Anything that's not blatant is
a riddle
Please read and review if you can!
Author's penname: Elixa Amethyst
Voices of the Past Part II
Written March 2002 onwards, pre Order of the Phoenix.
All characters and things you recognise, are © JKRowling, no infringement
intended.
All references to
"mediwizard" mean healer.
Read Part I at ?storyid1672635
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Chapter Twelve
All Part of Getting Used To It
"I understand why you don't know the answers necessarily to Professor McGonagall's questions. Neither of us particularly likes to pry out of place. We respect each other's privacy." Severus remained silent.
"She has offered a sympathetic ear, but I haven't taken it." I said more quietly. Still Severus didn't reply. He was looking into the fire.
"Why do I get the feeling I'm talking to myself?" I asked, rubbing my arms in an effort to warm up. Severus moved from the fire to one of the bookshelves. I watched him select a book from the third shelf and bring it towards me. He sat down beside me and opened the book. I quickly saw a waving girl on the front page, which looked like me, but was my mother.
"Your father no doubt destroyed all photographs of me and probably your mother's parents, and your mother's parents destroyed all trace of Adia, apart from these." Severus passed the album to me. I leafed through it, reading the captions. I noticed how quiet Severus was, just watching the fire with his unreadable black eyes. I stood up quietly and put my knowledge into action. Snape didn't seem to notice that I was soon stirring a potion in a cauldron over the fire he was still staring at ten minutes later. I ladled some of the potion into a glass and let it cool for a few minutes. I walked over to Severus and handed him the glass.
"Ignatia infusion. It should help." Severus glanced up momentarily; the fact that I'd just created a potion to combat silent grief started to register in his mind.
"Thank you." He said quietly. I went back to the cauldron and took it off the fire, letting it cool before I bottled it. I sat down again beside Severus and continued to look through the album.
Someone knocking at the door came into my dream, it didn't quite fit because I was dreaming about the garden of my parents' house, and I was turning to see them sitting by the house. I heard a door open, and in my dream I looked to the back door which was shut.
"Morning you two." Why was Professor Dumbledore in my dream? Then suddenly I realised it wasn't part of the dream, and woke. It was morning, I must have fallen asleep in the office last night, I realised my head was on Severus's shoulder, and his head was resting on mine. How it had happened, I didn't know. We both pulled away, embarrassed. Dumbledore thankfully had shut the door behind him, and he was only the one wise to the waking. In my arms was the album, the people in the photos were waking too. The headmaster picked up the book I'd been found with in the night, his blue eyes regarding it with interest.
"I overheard two of your fellow Slytherin seventh years talking about you being missing, and along with Mr Filch's report of a sleep walker, and Professor McGonagall's report that Professor Snape had escorted you back to your dormitory, I suspected correctly." Dumbledore said to me.
"We must have fallen asleep, last thing I remember was looking at the photos." I stood up and walked around the back of Severus to put the album back on the third shelf.
"You haven't missed breakfast completely, but your presence at breakfast won't particularly be missed I shouldn't think. I'll take this back to the library for you. Do be careful with books like this Miss Amethyst, your wand combined with your character gives you the potential of a dark arts follower…" I replied slightly more timidly.
"I will be Professor. Thank you for coming to find us discreetly." Severus was sat in his chair still, his eyes sleepy, and so far he'd been silent.
"I do believe Miss North will be taking an exam this morning in potions Severus? Any thoughts on her results?" Dumbledore asked as I cleared the cauldron from the previous night away.
"There is a possibility she'll pass, but I don't guarantee that it is a great possibility." Dumbledore nodded, and then left the office. As he did, two breakfasts appeared on Snape's desk. I heard him get up from the chair and pour another glass of the ingatia infusion as I wiped the cauldron clean.
"Susan will be taking her exam in the seventh year lesson this morning, it will probably be interesting watching her." He told me in a soft voice, which came from slightly behind me and to the left. I hadn't heard Severus walk across the room, and it surprised me slightly. What surprised me further was when he tucked a piece of my hair behind my ear without warning. I stopped and turned my head slowly to look at him. In those black eyes, I sensed both mourning and a hint of warmth.
"You look very like Adia." He told me, and then looked towards the desk. I turned back to the stone sink, blaming the out of character action on the potion I'd made for him.
Susan was anxious about her exam, clutching a second year potions book to her chest as we stood outside the potion lab, waiting for Snape to appear.
"Do you think I'll pass? I mean, I'm not that great at potions, as you know, but I've learnt so much…" I thought it was unlikely that she could have learnt the entire course for first year potions in less than a term, but the exam would find that out.
"Professor McGonagall says I've got the potential to be a very good witch, it's just learning to control the magic in me." I bristled, the feeling all more familiar to me now I'd been a cat. Susan could well have some of my power, and it could wear off.
"Seventh year students and Miss North, you may enter the lab." Snape's voice came down the corridor from the stairs down to the dungeon classroom, and we walked into the lab.
"Miss Amethyst, I want you at the front this lesson again, Miss North, there should be room if Elixa isn't going to take up the whole of the desk." I'd started to get used to the put downs that Severus slipped in, they reminded me firmly of my place as a student, and helped to stop any rumours of favouritism, especially since the whole school knew we were related.
"Oh yes, and Miss Amethyst, Miss North certainly doesn't want any help in passing her exam this morning." There was laughter from behind me as I sat down.
"Page four hundred, the use of plating potions in preserving artefacts, I want three scroll essays from all of you by the end of the lesson. Working in silence." We set to work. Snape then spoke to Susan about her exam, handed her a piece of parchment and sat down at his desk, keeping an eye on Susan every little while. I put my concentration into the essay, but kept an eye out should Susan make a mistake that would explode her cauldron or similar. Amazingly she seemed to be managing quite well…
Something brushed against my leg. I glanced down and saw a tail wrap around the bottom of my leg, black with a white tip. I tried not to panic, as long as I didn't provoke it, I wouldn't be scratched or bitten. I didn't particularly want to spend time being a cat again, especially in term time. A head appeared, and I tried to ignore the cat. I didn't know what it was doing in here anyway? Perhaps it belonged to Susan. Keep working Elixa… ignore the purring…the voice in my head repeated.
