Disclaimers and notes:

All things not Allosia belong to JKR.

This review thing is interesting, it both inspires me and dejects me. Oddly, I'm finding it more important to me to get these folks as they are in my head right, than it is for people to receive my original work well - I guess because my original work is all about projecting my imagination, and in an odd way, this is all about projecting little pieces of myself. Fan fic is weird, but I'll spare you further philosophizing here.

This is from Snape's perspective, and has a lot of insight into his issues, as the next several chapters will. Enjoy.

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Snape however, was wrong. Other than the usual unpleasantness of attempting to teach the uninspired and the willfully uneducable, nothing else happened as the week finished out. There were no more letters, only two melted cauldrons, and Allosia was giving him much needed space aside from reminding him of his perhaps misguided agreement to go to Hogsmeade with her.

As if I'm pleasant to be around right now, he thought to himself, before amending that to, as if I'm pleasant. He was not sure if there was anything she truly saw in him other than a challenge and someone who was at least somewhat tolerant of her moods and contradictions.

As he dressed for the outing, fastening manually instead of magically the tiny buttons that were the only decoration on most of his wardrobe, he felt as if he were armouring himself. And he supposed he was. The list of potential threats was long as his day to day fears were neither Death Eaters nor their horrors, but simple things, like strangers, and cruel children. He had the self-control to be a spy in a very dangerous and probably ultimately deadly situation, but not the self-control to banish the small paranoias of people perhaps mocking him from his mind. Smart children and only, they always go wrong somehow, he thought and grimaced.

In many ways, the brighter the student the crueler he was. Not that it was as overt as the tortures he saved for the likes of Longbottom, but those who could step up to the knowledge deserved recognition from him and yet, mostly all he could do is watch them with mistrust, because afterall, they could wind up just like him.

He tugged at his cuffs, and smoothed at front of his cloak, waiting for Allosia to arrive. He hoped he would manage to feel less dread once she was actually in his presence. Since the night she had spent, they had barely talked, and he was relieved. He knew, oddly, how to make people want him, but not what to really do with them beyond the carnal once they did. He made another face at himself and sighed in relief as he heard her kick at his door and say his name. Allosia never knocked, she insisted it hurt her hands.

He muttered the charm and gestured at the door and it swung open for her. He managed to smile broadly, but wonder if it looked merely like the imitation of a more human gesture that was lost to him. Then he noticed she was carrying her broom.

"We're not flying are we?" he asked.

"I thought we might," she said, smiling broadly.

Snape sighed. He hated flying in daylight. Hated it. He claimed the sun bothered his eyes, which was a feeble although somewhat true excuse. Mostly, he'd just never gotten over being laughed at as a child. And as imposing as he was now, he still sometimes felt, especially when it was light out, that he had no right to be up there. The worst part was, Allosia knew all this.

He gave her a sharp look, as if to say I know exactly what you are up to, but acquiesced. "As you wish, although, I'd hope we'll,"

She cut him off, "be discrete? Don't worry, did you think I was going to have us do a loops of the Quidditch stands first?"

"It would not have shocked me."

She raised an eyebrow. "Indeed. Now shall we?"

She gestured towards the door and he summoned his broom. It was going to be a long day.