AN: I am missing my own family quite a bit and I finally got to see them after months of lockdown in the UK. So many details in this that have been inspired by them.
Bangarang x
Chapter 57 - "Remembering you..."
"Smith, Circe…!" the gaoler called out to her through the heavy iron bars of the holding cell.
Circe sat up in the basic bed they had fitted the cell with, leaping over the other unfortunate wizard being kept in the Ministry's jail with her, who lay prostrate on the floor.
"Yes, that's me." she answered, her hands curling around the enchanted iron bars. She felt the slight tingle of the magic imbued within them on her palms, but her attention was firmly fixed on the little gaoler on the other side.
"You've been bailed, love." the squat, hairy man said with a jingle of his keys. "All charges dropped too."
"Ugh finally." She said with a roll of her eyes.
"You outta here, Circe?" A voice behind her asked. She turned around to face one of the other wizards lying on the floor of her cell.
"Yep. Told you the Minister would see sense soon."
"Brill." The other wizards replied with a slight slur of his words. "I can have the bed now."
The little man shuffled over to the cell's door and began reversing the repellant charms placed upon the bars.
"So why did Fudge change his mind?" She asked the gaoler as he worked his magic. He was quite a bit shorter than Circe and she could just about see the top of his balding head as he traced his wand over each iron bar from floor to ceiling.
"Well, Dumbledore was here in the early hours trying to get you out, but Fudge wouldn't release you until the muggles they brought in had made a statement."
"And how are they…?" Circe asked, her stomach churning with anxiousness.
"The bloke's still been seen to in St Mungo's, but once the muggle woman said that it wasn't you who'd caused all the trouble… It was you that actually tried to stop the other witch from torturing them… well that cleared you right up."
"I suppose they checked my wand too."
"They did. No recorded unforgivable curses used. Or any fiendfyre charms. Your story checked out."
"So… who bailed me?" Circe asked.
"I did." A low voice said from the shadows at the gaoler's back. And when Severus stepped out of the darkness with an expression that made Circe feel like a scalded teenager, her heart fluttered a tad.
"Hello, darling." Circe replied, leaning against the bars with a provocative smile. Severus's face was alabaster-white and lined with worry, yet he still managed to raise a singular eyebrow back at her.
"I do hope you're not going to make a habit of this, Professor Smith." He answered, his eyes darting around the Ministry holding cell. Circe blushed a little with embarrassment. Never in her wildest dreams did she think Severus would ever have to bail her out of a jail cell.
"What can I say? Prison changes a person. My downwards spiral into the crime world may have only just begun." She replied facetiously.
"You were in here for less than twelve hours…" Severus stated in his deadpan drawl.
The door to the cell swung open for her and Circe rushed through it as soon as the gaoler had opened it just enough for her to slip through. She sighed heavily, very happy to finally be out of the holding cell after a very, very long night.
"See you 'round, Gwidyon." She called back to the man on the floor of the cell. "Drink is to be enjoyed in moderation… blah blah blah."
"See ya, Circe." Gwidyon mumbled back, before burping loudly.
"Right, if you'll follow me we'll get your personal affects back to you." The gaoler chimed in merrily.
Circe nodded and he trotted off into the adjacent room. As she passed by Severus, he grabbed her by the forearm, grinding her to a halt.
"Are you alright?" He asked, barely louder than a whisper.
She ached to touch him, to be enveloped in his arms and sob with relief but there were too many people around. So she sucked in a deep breath and looked into Severus's pitch black eyes with a small smile and a nod. He reluctantly let her go and after another deep, settling breath she joined the gaoler in the adjacent room. He had already placed her wand and her necklace on the countertop by the time she'd caught up with him and she placed the oval back around her neck as he gathered her other things.
"... one Werther's Original, three bobby pins, one chocolate frog card of Anne Boleyn and a flyer for The Weird Sisters. My daughter likes them. Keeps pestering me to take her to a gig."
"I hear their new lineup is shit." Circe mumbled bitterly, sweeping the rest of her things into her pocket. "Thanks, Terry."
"No problem. Hope I never see you again!" He called after her as she swept from the room without a backwards glance.
Circe kept her head bent low as she made her way through the twists and tunnels of the Ministry. Severus was close at her back, almost jogging to keep up with her. She reached the elevator and mashed away at a few buttons.
"Circe…" Severus called out to her, relieved that she had finally stopped. He glanced around nervously, checking to see if they were truly alone and finding the hallway deserted. "Circe, tell me what happened after I left."
Circe hadn't budged an inch. She was still firmly facing away from Severus, her shoulders hunched as the emotional weight of last night came crashing down upon her now she was free.
"Dumbledore told me that you didn't-"
"No I didn't Crucio those people, Severus." She uttered out so quietly that Snape had to strain his ears over the mechanic whirring of the moving lift. "But I was going to. I was about to. Doesn't matter that I didn't in the end… I'd chosen to go through with it."
