herself at Severus, saying, "I am persuasive, as you probably just realized. I can get people to talk just as effectively as I can get them to shut their mouths." To Mette she said, "They will regroup and come back with something else. This is far from over. You better brace yourself, they'll be all up in your business."
"I will not do this again," Severus said, "they will have to stop making up stories!"
Claire sighed, saying, "They won't, darling. It's called freedom of speech. But hey – you have me, right? Do you finally believe that I can be useful here?"
Will Claire be able to drive Severus and Mette apart? Subscribe to never miss a new chapter! In the meantime, you'd do me huge favour if you gave the story a fave or wrote a review :)