He had woken up a few times in the night. The fact that he had slept at all was nothing short of a miracle. Every time a sound or a dream had jared him from sleep, instantly alert, adrenaline coursing quickly through his veins, he had felt a thin arm tighten around his waist, a hand run through his hair, a face burrow into the spot between his shoulder blades.

It was always wordless comfort, but those acts, her very presence, soothed him. It was a silent repetition of the unspoken mantra 'You are safe. You are warm. Rest. you can deal with whatever monsters you face, including yourself, in the morning.'

There were no expectations or strings put onto this simple human contact.

He would never admit to the few times he cried and screamed out in fear, during that night, but her reaction was always the same - a gentle, comforting touch and a calmness that allowed him his fear and grief, but reminded him that he would need to rest fo now to better be able to face them head on later.

Finally, sometime shortly after dawn, he woke up gently. It was a slow and comfortable returning to consciousness, gradual and peaceful. He was still so relaxed in the cocooning old quilts and threadbare sheets that, if she had been there to run fingers along his spine, or hypnotize him with her own half-asleep, slow and deep breaths against his shoulder, he would have been lulled back to sleep himself. But she wasn't there.

He sighed deeply and shifted on the mattress, springs groaning and squeaking, just as he grunted and the muscles in his back clicked and popped. It was just as terrifying waking up here as it had been last time, but for different reasons. He knew instantly where he was, but so much more was at stake. At least he was fully clothed this time - though they were unfamiliar, strange garments, so he felt just as exposed and awkward as he had in nothing but a sheet. Maybe worse - they were her clothes. It was one thing, one certain type of intimacy, to be naked in front of someone, but something entirely more to be in their clothes. One was just being stripped bare, the other was having something of them surround you.

She was already awake, obviously, as evidenced by her absence in the bed, and that meant that his time in this warmth, this feeling of safety was at best an illusion, at worst a ticking time bomb about to blow. It was only a matter of time, mere moments even, until she found out. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad if he was the one who told her . . . but there was nothing he could say, without giving away secrets he could not share, that would make what he did alright, or acceptable. For months he knew that was the case, and had thought he would not care that everyone would hate him for it. Everyone had already hated him.

Everyone but her, and he feared that might change.

He heard her across the room, shifting in a chair and shuffling some paper, just as she no doubt realized he was awake by the shifting noises he made. "Morning." She called, her voice still croaky from sleep. He sat up and looked to her at the table, his eyes drawn instantly to hers, like magnets. For all that he felt rested, she had the customary bags under her eyes, though she looked far more alert than he felt. "Tea's ready. . . if you want some." She said simply, with a small hesitation and then the qualifying addition, no doubt thinking of how poorly he had reacted to the offer of tea previously.

Now was not the time for cutting comments back, even though it was what he was conditioned to do. He hated the fact that she seemed reticent because of how poorly he had treated her last time, and the recrimination was only intensified by how kind she had been since he arrived last night. But then he looked at her again, and a wry half smile twisted at the corner of her mouth and she offered the quickest flutter of a wink, letting him know that while the last time had smarted a little, she wasn't too badly hurt over it.

"Tea would be .. . welcome. Thank you." He struggled to dredge up whatever polite manners his mother had ever attempted to instill in him. They felt stunted and false, but he knew he had to tread very carefully.

Not only was their own history combustive, but he still did not know how much, if anything she knew of last night's events, or what her reaction would be. She could be playing nice until Aurors came. She could be completely ignorant and one wrong word and the conversation could spiral out of control.

He wanted to trust her - every part of him yearned to believe that even after Dumbledore's death last night that there could still be one person that would stand by him even to some small extent - he could not put any hope in it. It was too much to ask, he was sure of it.

He moved carefully, applying every skill of artifice that he had to walk, act, move, and sound calm and relaxed, while every nerve was on high alert. Part of him considered running, but she had made him tea - you don't make tea for people you are going to attack or turn in. At least, he didn't think you did, his grasp of the etiquette in this type of situation, if it even existed, was sharply limited

As he sank into the wooden folding chair, obviously pilfered from an old church hall, she lifted the old chipped Brown Betty and splashed what smelled like Earl Grey into the same broken-nosed Father Christmas faced mug she had carried in her school bag years before. Once poured, she went back to her reading.

