September was warmer than Scotland was used to Septembers being. However, it was welcomed, since nobody was really ready to let go of summer. To celebrate the final days of sunshine and warm air, Madame Rosmerta put out some tables outside of the Three Broomsticks. It had become Gwen's routine to go every day with whatever work she was doing and eat her lunch outside.
Her big transfer to the Diagon Alley office had been nulled due to the fact that the village was barely functioning anymore. It hadn't made her as upset as she thought it would. Though she loved London, the idea of having to move all of her things to a new flat had not been exciting. The Hogsmeade office was now the main office for the Prophet and it was busier than ever in there. Most of the London office workers had been transferred to the smaller Hogsmeade building, so it was absolutely cramped in there. Gwen longed for her lunch hour now.
She and Betty had drifted over the summer. They went to lunch once in a while, but they weren't as tightknit as they once were. Gwen knew it was because Betty wasn't in the Order and Gwen felt that she couldn't tell Betty everything as she once had. Not many people knew she was in the Order, despite being involved in the Battle of the Department of Mysteries. Betty did and she didn't seem to mind, but she seemed a bit uncomfortable asking Gwen certain questions.
One sunny Thursday at noon, Gwen went to the Three Broomsticks for lunch, carrying rolls of parchment and inkless quills. People gave her nasty looks when she used her beloved pens in public, so she decided to conform to the rest of the wizarding world. Sort of. She also brought the book Snape had given her, so if she ever finished proofreading her article and the one Betty asked her for help with, she could keep reading.
She was halfway through her own article when a shadow crossed her parchment. She looked up and there was Snape, smirking at her.
"What are you doing here?" she asked, mildly surprised.
"A 'hello' would have sufficed," he muttered. She grinned and gestured for him to sit across from her.
"I didn't mean it like that," she reassured, going back to proofreading the paper quickly.
"You're rather good at that. You should think about being a teacher someday."
"Just because I can proofread quickly doesn't mean I can teach," she said, looking up at him.
"Then you should consider grading papers for me," he retorted.
"You never told me why you were here," she pointed out.
"To get lunch, just like you." As if on cue, Madame Rosmerta brought out Gwen's sandwich and butterbeer. Snape ordered his food.
"Doesn't Hogwarts feed you well enough?" Gwen asked as Rosmerta went back inside.
"One gets sick of eating the same ten meals for fifteen years," he said matter of factly.
"Touché," she said, rolling up her finished article and putting in her bag. She moved on to the next one, quickly marking Betty's rather poorly written article. "Oh Merlin, she needs a spellcheck quill."
"Those are known to be rather faulty."
"I know. That's why I never use them. But at least I know how to spell in the first place!" She put away Betty's parchment, not wanting a headache, and looked at Snape. "So, enough small talk. What did you want to talk about, Professor?" She used the title rather sarcastically and he raised an eyebrow.
"Why would I want anything?" he asked, equally sarcastic.
"You always have an agenda. You would not be sitting here if you didn't have a specific reason for doing so."
"I didn't anticipate on seeing you here," he explained. "But since I did-"
"Here we go," she muttered.
"-I wanted to know how you were doing with the book," he finished with a smirk.
She raised an eyebrow back at him. "That's all?"
"Should there be anything else?" he countered. Madame Rosmerta brought him his food.
She shrugged, but picked up said book. "It's really helpful. I'm only halfway through, though. It's been a busy week. I was going to read more now, but…" She gestured at him as he ate.
"And have you practiced silently casting spells?"
"Yeah, I think I can do them more confidently now," she said. "I'm having difficulty with the subtle wand movements though."
"We can work on that together," he said waving it off. "Come tonight."
"But I haven't finished the book." He gave her a look that said it didn't matter and she grinned.
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Snape seemed rather pleased with Gwen's ability to cast spells silently. They were going to work on wand movement's later.
They spent the lesson working on Gwendolyn's speed. It was simple, really. Snape shot out disarming spells and stunners at a pace until Gwendolyn could confidently block them or flick another spell back, silently, of course. Once she had mastered a certain speed, he would go faster and faster until she was able to flick her wand just as quickly as he could.