The elevator pinged and the metal grate doors slid open. Circe moved inside and kept her eyes fixed on the floor in utter shame. Severus followed, standing at her side and pushing the button for the atrium. His chest ached with regret: regret that he could not have spared Circe from that event, regret that he had not been there to save her from arrest, and regret that she finally now understood what it meant to masquerade as a Death Eater.
"I'm sorry." He muttered as the elevator began its ascent. "The first use of an unforgivable curse is something you always remember…"
"But I didn't use it!" She shouted in an ironic half-chuckle. "I had all of the intention and none of the actual spectacle!"
"Well, I understand that you may not feel it, but you should consider yourself lucky in that regard. Bellatrix's antics forced a rather difficult situation upon you and you still managed to appear to her as an ally and appear to the Ministry as an innocent."
""Innocent", Pfft!" Circe scoffed. "You should have heard Fudge's little rant. He doesn't see any of us at Hogwarts as innocent."
"Mmm, Kingsley told me about that." Snape muttered dismally.
"Oh he was about as useful as a chocolate teapot too!" Circe exclaimed. "Saw off Bellatrix without breaking a sweat but stayed quiet as a mouse when the Minister was arresting me."
"Well, he must have been a little confused when he saw the same woman in Cokeworth town square as he'd seen on the White Cliffs of Dover after the Azkaban breakout… Safe to say his suspicions were raised."
"But why did he not know I was an Order member?"
"Have you two ever been at a meeting together?" Severus asked.
"No." Circe sighed. "I suppose he was erring on the side of caution…"
The elevator pinged again and the doors slid open with a metallic squeal. Circe and Severus stepped out into the atrium and were soon enveloped in the throng of witches and wizards milling about the place, hurrying from Department to Department. Circe had never been to the Ministry headquarters before, but she was not in a mood for sightseeing. It was early Christmas Eve and most of the Ministry workers were closing up shop for the holidays, heading home to start the yuletide celebrations. She kept her head bent low as she maneuvered around the softly bubbling golden fountain at the atrium's center, praying that she didn't run into anybody she knew. The last thing she wanted right now was a run-in with someone like Arthur Weasley or, god forbid, Lucius. She hurried over to the floo network fireplaces, her silhouette dancing off the surface of the highly polished green tiles. Severus reached out and grabbed her before she could disappear inside a fireplace.
"Where to?" he asked.
"I'm going to Dad's. Now." she responded flatly.
"What? Right this second?"
"Yes. I'm going to make sure they're all safe in case Bellatrix tries anything like that ever again. I may have just about assured her that I was on her side, but she won't be utterly convinced."
"Circe, come home first. Have something to eat."
"Every second I waste is a second I'm putting them in danger!" Circe hissed, fixing Severus with a rather manic look.
"Have you ever performed an obliviate charm before?" Severus asked shortly.
"Yes, actually! I did it to Hagrid a few years back…"
"And how much did you take? A few minutes? An hour? You're planning on removing years worth of memories, that's another ballgame entirely. You'll need to study. To prepare… And do you know the spell to reverse it?"
Circe fell silent, her emotional mind sobering at Severus's words. A sharply-dressed Ministry man cleared his voice primly from behind Severus.
"Sorry…" Circe muttered, moving aside and letting the Ministry worker use the floo fireplace she was blocking up. The green flames flared, swallowing him whole as he disappeared off into the network, the viridian colour illuminating Circe's morose face.
"I thought you wanted me to accompany you as well…" Severus stated when she did not say anything. Circe looked at Severus with confusion in her eyes. "I did promise you, after all, that I'd meet your father if it ever came to this."
Circe was silent for a while longer, letting several Ministry workers pass in between them and disappear into the green flames before she spoke again.
"Alright." she nodded miserably.
Severus breathed a small sigh of relief. "Well… not quite the circumstances I wanted… but at least now I have an excuse to keep you busy and out of the kitchen on Christmas Day…"
"Sev!" Circe cried out in outrage, but the corners of her mouth twitched into a little grin. "That's not funny!" she stated forcefully.
"Taking a leaf out of your book, my love." he whispered to her. "If you can't cry about it, then laugh about it."
"Well that's dark humour if ever I heard it, Sev…" Circe scoffed with a roll of her eyes.
"Home?" Severus asked.
"Home." Circe replied quietly.
Matthew Smith woke up in his armchair in the living room of Number 6, Windmill Way with a start. He'd fallen asleep watching Antiques Roadshow and reading the Radio Times.
"Did the doorbell ring, love?" He asked, rubbing his bleary eyes and calling out to Jane.
"I think so." Jane replied, not looking up from her crocheting.
"Don't everybody move to answer the door then…" he grumbled.
He rose out of his seat with a huff and made his way to the front door, pausing for a moment as he saw the outline of two figures through the frosted glass. He wasn't expecting any visitors, especially in the delightfully confusing time in between Christmas and New Year when unwanted houseguests tended to leave you alone. He flipped the hall's lights on and he heard the two figures in the frosted glass muttering anxiously and one shush the other.
