Fanfiction based in the world of Harry Potter, created by JKR. Her
characters are hers. Original characters are mine. Please see first
chapter for full disclaimers and description.
Thank you to my beta, Elaine!
Occlumency with Harry.
Chapter 18: Murky Waters, Shaky Ground
Rowena led Harry to the small seating area by her fireplace in her office. She sat comfortably in one of the plush chairs and conjured hot tea. As she poured for both of them, she looked at him appraisingly.
Harry Potter was a tall, lanky, teenage boy with the sour attitude that often accompanies the teen years. Rowena had fought the urge to dislike him instantly, when she first saw him at the Memorial in June, simply due to his striking resemblance to his father. But the truth of the matter was that he had none of James's flamboyant arrogance. Instead he was angry, sarcastic and bitter. Harry sat silently brooding, slumped in the other plush chair, arms folded aggressively across his chest, plainly in no hurry to open any conversation. Nor did he touch the teacup in front of him. She sipped her tea a moment contemplatively, trying to think of a way to reach this sullen boy.
It was his volatile emotions that made Albus ask her to teach his Occlumency. Harry needed to learn from someone that didn't inspire strong emotions in him by their mere presence.
This would be a harder task than she originally thought. At this particular moment, Harry had a chip the size of a dragon on his shoulder and a bitter sneer on his face that Severus would not have been ashamed to wear himself. Rowena had a sudden realization that there were many similarities between those two: Harry Potter and Severus Snape, though she was quite certain the comparison would not be appreciated by either, no matter how apt.
"Harry, you know why you are here. I know you had some rather unpleasant experiences with Occlumency last year. We're going to try and sort of forget about that and start fresh today," she said at last, setting her cup on the coffee table.
"You may call me Rowena or Miss Lupin here, whatever you feel more comfortable with. I don't really feel much like a "Professor" most of the time, and it seems rather formal considering the work we're going to do, don't you think?"
From what she had seen and heard, he seemed to have serious difficulty with authority figures. Perhaps by not holding that over his head, he would lighten up a bit.
His startling green eyes glanced at her uncertainly. He shrugged, "All right, Rowena, then."
His voice was sullen, his tone defiant. "Snape didn't teach me anything. He just told me to clear my mind and then started casting spells at me, poking around in my brain, my private stuff."
She sighed, trying not to feel immediately discouraged and antagonistic. But she wanted it clear that she wouldn't allow him to try and play her against Severus, regardless of her interventions in his favor to get him out of detention this evening. "PROFESSOR Snape, Harry. Yes, well I believe I heard something about you 'poking around' in his private things as well, so let's not go there."
He had the grace to look slightly embarrassed, "Well, that was sort of an accident."
"An accident?" she asked, her brow rising in disbelief, "You accidentally fell into his Pensieve that you knew contained things he didn't want you to see? I think we had better not discuss that, Harry. It's between you and Professor Snape. I have no deep, dark secrets to hide, so your curiosity won't be piqued by me.
"Now, first I am going to start by teaching you the Legilimens incantation and discipline."
He looked up at her, surprised and suspicious, "What? Why?"
"I'm a researcher, first and foremost, Harry. I learn things best by doing, seeing, experiencing whenever possible. So, that's how I am choosing to teach as well, in my class and here," she explained. "Legilimency is sort of 'the other side of the coin' if you will, to Occlumency. If you can see how Occlumency is supposed to work, from the 'other side', it might make it easier to learn."
She then looked at him very sternly, "It's a N.E.W.T. level skill, Harry. But then so is Occlumency. I will be very severe in dealing out consequences if I find you using Legilimency anywhere but in these lessons. It can be very dangerous when it's unrefined. Do I make myself clear?"
"Yes," he said shortly, though he had an air of curiosity now that she found encouraging. At least he was listening more attentively.
She nodded then, "Good. Now, you merely use your wand as the focus in Legilimency. A truly accomplished Legilimens, like You-Know-Who, and Professor Dumbledore can use this discipline to some effect without wand or incantation..."
"And Snape," interrupted Harry.
"... PROFESSOR Snape, Harry. And yes, he can do it as well. The wand and incantation adds strength and control to the discipline for them; or makes it possible at all for you and me."
She withdrew her wand, and felt a pang when Harry stiffened suspiciously, as though he expected her to hex him on the spot. She aimed it towards the wall, demonstrating the wand movement and incantation into the air.
"You aim your wand at your intended target. If you are seeking specific information, you concentrate your intention on that information. You then say the incantation, like so...Legilimens. The actual mechanics are fairly simple. It's refining the technique that is difficult. Any questions?"
"Yeah," he said, the sullen tones still heavy in his voice, "Does Professor Dumbledore know you are teaching me this?"
"Hmmm," she frowned slightly and shrugged. She decided to overlook his cheeky attitude for the present, though it took heroic effort to do so. "I doubt there's much that goes on around here that he doesn't know about. But no, I didn't specifically tell him this was the method I was going to use. You are a sixth-year student, Harry, and quite advanced in your Defense Against the Dark Arts skills from what I hear. There is nothing inappropriate about teaching you this."
He still seemed slightly suspicious, but nodded. She practiced the wand movement and incantation with him a few times until she was confident he had it correct before continuing.
"Alright," she said at last, "now you are going to use the Legilimens incantation on me. We will do this with and without my Occlumency in use, so you can see the difference and see what it is supposed to do."
She turned her chair so it was facing his more directly. "I'm not using my Occlumency now, go ahead and try it and see what happens."
He gave a sullen shrug and a half-hearted wave of his wand, "Legilimens."
In spite of his rather dilatory attempt, it was successful. Her mind whirled in a kaleidoscope of memories, though he made somewhat clumsy attempts to focus on images that he recognized. After a few minutes, she waved her own wand, "Protego" and the shield spell ended his connection.
He was frowning at her even more suspiciously now. "You knew my mum, too, as well as my dad. And you really didn't like my dad, or Sirius."
He didn't delve into specifics. He wasn't certain exactly what he had seen; the images had been so random and confusing. However, he had seen undeniable evidence that she fancied Snape, and to say that he was disgusted would be an understatement.
"Yes," she confirmed, and then immediately continued, trying not to let him get off the subject at hand. "Now, do you see how the information was all jumbled up? Just lots of confused and distorted flashes of images and emotions, right?
"If I had maintained the connection, and if you had the discipline, you could have used your will to sort through my thoughts to find specific information. That's very difficult, and very taxing to both parties. It's possible to cause very serious damage to someone by forcibly sorting through his or her thoughts like that. It's because of that danger that I warned you against using Legilimency anywhere but in our lessons.
"Now, I have raised my Occlumency. Try again so you can see the difference."
He shook his head mulishly and said, "I want to talk about my parents and Sirius."
"Not now, Harry. It's important not to get your emotions riled up while we're doing this work. I'll be glad to talk to you about them later," she said firmly, "Please repeat your incantation."
He frowned, still sullen, but to her surprise he didn't refuse. In fact, now he seemed interested in the attempt. His focus was better, and the power behind the spell was stronger, "Legilimens". He focused for several long minutes, even repeating the incantation, but it was obvious from the look on his face that he could 'see' nothing.
When she stopped the connection, she was slightly pale and actually perspiring somewhat. He was stronger than she had anticipated, and she was not particularly powerful in general, nor especially skilled in this discipline. It took more effort than she had expected to keep him out. "What did you feel, Harry?"
