They stayed on the couch by the fire in the woods for a long time. Freddie was warm and comfortable, cuddled up under the blanket with Snape. They had descended into a comfortable silence after their emotionally charged conversation. Freddie would have been content to stay there forever but she noticed he kept sneaking glances at his watch.
"We have to go, don't we?" she asked finally.
"We do, in order to reach our stopping point before dark," he answered but she could hear the regret tinting his tone.
"Okay," she said, but didn't get up. She snuggled closer to him under the blanket and sighed. "I wish we could stay here forever."
"In the woods?" he asked, amused.
"Yeah. If we had a tent or whatever we could just stay here tonight. I've never been camping before."
"I do not camp," he said, leaning down to kiss her forehead. "I like sleeping in a bed."
"You conjured a couch in the middle of the woods, Severus, I think you'd survive," she chuckled.
"Mm. We have more ground we need to cover before we stop for the night. We'll be staying in a hotel in a small Muggle village called Saint-sur-Mer. Come on," he said, tapping her arm to make her move so he could get up. He stood and stretched before the fire while Freddie got up, reluctantly shedding the blanket.
"I haven't seen you look at a map once since we left, how do you know we're going the right way?" she asked as he pulled out his wand and vanished the couch. Ziggy had been under the blanket and he landed on his feet on the ground. He let out an indignant meow and glared reproachfully at Snape.
"I forgot you were there," Snape said to the kneazle, then turned to Freddie. "I memorized the route and I have an excellent sense of direction. We are on the right path."
"If you say so."
"I do say so. You can stand by the fire a moment longer if you want while I use the bathroom."
"Bathroom?" she asked, confused. He gestured to the trees all around them then walked away into the forest. Freddie looked down at Ziggy who was sitting next to the fire, grooming his paws. "It's easy for boys to pee on trees I guess."
Ziggy stopped mid-lick of his paw and looked at her. He peed outdoors all the time, he was a kneazle. He gave his paw an extra lick before swiping it over his left ear. Freddie was shifting from one foot to the other in front of the fire when Snape came back out of the trees.
"What?" he asked her.
"I, uh...hmm. I've never peed outside before," she said helplessly, her face red. Snape laughed softly and she scowled at him.
"Do you need to go?"
"Yeah, I mean, kinda," she muttered, staring down at her boots. They still had a few more hours to fly and she knew she wouldn't be able to wait that long.
"Then go," he said with a shrug. "Go squat behind a tree."
She whimpered slightly and looked around before reluctantly trudging towards the trees.
"Don't try to watch me!" she called back to him over her shoulder.
"I may be...unconventional but I am not a pervert," he said but she could see him smirking.
Freddie walked a little ways into the forest, looking around as she did. This forest was different than the Forbidden Forest at Hogwarts. The trees were different and set farther apart so that light actually filtered through the trees. She found a wide tree to squat behind, but she didn't want to pull her pants down. It was cold and she didn't want to have her bare butt out in the woods. It didn't matter that there was no one around to see, she didn't think she could do it.
"This would be easy if I was a boy," she muttered to herself. "Or an animal." Then she smacked herself in the forehead. "I am an animal, duh."
She shifted quickly into her Animagus form and immediately felt more relaxed. She relieved her bladder without a second thought then stood a moment, smelling all the foreign scents of the forest around her. She could smell all sorts of animals, different from the ones back home. And when the wind shifted she caught the familiar scent of Snape and the fire, and, less intensely, Ziggy. She wanted to stay in kneazle-form and explore the forest but the human part of her brain knew better. This was why she'd told herself she wouldn't use her Animagus form until after the Potions Championship.
Maybe on our way home, she thought and forced herself back into her human form. She shivered slightly as her fur retracted. She hadn't even noticed the cold when she had fur. She started back towards the clearing, wondering if there was some way she could fly in her Animagus form to stay warm. Ziggy was streaking towards her across the clearing but he stopped short, looking confused, when he saw that she was human. He had been expecting her kneazle-form. She wondered if he'd been able to smell the difference when she changed.
Snape was still standing by the fire where she'd left him and his smirk widened as she approached.
"What?" she asked, raising an eyebrow at him. "What are you smirking at?"
"You had to become a kneazle to pee in the woods, didn't you?"
"Wha- shut up!" she said, feeling her face flush.
"You are spoiled," he teased. "Raised with money, never gone camping, never had to pee outdoors."
"Whatever. You don't even like camping," she said defensively.
"This is true," he chuckled.