Oh I hope it's not the Jehova's Witnesses or something… he thought.
But when he opened the front door, the face that stared back at him from the doorstep was just as much of a surprise…
"Hi Dad." Circe said with a sheepish smile.
"Circe! Good God, where have you been?! We haven't heard from you in months!" Matthew spluttered out, taking Circe into a desperate hug.
"I know… I'm sorry. But I'm here now. And I, Uhh… I brought a visitor." Circe tugged at the arm of somebody beside her and pulled them into Matthew's line of sight.
"Mister Smith…." Severus said nervously, looking a little green in the gills.
"Dad, this is Severus. He's my… boyfriend." Circe said steadily, watching her father's face intently for his reaction.
As she'd expected, Matthew was sporting a look of flustered, silent surprise. He looked from his daughter to the stern-faced and black haired man at her side, his eyes wide and his mouth open.
"Right… well you better both come in." He said simplistically.
Circe gripped Severus's hand tight, almost tugging him over the threshold and into the hallway. His palm was slick with sweat and she could see the damp on his forehead too. Severus would of course blame his perspiring on the rather homely looking green cable knit jumper she'd made him wear in an attempt to make him look less monotonously black. Or the long, black pair of muggle denim trousers. Or the leather jacket he customarily wore for forays out into the muggle world. But Circe knew he was anxious beyond words. He'd almost been visibly shaking as they'd walked up the drive and removed their chameleon charms. Circe wondered which of the two of them was the more nervous: her, as she prepared to enact her obliviate charms on her own family, or Severus in anticipation of meeting Circe's father…
"Tom, Alec, come say hello to our guests!" Matthew hollered up the stairs. "Jane, guess who's here."
Before they'd even fishies taking their coats off, Jane's blonde-bobbed head emerged from around the door to the living room.
"Ahh!" She exclaimed half joyous, half alarmed. "Circe! Oh my dear…" Jane took her step-daughter into a hug.
"Hi Jane." Circe smiled weakly again.
"Ohh your Dad will be pleased. He's been up most nights in the garage worrying about you…"
"Jane…" Matthew grumbled.
As Jane drew apart from her embrace with Circe, her eyes finally found Severus, who seemed to shrink into the corner whilst the family reunion happened.
"Ohh who's this then?" She asked, wrapping her dressing gown around her.
"Circe's… boyfriend." Matthew said disbelievingly.
"Oh I suppose you'll be wanting the spare room made up then." Jane stated in a quiet and polite sounding voice, shuffling through the others stood in the hall and laying a hand on the banister. "Back in my day I wasn't allowed to share a bed with my boyfriend at my mum's house… but we're very modern here, so don't worry… uhh, sorry love, what's your name?"
"Severus."
"Severus! What an unusual name." Jane repeated, climbing the stairs. "Alec! Tom! Come downstairs now! I'm sorry, Severus. They got a Scalextric set for Christmas and they can't leave it alone."
Jane disappeared out of sight and hollered at the top of her lungs, her voice changing from Hyacinth Bucket to banshee in a heartbeat. "TOM! ALEC! YOUR SISTER'S HERE!"
Matthew gestured to the living room and asked them both for their tea preferences.
"Or I have some John Smith if you're a beer man, Severus." He offered.
"Oh, um just tea thank you. Black, please." He replied, sinking into the terracotta coloured sofa at Circe's side.
Matthew nodded. "Still milk no sugar, Circe?"
"Please. Thanks Dad."
Matthew disappeared off into the kitchen and Severus leant over to whisper in Circe's ear.
"What's Scalextric?"
"An electric track for car models. You're doing fine, by the way." Circe smiled at him, squeezing his hand.
Yet despite Circe's reassurances, Severus still noticeably flinched when the thunderous sound of footsteps came charging down the stairs, rattling the hanging light fixtures above them. Into the living room burst Circe's step-brothers Alec and Tom.
Their faces lit up and in unison they both screamed "BANGARANG!"
"BANGARANG!" Circe hollered back at them, before launching herself off the sofa and tackling the two boys to the ground. Severus looked on in confusion as something of a wrestling match began between the two young boys and Circe. The boy's light up trainers winked and blinked in the light of the living room as their little limbs kicked out in every direction. Severus realised just how scarily on-point Bellatrix's pick of victims had been on that night at the Christmas market. Circe was right to have been so unsettled; It was a brilliant, small detail that cut straight to the core. She had been watching. Severus sat in his seat, unsure of whether to intervene in the wrestling match or burst into laughter, when Matthew offered a steaming mug of tea out to him.
"Thank you." Severus said, slightly reassured that Matthew didn't seem bothered by the fighting happening on the living room floor.
"Oh, I should probably explain." Matthew whispered, sitting on the arm of the sofa nearest to Severus. "When the boys were very young, we tried to explain the whole "magic" thing by telling them Circe was a Lost Boy… Well a Lost Girl, I should say!... that had come back to her home after leaving Neverland. Have you ever seen the film 'Hook'?"