"Nothing," he said, "Like trying to break through a wall or something."
"Exactly!" She said eagerly, "Now, try one more time. This time, I am going to show you where we want you to get with your own discipline eventually. I will be using my Occlumency, but also very deliberately allowing only specific thoughts to come to the surface. This is tricky, and honestly I'm not very good at it. It's possible that you'll break through altogether eventually. But you should get the idea."
This time he was totally focused and intrigued. "Legilimens."
After a few short moments, she broke the connection. She had carefully tried to show him the few images she had of Remus, James and Black that did not have strong negative emotions for her. Those were very few indeed. They both were sweating lightly now.
"Very good, Harry," she said, slightly winded as though she had been running, "I barely managed to keep you out."
"But I wasn't out," he contradicted her, "I saw Professor Lupin, and my dad, and Sirius..."
"Yes, but you saw what I put there for you to see," she explained, "Did you feel the resistance? When you tried to follow a memory deeper, such as with James, you could only go so far and it changed?"
"Yeah... I wanted to find my mum, but I couldn't."
"Right. So that is Occlumency. Think of it as... hmm, what would be a good analogy," she cast about for a good comparison before continuing.
"How about this: your mind is like a pond, a lake, where the water is your thoughts, feelings and ideas. Occlumency is like ice over that lake in the winter. We want that ice to be thick and firm so that nothing can break through it. But eventually you will have total control over that ice. You will be able to lay thoughts on the surface of it, so that no one but you will know what is concealed, or even that you are concealing anything."
He was still regarding her, and seemed to be genuinely thinking about what she was saying. He nodded in apparent understanding.
"It will take a lot of practice, Harry. But you do have the strength for it," she said encouragingly, "Not every method works for everyone. I know that Severus was having you work on clearing your mind of emotions. That's his technique, and serves him well. Not everyone can do that. I certainly can't.
"Instead, I use my emotions to make the "ice" that is my Occlumency shield," she explained, "The result is the same—I can hide my true emotions when I'm using my Occlumency, but I use my emotions as my strength to form the shield. Does that make sense? It's another way we can use our Intention, our thoughts to control something, like we talked about today in class."
He frowned, "That sounds kind of like what my Mum did... when she... that made Voldemort's spell bounce back at him..."
Rowena couldn't suppress a shudder at the Name, but did her best to conceal her discomfort as she continued their discussion.
"Yes, Harry," she said, agreeably. "Very similar; your Mother's love saved you, shielded you. Now, you have to find something inside of yourself to shield your mind. For some people it's love. Some use a pure absence of emotion. For others, they use other emotions or sheer force of will to create their shield. You have to find your own method that will work for you, your own strength.
"So, now, I want you to think about sealing your mind. Don't worry about putting anything on the surface. And don't worry about fighting back or casting any counter spells. Right now, just think about closing your mind completely. When you are ready, I will attempt to break through."
His face screwed up in concentration for several long moments. At last, it suddenly became calm and expressionless. "I think I'm ready...."
She nodded and smiled encouragingly. "Legilimens."
She broke through, but it took some effort on her part. He held her out for nearly 20 seconds. She withdrew immediately, before seeing even a brief glimpse of his thoughts. This was not the time to teach him to repel someone once they were through. They could address that later. For now she merely wanted him to develop a shield. She grinned at him, and he was actually grinning lightly back.
"You did it, Harry. Good job! That's exactly the technique. Now we just have to practice to make it stronger. Once it's stronger, we'll work on other aspects of it; things like being able to maintain the shield and do other activities simultaneously."
"That was easier than I thought it would be, once you told me how to do it," he admitted, but there was a bitter edge to his tone, "Why didn't Sn.. Professor Snape explain it right at first?"
She sighed and shook her head, "Harry, everyone has different teaching and learning methods. You and Professor Snape have more issues there than I even want to think about. That's why I'm teaching you this year.
"Are you feeling up to another go? You can try different methods of shielding your mind to see what works best for you. I don't want you to get over-tired, though. So you decide when you've had enough for today."
They practiced for nearly half an hour. Twenty seconds was the longest he repelled her, but it took him less and less time to establish his shield with each attempt.
"You practice what we've done here today," Rowena said when they both decided they'd had enough, "and let's meet at least once a week to work on it. I want you to try to consciously shield your mind before you go to sleep at night. My time is very flexible. I will gladly work with your schedule to meet as often as you have time."
"Okay. I might be able to come again later this week," Harry said, with an air of eagerness she hadn't expected.
He looked at her a bit uncertainly and asked, "Rowena... can I ask you... about my parents?"
Oh boy. She would really rather not damage the rather tenuous rapport they had only just developed. But wouldn't he be equally upset if she refused? With a sigh she nodded, "Certainly, Harry. But you should know that I wasn't in their house—I was a Ravenclaw. I was four years younger than they were, so I didn't know them very well."
"And you didn't like them very much," he supplied.
She gave him a rather wry smile, "Well, I didn't have anything against your mother. She was very nice, always—to everyone. I was devilishly jealous of her because she was extremely pretty, but she was never snobby with it or anything."
"But my dad?" he asked, eyeing her closely.
"Oh, Harry. We were kids. Some kids just don't like other kids, you know? I was timid and shy. James was loud and flamboyant."
"You mean he was an arrogant jerk. That's what Sn... Professor Snape says," Harry said challengingly.
She poured herself some more tea to give herself time to think. Honesty was important, but she didn't want to cause Harry any more pain.
"James was very popular, Harry. It's hard for a boy at that age to be that popular and not be a bit conceited," she said, silently congratulating herself for her diplomacy.
"He wasn't popular with everyone. Professor Lupin and Sirius told me last year that he used to go around jinxing people in the halls for no good reason," he said.
She actually grinned, "Well, okay. There was that. I think I would be hard pressed to guess who spent more time in detention for things like that—James or Black. But they never really hurt... well, hardly ever hurt anyone."
Except Severus, of course.
Harry pounced on what she had said, glaring slightly "How come you call Sirius 'Black' instead of saying his name? You hated him even more than my dad, didn't you?"
"Harry, I don't think we should continue this any more tonight," she said suddenly, and with an air of finality. "Your mother was a very smart and beautiful girl who was every bit as sweet and kind as she was pretty. Your dad was an extremely smart and popular boy. Black... he was smart and popular, too, but... well, I really didn't like him. There's a lot of past stuff there that you just don't need to worry about. It's in the past."
Surprisingly, he seemed to accept that she wasn't going to talk about it anymore. He picked up his bag and she led him back through the private doors to Snape's lab.
Harry was relieved that Snape wasn't in his lab, though his voice could be heard coming from the direction of his office and he could hear the little girl laughing. He didn't want to risk any more of Snape's wrath for one day, and quickly exited through the public door.
"Goodnight, Rowena," he called over his shoulder as he left.
"Goodnight, Harry," she returned, as she headed through the office towards the sound of happy laughter.
Severus was singing to Katrina. Yes, Severus Snape was SINGING, in German. It must have been some sort of children's song, and apparently a humorous one, as it had Katrina in gales of laughter. She was sitting on his lap clapping in time to his song as he bounced her on his knees, her golden curls springing exuberantly.
