Lorelei strolled past the line of students waiting for Filch to verify their permission slips for the Hogsmeade Weekend. The young people chatted about all the things they would do once they reached the village. She heard one boy mention Zonko's Joke Shop, an excellent place for her to find her cousin's son a birthday present. Cousin Ariel sent Howlers to any relative who forgot to pay tribute to her precious only child. Her blackmail was effective. Ickle Diddums had more toys than he could possibly play with. Lorelei chose to comply passive aggressively. She sent presents that Diddums loved and Ariel hated.
She drew in the clear, cool, October Day as she walked the familiar route to the village. She and Tonks travelled the same path to the Three Broomsticks several nights a week. She hoped Tonks hadn't told Remus about the singing incident.
Thinking about the meal she had shared with Severus, Lorelei smiled. They hadn't talked much, but just sitting across a rough work table with him was more romantic than any other date with any other man. While they ate, she had casually mentioned when she was meeting with Tonks at the Three Broomsticks. Well, attempted to be casual. The lifted brow of the clever man sitting across from her had implied otherwise. Severus hadn't responded to the veiled invitation, but she was hopeful that he would find his way there.
.
Inside Zonko's Joke Shop, Ron held up a Skive Box. "It's a ruddy copy of Fred and George's Skiving Snackbox!" He read the back. "Bleeding Nose Bonbon- yeah, right. Like that's not really a Nosebleed Nougat."
Hermione glanced out the window and said, "Professor Lorelei's outside, just staring off. Should we go see if she's all right?"
Ron peered over her shoulder. "I dunno. She looks a bit mental to me."
"She's not mental," Harry said. "She's . . . thinking about something."
"Like Luna Lovegood? Then you'd better go, Harry. You've got experience with loonies." Ron nudged his friend.
Harry left the shop and approached Professor Lorelei. "Are you all right, professor?"
She smiled. "Hello, Harry. Yes, Thanks. I was just wondering what to get my cousin's son for his birthday." She gestured to Zonko's. "Got any ideas?"
Harry nodded and led the way into the shop towards Hermione and Ron. "The professor's looking for a gift."
"What kind do you need?" Hermione asked.
"A Birthday gift for the ickle Diddums of an annoying cousin."
"You should visit my brothers' shop in Diagon Alley...Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes." Ron said.
"Gred and Forge?" Lorelei asked.
"You know Fred and George?"
"I wondered about those names," Professor Lorelei said. "I met them a couple of months ago. They were really sweet. Showed me where to find extendable ears." She chuckled. "Asked me out to dinner."
"Both of them?" Hermione asked.
"Yes, they wanted to take me someplace called The Burrow. I had something else on or I would've gone—what's funny?" Professor Lorelei asked when the three started laughing..
Hermione said, "The Burrow is the name of the Weasleys' home. Ron's older brother Bill was visiting and obviously the twins were going to take you home and show you off."
"If I'd only known," Professor Lorelei said. "I would've cancelled my plans." She told Ron, "Say hello for me, next time you see them." She gazed around the shop. "What do you recommend for my ickle cousin?"
"Whizzing Worms," said Harry.
Ron said, "Belch Powder."
Professor Lorelei looked at Hermione.
Hermione said, "I'd buy both."
.
Lorelei made her purchases and stopped by the post office before heading to the Three Broomsticks. The streets of Hogsmeade glowed golden in the fading sunlight. She gazed appreciatively at the picturesque thatched shops and cottages. Many of the cottages had wreaths of vine and leaves upon their doors, and a few spectacularly decorated homes were worthy of Bewitching Homes and Gardens. Her favourite cottage had children playing in the front yard, jumping into enchanted piles of leaves. The magicked piles gathered themselves back together after each jump scattered the leaves across the lawn. Lorelei waved to the children and strolled on.
In the Three Broomsticks, Lorelei noticed that the students had gone back to school and only adults remained. She removed her cloak and she searched the warm, crowded pub for her friend.
A cheery voice cried, "Wotcher, Lorelei!"
Lorelei saw Tonks waving from a table near the fireplace. She waved back and got a Butterbeer from the bar before walking over to the table where Tonks and her partner Remus were seated.
"Hello." Lorelei sat across from the couple and looked curiously at the man her friend called The Best.
"It's a pleasure to meet you," Remus said warmly, following Tonks' introduction.
He was totally different than expected. Somehow, Lorelei had anticipated that the vivacious young woman would have an equally energetic boyfriend. Remus Lupin was quiet and charming, around Severus' age, but with grey threading his light brown hair. His soft brown eyes were kind, and merry in a much more subtle way than his partner's. He wore clean, slightly shabby wizard robes while Tonks wore a lime green jumper to match today's spiky hair. Observing the pair together, Lorelei mused how complimentary the couples' differences were. Their affection for each other was heart-warming...and envy inspiring.
Remus said, "Tonks tells me you're quite the singer."
The gleam in his eyes belied the casual tone of his question. Lorelei shot Tonks a look promising later retaliation and. "I sing a bit now and again."
He didn't press for more information. Gentlemanly, he changed topic. "What's it like working with Snape? My cheeky darling tells me that he's jealous of your sterling record."
"He's jealous that she doesn't have to terrorize children to make them learn," Tonks said.
"I think Professor Snape and I rub along quite well, considering." Lorelei felt her face heat as she told herself to stop thinking of rubbing along Severus. The curious and quick looks at each other told the blushing woman that Remus and Tonks were wondering about her interesting reaction. Desperate to divert their attention, Lorelei said, "How about another round?"
Remus considerately rose and asked what he could get them before heading back to the bar.
"So?" Tonks asked after a few minutes.