"Umm… No."
"Ohh we'll have to show it to you. We've got it on video, the boys love it. Jane had just taken them to see it for the first time when Circe came home that first summer after she'd started teaching at your school. And well, they started asking questions about why this thing was floating or why that newspaper's pictures moved. So Jane told them she could do magic things like Peter Pan."
"Ow! Ow! Ow! Alec, that's my kidney!" Circe screamed out, the two boys now having managed to successfully pin her face-down on the green carpet, sitting on her back triumphantly. "Bloody hell, Tom. When did you get so big?"
"Do the thing!" Tom, the younger of the two, cried out with a merry laugh.
Circe groaned and tried to unpin her right hand from beneath her, delving into her pocket for her wand. She huffed and strained, the two boys on her back giggling all the way, and eventually she cast a quiet spell under her breath. Severus watched with mirth as Circe, Tom and Alec levitated a few inches off the floor. The boys cheered and laughter rippled throughout the living room as Circe spread her arms wide as if she was flying.
"Circe!" Matthew chided. "If Jane sees you doing that and we get another one of those-"
"Alright, alright."
Circe cut her spell short and all three of them went crashing to the ground. Eventually Circe had regained enough air in her lungs to sit up and rejoin Severus on the sofa, red faced and grinning broadly. Severus fixed her with a wary look.
"What?" She asked with a light chuckle.
"It's a wonder the Ministry haven't written you up for performing magic in front of muggles." He muttered.
"Boys!" Matthew said suddenly, almost as a physical reaction to the words Severus was using. "Go and get the menu for Shukur's Brasserie. I feel like a curry tonight…"
Tom and Alec rose to their feet and went running from the living room with shouts of joy.
"Ask your mum what she wants too. Order it and I'll pay when we pick up!" Matthew called after them as quiet settled over the living room once more.
"The Ministry may send a Howler if it's a major charm or hex. Or if something has been performed in front of a "non-initiated"... muggle." Circe spoke the last word in a hushed voice, glancing swiftly back at her Dad as he lowered himself back into his armchair. "But most of the time, a minor spell performed in front of immediate family goes un-policed. How do you think couples who are part wizard, part muggle survive?"
"I thought they had to hide their magic."
"Well they still do. I mean, could you imagine only being allowed to perform First Year spells for the rest of your life?"
My mother didn't even do that… If my father caught wind of any magic, he'd beat us both. Severus thought somberly.
"So…" Matthew stated suddenly. "Now Alec and Tom are being kept busy and Jane's making up the spare room for you… Circe, where the bloody hell have you been?"
Circe was a little taken aback. Her Dad had never sounded so brusque to her in her life. Even now he didn't sound angry, more quietly concerned, but that was enough to get Circe's heart beating.
"Dad, I'm okay. I-"
"Are you pregnant?" Matthew interrupted. "Is that why you've brought… Severus with you?"
Severus's face drained of all colour as Matthew pointed at him.
"Dad! No, I'm not pregnant!"
Matthew sighed and sat back in his armchair. He looked at the two of them closely before he chose to speak again, gathering his signature calm and cool exterior.
"Alright. Then explain to me why you've not been home for six months, why we've not had more than a postcard from you since the summer, and why a woman who looks like she's been dragged through a hedge backwards has been asking after you here..." Matthew said quietly.
Circe took a deep breath and looked to Severus, this time for her own reassurance.
"You might as well tell him." Severus said to her. He will remember none of it by tomorrow. He added in his own head. She nodded miserably to him and tried to gather her courage
"So… Dad." Circe began a little shakily. "There's a war brewing amongst my kind. Possibly the most dangerous war we've ever been through."
The atmosphere of the room shifted instantly. Matthew pushed his spectacles up his nose and regarded his daughter intensely. He was quiet for a while, his mind puzzling over what his daughter had told him. "Like the one before? When you were young?" He asked, startling Circe a little.
"I… yeah." Circe stuttered,taken aback by her Dad's apparent shift in regards to talking about the wizarding world. "I thought you didn't like hearing about magic…"
"Magic has always been something that I'm, by my nature of not being like you or your mother, ignorant about. And I don't like being ignorant…"
"So how did you know about the first wizarding war? I never told you. And mum was d-."
"Circe, I would have had to be stupid to not pick up on all the radio broadcasts you were listening to, all those headlines on that odd newspaper you used to get delivered… You think I wouldn't notice when my own daughter was troubled? You didn't say anything, but I knew you were grieving. I've seen you grieve before, remember?" He paused, watching Circe look down at her hands awkwardly. "Plus, your Headmaster wrote to me and told me you'd tried to sign up to his "order" or something…" Matthew said levelly.
"Oh…" Circe muttered.
"So. A war. A new war. That's where you've been? Fighting in this war?"
"Yes, I guess that's the long and short of it." Circe said plainly, her Dad never one to dance around the point.