"Perhaps we'll need to work on this once more," he concluded about two hours after they had begun.
"But I did well?" she asked.
"You did what you were supposed to do," he replied.
"But I did well," she concluded, her eyes twinkling with delight. Snape was definitely not one for compliments. He sat down on the couch and Gwen sat beside him and looked at him intently. They kissed for a moment, but then he pulled away.
"Gwendolyn, we need to talk about this," he said seriously. She felt her heart beating in fear. Hadn't she dealt with enough rejection this year? If Snape didn't even want to shag her anymore…
"Okay," she said simply.
"If… this is to become a regular occurrence, nobody can know," he said.
"Of course not!" She was relieved. Snape helped her forget Bill and Sirius and the horrible war looming over everyone and he seemed to want to shag her often. Maybe one day she wouldn't even think about Bill anymore.
"Gwendolyn, you cannot take this lightly," his voice and eyes extremely serious. "You can't tell your little friends. You can't tell any family. You can't tell Bill Weasley to try and make him jealous." She smirked, about to lie and say that she didn't care how Bill felt, but he continued. "Nobody. No Death Eater can know that I am sleeping with a member of the Order of the Phoenix."
"I…" She suddenly felt rather sad. "I don't have any friends anyway." It was rather true. Tonks was unhinged, Remus was with the werewolves, Betty was growing distant, and Sirius was dead. "There's nobody to tell."
"Very well."
"Anything else?" she asked, leaning in to kiss him again, her face only an inch away from his.
"This is just sex," he murmured. "Nothing more." She smiled and kissed him.
"Well, thank Merlin for that."
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Tackatatackatatackata went the typewriters in the office. It was a quiet day, for once, at the Daily Prophet. No big stories or breaking news. The London transfers were finally settled down. It was nearly noon on a Wednesday and not a sound could be heard but the ticking of the clock and the tackata of the typewriters.
October had flown by for Gwendolyn. Until today, work had been extremely hectic. The London office had officially closed down and a new extension was built to the Hogsmeade office. Big stories were a regular thing now and Gwen was constantly writing and working and helping the new transfers.
She and Harry had stopped writing each other, except to make plans to meet. More and more owls were being intercepted and neither of them wanted to take the risk. She had seen and spoken to him while on patrol in the school and when he had been on a Hogsmeade trip. He was doing well, he had said. Quidditch was good, his studies were good, and Snape was awful. Malfoy was up to something. Harry was one of Slughorn's little favorites. Gwen would bring him sweets and Quidditch snippets and he would vent to her. She had to admit that it was not only her most important assignment for the Order, but her favorite.
She went to the Burrow now only for meetings and to have tea with Mrs. Weasley once in a while. The kids were at school, Remus was with the werewolves, and Tonks was in counseling. Gwen was proud her friend was trying to defeat the depression, but she worried for her still. Tonks spent more time home than anywhere else nowadays and Gwen would visit her when Tonks was up to it.
Bill seemed to think they were friends ever since the train ride, but it was painful to be his friend. Although they didn't talk about Fleur often, seeing him smile at her and not being able to kiss his smile wounded her heart deeply. Fleur obviously didn't know Gwen and Bill had been together, for she would have been livid at seeing them speak. Still, she seemed a bit cold towards Gwen and always made a point to snog Bill after he spoke with Gwen, to Bill's ignorant delight and Gwen's demise.
But she only forgot Bill when she spent the night with Snape, which was a roughly once a week occurrence. She hadn't seen him in the village since that warm September day. The lessons were going better than Gwen had ever imagined- she was now quick and subtle with her dueling skills. They were working on expecting spells, which Gwen found difficult. Snape knew a myriad of spells and to guess which one he was going to use was an immense challenge. But Snape assured her that if she could guess what he was going to do, she could do it for any Death Eater.