His baritone was deep and rich as it flowed smoothly over the lyrics. His face was more relaxed than she had ever seen it, not a rigid mask of tightly controlled stoicism, but a soft look of peaceful contentedness. He was even smiling slightly at the child. Rowena stood silently in the doorway, enchanted by the picturesque.
He looked up and saw her standing there when his song ended, and he raised a brow archly.
"So, the Honorary Slytherin returns to face the consequences of her manipulations and deceptions," he said, sardonically, though the relaxed expression remained.
She entered the room fully then, feeling braver once she was certain he wasn't going to rage at her—at least not in Katrina's presence. She grinned at him as she stepped over to hug and kiss the child.
"Of course I returned. Haven't you heard already? Thanks to your behavior at the feast and at breakfast, with all the rumors that resulted—the entire school is depending on me to tame the vicious Dragon that is Severus Snape. I can't let them down now, can I?"
He actually laughed gently at this... a true laugh, not a sarcastic one. "Indeed? No, I had not heard that yet. Had I heard such nonsense as recently as this past June, I would have said it couldn't be done. Though whether I would have said that before or after hexing the message-bearer into oblivion is debatable. But perhaps I might eventually have to concede the point that I just may be 'tamable' after all."
His bottomless black eyes met hers as he spoke, and there was a hint of warmth there that she had never seen from him before. Her heart did an odd little skip to see it, and she felt her face blush. Sure, there were a lot of 'mights' and 'maybes' in that statement... but there was the hint of a stronger future, and she tucked it away carefully in her heart.
Katrina climbed off his lap and ran to Rowena, insisting on being picked up at once, which she did. "Did you have a nice time, Katrina?"
"Oh, yes. My Severus got me chocolate from the little people in the kitchens. There are elves, there, Rowena, real elves! And my Severus says that next time I visit, if I come in the daytime, he will have the big man in the forest show me a real unicorn!" The child chattered happily for several minutes, each sentence punctuated with "My Severus".
Eventually Severus stood and took her from Rowena and picked up the basket that the child had brought with her. It seemed somehow full of more things than when she had arrived.
"It is late, little one," he said warmly to Katrina. "We need to take you back to Molly's now so you can sleep. We will see you later this week."
Rowena followed them out of his quarters, sealing doors behind them since his hands were full. They had decided to use the hearth in her lab for the floo connection to the Burrow, since he rarely lit the fires in his.
Katrina had started to babble with him in German—her facial expressions and tone of voice, met by his firm tones—spoke of arguments. She clung tightly to him, wailing loudly when he tried to lay her in the bed. She obviously didn't want him to leave her. It required a great deal of firmness from him before she would allow herself to be tucked into bed. She pouted angrily and continued to sniffle. Severus seemed genuinely disturbed by her distress.
Molly Weasley, however, was delighted at the child's display of temper. "Oh, Severus, you just don't understand what that means. She's been through so much she really wasn't acting like a normal three-year-old yet. That she feels secure enough with you to argue and fuss to try to get her way—well, that's a sign that she's healing. Trust me. It's wonderful for her to spend time with you. I know things are terribly busy, but feel free to drop in any time you like."
Severus sat down at her kitchen table, to the surprise of both women, and looked at Molly piercingly as though sizing her up. Rowena recognized the "bored" look that always concealed the "something is bothering me" inner turmoil, but sat next to him silently, waiting to hear what he would say.
"Mrs. Weasley, I'm not certain that it is in Katrina's best interest for me to continue to visit her. I would welcome your advice on the matter. Eventually a family will be found that can adopt her permanently. When that happens, if she has become attached to me, it will make the separation more difficult, will it not? I would not wish to cause her further distress."
Rowena thought her heart might break in compassion. She knew how much those two had come to mean to each other, and the thought that they would be separated now was agonizing. How unfair to pull them apart when they were just learning to find some measure of healing together! She looked at Molly, desperately hoping that the woman—whom she had come to regard as the "universal mother"—would have words of wisdom that would solve everything.
Molly's eyes flashed with her own sympathy and compassion for the man who was usually so dark and brooding. Instinctively she turned away so he wouldn't see it or mistake it for pity. Instead she provided them all with tea before she answered him.
She sat on his other side and laid a comforting hand over his, which he surprisingly did not pull away.
"It's 'Molly', dear," she said gently, "Severus, Katrina needs you right now. It could be months before a family is found, and in the meantime, she needs a chance to heal, to be a normal little girl with all that entails, including pouts and temper-tantrums.
"I'm sure you could make provisions with whoever adopted her for visits. You could be sort of like an uncle if you wanted. She needs you, she needs consistency. I'm sure her Social Witch has taken that into consideration. You would be doing more harm than good if you tried to separate yourself from her now."
Severus stared at her searchingly as she spoke, and she did not flinch from his gaze, her compassionate hazel eyes meeting fathomless black ones. He seemed at once to be comforted by her words, and to retreat back into his usual shell of stoicism. He turned over his hand that was still beneath Molly's, so that it became merely a handshake rather than a comforting gesture. He stood gracefully and bowed rather formally.
"Thank you, Molly. That is reassuring. We will visit as often as we can, of course," he said.
Rowena stood as well and hugged Molly warmly. There was something about a 'Molly Weasley Hug' that just left her feeling as though all would be right with the world. Silently then, she followed Severus through the floo, back to Hogwarts.
He followed her to her quarters and sat silently on her couch. She sat next to him and turned sideways so she could face him. But she was unsure of his mood so she didn't attempt to reach out to touch him, though she longed to do so.
"Did Potter give his usual abysmal performance at Occlumency today?" he asked, rather conversationally.
"No, he didn't. In fact, he was able to hold me out for nearly half a minute once he got the hang of it," she said, glad that he seemed inclined to overlook her manipulations of the evening.
"Forgive me, Rowena," he said dryly, "but I am forced to assume that is more due to your lack of skill in Legilimency than his increased skill as an Occlumens. The boy swims in a sea of emotion that he can't possibly control. Rather he lets them control him."
He laid an arm around her as he spoke, and began idly playing with her hair, wrapping a long strand around his fingers.
"Indeed," she said, using one of his favorite words in a teasing mimicry of his usual sardonic tone, "However, I am not teaching him to clear his emotions from his mind. I am teaching him to use them as his shield. It's an effective technique for those of us who are too attached to our emotions to shove them aside completely."
"An impure form of the discipline," he chided her. "It will be weak. He cannot afford weakness. I do not think you are doing him any favors teaching him shortcuts."
"Not everything based in emotion is weak, Severus," she contradicted him. "His mother's love repelled the strongest spell known to wizards—that's not a display of weakness."
He sighed, shaking his head. "Another circular argument you and I will not resolve. The point is he MUST learn Occlumency."
"I think he will learn it," she countered, "You just need to give him a chance. He picked up on it really quickly this evening. He's going to practice and we'll work on it more later this week."
Severus snorted derisively, "Do not count on him practicing anything. He is lazy and makes no effort. He is satisfied with shoddy work in everything he does."
"No, Severus. He is a 16-year-old boy who lacks your brilliance and your ambition. Not everyone is driven to learn and do everything with precision and perfection. There is a difference," she said.
He made another derisive sound in his throat, shook his head, and was silent. He looked so dark and stern, sitting there regarding her with his inscrutable, fathomless black eyes. Yet her shoulder and neck tingled pleasantly where his hand played with her hair and caressed her skin. Finally succumbing to her own desires, she leaned over and kissed him gently. She softly stroked the satiny flesh of his lower lip with her tongue, timidly tasting him. His tongue met hers in a soft caress that sent sparks of sensation through her so that she could not suppress a delicious shiver. The kiss was painfully brief, as he pulled back to look at her, a brow raised.
