Something strange was going on at the Evans's house. Severus was acutely aware of this because he'd been… gathering intel on the fey-like creature known as Lily Evans ever since he started suspecting she may be magical. At first, he had to admit he wasn't fully convinced she was a witch. Magical yes, but surely she was most likely a veela or some sort of forest nymph disguised as a 10 year old. No human girl was allowed to be so beautiful. Then, he met her sister Petunia, with whom she regrettably shared some similarities, and thus Severus arrived to the conclusion that the redhead was either a magical creature adopted by muggles or a muggleborn witch looked favourably upon by the fates (he really wasn't ready to let go his magical creature theories just yet).
Anyways, the strange happenings had begun the weeks following that marvelous Sunday morning in which Lily Evans had allowed him to instruct her on all things magical. Severus, being an intelligent boy, had made her promise not to tell anyone other than her sister Petunia (and even then he said only to tell her what was strictly necessary). He really wasn't stupid, he knew all about the Statue of Secrecy and what it would mean for him and his Ma if word were to come out that Severus had exposed the magical world. His house was enough of a prison just as it was, thank you very much, and he didn't want to add Azkaban to his Ma's life sentence (even though he thought dementors couldn't be as bad as Tobias Snape on his bad days). Lily Evans had agreed that magic would be kept a secret from her parents until the fateful day when a professor from the illustrious Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry would knock on her door and explain all about magic to her parents (adults were always more agreeable to the extraordinary when it was presented by other adults). It had taken some convincing for Lily to not go running and telling her parents, which made Severus a bit nervous regarding Lily's future sorting, but there was still some hope, as it was only mid September, so Severus still had time to make a Slytherin out of her.
Or at least he thought he would have time to do that, until he noticed Lily had stopped going to the playground. At first, he wasn't really worried. He had just dropped a bomb on her, and even though it looked like she had taken it well, some people broke down later, when they were alone and able to process, Severus understood this, so he gave her a couple of days. When those days turned into a week, he started worrying. Was she avoiding him? Did something happen to her? Maybe she'd arrived at the wrong conclusion and believed Severus had lied to her, he'd have to talk to his Ma and try to convince her into talking to Lily and explaining the Wizarding World to her with the authority only adults could muster. Maybe she'd told her parents anyways and they told her to stay away from the creepy Snape boy, and she was sitting by her window, looking outside longing for her freedom, looking like that princess from the muggle story, the one with long hair and trapped in a tower, waiting for her knight, or was it a prince? In a flight of fancy, Severus decided that as a Prince (a half-blood one, but a Prince nonetheless) he had the right to at least attempt a rescue, so he had to scout the fortress in which the beautiful princess was allegedly kept.
Saturday was the first full day of surveillance. He had started spying sporadically on Monday but say what you want about Eileen Snape, a lazy teacher she was not, and homeschooling was consistent Monday through Friday, with mixed magical and muggle teachings, the magical portion of Severus's education carefully hidden in between muggle lessons, many times taking place simultaneously with cooking or cleaning the house. It wasn't rare for Potions to take place at the same time as cooking, especially casserole and soup days, or for an arithmancy assignment to be mixed with his maths sheets. Eileen didn't often use her wand, her magic having dulled quite considerably since the loss of her parents, but she had spent quite a bit of power in permanently glamouring against muggle eyes her old textbooks as well as her personal collection of magical texts, most of them quite grey magic-wise and taken from the Prince vaults before she was disinherited. Currently they were going through 3rd year material, Severus had proved to be quite adept at learning theory, and hopefully he'd be able to practice when he got his wand, as Eileen's residency on Spinner's End qualified the household as magical, making the Trace for minors void within the walls of the dreary house.
Come Sunday evening, a very cold and flat butted Severus had decided that the Evanses had either left for a sporadic vacation or something seriously wrong had happened to the family. He had seen no movement whatsoever, the family car was missing and Petunia's annoying screech was nowhere to be heard. He really hoped that the revelation of magic wasn't the reason they'd left. It would be just like him to ruin the first chance he had at having something akin to a friendship with someone his age, even if said friendship was nothing more than Severus tutoring Lily and becoming her guide into the magical world. He was going to be a Slytherin, and certainly the first step for friendship was having something in common, he'd only have to build on that. At least that was what he thought before the Evanses had gone missing.
Dejected, Severus stood and shook his wiry limbs awake and started walking towards his house across the river. Monday was going to be a busy school day, as he had to tend to the small garden in which Eileen kept both magical and non magical plants (of the non-lethal and non-screaming kind) that were used both on meals and potions. At least that would help him keep his mind away from Lily until tea time, when he'd be free to stalk and sulk and do all those other things a nervous Severus was inclined to do.
Sulky Severus wasn't the most observant Severus. One of the Fanged Geranium they had hidden under a notice-me-not bit his middle finger while Severus was coming up with more conspiracies regarding the Evans's whereabouts, and he'd forgotten to use his dragonhide gloves, so his mother had scolded him, applied some dittany in the deep punctures and kicked him out of the house, as she reminded Severus, his additional magical education was a privilege, so he'd better go outside, reflect about his actions, and returned acting like someone who knew how valuable these lessons were. Feeling guilty, he walked towards the park on the other side of the river, with no final destination in mind.