Matthew began fiddling with his Radio Times, curling the pages into a long tube and tapping his hand in agitation.
"You know… after you disappeared for those few days a couple of years back… I thought we had an understanding, my duck." Matthew sighed. "I thought you'd tell me if you were in trouble. Just so I wouldn't worry."
Circe's chest ached at that. "I couldn't tell you, Dad. I didn't know how much you'd understand."
"I'm not an idiot, Circe. I understand that there's another world that you're part of that I am not… I know things happen in that world that I will never see. But I thought you'd at least try to let me know what was keeping you away."
"That's why I'm here now." Circe responded, tears in her eyes.
"So, tell me." her father prompted.
"Well… Now I am old enough to join The Order. Now I can do something about those horrible headlines and radio broadcasts that'll be coming again soon. Now I can make sure no one at Hogwarts has to watch their friends die fighting against V-"
Severus elbowed her in the ribs.
"-against the enemy."
"You're in danger." Matthew said gravely, his brow furrowing into a deeply troubled expression.
"Dad, I'm trying to make sure that there's a decent world left for us all at the end of this."
"Was this your idea?" Matthew asked Severus rather sharply, rising to his feet and beginning to agitatedly pace up and down the living room. "Are you part of this Order as well? Did you encourage her to sign up and risk her life?"
"Quite the contrary." Severus replied, trying to keep his cool now Matthew's attitude towards him had changed from warm and welcoming to harsh and confrontational. "I would like nothing more for Circe to have had no part in this."
"Then why do you, Circe? Why couldn't you have let someone else fight and put themselves in danger?"
"Because I couldn't do nothing, Dad!" She shouted. "I couldn't just look the other way!"
"If you want someone to blame, Mister Smith…" Severus said, rising to his feet and placing himself in between Matthew and Circe. "Then blame me. It's true that if it were up to me, I would sorely wish for Circe to remain out of the fight… but I'm afraid she has chosen to follow me into the fray. All because, for reasons that are utterly inexplicable to me, she says she loves me."
Severus paused, letting Matthew digest what he had said.
"And… I love her. Most ardently. And I would put myself in harm's way before I ever allowed anything dangerous to happen to Circe. On that you have my word, Mister Smith."
Alec came walking into the living room carrying a Sonic the Hedgehog notepad and pen. His eyes were firmly on the notes he was making in his notepad, utterly oblivious to the situation he had just walked in on.
"Right… Mum says she wants a Chicken tikka, Tom wants to try a Lamb bhuna and I'm having a korma. Then I've got three pilau rice's, three peshwari naans and a side of okra. What do you want?"
"One chicken madras for Dad, I'll have a jamdani hash, Sev will have a-"
"I'll have a madras too." He said, turning to Alec and mustering his best warm smile.
"Okay…" Alec said, turning on his heels and calling back up the stairs. "MUM! TELL TOM TO GET OFF THE INTERNET SO I CAN CALL THE INDIAN TAKEAWAY!"
Once they had been left alone again, Matthew let out a long sigh and sat back down in his chair.
"I don't like it…" he muttered, glancing at Circe and Severus both with a rather unimpressed look.
"Of course you don't. You're her father." Severus said plainly, completely understanding Matthew's reaction.
"Well you don't have to like it, either of you, because this is my choice." Circe butt in.
"I know, Circe. But I don't think I could stand to lose you like I lost your mother." Matthew whispered hoarsely. "And if she were here, she'd want you to stay safe too."
"Mum was a witch just as stubborn and headstrong as me. She couldn't have stopped me from fighting either, not even if she'd hexed me."
"Well that's certainly true. Phoebe passed more than just her magic on to you." Matthew chuckled.
"And I'm afraid she gave me an annoying little mantra to see me through this war too." Circe smile back at her father.
"Oh God, the one about the...hands?"
"As long as you have your beating heart, and two hands to heal with, there's nothing in your day that you don't have the strength to tackle." Circe recited.
"I suppose I'll have to remember that one too when I'm sat here worrying about you night after night."
You won't. You won't have any more restless nights about me after this one… Circe thought, trying desperately to hold back the tears in her eyes.
"Alec's placed the order at Shukur's." Jane said in her sing-songy voice as she walked back into the living room. "And your bed's made upstairs. We can go and get the order, can't we Matthew. Let these two settle in."
"Umm… fine." Matthew muttered. "I'll get my wallet."
Matthew grabbed his coat and his keys from the kitchen, following Jane out to his Rover. Once the engine turned over and the car reversed out of the drive, Circe and Severus breathed a collective sigh of relief.
"Well that was…"
"Awful." Circe said quickly.
"I thought it went rather well, considering..." Severus grinned back at her.
Circe elbowed him in the ribs with a light chuckle.
"Well you definitely scored some points for ordering a madras, Sev."
"To be honest, I just panicked. I recognised the name, my father used to order it when he came home with a curry after a night down The Malt and Shovel."