"Mmm, let me think. He's handsome, intelligent, witty, and madly in love with you." She grinned. "He's a keeper."
"And they say eavesdroppers never hear good of themselves." Remus smiled as the women startled like guilty schoolgirls caught in a gossip.
Tonks jumped up to help Remus with the drinks. Lorelei watched as her friend hesitated, standing with her back to Lorelei, for a moment. Tonks soon turned and placed a foaming mug of Butterbeer in front of Lorelei. Seated again by her partner, she raised her mug. "Cheers."
Lorelei took a long drink and frowned. "D'you notice the drinks taste funny?" she asked the couple across from her. Actually, she was starting to enjoy the taste. She drank some more.
"I noticed Tonks had her wand out before she gave you that drink," Remus said.
Tonks squirmed in her chair for a moment and then said, "I put a charm on the drinks. I just wanted her to try something other than that bloody . . . ." Tonks trailed off under Remus' level gaze.
"S'what am I drinking?" Lorelei peered into the large empty mug. She turned it upside down. "Was drinking." She laughed. "Have drunk?"
"Drunk being the operative word." Remus said.
Tonks cried, "She can't get plastered from a tankard of mulled mead."
"Well..." Lorelei placed a finger to her lips. "I don' usually share my fam'ly hist'ry, but if you pinky promise not to tell." She waited for their solemnly amused promises and said, "Y'know my mum works for Siren Cosmetics?"
Tonks nodded.
"It's one of the fam'ly corporations...y'know...Sirens?" Lorelei waved her hands about airily. "Not 'lot of booze in the ocean, luvs...low alcohol tolerance s'practially a fam'ly trait. Sad, that."
"That's the second time you've used that word when you obviously aren't." Tonks snickered. "I do not think it means what you think it means."
"Too right, I'm not sad- now." Lorelei pointed to the wizard standing in the doorway. She watched him glide through the crowd to sit at a table in a shadowed corner of the room. "S'nice to meet you Remus." She tossed her cape over her arm and said, "Bye Tonks...gotta talk to a man about a...something."
She heard Tonks exclaim to Remus as she walked off, "Lorelei's going over to chat up Snape?"
Remus chuckled. "There's someone for everyone."
.
Severus traced a fingertip around the rim of his glass of firewhisky as he tracked Lorelei's sauntering progression to his table. His voice of reason had recommended staying home with a good book in lieu of keeping this ridiculous assignation. After all, he hadn't promised to meet Lorelei here, he just hadn't said no. Perhaps he should feel uneasy at how often he ignored his voice of reason, but he wasn't. He was too preoccupied with wondering what to dowith the woman who had just sat down in the chair next to his.
"Hiya, Severus." The glow in her eyes and the seductive smile on her face were extremely attractive.
"Have you been drinking?"
"How did you know? Wait. I gotta do something." Lorelei tapped their heads gently with her wand.
He felt nothing.
"Obfuscation Charm." She shot a glare across the room. "Nosy friends won't be watching private conversations like telly now, will they?"
"You're referring to Tonks and Lupin?"
"Yeah, and Yeah—yeah to the referring, and yeah to the drinking. Only accidentally, the drinking part, Tonks made mulled mead look like Butterbeer." She looked at him earnestly. "No way she could'a known about the siren/alcohol thingy."
Ha. He always knew she was a siren. Filing that interesting information away, Severus contemplated the slightly inebriated woman leaning towards him, inches away. She was staring back with a dreamy expression. He was sorely tempted to take advantage of the situation. Regretfully, taking physical advantage was out of bounds. Deciding anything mental was fair game, Severus asked, "Did you attend Hogwarts?"
"I didn't attend any school." At his look of disbelief, Lorelei giggled. "I took my NEWTS at Durmstrang, and my OWLS at Beauxbatons, but I never attended anywhere. I was needed me with her, and we were always moving. I received an excellent education," she said. "Marina was a muse for lots of brilliant wizards, and I did correspondence courses with everyone on the students' required reading list. I'm a good teacher—no classroom accidents."
Severus was at a loss. He had thought Lorelei one of those popular girls like Cho Chang. Discovering that she had never had a normal school life made him feel...something he didn't want to deal with. He asked, "How on earth have you managed to teach without accidents?"
Lorelei's face lit up. "I've been waiting forever for you to ask me that! I invented a charmed cauldron when I assisted Miranda Goshawk for a few months before I started teaching. She helped me fiddle the spell combination, and there I had it- a cauldron that glowed in response to the potion inside." She giggled. "I based it on a Muggle stoplight. Green glow, good potion; yellow glow, fix something fast; Red glow -Evanesco!"
"Why haven't you patented the cauldron?" Severus couldn't understand why she would teach instead of making galleons off her ingenious invention.
"I have." Lorelei moved closer to whisper, "Ministry gave me a proviso patent for personal and professional use only. Can't manufacture it, might upset the economy. D'you know how many factories make cauldrons?"
"No. How many?"
"Dunno- that's why I asked you!" Lorelei dissolved into merry peals of laughter.
Daft woman. He should accompany her back to Hogwarts before she realised that he had gained informatio while she had learnt nothing more about him. He rose and extended his arm in the gesture that had made her grin like a fool after the episode with Peeves. How surprising, she was grinning like a fool again. A tempting fool, whose lips parted in invitation.
"May I accompany you?" Severus forced himself to ask calmly, indifferently.
"You may."
Severus helped Lorelei into her cloak, and together they made their way into the night.
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A/N: Freely admit to borrowing JK's luvly world & characters for my story. Also confess that I used a line from the Princess Bride and took inspiration for my sloshed siren from Cap'n Jack Sparrow. Shakespearean and proud of it I be, me hearties!