Not wanting to interrupt her, and also still not sure of the correct or safest form of address, he scanned the table quickly, and it seemed she had predicted need and had left the small glass milk jar out on the table. His hand reached for it and then froze as he realized she had been using it as a paperweight to hold down the pages she had finished with, keeping them from scattering in the wind from the open dormer window.

There, under the glass carafe, in the subset of the article, was his own face. It was an older photo, taken some sixteen years ago, around when he started teaching, but undeniably him. He still had his goatee in it, and looked every ounce the not-quite-but-maybe-reformed Death Eater. Larger, and in the center, was the image that had been haunting him since the night before - Dumbledore's broken body sitting at the base of the Astronomy tower, legs and arms askew, the edge of the Dark Mark in the sky just visible in the background. The headline burned his eyes like bright neon - "DUMBLEDORE DEAD! MURDERED BY SNAPE!"

What was a low hum of fear the buzzed in his ears became a skreigh of terror. His gaze shot back up to her face and she was focused intently on the inner pages of the paper, not even looking at him. He swallowed hard, fist clenching around mug but not daring to pick it up for fear she would see his hand shaking. "I did not realize that you read the newspaper." He managed to say as if it was just a casual point of conversation, and not the sounding for depth that it was.

"Implying that I can't read?" She asked with a mischievous curl to her lip.

"Implying that the Quibbler seemed more your ilk." It was easy, the banter was familiar ground, and it rushed from him, in some unspoken hope of regaining some balance.

"Their word searches are rubbish. Nah, Regular Prophet reader, me - the girls got me a subscription for Christmas last year. Cover to cover, every day.." her response was glib, not smart or arrogantly so, but with a firm finality, that in addition to the obvious placement of the front page, could leave him in no doubt that she knew and was herself fishing for reaction and comment from him, just as much as he was of her.

He finally bit the bullet - they could not keep dancing around the subject forever, even if they would not be able to speak one hundred percent openly. "So, you know then?"

"There are three speeds of communication, Snapeykins. Telegram, Telephone, and Tell-a-Wizard." He understood the implication, and realized that it was entirely possible that she knew as early as last night. That fact made it both better and worse. Better in that if she took him in, knowing even then, chances were she wouldn't kick him out, screaming at him this morning. But it also made it vastly more complicated in that she really had taken him in, no questions asked, knowing the worst version of what could possibly be. "'Course, with the state of modern journalism, they don't care so much about facts as splashy headlines and castings aspersions and assigning guilt before motive and means can even be investigated."

He thought she was asking, in not so many words, for something he could not give - a reason to believe in him, an explanation, something to justify or contradict what the papers said. That she acknowledged there might be more to this then met the eye did her cleverness credit, and gave him some peace that she was not going to automatically assume his absolute guilt. But he could not tell her the truth of the matter, he could not tell her what the truth was - the only thing that might possibly indemnify him was the one thing he could not say to try and justify himself. "I can do little to correct their errors. . . . There are things that I cannot tell you."

"I wasn't asking." She finally lowered the paper and looked him square in the eyes, an act of blatant honesty that was not part of her normal idiom.

He stood abruptly, as much to avoid her steely gaze as to start his retreat. "I suppose I should be leaving then."

"Why?" He had never heard her use so few words, but no more were needed.

"Because I cannot make you believe that I am anything other than what you see, and I cannot pretend that this" He picked up the paper and shook it at her. "Did not happen, and I cannot give you any information that will explain any of it away. So either you will think me a hero for being a Death Eater, or you will hate me for being the worst sort of villain, able and willing to kill an unarmed old man. I do not think I can stomach either impression." It had been so long since he had been so unabashedly honest that the confession actually hurt, as if it was being ripped out of him

He moved to turn away from her, scared to look at her, but before he could step away she grabbed his wrist. "You act like those are the only two options." He gaze shot to her long, narrow fingers, wrapped in death grip around his arm, and then followed the pale skin up past elbow and shoulder and eventually to her face. "Despite years of evidence to the contrary, you still seem to think that I am a believer in black and white. That I have to either believe you were Death Eater or one of the do-gooders. There is a third option, Snape, and that is where I had you pegged long ago and this," She snatched the page out of his hand and crumbled it up. "Doesn't change it. It's pretty damned obvious that you are doing whatever you need to do, for whatever reason you need to do it, and I don't need to know you motives to decide my opinion of you. I am on the same side as you."

"I was under the impression that you were entirely on your own side?" He sneered.