"We'll, I guess you'll want the tour of the house now." Circe said, rising to her feet.
"Let me guess… this is the living room." Severus replied sarcastically.
"Stop it. I won't be coming back here for what will probably be a long time. I grew up here, Sev. I want you to know where I came from."
"Fine, fine. Lead on, tour guide." Severus waved his arms invitingly out of the living room.
Circe took him from room to room of Windmill Way, telling him stories of her childhood and pointing out pictures that hung on the walls. Severus drank it all in with a loving fascination, seeing Circe grow up before his eyes as he hopped from photograph to photograph. Sunny days by the sea, primary school pigtails, pre-teen awkwardness, adolescent grunge… the years danced before him in a whirling haze. Dozens of frames holding the collective memories of several lifetimes worth of memories. Not just Circe's, but her father's and his father's, and on and on… Circe talked him through the oldest black and white pictures of her grandmother, to the most recent of Alec and Tom's school photos, framed with pride on the mantelpiece. Every room and every wall was imbued with a remembrance of one happy event or another. Every inch and brick of the house teemed with a history of close, familial love. Every picture, although static and still, seemed to almost come alive with the real, tangible memories they encapsulated.
The house was a modest, modern build with three rooms downstairs and four upstairs, overlooking a beautifully humped ancient furrowed field, a byproduct of Medieval farming. Circe wished Severus could have seen the field in the light of day as the farmer who owned it would often leave cows or sheep to graze in it. Circe had spent many a summer evening feeding the farmer's cows scraps from her kitchen when the animals would come investigating right up to the lower fence of her garden. Circe had always wished her room had overlooked the furrowed field, but it didn't. It faced the road, and Circe dragged Severus up the stairs and onto the upper floor.
"Jane wants to convert half the garage into another room for an office or something, but Dad won't hear it." Circe explained, pointing to the space behind the firm wallon one side of the stairwell.
"So they haven't re-purposed your room yet?" Severus asked.
"They wouldn't dare." Circe shot back with a smile. "Jane can call it "the spare room" all she likes, but it'll forever be mine."
They reached a door to the immediate right of the top of the stairs where a plaque that read "Circe's Room", complete with a Beatrix Potter illustration of Jemima Puddleduck, sat.
"I actually placed a stickfast hex on this so she can't take it off." Circe chortled, pointing at the sign.
Severus rolled his eyes at her and followed her inside her old bedroom.
"Here we are then. My cave."
Circe waved a hand about her old bedroom and Severus did his best to take in as much detail as he could in one glance. It was much like any other teenage girl's bedroom: painted a dusty pink, fitted with a french style, white, wrought iron bed frame, and a few choice pieces of similarly white furniture. But Circe's unique touch was stamped on the place too. She had several bookcases that teemed with almost a 'Borgin and Burke's' level of items as each shelf was brimming with literature and an odd selection of trinkets: old jewellery, perfume bottles, keep-sakes from her travels, even a row of old, stuffed animals sat atop one of her bookshelves, peering down on the little space like a procession of guardians… Severus walked over to the corner that immediately took his eye where a display of some forty or more Polaroid pictures were still shown. Circe had strung a long line of beads from one wall to the other and each picture was clipped to the beaded string so they fluttered as Severus approached, like a swarm of tiny birds. Again, Severus was taken in by the selection of bright and shining faces of Circe's teenagedom. Some people he recognised encapsulated in the Polaroids, like Myron and Tonks, and others were unfamiliar. It was a collage of youth, a testament to her childhood. Severus's hand traced over one Polaroid of a younger Circe, sat on a red brick wall, holding a guitar, a cigarette in her mouth and flicking a 'v' at the camera.
"I was about eighteen there. Quite soon after I got back from France, actually. I told Myron and Tonks what had happened and they took me to the Notting Hill Pride carnival. I was still in a bit of a bad mood after the whole "Odette" debacle-"
"I can tell." Severus smiled, tapping his fingertip on Circe's rude gesture.
Circe chuckled. "I know. Absolute symbol of ladylike grace and decorum, haven't I always been…? But me and Myron had been busking at the carnival for a while, trying to get a bit of money together so we could ask someone to go into an off-licence for us. But I played...he sang… I sang too… and after a while we realised we'd made about three times more than what we'd originally aimed for. We just… didn't want to stop."
"And so The Weird Sisters was born." Severus said dramatically. His eyes darted from Polaroid to Polaroid, and he found himself being naturally drawn to the ones that had been taken at Hogwarts. Severus spotted another image of Circe, this time with her impossibly bushy eighties hair and heavy blush, but this time standing next to a boy with sunny-yellow hair and broad set shoulders.
"Is that Michael?" He asked, tapping the picture.
"Yeah." Circe replied, blushing a little. "That was taken about a month before he left school to join The Order. He'd be dead about six weeks later."
