Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ginny, Neville, and Luna all stayed late. Their little group usually did, but after the particularly tiring Dumbledore's Army meeting they had just had, they were all a little surprised when Luna announced that she had news. She'd told them earlier that it wasn't anything bad, nothing to worry about. No one was in danger. As Ginny yawned, Luna launched into her story.
"So you know how Professor Ashmore has been on our side since the beginning, with the Order meetings and, well, not turning me in to Umbridge, and writing us special permissions for the Restricted Section?"
"Does she have news from the Order?" Ron assumed that he or Harry would have heard first, but if it was something incredibly new, maybe not.
Luna shook her head. "It has nothing to do with that."
"Then why did you lead with - never mind. What's she up to?" Neville asked, taking a seat on a beanbag chair they had been using to test shield spells.
"Well you know she's one of the few people Professor Snape regularly talks to, and seems to actually enjoy talking to," Luna began. "I was talking to one of the third-year Ravenclaws a few weeks ago, and they spotted the two of them in The Three Broomsticks."
"Snape? I don't think he's ever set foot in there," Hermione frowned, trying to remember if they had ever seen him outside of the select few stores he frequented when he supervised Hogsmeade trips. "What's he playing at?"
"They've been up late working in Ravenclaw Tower. I've seen them sometimes, grading papers or reading or putting together lessons."
"Wait, what? Snape? Like the Snape who gave me detention for sneezing too loudly last year?" Ron scoffed.
"I was up late last night. I got back from Astronomy Tower, and I was thinking of working on Divination homework, so I was sitting up at the top of the stairs, right near the door to the girls' dormitory," Luna continued, shifting her gaze between them. "I had been sitting there reading for ages when I looked up and they were practically holding hands."
"What?!" The group exchanged confused looks, everyone staring at Luna and telling her to elaborate.
"I wrote to my dad this morning, and he says they were close back when they were all in school, at least until Professor Snape became a Death Eater. Who knows what happened since. I thought I was seeing something. Plenty of Confounding Nargles get lost up in Ravenclaw Tower, since we have so much open space. They like nesting in the rafters. But no, it was really happening. Professor Ashmore and Snape stay up late talking a lot, but…"
Hermione's answer was the most logical. "Whatever's going on, there's no way they can talk freely in the Slytherin common room. Not with every other Syltherin in the Inquisitorial Squad. The Ravenclaws don't associate with the Umbridge crowd, do they?"
"No. We try to stay away from her."
"Then there's a lot less to worry about talking there. And no one would think anything much of it. McGonagall usually talks to the other professors in her office, but I've seen her and Professor Sprout talking in the common room a few times. It's not unheard of."
"But they were holding hands? Ugh." Ron and Harry shared a look of disgust, both of them harboring a deep hatred for Snape. "She could do so much better."
It had been a long day to say the least. Hazel had to deal with another Umbridge meeting, this time being forced to defend one of the Ravenclaws who had stood up to Umbridge's unorthodox teaching methods. Flitwick was meeting with Dumbledore at the time, leaving her to deal with house discipline. After nearly an hour of Umbridge fuming and pacing around her overly pink and kitten-laden office, Hazel had managed to convince her to deal with it. After all, the High Inquisitor had much more important things to deal with than one student making a careless remark under his breath. She promised harsh discipline, Umbridge letting her take her student and leave. Once they were in the hall and out of earshot, Hazel had given Ravenclaw five points and told him not to worry about detention, just to be more careful about who was listening in.
Snape had dealt with a group of second-years who managed to mix up a cloud of poison gas from an innocuous potion. He had no idea how someone could turn a healing potion into something that sent the class running for the door, forcing them to let the room air out before they could return. Or how the group could have completely melted their cauldron with whatever concoction they had managed to produce. Most likely the porcupine quills. Or the horrendous amount of wormwood they had carelessly dumped in. Luckily it was the last class of the day. He had chased them out and just cleaned up the mess when the mark on his arm began to burn. Leaving Hazel to wonder where he was during dinner, he had been forced to disappear to Malfoy Manor for a Death Eater meeting, only having a chance to eat when he returned. The feast had long been cleaned up, but a couple of helpful House Elves always had something cooking in the kitchen.
