Disclaimer: Dove and Raven are mine (still) but nooooobody else. I made up Vessum Hill and the teensy incantation. Otherwise, nothing big here.

The Winged Serpents

Chapter Three: The Relative Past

***

Dove curled up on her bed. She had been waiting for nearly a half an hour now in the tiny apartment that she and Raven shared. She wanted to be sure Raven was gone before she started. She glanced around the room. It was practically empty. There was a fireplace on the far left wall and a small rug in front of it. Along the back wall was Raven's bed, a small table underneath the only window with some parchment and an Inkless Quill on top of it, and then her own bed. Against the far right wall were two medium-sized oak wardrobes, each only about half-full. And on the wall across from her was...nothing. Just the door to the outside world, overlooking Vessum Hill, a small town only a few miles away from Diagon Alley. There were a few Muggles about, but not many. Vessum Hill, while not Unplottable, was certainly hard to find.

Dove and Raven had chosen to live here as it had been a favorite spot for their father to take them as children. There was a little park just down the road where the swings pushed themselves if you said the right words. Besides that, the rent was low, and the neighbors made no effort to acquaint themselves with one another. The last thing Dove needed was Raven hexing a little old witch over a cup of borrowed Sinleaf.

Raven, right. She's probably there by now. Dove straightened up, remembering her task. She unrolled the parchment they'd received the day before. It looked as if it had been sitting in a drawer for a few years, and the bottom was torn across, but it was otherwise entirely ordinary. Or it seemed that way. Dove just wanted to be sure that all was as it seemed. While Raven was away in Diagon Alley, she had been given permission from her sister to tamper with the scrap as she wished. Pointing her wand at the scrap, she whispered Prior Scriptoris and watched the words on the parchment jumble about. Most of the letters moved to the edges of the parchment, but a few stayed framed within near the center and rearranged themselves to form the name Russell Thomas.

Dove gasped to see the name. Having been re-written with the letters it seemed he had, in fact, written, the name came out looking almost as his signature. Her father's signature. Tears welled up behind her eyes, but she did not allow them to fall. She whispered a few more words and watched the parchment blink and light up, curl around the edges and rewrite itself. There seemed to be no form of deception behind the note. So he had written it, and with good intentions. But why did it take so long to reach us? Why was there no accompanying letter of explanation? She tried a few more spells and charms on the small scrap before giving up. Raven would be back soon. But she resolved to find out more by any means necessary and, replacing the parchment on the table, prepared for her sister's return.

***

Raven wandered aimlessly down the cobbled street. Diagon Alley was especially crowded now, with only a few more days to start of term. She had already purchased the books they would need for their fifth year, and their school robes were being retailored even as she walked. The brand new cauldrons filled with the numerous vials and packets for Potions floated along quietly behind her. She passed by a group of kids no more than thirteen and wondered what they were looking at...Ah yes, that's right. The Firebolt had just been released. Has just been released, she chided herself, remembering what time she was in. This is going to take just a bit more getting used to. She padded quickly inside. She still had a few galleons left, and there was no harm in looking. She wouldn't be needing a new broom, of course. She and Dove had bought a couple of like-new Firebolts on sale before taking the two-year jump back. They may be expensive now, but in a couple of years they would be outdated like everything else, and not too hard to pick up.

What she would be needing, however, were some new wrist pads. She and Dove had been Beaters before their little hiatus, and they had kept up some rather informal conditioning through it all. It had been one of the few things that gave them a real sense of pleasure, and it had kept their mind on what lay ahead rather than who lay next to them. Raven's mind suddenly exploded with anger. She remembered Mother's words as she had thrown the two girls into the tiny house ahead of her. You're going to help me out, understand? Any way I deem necessary. And I don't want to hear a word about it, or else. She'd taken away their wands and locked the precious instruments inside a drawer next to the huge bed in the back room. The bed...Raven's throat constricted at the memories. But she pushed them aside and regained her focus on the wrist pads hanging on hooks against the far wall. Grabbing two pairs, one for herself and one for Dove, she stalked to the counter and paid. Then she left the store in a hurry.