She released his arm, as if she was finally convinced he wouldn't run. "Exactly. Same as you" She smiled impishly for a second, but then a look of solemnity not common to her face took over. "In all of this stupid war, Death Eaters, Dumbles, all of it - I don't care. I didn't take you in last night because I either feared or idolized you. I took you in cause you were in trouble, and while I don't give two good goddamns about any of this bullshit... I...I do about you. It doesn't matter what side that you fall on, I am on your side. Not a team, not a posse. Your side."

The sincerity was practically a rock she lobbed at him, and it hit him with that same kind of force, winding him. He did not understand why, or how, she was willing to stand by him, but it seemed she was, and in a fashion heretofore he had never experienced or dreamt of experiencing. Dumbledore had stood by him, but always with an agenda. It was almost too good to believe - but he did believe it. He shouldn't - his whole life was predicated on assuming and predicting people's secret hearts and hidden motives.

But as she stood there, her arms wrapped around herself - a defensive position - refusing to make eye contact, hers was now a body language that typically would imply dishonesty, but not on her. She was usually made up of bluster and bravado, and there was a lie or prevarication on her every breath. She was comfortable with lies and stretched truth, or stories told leaving out subtext and context. What she had just said, she was uncomfortable saying, ergo, it was most likely the truth. It did not take occlumency for him to see through her, to read her thoughts. And it made him as uncomfortable to hear as she apparently was saying it. And there was still more to be said, but it could wait.

Historians and scholars could argue who kissed who first in that moment. It was one of those unanswerable questions, truly impossible to judge, they reached for each other almost in synchronization.

It was not the passionate, anger and adrenaline fueled kiss of weeks prior, but no less desperate and clinging, no less predicated both on words finally said and left unsaid.

Where before they had kissed like starving men scrambling for the food they needed for sustenance, this was deeper and slower but equally lifesaving -like suffocating men drawing their first deep breaths, inhaling deeply as much as their lungs could take and letting the oxygen linger before daring to exhale.

They made it to neither bed nor couch, clothes not even removed, but more just peeled back out of the way. An obliging wall was all that was needed for balance. It was as neither could wait for that physical human connection - she feeling at odds with herself for finally giving words to something that she had kept entirely to herself for so long, and needing proof she would not be rebuffed; and he needed to know the words weren't just part of the daily flood of lies he both voiced and heard. Their bodies joining together told all the truths they needed.

Eventually, once need was spent, they collapsed to the floor, the wall that had obliged their passion now served as backrest to lean against as they both took a moment to sit and catch their breath.

"So," She started between steadying breaths. "Are you going to bolt off with your trousers falling down around your ankles again?" She tried to ape her usual devil may care mockery, but there was a tinge of fear streaking through her words that surprised Snape.

He paused for a moment, trying to decide what his answer would be. "No. . . not this time." His words implied that he might on any other occasion but as he said it his hand shifted ever so slightly so that it brushed hers; he couldn't bring himself to actually clasp it in his, no matter how much he felt he wanted to. Everything else went unsaid. It didn't need said. He knew she understood why he ran and forgave him for it. She knew he had regretted it.

Sitting forward slightly and re-situating garments, Nezza moved on to the next question, acting as if it wasn't nearly impossible to ask. "Well, how long are you staying then?"

"I do not know how long I can . . . or should." It was a simple, almost non-answer that he gave, commiting to nothing, but also not not shutting out possibilities.

"Well, there isn't much food around here, so I might have to go down to the grocer's. Also, full disclosure, but I really only know how to cook, like, maybe three things, so if you are staying much past tomorrow night, I should maybe try to lay hands on a cookbook or something." It was so mind numbingly practical and . . . domestic Of course, she parsed it in a tone that was unequivocally her - glib, self-deprecating and droll, but there was no denying the simplicity of it.

He found himself responding in kind. "I am a thirty-seven year old bachelor and have the cooking skills of such; As much as I wish to pretend that I fear for life and digestion from your cooking, it cannot be any worse than some of the dark and truly evil combination of foods that I have been forced to put together from the scraps left in my refrigerator."

"Yeah, I guess there isn't much time to sit around watching Delia Smith's Cookery Course reruns between bullying students and killing headmasters." He wasn't sure exactly how to take that jab, but she didn't give him much time to allow himself to become offended. With a quick bump of her elbow and a toss of her head towards the door he had assumed was a closet. "C'mon, shower's almost big enough for two, and it's still early enough there might still be some hot water left "

And if he had any lingering doubts about continuing to stay with her until he received his next instructions, she managed to bat them away with an impish wink.


