Author's Notes:

Thank you all for reading along and for your encouraging words in your reviews. I anticipate updating weekly.

Reviews and comments are always welcome.

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The rare stillness of shared human experience became a long silence inside The Three Broomsticks. Each living creature felt connected to something other than itself, skin no longer seemed to separate individuals, all were part of a larger body. They were a primitive group, a family held within the Earth's embrace, deep within a cave. And then the moment faded into a memory.

Wild clapping ensued. Tziganne stood, her green robes back in place, but her brow still gleaming with a fine sheen of sweat and her hair falling lankly over her shoulders. She brought her palms together, lowered her lips to her fingers and thanked the crowd. She moved through the tables back to Snape. He was standing, shaking his head in a bemused way, but his eyes sparkled with pride and desire. She winked at him, leaned up for a quick kiss and lowered herself back into the chair that Rosmerta was now standing behind.

"Oh, Tziganne, you're something, you are." Rosmerta said this quietly but with a tone that suggested it was a hard-earned compliment, her hand on the woman's shoulder. "You haven't changed a bit." Tziganne reached up and squeezed the older woman's hand.

Lupin leaned across Bera and fixed a heavy stare on Tziganne. "You've mastered the form."

She inclined her head and then nodded. "So, I hear. But I have been dancing all my life, before I could even walk, I'm told." She smiled at the werewolf, "Like all things, one gains a certain craftsmanship, from years of living. Even magic grows and improves."

"It's a charmed dance?" Hermione asked this accusingly, looking from one adult face to another, until her gaze settled on Tziganne.

Tziganne's eyes were intent on the girl's face, "I cast an age-old charm on the room, to entice a feeling of clan. If we were outside, gathered around a fire, late into the night, it would not be necessary. The music, of course, is magical. The dance is not, in the way you are thinking, charmed."

Hermione looked confounded and a bit suspicious. "But you caused images to appear in our minds?"

 Tziganne asked in quiet disbelief, "You believe I magicked some thoughts into your head?"

The girl colored deeply, Potter moved uncomfortably in his chair, Lupin and Eriksson shifted away from each other.

Snape observed this coolly, and then leaned into the table, "Miss Granger, it would appear that you have experienced," he paused, "some thing during Tziganne's dancing that you believe to have been caused by the dance and the dancer. In a way, you are correct. The dance may have encouraged a part of your mind to respond in kind, with images or emotions, a memory perhaps. However, your experience is unique to you and not, as I think you may fear, shared by others in the room or amongst this group."

"I, I, well," the girl was stammered, "I will take your word on it." She shook her head, "I've never seen a dance like that before. I mean, not in person."

"If not in person, then how? In books?" Bera asked this gently.

"I meant on the telly." Hermione answered quietly.

"Ah," Bera nodded, "Of course. I didn't realize you were muggle-born. That's a rather sterile way to experience things, I'm told."

"I suppose it is. Yes."

Harry nodded.

"Thank you. It was very beautiful," Hermione whispered to Tziganne and the other woman gave her an inquiring look. "The dance." The girl stood abruptly. "I think we need to get going now. Harry, don't you agree?" The boy nodded and pushed back from the table, reaching down for their packages on the floor. Snape and Lupin stood. Harry grasped Lupin's hand and shook it warmly. Lupin reached around the boy with his other hand and rubbed Hermione's arm. She nodded at this, but looked over at Snape.

He held her gaze, "Miss Granger." Her lips parted slightly, she stared at him, her gaze not wavering. After a long moment, he cocked one eyebrow and she closed her eyes. He turned his head, nodded quickly at Potter and resumed his seat.

Harry and Hermione turned as one and walked away.

Bera was watching Tziganne who was watching Hermione disappear through the crowded pub and then out the door into the late afternoon. She looked briefly at Snape who was exchanging a cryptic glance with Lupin. Tziganne then turned to Bera who raised her eyebrows and gave a small shake of her head.

"I believe that our work here is done," Tziganne said playfully to no one in particular. Snape grimaced and glanced down at the woman next to him.

"Tziganne," he admonished in dulcet tones. Lupin blushed.

"Something has gotten past me," Bera said. "We'd come to accomplish something? Tziganne?"

The dark woman leaned over and gave the blonde a kiss on her cheek. "Oh dear Bera. Nothing as serious as all that. And I did want you to meet Remus. I think you both have much in common." Bera had smiled at the kiss, but still looked hard at her friend.

Snape cleared his throat, "I'm afraid that I took the advice of a" he looked at Lupin, "well meaning friend, and I see now that perhaps I was concerned for naught."

"I wonder how each of you would feel if I began to converse in Norse, because that's about how well I'm following any of this." Bera's voice was silky and clear, humoured but firm, "I apparated for a little over an hour, across the Channel no less, and if there was a reason other than the one I was told, I would like to know it."