And the sex was good. Really, really good. But he had not been kidding when he said it was just sex. He would not touch her after they shagged. Sometimes, he even got up and dressed and left the room to wander the halls or something. Snape had insomniatic tendencies. But despite often sleeping alone- or at least feeling like it- having someone to shag still felt nice. Her friendship with Severus- yes, she had started using his first name now- was slowly budding. It was nice to have an adult friend who didn't sugarcoat everything or need her to be emotionally available constantly. And perhaps it was odd that it was Severus, but it was fine for her. They were using each other to forget the war and that was perfectly okay. Sirius and Moody used to talk about how everyone did that in the First War, so why not now? Why not them?
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A.D. wants to see you tonight at 9.
-S.S.
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The journey to Dumbledore's office was a nostalgic one. She remembered being just a girl, going to see Dumbledore to talk about being a reporter. She must have annoyed him to no end, but he was always so gracious and kind. Dumbledore used to remind her of Father Christmas.
"Licorice wands," she told the gargoyle. "Do you ever get sick of people only saying names of sweets to you all the time?" The gargoyle looked at her with an irritated look.
"I'm a statue."
"Right," she muttered, hurrying up the stairs. She knocked on the big oak door and heard Dumbledore say she could enter.
"Hello, my dear," he said smiling, those blue eyes twinkling. She smiled back. She had always liked Dumbledore.
"Hello, Professor."
"Have a seat. Would you like a sherbet lemon?"
Gwendolyn laughed, "No thank you, sir." She took a seat across the desk from Dumbledore, the seat hundreds had inhabited before her and would inhabit after her.
"I've been meaning to speak with you since Sirius's death," he explained and she suddenly felt the wave of realization that Sirius was gone again. "I wanted to know how you've been handling it."
Bit late. "It was… difficult. But I guess I've decided that Sirius would have wanted me to be happy."
Dumbledore smiled. "That's a lovely way to think of it, Gwendolyn. Forgive me, but I've always been curious to know… if you and Sirius…"
Gwen's eyes widened and she shook her head. "No, no, no, we were just friends." She had seen him as more of a brother.
"I had to ask," Dumbledore admitted. "Old men like myself tend to be a bit nosey in the affairs of our younger friends."
She smiled kindly at him. "It's alright, Professor."
"And how was your first battle? I have told Alastor perhaps it was unwise to have thrown you into such a situation, but quite a few people had their first battles that day and returned physically unscathed."
"It was terrifying," she admitted. "I feel as though I escaped by sheer luck. But it's alright, I've been studying and preparing for the next one." She was rather proud of being proactive.
"Fantastic," he said cheerfully. "Well, this going much more smoothly than the conversation I had with our dear friend Nymphadora."
"I can imagine, sir," she said softly. Poor Tonks…
He asked about Harry and about work and about if she'd been to the Ministry lately. It went rather smoothly, until Dumbledore came to his final question.
"It has come to my attention that you are spending… extra time at Hogwarts."
Gwen was suddenly at a loss for words. Did Dumbledore know? Had Severus told him? Maybe Dumbledore just knew. He had to know who was in his school, after all. But why was he asking? She wasn't doing anything bad… not really. Maybe morally, if Dumbledore had opinions on premarital sex or something. The silence was getting awkward. "Yeah." Dammit…
"Do you believe it is hindering your job or work for the Order in any way?"
That was it. Dumbledore definitely knew. Or maybe he was trying to get her to admit to it. That was a very reporter-like thing to do.
"Absolutely not," she declared. "Severus has been giving me Defense lessons. That's how I've gotten so much better." She was sure Severus would not mind her telling Dumbledore that.
"Severus is an excellent teacher," Dumbledore said nonchalantly. Gwen inwardly groaned at her slip up.
"Yeah, he is," she replied.
"Well, Gwendolyn, I'm very glad to see that you are doing well," he said kindly. "I hope you have an excellent week and I will see you at the next Order meeting."
She smiled, thanked him, and left. The halls of Hogwarts were still dark and empty and she considered going down to the dungeons, to where she found solace. But she needed to be alone.