Chapter Five: In Which a "Vampire" Steps Forth
"Three days left, Sinistra, before Dumbledore finds out about the Hogsmeade incident," Minerva reminded her at lunch a few days later with an uncharacteristically malicious smile.
"What incident?" Celaene asked irritably.
"The one where you got so thoroughly drunk that you shaggedthat man dressed as avam—" began Victoria, but Celaene interrupted her loudly.
"Okay, okay, that one," she snapped. "I'm so sorry I asked."
"So am I," murmured Severus Snape, taking his seat beside Celaene. "Do you still need the sleeping potion?" he asked in a very quiet voice.
"Yes," she whispered back. "Haven't slept since last Thursday."
She looked like it, too. There were dark blackish-purple circles under her eyes and—according to her—she didn't know why she couldn't sleep. He felt almost sorry for her because he did have a shrewd idea of why she couldn't.
He was just unwilling to help the way she really needed it.
"There's no way I can teach tomorrow if I don't get any sleep tonight," she added, taking a half-hearted bite of chicken.
Severus nodded shortly. "I believe you. I'll bring it up to you this evening."
Celaene nodded wearily, stood up, swayed, and fell over. Snape glanced at her, sighed, and bent down to pick her up. "Sinistra, go to bed," he said impatiently.
"Only if you'll come with me," she said with a somewhat sad attempt at a smile.
"No," he said firmly, setting her back on her feet and letting go rather more quickly than he would normally have done. "You got yourself drunk and I have no intention of getting you out of this. You'll just have to let Dumbledore find out about the Hogsmeade incident. He'd probably find it funny, the barmy old codger. I do."
"How do you know about it?" asked Celaene, suddenly incredibly animated for a woman who had not slept for more than ten minutes at a time in four days.
"I was there," he said coolly.
"You were not," she said desperately, as though trying to persuade herself more than him.
"I was," he said, smirking. "You had that vampire so out of breath that he probably wouldn't have been able to tell the difference between blood and white wine." Celaene would have hit him—if she'd had the energy. "Now," he added impatiently. "You'll make yourself sick. Go to bed."
"I have classes to teach."
"In this state, you probably can't tell one end of a telescope from the other. Bed."
"No."
"Yes."
"No."
"Do I have to hex you?"
"No."
"Sleep. Now," said Snape in the dangerous voice he reserved for particularly dim Gryffindor students.
"No, damn it. I'll go to sleep tonight when I've got the potion. There's no way I'll be able to sleep without it."
Snape surveyed her for several moments before muttering under his breath, "Addict," and walking swiftly away.
Sinistra glared after him for a few seconds before walking slowly to the Astronomy tower to prepare for her N. E. W. T. Astronomy class.
Snape threw the potion together with hardly a thought. It was second nature to him now. For years after he'd left the Dark Lord's service, he'd been dependent on it to get a night's rest. It bubbled and turned a pleasant, peaceful shade of purple. After a second's hesitation, he added a tiny splash of vanilla. If she wasn't one of the few cases of intolerance, it would give her a healthy amount of dream sleep. If she was, they'd be in for a very long night.
A sharp rap on her door made Celaene jump. She turned around and opened the door before sinking back down into her chair. She was so tired…
Severus stood before her holding out a cup of potion. It was as if she were dying of thirst and he'd given her water just in time. As if she were freezing and he'd given her fire. She reached out for it and he watched her drink it, saying sternly, "Drink it all, Celaene. Yes, I know it tastes like owl droppings. Drink it anyway." She made a face but swallowed it. Then she frowned.
"What did you put in this, Snape? It tastes different."
"Vanilla. To help you dream. Now get in bed because you'll be asleep in twenty seconds and I will not carry you into it."
She stood up and made it halfway across the room before tripping and stumbling the rest of the way and landing halfway on her bed. After a moment of half-amusement, Snape sighed and nudged her onto it. "Goodnight," he murmured in his deep, silky voice.
"Good…night… Severus," she managed through a yawn. Celaene drifted off, her eyes finally closing and her thought slipping away until she landed again and opened her eyes.