It was time.

Almost a month had passed.

A month filled with an endless repetition of daily mundanities - late breakfasts of tea and occasionally burnt toast that lingered into lunchtime. Poorly cooked dinners that invariably devolved into games of chess, lounging around reading, unhurried lovemaking, or any combination of the three. All of this was punctuated with a twice daily argument about a myriad of topics ranging from the correct mathematical ratio of milk and tea all the way to the relative sentience of hedgehogs. She mostly talked complete nonsense, but it had been so long - almost 20 years - since he had some to just TALK to; something in between basic pleasantries, and life altering directives. Something that wasn't directly related to class assignments, blood purity, or intrigue.

He had only left her small flat once, at her insistence, and that was at two o'clock in the morning, to go to a muggle-side Offy that was opened 24 hours, to get a bottle of cheap whiskey, some cigarette papers, and a kabab from shop next to it that handed out leftover to the street bums upon closing for the night. She said he needed to get some fresh air and insisted that she knew a back way out of the Alley that he wouldn't get recognized - at least by anyone that would turn him in for murder. And she had been mostly correct - there was a small portal behind the White Wyvern, though it was seldom used. He was amazed at how accurate her assessment had been- he wore a deep hood for the 3 block walk and ducked through the portal first, no one having noticed him at all. She insisted that it was because all the inhabitants of the Alley, especially those still awake at 3am, tended to avoid looking at her in case she started talking to them. Infamy, it seemed, followed her.

Cheap alcohol, smokes, and questionable meat on a stick obtained, Nezza led the way back, astounding him with her ability to eat and walk at the same time when she usually struggled with those skills on their own, and they were almost to her door, when Snape noticed a familiar dark shadow, skulking in the opposite direction, towards the Wyvern.

Mundungus Fletcher - it was the perfect opportunity to plant the plan within the Order. His brief reprieve was over, and the weight of what was to come fell back on him instantaneously. Soon. he would have to return to Voldemort, return to Spinners End. "Go back to the shop. Ward the door. If I am not back within an hour, do not expect me back at all. . ."

"What? What are you on about?" He didn't answer but turned to slink after the man, only just managing to hear her mutter under her breath that if he wanted to drink alone at the pub like a Johnny-no-mates that was all he had to say. But despite her grumbling, she complied, and for that he was grateful.

And just like that Fletcher had been confunded, the idea of decoy Potters planted, and that was the beginning of the end for his time of comfort and peace.

A few days after that, the mark started to darken again. If she noticed it, she did not say anything to him about it at first - but of course she had noticed it, her usual owl-like observation disguised by her customary farcical antics and behaviour.

But it was time now - sitting on the edge of the bed, gripping at his bare forearm, he realized this.

"You're leaving soon." She stirred behind him, sitting up. The only sign that this realization disturbed her was the slight tremble to her hand as she reached for the cigarettes stashed under her pillow.

He just nodded.

"Will you be back?"

"I don't . . . know." He could see no way that he would have time to come back, nor would it be safe - safe for him to leave the school and the students, nor safe for him to be seen here. He should have told her then, what the endgame held in store for him, but he couldn't. He should have told her straight, committed himself to the idea that he could not come back, rather than string her along, and string himself along for that matter.

But that he might be able to come back to her, even just a few times, to escape the horrors he was set to face - that he would gladly face to protect Lily's son, and all the children - gave him something to hope for. It was selfish, he knew, but she of all people understood selfishness herself and would indulge him in it despite the fact that she was the one most likely to suffer the most

"Eh, you know the wards to get in if you are ever in the area and need a place to crash." Again, the only slight clue that she was not as devil-may-care as she sounded was the smallest physical thing - shoulders brought back stiffly, at first disguised as a shrug, but that never moved from that pose. He had spent the last four weeks living with her, watching her, sharing her bed, so that he could see the slightest deviation in her normal physicality. The well hidden tension she bore gnawed at him a little. "Cup of tea first, or do you have to get into the office early to get a jump on the whole 'take over the world' ploy?" She smirked at him in that way she had - the way that said that she knew that he knew, and that she wasn't at all impressed or bothered.

"I have no need to rush." He said, looking at her, taking every last inch of exposed skin in, intimating that tea was the last thing on his mind.

It may be time to leave whether he liked it or not, but he would be sure to leave on his own terms, while he still could.