"You are trying to distract me and change the subject as you did this afternoon," he admonished.
"Mmmm, true. I failed miserably then. What is my progress now?" she asked against his lips, kissing him again.
He returned the kiss gently, but did not allow it to become heated. His own thoughts and emotions were in turmoil as well, and he had no desire to increase that confusion at present. He was already struggling mightily to sort them out!
"Adequate, I suppose," he answered in carefully controlled tones, wanting to seem unaffected by her kisses, "But I only drop the subject because I know Dumbledore has insisted that you teach the Occlumency. He doesn't think it is wise for me to spend unnecessary time with Potter."
She frowned teasingly and leaned away, desisting in her attempts to kiss him further. "Only adequate? Well, I have fallen a few notches in your regard lately, haven't I? If you insist on discussing school then, may I ask you something?"
He smirked at this. "You have not fallen a jot, and you know it."
The problem was not that she had fallen in his regard... quite the opposite. These murky waters of emotion were unfamiliar to him in the extreme. He was desperate for firmer ground. "You may ask. I do not promise to answer. I know what you will ask."
"That's a pretty confident statement," she exclaimed, laughingly.
"You are going to ask me why Dumbledore does not grant me the Defense position," he stated, "You presume, correctly, that I know why he consistently chooses not to put me there."
"Okay, then. Why don't you want to tell me?"
He moved away from her slightly, though his arm remained gently around her shoulders. He became silent and contemplative.
She gave him a look of extreme irritation and tapped one finger on his chest in frustration, "Oh, I get it. This is another one of those, 'If Rowena knows the truth, she might change her mind about me' things, isn't it? You really are a hard man to convince, Snape. Tell me or not, it doesn't matter. And it certainly changes nothing, either way, as to how I feel about you."
He remained silent, regarding her. At last he sighed and ran his hand through his hair. "Very well. I apply each year because I know I would be the best Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher this school has ever had. Why shouldn't I be? I know all the Dark Arts!
"Dumbledore refuses me each year because he knows that the Dark Magic still calls to me, that I still feel its seduction and its false promises. He feels, possibly correctly, that the temptation to yield to it if I was working that closely with it would be too great.
"He has two ostensible reasons. First that he could find no Potions Master to replace me that could come close to my skill level. Which is true, of course," he said without a hint of embarrassment or humility. "And second that I cannot produce a Patronus, which is a required skill in order to be able to teach it to the N.E.W.T. students."
He fell silent again at this, thinking over the course of the evening... even the last few months. "I admit I haven't tried to do the Patronus in many years."
Perhaps he might try again sometime soon, he thought to himself as he looked at Rowena, snuggled against his side as comfortably as though she had always belonged there. She, apparently, was thinking along the same lines. Her irritation with him had faded as he talked to her. She gave him a small smile and kissed him gently.
"Well, maybe we could work on the Patronus," she said mischievously. "Surely that's the real reason? I mean, it's listed as a required skill for the job. I don't really think the dark magic bit has anything to do with it—do you? Dumbledore trusts you. He knows more than anyone else how much you endure to be of help to him."
His body stiffened in irritation, even as he had pulled her closer to return her kiss. He valiantly tried not to lash out at her. Again she was displaying her blind trust in him, and still it grated. He knew he should be grateful for the gift of such trust...but he simply didn't deserve it! For once he determined not to respond angrily as he tried, yet again, to make her see just the kind of man he was.
"You precious fool-why do you deliberately not want to understand?" he sighed, exasperatedly.
"I still have all my Dark Magic books, Rowena. Every one. Every spell I created or learned from others. Every potion recipe. All of it. I keep them well concealed and locked, of course. But I face them every day. Every day I feel the call, the lure, the longing. It is not unlike what I feel for you in the height of my desire, though different... and perhaps if I evaluate it objectively, the yearning is not as strong as it once was," he admitted reluctantly.
"Why do you keep them? Why not destroy them?" She was listening intently, interested and rapt, playing her fingers through his hair.
He looked at her, incredulous. "Rowena, why are you still here? Why do you sit there and look at me like someone deserving of your time and attention after what I have told you, after all the things you know about me? I keep them because I love them! If I have any of that emotion inside of me, it is for those books, that magic. They saved me when I would have drowned in self-pity and wretchedness. They gave me power and revenge, knowledge and control."
With heroic effort he resisted the urge to shake her, as though he could physically shake some sense into her.
"If I so much as touched them again, I think I would be lost forever in their seduction. Sometimes I feel like it whispers to me... telling me that perhaps now, after all these years of resisting it and developing other strengths, I could be stronger than I was before. Maybe I could wield it and control it without letting it control me. Maybe I could be stronger than the Dark Lord himself."
He sighed, tiredly. The self-disgust nearly dripped from every word as he spoke. "Don't you see how dangerous that is? How dangerous I am? I can't destroy them because I can't bear to even touch them, even if I could muster the strength of will to wish them destroyed."
His eyes bored into hers, as though he could somehow make her understand by sheer force of will, imploring her silently to understand. "This is the kind of man you imagine yourself to be fond of, Rowena. You should not be here with me. You should not wish to be within miles of me. I don't know how to make you understand what I am."
She sighed in mirrored frustration and snuggled closer against his chest, wrapping her arms tightly around him. "I don't believe you to be nearly so power hungry or consumed by darkness as you believe you are, Severus. I think you are living with a past belief of yourself. I think you could face all those books and things and surprise yourself with how much they DON'T draw you anymore, and chuck them into the fire without a second thought."
He pushed her away from him so he could look, disbelievingly into her eyes. He saw her honesty and total faith in him and shook his head in disgust. "Rowena, you willfully deceive yourself as to me. How can I take any of this seriously when you think I am something that I am not?"
She smiled sadly and kissed him tenderly. "You can't, Severus. You can't take me seriously, you can't be serious about our relationship when you can't believe in or trust my feelings for you. And you can't do that if you believe them to be built on a false foundation. I don't know how to resolve this. One of us is seriously self-deceived as to your true nature. I don't believe I'm the one."
He nodded and stood to leave. "You are right, Rowena. I need time to think about things. I have come to care for you greatly, but I dislike being on such shaky ground."
He was left with no choice. He needed to—perish the thought—TALK to someone who could help him find clarity in his turmoil. And there was only one person in the world he trusted enough to discuss anything so personal and (in his opinion) distasteful.
It was time to talk to Albus.
He pulled her up to him and held her tightly for a moment. He then gazed deeply into her eyes, kissed her tenderly and left without another word. The kiss hinted strongly of 'good bye'.
Rowena was not brave, nor especially powerful, nor did she have any spectacular or unusual talents or gifts. But one thing she did have was a stubbornly strong streak of sheer determination. Now that she had found him again, she had no intention of letting him get away that easily.
The muse just wasn't cooperating much this week. Next chapter will be less 'head' and 'angst' stuff and more action. We will have a brief visit with Albus. But the Death Eaters are active and soon we will see the consequences. Remus, Tonks, Moody and a serious attack combat coming up.