He was starting to think that maybe this… fixation on the Evans girl had to stop, maybe find a way to shove his thoughts about her in a box. It wasn't fair to his Ma, she was right, it was a privilege, and not only that, she was spending precious time she could be using otherwise, for example getting a job to support Tobias's incompe, or simply spend the additional time on herself, but no, she was choosing Severus's education over herself, even risking Tobias's wrath if he were to find out the depth of his son's magical education, and what did Severus have to show for it? Half-arsed attempts at the simplest of tasks all because he couldn't get a girl out of his head. That wasn't something intelligent men did, and thus, it wasn't something Severus should do.
All thoughts of what men should do left his head the moment he spotted a bright red mane of silky hair sitting on the swings. Gods she was radiant! He wanted nothing but to run to her, but he was Severus Snape, son of Eileen Snape neé Prince, and future Slytherin, so he knew better than to give in to sudden urges (except when said urges led to hiding or surveillance, those were urges he approved of). He took a deep breath to steady himself and took in the scene in front of him. The park was relatively empty, as the school nearby (which the Evans girls attended) had classes until 4pm, and Severus had been temporarily exiled from his home just an hour after noon. The only occupants were two girls at the swings, his red headed fairy and a girl who was definitely not Petunia. The second girl made him pause. He'd never seen her next to Lily, she definitely wasn't one of the girls she frequently hung out with, they weren't many and he'd already memorised their faces. They obviously knew each other, because even from a distance (and behind a couple of trees, for extra spying security) he could hear Lily talking nonstop and he saw the girl giving brief nods and small smiles once in a while. She looked like a ghost of a girl really, she seemed really pale, with deep bruises under her eyes. Where Lily shone like the sun, the girl beside her looked like a shadow, the only sign of life in her were the rebellious locks attempting to escape her tight braid. He was still debating whether to go or not when a pair of round, mud-brown eyes caught his, and the girl's swing stopped. Lily kept on talking, but Severus knew his cover was blown, if he didn't want to come out looking like a creep, he'd have to make himself known.
Well, here goes nothing.
"... and there's Emily as well, she's a bit shy, but does great in maths and the other day she was so nice, she gave me some cookies and a hug. She remembered auntie Lin from our trip to London, you see? Mi?" Lily Evans followed her companion's line of sight until her beautiful emerald eyes landed on Severus's lanky form. "Oh! Severus! Hello!" She gave him a bright smile and left her swing, taking the girl's hand on her way to Severus. "This is my cousin Mi! She'll be staying with us this year." Lily was bouncing in excitement and turned towards the girl, who had been looking at Severus with a look of naked curiosity from the moment his name left Lily's lips. "He's the one I told you about, remember? The one who knows all about magic!" At this, Severus blanched. A million images flashed quickly: his Ma in chains waiting for Azkaban, Lily obliviated, her mind forever rid of one Severus Snape, an owl bringing a letter informing him that Hogwarts wouldn't accept criminals, and that he'd never be allowed to get a wand. He was broken from his reverie by an extended hand.
Attached to said hand was a girl completely different to the ghost he'd seen earlier. Her cheeks were lifted by a smile and despite the tiredness of her face, she had some sort of glow about her, maybe a moon to Lily's sun. He took her hand and shook it, and was a bit surprised when he was met with a firm grip.
"Hello Severus, my name's Hermione Granger. Lily told me I could talk to you about my letter." She produced an envelope from a book bag he hadn't noticed she'd been carrying. In it was a seal with an emblem he was extremely familiar with. "Would it be too presumptuous of me to ask you some questions?" He could hear the uncertainty building on her posh accent.
"Hello Hermione, it wouldn't be presumptuous at all." He gave her a small smile, happily unaware of the barrage of questions coming his way.
A/N: So that's the chapter! I know it was a bit small, but it was the last introduction (at least for a while), now were going to start building on the story :D
I wanted to answer to some of your comments (the ones here and on ao3)
1. Hermione's mum having cancer isn't just angst for angst's sake, I swear. It will be developed further in the story, but I won't spoil.
2. I don't like Perfect!Lily OR Lily Bashing. She's a character, and people are more complex than "the perfect girl" or "the awful wench who couldn't appreciate Severus Snape", I'm basing Lily on girls I've known and how I've seen them grow, I hope I don't end up slaughtering the character, but hey, it's just my interpretation.
3. There will be a connection with canon universe, but that is a future plot point, so again, I won't spoil :P
Also, I want to apologise beforehand for my grammar. English isn't my first language so there might be some things that make sense to me in Spanish but that don't really translate well into English, so any and all corrections are appreciated (dm me if you'd like!) I'll be fixing mistakes when the story's a bit more advanced, in case there's a need to fix other details for the story to keep making sense, and also to not confuse you if I make changes that may affect the story.
Finally, I'm a University Student with ADHD, so even though I'd like to be more consistent with my posting, updates will be sporadic unless I decide to write many chapters at once/finish the whole story before posting it, but realistically, I'll be updating once or twice a month, depending on how my life's going. This is a WIP, and even though I have an outline and general idea of where it's going, I still haven't hashed out most of the details. I hope you've enjoyed so far!