"Ahh, he was a good looking chap, wasn't he…" Severus murmured, his voice showing the telltale signs of jealousy. Michael had his arm around Circe's shoulders, and she too seemed to lean into him. Based on their body language, Severus would have found it hard to believe they had never been a couple had Circe not told him differently.
"You and I… we don't even have a single picture together." Severus murmured quietly. "All these memories, all these photographs from your past… and there's not one single piece of evidence that exists that could show I was a part of your life at one point."
"Well, most of the time the best moments of happiness happen when a camera's not pointed at you. I have plenty of Polaroids of us in here…" she smiled, tapping at her temple.
"Oh? And what kinds of picture perfect moments have you got stored in your little cranial album?" Severus asked.
"I remember how you looked when you and I stood in the rain. When I ran into the storm after you when I saw how you saved me from the werewolf attack. You looked so lost and scared and wet. And we kissed as the sky fell down around us.
I remember the expression on your face when I hit you in the back of the head with that snowball. When you found the courage just to let it all go and hurl the snow back at me too.
I remember when we finally fell into each other's arms on that day after the Yule Ball. Both of us wept in each other's embrace, crying for the death of our hearts."
"That is a rather beautiful collage." Severus whispered hoarsely, leaning in close to her and sealing a kiss upon her lips.
"Eeew! That's gross!" A voice sounded out from the open doorway. Severus and Circe drew apart to see Tom standing in her bedroom door, making a disgusted face at them.
"Are you spying on me, Tommy?" Circe asked with a chuckle.
"You were kissing." The little boy said, his face scrunching up as if he were eating a lemon wedge. Circe and Severus both laughed.
"I don't suppose you remember me do you, Thomas?" Severus asked, walking over to the boy and kneeling in front of him. "You answered the door to me a few years ago when I came inquiring after your sister. How old are you now?"
"Nine."
"Ahh! And Alec is-"
"Eleven. He's at "big boy" school now and I'm still stuck in Primary. He always says he gets first go on the Scalextric because he's at "proper" school…"
"Oh dear, well that's not on. Why don't you show me your track? I hear you got it for Christmas."
"ALEC! CIRCE'S BOYFRIEND SAYS IT'S MY TURN ON THE SCALEXTRIC!" The little boy screamed at the door to the room directly opposite Circe's. Tom charged into the door and with a bang, the boy's bedroom was revealed, the buzzing, whizzing noise of the electric track filling the air.
"Come on then!" Tom huffed, grabbing Severus's sleeve and pulling him into the bedroom. The cars whizzed underneath Severus's feet as he stepped over the track and was told exactly where to kneel by the young boy.
"I'll set the table then, shall I?" Circe asked incredulously, poking her head into the boy's room. "Make sure you let Sev have a go too. Tell him the names of all the cars…" she chuckled.
Alec put down the remote and the cars ground to a halt. He picked up the model closest to him and held it out proudly to Severus.
"That's the Audi Quattro." He explained. Alec was tall and gangly for his age, with his brown hair cut into a style that reminded Severus of 'Tintin'. Alec's voice was just about beginning to break and occasionally his words would emerge from his throat as a squeak, but he did his best to hide it by coughing and hunching his still slim shoulders. Yet his deep brown, almost amber-coloured eyes lit up each time he reached for a car, and Snape could see the joy in his freckled face each time he passed a model to him.
"You like cars then, do you?" Severus asked when he'd received his third model from Alec.
"Yeah. Matt takes us down to the racetrack at Silverstone sometimes, to watch the F1."
"We were on TV once!" Tom piped up, grinning at Severus with a mouth that was missing a few baby teeth. "When we saw Michael Schumacher win his third title. Mum recorded it onto a video for us and everything."
Tom had eyes of the same honeyed amber as his brother, and hair coloured the same chestnut brown. But his hair was cut into an almost mullet-style trim; Circe had told Severus that Tom hated haircuts with a passion and when he was little he'd kick and scream at the sight of a pair of scissors, so Jane just let it grow long. Being the younger of the two, he was a good foot shorter than his brother but a little bit thicker around the waist. But his kind, gentle eyes and his good natured spirit made Severus warm to him.
He's like a mini Hobbit. Severus thought with a chuckle.
"When we next go back to Silverstone, I'm gonna get Schumacher to sign the Mercedes." Alec stated, casting his eyes about the room for the model he wanted. "Tom, where's the Mercedes?"
"I dunno…" the little one said sheepishly.
"Yes you do. Have you hidden it again?"
"You won't let me play…"
"Tom, give me the Mercedes!" Alec shouted.
"Uhh… boys. There's no need to fight." Severus said, trying his best to sound calming. "Tom, have you got the car?"
"I put it on the top shelf." He answered, keeping his eyes on the green carpet and pointing up to the ceiling.
Severus cast his eyes up to where the little one pointed, to the very top of a stack of shelves embedded into the boy's bedroom. The top shelf was only about a foot off the ceiling and Severus gasped. The little white car model was indeed placed on top of the shelf, amongst dusty relics, books and toys placed up there out of their reach. Severus frowned, trying to work out how Tom had placed it there as there was nothing the little boy could have used to climb up to reach the shelf.