He pulled out his wand and got rid of the fire, making the chill in the air all the more pronounced. The clearing was now exactly as it had been when they first arrived, but Snape stood staring at the spot where the fire had been. He was no longer smiling.
"You look troubled," she said, slipping her hand into his. He glanced down at her and gave her hand a squeeze.
"Everything that I told you...you can never tell anyone," he said, his expression somber.
"Of course not. I know better."
"Promise me...even if you end up hating me, you can never tell anyone any of it. It could put my life in danger," he said quietly. "If the Dark Lord returns..."
"I understand. I promise," she said, putting her arms around him. "I'll never tell a soul. I can make the Unbreakable Vow if that would make you feel any better."
"That is not necessary," he said. He put one arm around her and kissed her forehead. "I trust you. I would not have told you if I didn't trust you."
"Don't worry," she murmured against his chest. "And for the record I could never hate you."
He kissed her forehead again then let her go.
"Come on," he said, going to retrieve his broom. "We need to get going."
"Alright," she agreed. She mounted her broomstick and was about to push off when she remembered something. "Oh wait."
She pulled her purse to her front and opened it. Snape watched, looking mildly impatient...then surprised when she pulled out Daniel's record player.
"What are you doing?" he asked, amused.
"Daniel used to do this," she said as she strapped the record player to the broom in front of her. "Stabilis. It keeps it steady so we can listen to music while we fly – is that okay?"
"I suppose," he said with a shrug. "We will not pass too low over any Muggle villages so it is unlikely anyone will hear it."
"Excellent," she said, pleased. She chose Daniel's Eagles record to start with and put it on. Take It Easy started to play as they kicked off from the ground and ascended into the air.
Freddie sang along to the record as they continued their journey south. The forest seemed to stretch on below them forever until the trees gave way suddenly and they were flying over water. She thought it was a lake at first but it kept going. They'd been flying over it for nearly an hour and Freddie still couldn't see the shore on the other side.
"Is this an ocean?" she called to Snape over the wind and the music.
"The English Channel," he answered with a nod. "Part of the Atlantic Ocean."
"Cool!" she said, angling her broom down.
"Where are-" Snape started to ask but his question was lost on the wind as she flew away from him. She'd never flown over a big body of water before, nothing bigger than the lake at Hogwarts, and she was curious. She made sure there were no boats or ships around before flying down. She was so low that her feet almost touched the water. Ziggy poked his head out of her cloak, saw the water beneath them, and shrank back against her with a yowl.
"Scaredy-cat," she chuckled and gave him a reassuring pat through the cloak. "Don't worry, I won't let you fall."
It was even colder down close to the water so it wasn't long before she ascended back into the sky where Snape was keeping pace with her. He was smiling slightly but his face fell as a new song started on the record player.
"Desperado, why don't you come to your senses?
You've been out ridin' fences for so long now
Oh, you're a hard one
I know that you got your reasons
These things that are pleasin' you
Can hurt you somehow..."
"Skip it," he said, a hard edge to his voice that she didn't hear often. "Or turn it off, Miss Gray."
"What, why?" she asked, but he didn't answer. "...Okay."
She kept her broom steady with one hand and pulled her wand out with the other. She used her wand to take the Eagles record off and return it to her bag. She thought for a moment then replaced it with The Doors vinyl she'd gotten from the record store in London. It was the same one Daniel used to have. She was putting her wand back in the pocket of her cloak when it slipped from her fingers.
"My wand!" she shrieked as it plummeted towards the ocean.
Snape streaked past her in a flash of black. She was still trying to turn her broom around when he reappeared, holding her wand in one hand.
"You should be more careful," he said, flying close enough to hand it back to her.
"Thanks. My fingers are numb from the cold, it slipped," she said as she carefully returned it to her pocket. "That was really impressive flying! Did you ever play Quidditch?"
"I was a Seeker," he confirmed, smiling slightly.
"You never told me that!"
"You never asked," he said with a shrug.
She tried to imagine a young Snape flying on a broomstick, but she couldn't. She knew him as an adult and she'd seen pictures of him as a child with his mother, on the wall of his house in Spinner's End. But she couldn't picture him as a teenager, the age she was now. Seekers were usually small and skinny. Had he been scrawny?
"It was a song my mother used to sing to my father," he said quietly and it took her a moment to remember what he was talking about.
"Desperado?" she asked and he grimaced slightly.
"Yes. I do not like thinking about it."
"I'm sorry. I won't play it again," she promised.
"...Thank you."