If you like my story, please recommend it to others. If you don't, please tell me so I can improve! If you don't want to offer critiques on the public reviews, I always welcome emails. Happy reading! --Lisa
Thank you to my beta, Elaine!
Occlumency with Harry.
Chapter 18: Murky Waters, Shaky Ground
Rowena led Harry to the small seating area by her fireplace in her office. She sat comfortably in one of the plush chairs and conjured hot tea. As she poured for both of them, she looked at him appraisingly.
Harry Potter was a tall, lanky, teenage boy with the sour attitude that often accompanies the teen years. Rowena had fought the urge to dislike him instantly, when she first saw him at the Memorial in June, simply due to his striking resemblance to his father. But the truth of the matter was that he had none of James's flamboyant arrogance. Instead he was angry, sarcastic and bitter. Harry sat silently brooding, slumped in the other plush chair, arms folded aggressively across his chest, plainly in no hurry to open any conversation. Nor did he touch the teacup in front of him. She sipped her tea a moment contemplatively, trying to think of a way to reach this sullen boy.
It was his volatile emotions that made Albus ask her to teach his Occlumency. Harry needed to learn from someone that didn't inspire strong emotions in him by their mere presence.
This would be a harder task than she originally thought. At this particular moment, Harry had a chip the size of a dragon on his shoulder and a bitter sneer on his face that Severus would not have been ashamed to wear himself. Rowena had a sudden realization that there were many similarities between those two: Harry Potter and Severus Snape, though she was quite certain the comparison would not be appreciated by either, no matter how apt.
"Harry, you know why you are here. I know you had some rather unpleasant experiences with Occlumency last year. We're going to try and sort of forget about that and start fresh today," she said at last, setting her cup on the coffee table.
"You may call me Rowena or Miss Lupin here, whatever you feel more comfortable with. I don't really feel much like a "Professor" most of the time, and it seems rather formal considering the work we're going to do, don't you think?"
From what she had seen and heard, he seemed to have serious difficulty with authority figures. Perhaps by not holding that over his head, he would lighten up a bit.
His startling green eyes glanced at her uncertainly. He shrugged, "All right, Rowena, then."
His voice was sullen, his tone defiant. "Snape didn't teach me anything. He just told me to clear my mind and then started casting spells at me, poking around in my brain, my private stuff."
She sighed, trying not to feel immediately discouraged and antagonistic. But she wanted it clear that she wouldn't allow him to try and play her against Severus, regardless of her interventions in his favor to get him out of detention this evening. "PROFESSOR Snape, Harry. Yes, well I believe I heard something about you 'poking around' in his private things as well, so let's not go there."
He had the grace to look slightly embarrassed, "Well, that was sort of an accident."
"An accident?" she asked, her brow rising in disbelief, "You accidentally fell into his Pensieve that you knew contained things he didn't want you to see? I think we had better not discuss that, Harry. It's between you and Professor Snape. I have no deep, dark secrets to hide, so your curiosity won't be piqued by me.
"Now, first I am going to start by teaching you the Legilimens incantation and discipline."
He looked up at her, surprised and suspicious, "What? Why?"
"I'm a researcher, first and foremost, Harry. I learn things best by doing, seeing, experiencing whenever possible. So, that's how I am choosing to teach as well, in my class and here," she explained. "Legilimency is sort of 'the other side of the coin' if you will, to Occlumency. If you can see how Occlumency is supposed to work, from the 'other side', it might make it easier to learn."
She then looked at him very sternly, "It's a N.E.W.T. level skill, Harry. But then so is Occlumency. I will be very severe in dealing out consequences if I find you using Legilimency anywhere but in these lessons. It can be very dangerous when it's unrefined. Do I make myself clear?"
"Yes," he said shortly, though he had an air of curiosity now that she found encouraging. At least he was listening more attentively.
She nodded then, "Good. Now, you merely use your wand as the focus in Legilimency. A truly accomplished Legilimens, like You-Know-Who, and Professor Dumbledore can use this discipline to some effect without wand or incantation..."
"And Snape," interrupted Harry.
"... PROFESSOR Snape, Harry. And yes, he can do it as well. The wand and incantation adds strength and control to the discipline for them; or makes it possible at all for you and me."
She withdrew her wand, and felt a pang when Harry stiffened suspiciously, as though he expected her to hex him on the spot. She aimed it towards the wall, demonstrating the wand movement and incantation into the air.
"You aim your wand at your intended target. If you are seeking specific information, you concentrate your intention on that information. You then say the incantation, like so...Legilimens. The actual mechanics are fairly simple. It's refining the technique that is difficult. Any questions?"
"Yeah," he said, the sullen tones still heavy in his voice, "Does Professor Dumbledore know you are teaching me this?"
"Hmmm," she frowned slightly and shrugged. She decided to overlook his cheeky attitude for the present, though it took heroic effort to do so. "I doubt there's much that goes on around here that he doesn't know about. But no, I didn't specifically tell him this was the method I was going to use. You are a sixth-year student, Harry, and quite advanced in your Defense Against the Dark Arts skills from what I hear. There is nothing inappropriate about teaching you this."
He still seemed slightly suspicious, but nodded. She practiced the wand movement and incantation with him a few times until she was confident he had it correct before continuing.
"Alright," she said at last, "now you are going to use the Legilimens incantation on me. We will do this with and without my Occlumency in use, so you can see the difference and see what it is supposed to do."
She turned her chair so it was facing his more directly. "I'm not using my Occlumency now, go ahead and try it and see what happens."
He gave a sullen shrug and a half-hearted wave of his wand, "Legilimens."
In spite of his rather dilatory attempt, it was successful. Her mind whirled in a kaleidoscope of memories, though he made somewhat clumsy attempts to focus on images that he recognized. After a few minutes, she waved her own wand, "Protego" and the shield spell ended his connection.
He was frowning at her even more suspiciously now. "You knew my mum, too, as well as my dad. And you really didn't like my dad, or Sirius."
He didn't delve into specifics. He wasn't certain exactly what he had seen; the images had been so random and confusing. However, he had seen undeniable evidence that she fancied Snape, and to say that he was disgusted would be an understatement.
"Yes," she confirmed, and then immediately continued, trying not to let him get off the subject at hand. "Now, do you see how the information was all jumbled up? Just lots of confused and distorted flashes of images and emotions, right?
"If I had maintained the connection, and if you had the discipline, you could have used your will to sort through my thoughts to find specific information. That's very difficult, and very taxing to both parties. It's possible to cause very serious damage to someone by forcibly sorting through his or her thoughts like that. It's because of that danger that I warned you against using Legilimency anywhere but in our lessons.
"Now, I have raised my Occlumency. Try again so you can see the difference."
He shook his head mulishly and said, "I want to talk about my parents and Sirius."
"Not now, Harry. It's important not to get your emotions riled up while we're doing this work. I'll be glad to talk to you about them later," she said firmly, "Please repeat your incantation."
He frowned, still sullen, but to her surprise he didn't refuse. In fact, now he seemed interested in the attempt. His focus was better, and the power behind the spell was stronger, "Legilimens". He focused for several long minutes, even repeating the incantation, but it was obvious from the look on his face that he could 'see' nothing.
When she stopped the connection, she was slightly pale and actually perspiring somewhat. He was stronger than she had anticipated, and she was not particularly powerful in general, nor especially skilled in this discipline. It took more effort than she had expected to keep him out. "What did you feel, Harry?"