"How did you get up-"
But before he could finish his sentence, the Mercedes model floated down from the shelf, sailing silently through the air. It approached Severus expectantly and he offered an open palm out to it, letting the car drop Into his hand.
Snape looked back at the long-haired boy with a look of shock on his pale face.
"Did you do that, Tom?" He asked quietly.
"Mum said you were a Lost Boy too. Just like Circe..." Tom muttered.
"He does it all the time!" Alec complained. "He's always making my cars disappear when he's in a huff or it's not his turn to play."
"But I never went to Neverland, Severus." Tom asked, the confusion in his voice. "Why can I do the floaty thing like Circe does if I was never a Lost Boy?"
"Maybe you're just a freak." Alec said with a joking chuckle.
Severus was reminded of a time long ago when he had played down by the Cokeworth canals and he had heard two sisters in hushed conversation. Petunia had called Lily a "freak" that day too…
"Alec, don't call him that." Severus said a little sharply. "He… He's not a freak."
"I was just joking…" Alec said a little red with embarrassment.
"I know. I'm sorry…" Severus spoke in a hushed voice. "Does your mother know you can do this, Tom? Or Matthew?"
"Nah, he won't do it in front of anyone else but me." Alec said with a dismissive wave, picking up the Mercedes from Severus's hands and placing it on the track.
"I see." Severus nodded slowly. "Well, you're not a freak. You… have a gift. A gift that some people might find hard to accept. But you have a wonderful, wonderful family, Tom. One that I wish I had…."
Severus went quiet, aware that Alec and Tom were both watching him with looks of utter confusion on their faces. Severus realised that this conversation would end up being futile by tomorrow morning, but Circe needed to know…
She needs to know that the little one is a Wizard… Severus thought, rising to his feet, clearing his throat awkwardly .
"I… Uhh… I'm going to help your sister with the table." He said weakly.
"Okay…" Alec said, going back to his track, handing his brother the remote. "Your turn". Tom squealed with delight and took it from his brother with a broad, toothy grin.
Severus found Circe laying out the last few plates on the small, round table in the kitchen.
"Did you get bored of the car talk already?" Circe smiled.
"Circe, there's been a small hiccup in the plan…".
"Dad's taking forever with the takeaway. He shouldn't have taken this long to drive to the next village and pick it up."
"No. Not that. The little one."
Circe set down a fork and glanced up at Severus with a worried look on her face. "Tom? What about him?"
"He's-"
The front door closed with a bang and Matthew called out to everybody. "Curry's here!"
"Tell me later." Circe whispered as the two boys came running down the stairs for their food. Matthew lay each takeaway box on the table one by one as everybody took their seat.
"What happened to Jane, Dad?" Circe asked.
"Ohh she got a page from the Hospice when we were waiting to collect the food. One of her patients is taking a downturn, so I dropped her off before I came back."
"Oh what a shame…" Circe mumbled, snapping off a piece of poppadom.
"I was going to wait until after you'd eaten your curry, but…" Matthew lay down the last pilau rice and exited the kitchen. Circe helped Tom and Alec portion themselves out a bit of food all whilst Severus kept a weather eye on the younger boy, alert for any more magical happenings. How he wished in that moment that he could telepathically transmit information to Circe… Matthew came striding back into the kitchen, holding what looked like a huge, leather-bound folder.
"Jane told me that all the other Hospice nurses have just written off the poor bloke and they say he's getting delirious in his last days…" Matthew mumbled. "But because of, well, because of what she knows about your lot, Circe, she listened to him. This poor, dying bloke has been trying to find his son… and he says his son is "magic".
He gave the nurses this photo album that he had and they've been doing their best to find his family. But, of course, it's a needle in a haystack isn't it. But when he said "magic", Jane thought that the guy's son might be one of your lot.
She ran into the Hospice and grabbed this for me to take back to you." Matthew said, extending the book out to Circe. She took it and opened up the first page, her nose wrinkling as the pervasive smell of tobacco and dust wafted into her nose from the album, even through the strong smell of curry. "I thought there might be someone you know. Someone you might recognise."
Circe's eyes bulged as they settled on the pictures in her lap. Severus finished his bite of madras and slowly put down his fork, noticing Circe's porcelain face.
"Circe?" He asked gently.
Circe let the photo album drop from her grasp just enough that the pictures stared up at him from her lap. Severus had only taken a few bites of food, but as he looked down at the album, his whole stomach convulsed with nauseating waves.
"That's… Thats…" Severus stuttered.
The photo was bleached with age and the glorious summer sun of an August gone by, but the two people in the picture were nevertheless strikingly clear. They almost seemed to levitate out of the picture with their unashamed youth. A painfully skinny, pale white boy in bright blue flares sat on the wall outside a Cokeworth terraced house, right beside an auburn-haired girl with a golden smile.
"You and Lily."