Lupin spoke, "I'm very glad you're here, Bera. And I'm glad you apparated all that way." Bera smiled at him. He continued, "I had suggested to Severus that perhaps an, ah, inappropriate interest in his person could be, um, cut out at the root if the existence of a long-term partner was discovered."

Bera furrowed her brow, looked from his face to the others and then laughed. "I think I understand." She reached for her drink and sipped it slowly, her eyes unfocused. "Poor Miss Granger."

Snape let out a short, barking laugh. Bera looked over at him slowly. "I had a girlhood crush on an older man. I cried for months when I found that my feelings would never be returned. But I did learn quite a bit from the miserable experience."  She paused, keeping her light eyes locked to Snape's dark ones, "I fear I had a similar comedown to the one Miss Granger has just had."

Snape raised an eyebrow in question and she continued, "Oh, I loved him passionately. He wasn't an instructor, he was a family friend. He was much older than I, let me think," she ran a slender fingertip around the rim of her glass, bringing a wet drop up to her lips, "I was sixteen and he must have been in his thirties. So, twice my age. He was different from all the boys I knew. He was smarter than anyone, worldly, he had just returned from North America when I decided I must simply have him for my own. I rather think the world had shrunk to just he and I. Everything in my world spun on the axis that I had made of him. You can well imagine how devastated I was when he brought his lover to dinner one evening in our home."

She paused and finished her drink. "Oh, yes. I hadn't known you see. Or perhaps I had known and just convinced myself that I was his true soul mate and that surely he would come to see me as the same." She blushed. "I remember feeling…I was completely stunned." All three of her tablemates were staring at her now and she looked from one face to another. She continued, "I don't think I had really thought of 'women' before that moment. I mean, thought of women as being creatures other than those like my own mother, my grandmothers and aunts. This woman, I remember her name, Katarine Galler, was in her thirties also, I assume. A mature woman, you see, who was not a mother but was something I no experience of. She was very attractive and quite intelligent and in no way aware that I was in love with her paramour. She worked for the Ministry, I think, something glamorous and mysterious. She was not like any of the women in our small village. I lived on a dairy farm with my parents and five siblings. I was very naïve. I think now, working with young people, that I was a very young sixteen year old girl.  But I read and read and read so many books and I thought I knew so very much, thought I felt at life so much deeper than others did." She shrugged. "It was good for me to meet her. To have my heart broken in that fashion. I broke it myself, didn't I?"

Snape raised an eyebrow at this and tilted his head to the side. "Perhaps."

Lupin cleared his throat and Bera turned towards him. His face seemed to reflect her injury back at her. She shrugged and smiled at him apologetically. He answered her with a thin rising of one corner of his mouth, but he had a sad look in his eyes.

"Oh, Bera," Tziganne whispered this and the horror in her voice reached across the table. "I'm sorry. I was insensitive."

Bera laughed and the sound was sincere, "By Skuld's Sisters, I didn't mean to be so maudlin. Please forgive me. It was a long time ago."

Still Tziganne stared at her, "Yet it still can bring you pain."

"It doesn't really. Not like that. I guess I feel badly for the girl," she shrugged. "I can identify."

"I cannot but I should be able to imagine it."

"Could we, perhaps, not continue this conversation on empty stomachs?" Snape pushed his empty glass away and downed the remainder of Tziganne's drink.

"Should we go someplace, Severus? Can we all go to dinner? Or perhaps make dinner? Where are you living, Remus?" Tziganne asked.

"I'm at the Black home, it's not a very welcoming place, but we could go there. I would love to cook for all of you," Lupin offered, looking at Bera.

Snape sighed. "Yes, there really is not much else to choose from for the evening's entertainment. I apologize if my plans were not quite complete regarding the weekend."

"No apology necessary, dearheart. Let's take Remus up on his offer and we will have an evening of good food and good friends." Tziganne stood. "We'll stop and pick up groceries and wine, yes?"

The group was all standing now, Lupin pulling Bera's chair out for her. Snape dropped two galleons on the table. They began to make their way towards the back of the pub.

As they passed the group of Scottish wizards rolling dice, one stood and blocked their way. He put his hand on Tziganne's arm. "You're a powerful witch, indeed, Tziganne." She inclined her head at his words. Severus put a hand on her other arm, "Ay, Snape, you're a lucky bastard, then. I can't help but wonder what kind of bait ye used to catch a fish like this one."

"I believe when discourse has sunk to this level, McBride, the only possible response to that would be, it's not the bait but the size of your lure."

A muffled squeak from Bera behind him and a low chuckle from Remus as Tziganne tucked her hand under Snape's arm and the four of them walked to the back of the room. They apparated to the sound of the Scotsmen's laughter.