"Nothing," he said, "Like trying to break through a wall or something."
"Exactly!" She said eagerly, "Now, try one more time. This time, I am going to show you where we want you to get with your own discipline eventually. I will be using my Occlumency, but also very deliberately allowing only specific thoughts to come to the surface. This is tricky, and honestly I'm not very good at it. It's possible that you'll break through altogether eventually. But you should get the idea."
This time he was totally focused and intrigued. "Legilimens."
After a few short moments, she broke the connection. She had carefully tried to show him the few images she had of Remus, James and Black that did not have strong negative emotions for her. Those were very few indeed. They both were sweating lightly now.
"Very good, Harry," she said, slightly winded as though she had been running, "I barely managed to keep you out."
"But I wasn't out," he contradicted her, "I saw Professor Lupin, and my dad, and Sirius..."
"Yes, but you saw what I put there for you to see," she explained, "Did you feel the resistance? When you tried to follow a memory deeper, such as with James, you could only go so far and it changed?"
"Yeah... I wanted to find my mum, but I couldn't."
"Right. So that is Occlumency. Think of it as... hmm, what would be a good analogy," she cast about for a good comparison before continuing.
"How about this: your mind is like a pond, a lake, where the water is your thoughts, feelings and ideas. Occlumency is like ice over that lake in the winter. We want that ice to be thick and firm so that nothing can break through it. But eventually you will have total control over that ice. You will be able to lay thoughts on the surface of it, so that no one but you will know what is concealed, or even that you are concealing anything."
He was still regarding her, and seemed to be genuinely thinking about what she was saying. He nodded in apparent understanding.
"It will take a lot of practice, Harry. But you do have the strength for it," she said encouragingly, "Not every method works for everyone. I know that Severus was having you work on clearing your mind of emotions. That's his technique, and serves him well. Not everyone can do that. I certainly can't.
"Instead, I use my emotions to make the "ice" that is my Occlumency shield," she explained, "The result is the same—I can hide my true emotions when I'm using my Occlumency, but I use my emotions as my strength to form the shield. Does that make sense? It's another way we can use our Intention, our thoughts to control something, like we talked about today in class."
He frowned, "That sounds kind of like what my Mum did... when she... that made Voldemort's spell bounce back at him..."
Rowena couldn't suppress a shudder at the Name, but did her best to conceal her discomfort as she continued their discussion.
"Yes, Harry," she said, agreeably. "Very similar; your Mother's love saved you, shielded you. Now, you have to find something inside of yourself to shield your mind. For some people it's love. Some use a pure absence of emotion. For others, they use other emotions or sheer force of will to create their shield. You have to find your own method that will work for you, your own strength.
"So, now, I want you to think about sealing your mind. Don't worry about putting anything on the surface. And don't worry about fighting back or casting any counter spells. Right now, just think about closing your mind completely. When you are ready, I will attempt to break through."
His face screwed up in concentration for several long moments. At last, it suddenly became calm and expressionless. "I think I'm ready...."
She nodded and smiled encouragingly. "Legilimens."
She broke through, but it took some effort on her part. He held her out for nearly 20 seconds. She withdrew immediately, before seeing even a brief glimpse of his thoughts. This was not the time to teach him to repel someone once they were through. They could address that later. For now she merely wanted him to develop a shield. She grinned at him, and he was actually grinning lightly back.
"You did it, Harry. Good job! That's exactly the technique. Now we just have to practice to make it stronger. Once it's stronger, we'll work on other aspects of it; things like being able to maintain the shield and do other activities simultaneously."
"That was easier than I thought it would be, once you told me how to do it," he admitted, but there was a bitter edge to his tone, "Why didn't Sn.. Professor Snape explain it right at first?"
She sighed and shook her head, "Harry, everyone has different teaching and learning methods. You and Professor Snape have more issues there than I even want to think about. That's why I'm teaching you this year.
"Are you feeling up to another go? You can try different methods of shielding your mind to see what works best for you. I don't want you to get over-tired, though. So you decide when you've had enough for today."
They practiced for nearly half an hour. Twenty seconds was the longest he repelled her, but it took him less and less time to establish his shield with each attempt.
"You practice what we've done here today," Rowena said when they both decided they'd had enough, "and let's meet at least once a week to work on it. I want you to try to consciously shield your mind before you go to sleep at night. My time is very flexible. I will gladly work with your schedule to meet as often as you have time."
"Okay. I might be able to come again later this week," Harry said, with an air of eagerness she hadn't expected.
He looked at her a bit uncertainly and asked, "Rowena... can I ask you... about my parents?"
Oh boy. She would really rather not damage the rather tenuous rapport they had only just developed. But wouldn't he be equally upset if she refused? With a sigh she nodded, "Certainly, Harry. But you should know that I wasn't in their house—I was a Ravenclaw. I was four years younger than they were, so I didn't know them very well."
"And you didn't like them very much," he supplied.
She gave him a rather wry smile, "Well, I didn't have anything against your mother. She was very nice, always—to everyone. I was devilishly jealous of her because she was extremely pretty, but she was never snobby with it or anything."
"But my dad?" he asked, eyeing her closely.
"Oh, Harry. We were kids. Some kids just don't like other kids, you know? I was timid and shy. James was loud and flamboyant."
"You mean he was an arrogant jerk. That's what Sn... Professor Snape says," Harry said challengingly.
She poured herself some more tea to give herself time to think. Honesty was important, but she didn't want to cause Harry any more pain.
"James was very popular, Harry. It's hard for a boy at that age to be that popular and not be a bit conceited," she said, silently congratulating herself for her diplomacy.
"He wasn't popular with everyone. Professor Lupin and Sirius told me last year that he used to go around jinxing people in the halls for no good reason," he said.
She actually grinned, "Well, okay. There was that. I think I would be hard pressed to guess who spent more time in detention for things like that—James or Black. But they never really hurt... well, hardly ever hurt anyone."
Except Severus, of course.
Harry pounced on what she had said, glaring slightly "How come you call Sirius 'Black' instead of saying his name? You hated him even more than my dad, didn't you?"
"Harry, I don't think we should continue this any more tonight," she said suddenly, and with an air of finality. "Your mother was a very smart and beautiful girl who was every bit as sweet and kind as she was pretty. Your dad was an extremely smart and popular boy. Black... he was smart and popular, too, but... well, I really didn't like him. There's a lot of past stuff there that you just don't need to worry about. It's in the past."
Surprisingly, he seemed to accept that she wasn't going to talk about it anymore. He picked up his bag and she led him back through the private doors to Snape's lab.
Harry was relieved that Snape wasn't in his lab, though his voice could be heard coming from the direction of his office and he could hear the little girl laughing. He didn't want to risk any more of Snape's wrath for one day, and quickly exited through the public door.
"Goodnight, Rowena," he called over his shoulder as he left.
"Goodnight, Harry," she returned, as she headed through the office towards the sound of happy laughter.
Severus was singing to Katrina. Yes, Severus Snape was SINGING, in German. It must have been some sort of children's song, and apparently a humorous one, as it had Katrina in gales of laughter. She was sitting on his lap clapping in time to his song as he bounced her on his knees, her golden curls springing exuberantly.
His baritone was deep and rich as it flowed smoothly over the lyrics. His face was more relaxed than she had ever seen it, not a rigid mask of tightly controlled stoicism, but a soft look of peaceful contentedness. He was even smiling slightly at the child. Rowena stood silently in the doorway, enchanted by the picturesque.