It seemed like very little time had passed and Severus was still standing over her bed with his condescending half-smile and an empty crystal goblet. It caught the last light from the sinking sun and threw it across the Astronomy Professor's sheets, but he dropped it and it broke on the stone floor. Then Snape sat down on the edge of her bed and leaned over her. "You should go to sleep," he said quietly, his face only an inch away from hers. "And so should I."
"Goodnight," she murmured. "Sleep well in your cold, miserable dungeons."
"I'm not going to my dungeons," he corrected gently in the same soft voice.
"Then…" but Sinistra didn't have to ask. She was spared the trouble by the Potions Master's lips touching hers and silencing her. "Oh," she finished weakly when he stopped. Celaene stretched and smiled at him. He smiled back, but it wasn't a happy smile… it was far too dark for that. Much more intense. "You didn't have to stop," Sinistra added.
"I know," he hissed, and his voice was like fire burning her mind but she didn't want it to stop. She wanted it to go on burning until she couldn't think anymore… until she didn't have to think because he would do it for her. He had always known what she was thinking and what she wanted and what she needed. And now she needed him and he knew.
Snape's tongue traced an intricate pattern across her collarbone and down to her chest and Celaene shivered when his hands joined the game. "Severus," she murmured. "Severus, please…" Sinistra was fading in and out of herself, like a bad radio. She fell out again and once again landed, but now she was alone, her only company a clock that read "12:32—Get Out of Bed Because You're Supposed to be Teaching." Snape was not there.
After several long moments, Celaene understood that she had slept through the night and into the next afternoon. "Shit," she swore, as much about losing the dream as about being so late. Sinistra rolled out of bed and threw on a set of black and silver robes, dragged a brush through her hair, and, snatching her wand, stumbled out the door and down to lunch.
Celaene looked messy and frustrated and angry as hell at him, but she did look well-rested. She threw herself into a chair beside him and said accusingly, "You made me sleep for eighteen hours, Snape. I asked for a decent night's rest. That was all. Shut up," she added, whipping around and addressing Sprout, who had mumbled, "Decent night's rest, eh?" Severus barely glanced at her.
"You needed the sleep," he said simply.
"I hate you."
"Oh really?" he asked very quietly, staring straight into her brown eyes and seeing in them, floating lazily to the surface of her mind, the memory of a very recent dream. Sinistra flushed and pushed him out of her thoughts. He laughed and she raised her wand menacingly.
"Celaene," said Dumbledore's voice warningly. "If you are going to curse Professor Snape in front of the students, I am afraid I will have to dismiss you."
"Sorry, Albus," she said, lowering her wand a little wistfully.
Snape went back to his lunch. She was quite nice-looking when she was frustrated with him.
There were two nights left for her to seduce him. And then Dumbledore would find out and she would lose her job. She'd just have to grit her teeth and do it… there was simply nothing else to be done about it. So, at nine-thirty, when all of the students would be in their dormitories or in detention for not being there, she made herself more than presentable and slipped quietly through the school and into the dungeons. The torch-lit hallways were full of long, velvety shadows and thick layers of dust and neglect. She lit her wand to illuminate room numbers until she found the one she wanted: 138 E. Celaene knocked and waited for an answer.
The door opened a few inches and Snape recognized her after a second or two. He let her inside and she looked him over. There was a glass of elf-made wine in one hand and the book, Thanatos Kai Pyr, in the other, and while he was not yet drunk, he was pleasantly hazy and looked, in the cool light of the long black candles in the room, almost like a shadow himself. He looked her over and then offered her a chair. She sat. He sat and offered her a drink. She drank.
"It's good," she said slowly, referring to the wine.
He glanced up from his book. "Yes," was all he said before returning to the dusty pages. After several more long minutes, she said in a contemplative voice, "You know, I still can't believe you were there."
"Where?" His voice was so low that she could have easily thought she imagined it.
"In Hogsmeade. That night."
"I was there."
"I didn't see you."
"Yes, you did," he stated very firmly. "You definitely saw me."
"You weren't there," she said, nearly hopefully, but the look in his black eyes was enough to say without a doubt that he had been. Then he said the four words that she should have known all along.
"I was the vampire."
I really hope you liked it! The next chapter will probably be the last or close to the last.