Making his way to Ravenclaw Tower, Snape found Hazel sitting there, buried in a book like usual. It was getting late, but he figured he owed her an explanation. "Hey," she smiled as he came through the door. She was the last one up, sitting in front of the crackling fire and enjoying the peace and quiet of an empty common room.
"Muggle clothes?"
"You know I don't wear robes if I'm just laying around the tower," she laughed as he settled in on the sofa next to the chair she was curled up in. "They're a lot more comfortable. Dumbledore's lucky I don't walk around the castle in Muggle clothes all of the time."
He frowned, knowing that something as simple as that could be dangerous now. "I'm sorry to miss dinner unannounced, but I was called away again."
"So was I. The Order met for dinner at the usual place. Everyone sends their regards -"
"Do they really?"
It was Hazel's turn to frown. "No, but it's a nice thing to say. Anyway, Arthur is worried that something's brewing in the Ministry. Molly's worried that Arthur's worried, and that something really could happen to him there. He's hardly quiet about where his sympathies lie. Sirius is worried because Harry's still having those headaches and getting flashes of Voldemort's mind."
"Dumbledore shares the concern about Potter. He's thinking of having me teach him Occlumency when the new semester begins. Exams are coming up, which will be enough work as it is. He doesn't want to worry us both, though I think starting earlier would be for the best."
"How was your meeting?" Hazel asked, carefully balancing her book so she wouldn't lose her page.
Snape's eyes flicked to the portraits on the walls, knowing that while they wouldn't report anything to Umbridge, they might talk nonetheless. "Hardly productive. Some of them want a brute-force approach, though not many have ever had the skill of subtlety. There is something big in the works, a demonstration to put to rest everything the Ministry is trying to keep quiet, but no one knows anything about it yet, save for possibly Lucius and Bellatrix."
"Hmm. Well, whatever you do, be careful. I'm expressly forbidding you from ending up in Saint Mungo's."
They settled into their reading, the turning of pages and the crackling of the fire the only noise in the common room for ages. Hazel was devouring a book about the Norse magical system, and how they had managed to streamline wizard-Muggle relations years before without all of the witch hunts. Snape was leafing through a heavy tome on the ancient potions experts of the Americas, trying to decipher a good substitute for some ingredients.
When they were in school, this had been normal, one of them invading the other's common room so they could work. If the library was too packed, and it was too cold to be up in Astronomy Tower, and the Room of Requirement was filled or too far of a walk, they would take over a space in the common room.
None of the Ravenclaws seemed to mind. Anyone with a book in their hand or a quill dancing over a piece of parchment was allowed to stay. It was next to impossible to cause trouble if you were buried in homework, no matter what house you were in. The Slytherins were a little more critical, but they left Hazel well enough alone after Maximillian Bustrode had done some research on her family. Purebloods all the way back to Romulus Ravenclaw. His more-famous sister would have been her great-something-aunt. That was more than enough to satisfy even the most critical of Slytherins. A pureblood descended from any of the Founders was beyond reproach. None of them had ever asked her about her thoughts on Muggles. Good. Otherwise she would have been thrown out and never welcomed back.
Hazel had absentmindedly draped her hand over the side of her chair, lost in her book. At least until she felt a daring set of fingertips just barely grazing hers, the ghost of a touch reaching out for her. She smiled to herself, or so she thought. Snape had glanced over at her, watching for a reaction. He couldn't help but smile as he saw the corner of her mouth turn upwards through the curtain of hair that was starting to fall into her face. She didn't dare to fix it, to move and ruin the moment.
So there they sat for what seemed like an eternity, neither of them venturing to move. Occasionally one would risk a glance at the other. When Snape started to yawn, he turned to see that Hazel had dozed off already. He silently closed his book, heading out of the tower and back down to the dungeons, turning something over in his mind, something he didn't dare to think about too much for fear of ruining it, as he'd ruined so much before.
Luna Lovegood sat in silence on the stairs to the girls' dormitory, rubbing her eyes. No, it wasn't a Wrackspurt or a trick of the light. What she saw had been real.