He looked up and saw her standing there when his song ended, and he raised a brow archly.
"So, the Honorary Slytherin returns to face the consequences of her manipulations and deceptions," he said, sardonically, though the relaxed expression remained.
She entered the room fully then, feeling braver once she was certain he wasn't going to rage at her—at least not in Katrina's presence. She grinned at him as she stepped over to hug and kiss the child.
"Of course I returned. Haven't you heard already? Thanks to your behavior at the feast and at breakfast, with all the rumors that resulted—the entire school is depending on me to tame the vicious Dragon that is Severus Snape. I can't let them down now, can I?"
He actually laughed gently at this... a true laugh, not a sarcastic one. "Indeed? No, I had not heard that yet. Had I heard such nonsense as recently as this past June, I would have said it couldn't be done. Though whether I would have said that before or after hexing the message-bearer into oblivion is debatable. But perhaps I might eventually have to concede the point that I just may be 'tamable' after all."
His bottomless black eyes met hers as he spoke, and there was a hint of warmth there that she had never seen from him before. Her heart did an odd little skip to see it, and she felt her face blush. Sure, there were a lot of 'mights' and 'maybes' in that statement... but there was the hint of a stronger future, and she tucked it away carefully in her heart.
Katrina climbed off his lap and ran to Rowena, insisting on being picked up at once, which she did. "Did you have a nice time, Katrina?"
"Oh, yes. My Severus got me chocolate from the little people in the kitchens. There are elves, there, Rowena, real elves! And my Severus says that next time I visit, if I come in the daytime, he will have the big man in the forest show me a real unicorn!" The child chattered happily for several minutes, each sentence punctuated with "My Severus".
Eventually Severus stood and took her from Rowena and picked up the basket that the child had brought with her. It seemed somehow full of more things than when she had arrived.
"It is late, little one," he said warmly to Katrina. "We need to take you back to Molly's now so you can sleep. We will see you later this week."
Rowena followed them out of his quarters, sealing doors behind them since his hands were full. They had decided to use the hearth in her lab for the floo connection to the Burrow, since he rarely lit the fires in his.
Katrina had started to babble with him in German—her facial expressions and tone of voice, met by his firm tones—spoke of arguments. She clung tightly to him, wailing loudly when he tried to lay her in the bed. She obviously didn't want him to leave her. It required a great deal of firmness from him before she would allow herself to be tucked into bed. She pouted angrily and continued to sniffle. Severus seemed genuinely disturbed by her distress.
Molly Weasley, however, was delighted at the child's display of temper. "Oh, Severus, you just don't understand what that means. She's been through so much she really wasn't acting like a normal three-year-old yet. That she feels secure enough with you to argue and fuss to try to get her way—well, that's a sign that she's healing. Trust me. It's wonderful for her to spend time with you. I know things are terribly busy, but feel free to drop in any time you like."
Severus sat down at her kitchen table, to the surprise of both women, and looked at Molly piercingly as though sizing her up. Rowena recognized the "bored" look that always concealed the "something is bothering me" inner turmoil, but sat next to him silently, waiting to hear what he would say.
"Mrs. Weasley, I'm not certain that it is in Katrina's best interest for me to continue to visit her. I would welcome your advice on the matter. Eventually a family will be found that can adopt her permanently. When that happens, if she has become attached to me, it will make the separation more difficult, will it not? I would not wish to cause her further distress."
Rowena thought her heart might break in compassion. She knew how much those two had come to mean to each other, and the thought that they would be separated now was agonizing. How unfair to pull them apart when they were just learning to find some measure of healing together! She looked at Molly, desperately hoping that the woman—whom she had come to regard as the "universal mother"—would have words of wisdom that would solve everything.
Molly's eyes flashed with her own sympathy and compassion for the man who was usually so dark and brooding. Instinctively she turned away so he wouldn't see it or mistake it for pity. Instead she provided them all with tea before she answered him.
She sat on his other side and laid a comforting hand over his, which he surprisingly did not pull away.
"It's 'Molly', dear," she said gently, "Severus, Katrina needs you right now. It could be months before a family is found, and in the meantime, she needs a chance to heal, to be a normal little girl with all that entails, including pouts and temper-tantrums.
"I'm sure you could make provisions with whoever adopted her for visits. You could be sort of like an uncle if you wanted. She needs you, she needs consistency. I'm sure her Social Witch has taken that into consideration. You would be doing more harm than good if you tried to separate yourself from her now."
Severus stared at her searchingly as she spoke, and she did not flinch from his gaze, her compassionate hazel eyes meeting fathomless black ones. He seemed at once to be comforted by her words, and to retreat back into his usual shell of stoicism. He turned over his hand that was still beneath Molly's, so that it became merely a handshake rather than a comforting gesture. He stood gracefully and bowed rather formally.
"Thank you, Molly. That is reassuring. We will visit as often as we can, of course," he said.
Rowena stood as well and hugged Molly warmly. There was something about a 'Molly Weasley Hug' that just left her feeling as though all would be right with the world. Silently then, she followed Severus through the floo, back to Hogwarts.
He followed her to her quarters and sat silently on her couch. She sat next to him and turned sideways so she could face him. But she was unsure of his mood so she didn't attempt to reach out to touch him, though she longed to do so.
"Did Potter give his usual abysmal performance at Occlumency today?" he asked, rather conversationally.
"No, he didn't. In fact, he was able to hold me out for nearly half a minute once he got the hang of it," she said, glad that he seemed inclined to overlook her manipulations of the evening.
"Forgive me, Rowena," he said dryly, "but I am forced to assume that is more due to your lack of skill in Legilimency than his increased skill as an Occlumens. The boy swims in a sea of emotion that he can't possibly control. Rather he lets them control him."
He laid an arm around her as he spoke, and began idly playing with her hair, wrapping a long strand around his fingers.
"Indeed," she said, using one of his favorite words in a teasing mimicry of his usual sardonic tone, "However, I am not teaching him to clear his emotions from his mind. I am teaching him to use them as his shield. It's an effective technique for those of us who are too attached to our emotions to shove them aside completely."
"An impure form of the discipline," he chided her. "It will be weak. He cannot afford weakness. I do not think you are doing him any favors teaching him shortcuts."
"Not everything based in emotion is weak, Severus," she contradicted him. "His mother's love repelled the strongest spell known to wizards—that's not a display of weakness."
He sighed, shaking his head. "Another circular argument you and I will not resolve. The point is he MUST learn Occlumency."
"I think he will learn it," she countered, "You just need to give him a chance. He picked up on it really quickly this evening. He's going to practice and we'll work on it more later this week."
Severus snorted derisively, "Do not count on him practicing anything. He is lazy and makes no effort. He is satisfied with shoddy work in everything he does."
"No, Severus. He is a 16-year-old boy who lacks your brilliance and your ambition. Not everyone is driven to learn and do everything with precision and perfection. There is a difference," she said.
He made another derisive sound in his throat, shook his head, and was silent. He looked so dark and stern, sitting there regarding her with his inscrutable, fathomless black eyes. Yet her shoulder and neck tingled pleasantly where his hand played with her hair and caressed her skin. Finally succumbing to her own desires, she leaned over and kissed him gently. She softly stroked the satiny flesh of his lower lip with her tongue, timidly tasting him. His tongue met hers in a soft caress that sent sparks of sensation through her so that she could not suppress a delicious shiver. The kiss was painfully brief, as he pulled back to look at her, a brow raised.
