In the dark of night, all was quiet. The students were all asleep (as far as Agnes or any other staff on patrol knew). Her heels clacked on the castle floors as she walked in the darkness. Agnes paused to gaze upon the night sky through a window. Based on the positioning of the stars, her patrol shift was almost to an end. Sighing with relief, Agnes started for the dungeons. By the time she would make it to her chamber door, her patrol would be over.

At last, Agnes arrived to the doorway to her home in Hogwarts. As she turned the doorknob, Agnes froze before she completely opened the door. A familiar meow had broken the usual silence. Agnes looked down to meet the green eyes of Beatrice. Agnes furrowed her brow in confusion. Why was Beatrice in the corridor instead of in the living chambers? Usually Beatrice was content with lazying about on the bed, or sitting on the window sill. The calico meowed again. Agnes looked to the cat then to the the door before her.

Agnes swept her foot to push the cat behind her. She pulled her wand out from the inside of her boot as she proceeded to open the door.

With caution behind every step, Agnes crept into what was supposed to be her safe place. Beatrice meowed and charged ahead "brr"ing the whole way.

Tch! Damn cat. Get yourself killed, then!

Based on the location of the thud that was heard, Agnes guessed that Beatrice had launched herself on to the bed. With no harm being done to the cat, Agnes relaxed and stepped further into the threshold.

She closed the door behind her as she transferred her cloak to the nearby coat hanger stand.

Agnes sighed and ran a hand through her hair. After taking a couple steps forward, she froze. Her breathing and body came to a complete halt.

There they stood before her - the intruder. Their back was to her, but Agnes' best bet was to assume they already knew she was there.

Agnes rose her wand to chin level anticipating any sudden movements. The silhouette did not move. They both stood there in deafening silence - waiting on one or the other to make a move. Neither did.

Finally Agnes spoke, "What is it that you want?"

The Intruder said nothing at first. Letting the echo of Agnes' last spoken syllable ring in the darkness. Slowly, at least it seemed to happen slowly, the intruder turned their head in Agnes' direction. The moonlight beamed off of their pale skin. Agnes studied their profile and instantly flared with anger.

"I believe, Professor Blackwood, that I have been continuously asking you that very same question. Unfortunately, you have yet to give me any form of answer. So tell me, Agnes, what are you doing here? More importantly, what is it that you want?"

"Dammit, Snape," Agnes dropped her arms in frustration. "I don't have time for any games!"

Severus spun around within the flash of a second, clearly sharing Agnes' frustration. "This isn't a game you insufferable woman! Now tell me what it is that you are doing here."

Agnes sighed, "To better my life."

"Try again. Why are you here?"

"To better my life by having a job."

"Liar. Why are you here?"

"Fine!" Agnes yelled. "I have no reason to be here other than to better my life! I have no evil plot; no diabolical scheme. I am not planning anything to bring down Hogwarts. I merely wanted a job!"

Agnes had hoped that her answer would satisfy him, but it only infuriated Severus more.

"Liar! You compulsive liar! After everything you've done and everything that you're capable of doing, you expect me to believe that nonsense? Do you honestly expect me to believe a dirty, no good Death Eater?"

"Now, wait just a minute!"

"Oh, there it is! Are you finally going to show your true colors?"

"Shut up!" Agnes gruffly growled. "Just what gives you the right to judge others? What gives you the right to judge me?

"We both have the same colors, Severus - silver and green. We both walked similar paths of life. We both have done terrible things, though one person's deeds more heinous than the other's. You have no right to judge me. You yourself were once a Death Eater; Voldemort's right hand man at that!"

Severus cringed at His name.

"I bet you still have the Mark as well as I. You believe yourself to be perfect, but all the Ajax in the world couldn't clean your dirty laundry, Severus. Neither could it mine. We are almost one and the same minus the degree of our deeds."

Severus said nothing. All he did was continue to glare at Agnes.

Tears spilled from Agnes' eyes as she endured the silence.

"You are the Death Eater who killed her fellow Death Eaters - your own parents."

"Severus, you don't understand."

"Confess. Then maybe I will go easy on you."

"It was the will of the Dark Lord."

"Well that's no surprise there," Severus scoffed.

"No, stop interrupting me.

"It was the will of the Dark Lord that we raid that Wizarding community. This was about the time the Dark Lord was seeking the Child of Prophecy. Someone had given the Dark Lord false information on the location of the Potter's. This was before their true location was discovered."

Agnes paused to allow any unpleasant memories clear from Severus' mind before she continued. She knew that he was the one who gave that false information.

"What does that have to do with your parents?"

"I was getting to that," Agnes took a moment to light a cigarette. "The task to raid the little community was given to my family - my mother, my father, my cousin, and I. A friend of mine, who had no idea that I came from a family of Death Eaters, lived in that community. I knew almost everyone personally, and I had grown tired of killing innocents for a long, long while.

"It angered me that my parents took so much enjoyment from doing the Dark Lord's work. There were fires in the fields burning the crops. There were fires burning most, if not all, of the houses. I had finally snapped when my parents were having fun torturing a young boy before they were to kill him. It was either him or them. They encouraged me to perform the Killing Curse. They were the ones who died - not the boy.

"I ran after that. Me running was what you had seen when you invaded my mind. You had caught me off guard.

My cousin was able to summon the Dark Lord's Mark into the sky before a wizard defending the community had killed her. I was the only witness. I had told the Dark Lord that my parents were the ones who had betrayed him. He was shocked, but my Occlumency was strong. So, he believed me."

Severus was still silent as though he expected more.

"I only did what I had to do to stay alive, Severus," Agnes sighed.

"There's something else that I saw in your memories." Severus completely ignored her last statement. "It made me recall a past altercation between us. During our years as Hogwarts students, you were spying on me in the dungeons. Why?"

"Well," Agnes blushed. "I wanted to be your friend."

And maybe a little bit more.

"I just didn't know how to approach you. You always looked so troubled."

Tears once again stained Agnes' cheeks as she began to cry. "All I've wanted to do was to impress you and earn your acceptance. That's why I came to Hogwarts! I wanted to show you that I was willing to turn my life around."

"Oh, posh! You don't need my approval. It couldn't be that difficult to trick or brainwash people into believing that you have good intentions."

"I'm not brainwashing anyone," Agnes yelled through the tears. "I wanted you to like me. Love me even, Merlin permitting. You were my first and only crush. As I watched you through our Hogwarts years, I fell in love with you. But no, you had to have your eyes solely for her! The girl that got away who turned into the woman you could never have! Completely blind to those who were right in front of you all along. You forced yourself to live a life of misery and loneliness.

"Do you have any idea how much that hurt me? A whole fucking lot. It hurt me because I love you, Severus Snape; but I forced myself to live a life of misery and loneliness. Because I only have eyes for the boy that got away who turned into the man that I could never have."

Silence. Again with the silence. Severus stood with his mouth slightly ajar. This was a rare occasion where Severus was showing some form of emotion and Agnes couldn't even enjoy it.

"Say something!" Agnes demanded.

Severus regained his composure and his visage, once again, became unreadable.

"Goodnight, Blackwood."

Within a puff of black smoke, Severus vanished to some other part of the castle. Either to his office or chambers; Agnes could only guess.

Agnes flopped onto the bed with a sigh. She felt a heavy weight lifted from her shoulders with her confession of her love for Severus, but, as she petted Beatrice, Agnes wondered if in the end it was all for the best.

Could she deal with any pain that may come with Severus knowing her feelings?

Hi guys. I finally found some time to write after making a schedule for my son to sleep every night and it's going well.

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