Stopping only to pick up the robes from Madame Malkin's, she raced back home to the tiny apartment, eager to get her mind on something else. Anything else.

***

Professor Snape sat staring in the darkness at the spot across from him where he knew a bookcase stood. He was seated at his desk with quill in hand, as if preparing to write. He had hardly believed his ears when Dumbledore had told him about the twins the night before, but it had begun to make sense the more he thought about it. A few pieces still didn't fit, but he felt sure that it was because Dumbledore had left a few things out, not because it was wrong.

He'd always assumed the prophecy was a joke, not to be taken seriously. It was only a story from magical children's fairy tale books, a simple tale. It wasn't true, surely. But he had seen the look in Dumbledore's eyes as he had spoken. It was no tale, the Winged Serpents would come indeed, and it seemed they finally had.

Snape growled at the thought of it, such horrible timing. Why couldn't they have come earlier? Why not before all of this had gotten out of hand? Surely they could have helped. But he knew, in the back of his mind, that it wasn't so. The Winged Serpents were healers, protectors. They were not heroes. They were fallible like everyone else, it even said so in the fairy tale. One of them always died in the end to prove their simple fragile nature. Snape bit back a shiver as a thought streamed across his mind. A line of some long-forgotten poem pierced his brain. But when the moon and star converge/The Two shall lose the One.

The shivers wouldn't be ceased now. He thought of the two girls who had sat so proudly in the front row of his classes all these years. They weren't terribly adept at Potions, although they could carry out any number of complex instructions. But it wasn't because they were skilled at Potions, only at listening to and carrying out directions. They never seemed to grasp why the different concoctions worked the way they did. Or how one liquid could have so many different possible outcomes by adding the same ingredients in different ways. The understanding had always eluded them, no matter how hard they tried. And they had always tried very hard to succeed for him.

For me, he thought suddenly. He knew it was true, he had seen it in their eyes once as he had exploded over a few careless students. They knew how angry it made him to feel unappreciated, to feel as if his skills and hard work were unappreciated. And they had immediately set out to remedy it by forcing his Potions class to the top of their list of Priorities. They had begun to sneak into the Potions classroom after curfew, experimenting and practicing. It wasn't terribly uncommon for the two to show up with singed eyebrows or purple fingers after one of their little excursions. He's known it was them, they'd been a tad careless with their cleaning up. Although it had occurred to him some time ago that they might have done it on purpose so that he would know it was them. And he had been grateful for it. He purposely left the dank classroom door keyed to them so that they might brew without interruption late at night.

He had never told them, of course. They were Slytherins, and therefore received better treatment than other Houses, and even possibly better treatment than their fellow Slytherins. But he had never told them. And he didn't intend to. But he appreciated the effort nonetheless, and admired their seeming...What is it? he wondered to himself. What is it that makes them do it? Admiration, perhaps? No, although they did not hide their admiration, it wasn't what drove them to try so hard to lessen his emotional burden. Devotion seemed the right word, but he didn't feel he had the right to apply it to himself.

A thousand ideas rushed past his eyes, most of them rather pleasant. He surprised himself with is own willingness to believe that whatever it was they felt towards him, it was something he should be glad for rather than afraid of. He knew they were not against him somehow, and it was a feeling he was unused to. He'd only ever felt that around Dumbledore. Strange that such thoughts should materialize so suddenly. Last week, I might not have given either of them a second thought past some small amount of gratitude for their hard work. But now...now I can't help but read into everything they've ever done. Every word they've spoken, every gesture they've made, every look...He shrugged himself back into a saner realm of thought. I'm probably overanalyzing. I shouldn't be giving them so much thought, and yet...his thoughts broke off suddenly, and his face went white in the darkness. The last line rushed at him once more with full force. And yet, if the story's true...then one of them will die.

***