"You are trying to distract me and change the subject as you did this afternoon," he admonished.
"Mmmm, true. I failed miserably then. What is my progress now?" she asked against his lips, kissing him again.
He returned the kiss gently, but did not allow it to become heated. His own thoughts and emotions were in turmoil as well, and he had no desire to increase that confusion at present. He was already struggling mightily to sort them out!
"Adequate, I suppose," he answered in carefully controlled tones, wanting to seem unaffected by her kisses, "But I only drop the subject because I know Dumbledore has insisted that you teach the Occlumency. He doesn't think it is wise for me to spend unnecessary time with Potter."
She frowned teasingly and leaned away, desisting in her attempts to kiss him further. "Only adequate? Well, I have fallen a few notches in your regard lately, haven't I? If you insist on discussing school then, may I ask you something?"
He smirked at this. "You have not fallen a jot, and you know it."
The problem was not that she had fallen in his regard... quite the opposite. These murky waters of emotion were unfamiliar to him in the extreme. He was desperate for firmer ground. "You may ask. I do not promise to answer. I know what you will ask."
"That's a pretty confident statement," she exclaimed, laughingly.
"You are going to ask me why Dumbledore does not grant me the Defense position," he stated, "You presume, correctly, that I know why he consistently chooses not to put me there."
"Okay, then. Why don't you want to tell me?"
He moved away from her slightly, though his arm remained gently around her shoulders. He became silent and contemplative.
She gave him a look of extreme irritation and tapped one finger on his chest in frustration, "Oh, I get it. This is another one of those, 'If Rowena knows the truth, she might change her mind about me' things, isn't it? You really are a hard man to convince, Snape. Tell me or not, it doesn't matter. And it certainly changes nothing, either way, as to how I feel about you."
He remained silent, regarding her. At last he sighed and ran his hand through his hair. "Very well. I apply each year because I know I would be the best Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher this school has ever had. Why shouldn't I be? I know all the Dark Arts!
"Dumbledore refuses me each year because he knows that the Dark Magic still calls to me, that I still feel its seduction and its false promises. He feels, possibly correctly, that the temptation to yield to it if I was working that closely with it would be too great.
"He has two ostensible reasons. First that he could find no Potions Master to replace me that could come close to my skill level. Which is true, of course," he said without a hint of embarrassment or humility. "And second that I cannot produce a Patronus, which is a required skill in order to be able to teach it to the N.E.W.T. students."
He fell silent again at this, thinking over the course of the evening... even the last few months. "I admit I haven't tried to do the Patronus in many years."
Perhaps he might try again sometime soon, he thought to himself as he looked at Rowena, snuggled against his side as comfortably as though she had always belonged there. She, apparently, was thinking along the same lines. Her irritation with him had faded as he talked to her. She gave him a small smile and kissed him gently.
"Well, maybe we could work on the Patronus," she said mischievously. "Surely that's the real reason? I mean, it's listed as a required skill for the job. I don't really think the dark magic bit has anything to do with it—do you? Dumbledore trusts you. He knows more than anyone else how much you endure to be of help to him."
His body stiffened in irritation, even as he had pulled her closer to return her kiss. He valiantly tried not to lash out at her. Again she was displaying her blind trust in him, and still it grated. He knew he should be grateful for the gift of such trust...but he simply didn't deserve it! For once he determined not to respond angrily as he tried, yet again, to make her see just the kind of man he was.
"You precious fool-why do you deliberately not want to understand?" he sighed, exasperatedly.
"I still have all my Dark Magic books, Rowena. Every one. Every spell I created or learned from others. Every potion recipe. All of it. I keep them well concealed and locked, of course. But I face them every day. Every day I feel the call, the lure, the longing. It is not unlike what I feel for you in the height of my desire, though different... and perhaps if I evaluate it objectively, the yearning is not as strong as it once was," he admitted reluctantly.
"Why do you keep them? Why not destroy them?" She was listening intently, interested and rapt, playing her fingers through his hair.
He looked at her, incredulous. "Rowena, why are you still here? Why do you sit there and look at me like someone deserving of your time and attention after what I have told you, after all the things you know about me? I keep them because I love them! If I have any of that emotion inside of me, it is for those books, that magic. They saved me when I would have drowned in self-pity and wretchedness. They gave me power and revenge, knowledge and control."
With heroic effort he resisted the urge to shake her, as though he could physically shake some sense into her.
"If I so much as touched them again, I think I would be lost forever in their seduction. Sometimes I feel like it whispers to me... telling me that perhaps now, after all these years of resisting it and developing other strengths, I could be stronger than I was before. Maybe I could wield it and control it without letting it control me. Maybe I could be stronger than the Dark Lord himself."
He sighed, tiredly. The self-disgust nearly dripped from every word as he spoke. "Don't you see how dangerous that is? How dangerous I am? I can't destroy them because I can't bear to even touch them, even if I could muster the strength of will to wish them destroyed."
His eyes bored into hers, as though he could somehow make her understand by sheer force of will, imploring her silently to understand. "This is the kind of man you imagine yourself to be fond of, Rowena. You should not be here with me. You should not wish to be within miles of me. I don't know how to make you understand what I am."
She sighed in mirrored frustration and snuggled closer against his chest, wrapping her arms tightly around him. "I don't believe you to be nearly so power hungry or consumed by darkness as you believe you are, Severus. I think you are living with a past belief of yourself. I think you could face all those books and things and surprise yourself with how much they DON'T draw you anymore, and chuck them into the fire without a second thought."
He pushed her away from him so he could look, disbelievingly into her eyes. He saw her honesty and total faith in him and shook his head in disgust. "Rowena, you willfully deceive yourself as to me. How can I take any of this seriously when you think I am something that I am not?"
She smiled sadly and kissed him tenderly. "You can't, Severus. You can't take me seriously, you can't be serious about our relationship when you can't believe in or trust my feelings for you. And you can't do that if you believe them to be built on a false foundation. I don't know how to resolve this. One of us is seriously self-deceived as to your true nature. I don't believe I'm the one."
He nodded and stood to leave. "You are right, Rowena. I need time to think about things. I have come to care for you greatly, but I dislike being on such shaky ground."
He was left with no choice. He needed to—perish the thought—TALK to someone who could help him find clarity in his turmoil. And there was only one person in the world he trusted enough to discuss anything so personal and (in his opinion) distasteful.
It was time to talk to Albus.
He pulled her up to him and held her tightly for a moment. He then gazed deeply into her eyes, kissed her tenderly and left without another word. The kiss hinted strongly of 'good bye'.
Rowena was not brave, nor especially powerful, nor did she have any spectacular or unusual talents or gifts. But one thing she did have was a stubbornly strong streak of sheer determination. Now that she had found him again, she had no intention of letting him get away that easily.
The muse just wasn't cooperating much this week. Next chapter will be less 'head' and 'angst' stuff and more action. We will have a brief visit with Albus. But the Death Eaters are active and soon we will see the consequences. Remus, Tonks, Moody and a serious attack combat coming up.
If you like my story, please recommend it to others. If you don't, please tell me so I can improve! If you don't want to offer critiques on the public reviews, I always welcome emails. Happy reading! --Lisa