A/N - see Part 1 for Disclaimer etc. Thanks for the reviews - they are appreciated. Forgive me if it seems there is some Headmaster bashing in the next couple of chapters.

Repentance – part 5

He was brooding again – and it had affected his game. The black Queen had claimed victory far too easily and Minerva couldn't help but think that for once it hadn't been a fair fight. Perhaps they should have chosen a game with less emotional resonance – like exploding snap.

The castle slumbered around them as they faced each other across the now empty chessboard. But restlessness tugged at her, the need to be doing something, anything was hard to ignore. She had to squash the impulse to transform and dash around the corridors and staircases until she was tired enough to sleep. But one look at her companion told her that sleep wouldn't be coming for some time.

She had never intended to get to know him so well, never planned to be so familiar with his moods that a quick glance was often enough to tell her what he was feeling. Years ago she had decided that this was some small compensation for seldom knowing what he was thinking and never being able to predict what he would do next.

Their friendship had developed slowly but surely – the week they had spent together had lain its foundations, but only when they had met again all those years later had they really started to become close. The attraction that had complicated the last moments of her training had died a natural death somewhere in the intervening decade. When they'd become reacquainted he'd given no indication that he was interested in anything more than a professional relationship.

In fact, in the first moment of their meeting she had seen his reaction to her and known he was cataloguing how much she had changed. He'd carefully kept his response to her under control after that – but she'd seen enough and she knew he would never see past her austere clothing, the heavy glasses and the severe bun that held her hair back from her face – even if she had wanted him to. She knew he would never look at her and not regret the change, blame himself for it. If she were lucky she would at least ensure that Severus did not share that element of her fate. He struck her as a young man who desperately needed someone to care about him, she was not sure that he would learn to live with the haunted look she sometimes saw in Albus' eyes when he watched her.

She knew she wasn't the woman he'd sent off to spy on Grindelwald, but she had learnt to live with the person who had emerged in her place. It was a miracle that Albus had stopped blaming himself sufficiently to become her friend – she had no right to expect more – and yet, she wasn't someone who was easily satisfied with half measures. Making her decision she sat back in her chair and said quietly,

"There is nothing to be gained by regretting what had to be done." He started at her words and his eyes were shot with pain when he met her gaze.

"Under the circumstances I don't know how you can say that my dear."

"This isn't about me." The expression on his face suggested that he thought otherwise.

"It's generous of you to say that, but the truth is I've placed you in a position where you have no choice but to relive some extraordinarily painful memories."

"It didn't occur to you that I might be willing to suffer the discomfort if I thought it might help us to win? That the memories might be less painful if they could help someone else?"

"I didn't dare hope for that much." She sighed; they had never talked about this. At first because even though years had passed, mention of that time in her life had been painful for her. Later, as she had found herself again, it had simply been easier for them to leave the past alone. But now she realised that leaving the subject alone had been a mistake. If nothing else she should never have allowed him to wallow in guilt for so long. She should never have indulged his attempts to view her as damaged, to see her life as defined by her ghosts.

She was, above all, a practical woman and she had decided long ago that if she were to live with herself, find any measure of peace she would have to let go of the spectres that could so easily have haunted her. And she had done just that, not without pain, not without distress – but she had confronted her actions and accepted them. Now, it was clear that she should have forced Albus to do the same. She was his friend – she refused to spend a moment longer as one of his burdens.

"What do I have to do to convince you to stop seeing me as a victim? As your victim?" She mused – almost surprised that she had spoken outloud. "It was necessary, we both know that. I'm not sorry for what I did and I'm not sorry that I survived it. I don't think I am the sort of person who could idly sit by while a war raged around me, especially not when I could do something to help."

Her words seemed to have very little impact on him, he was still watching her with the same patient, sorrowful expression – it made her want to shake him. She stood up and leant against the fireplace instead, needing to put some distance between them.

"Albus – my life hasn't been destroyed, it hasn't been wasted. I have a job I love, teaching a subject that still fascinates me. The moment when one of my students makes a breakthrough in their learning still has the power to move me – even more so when they aren't gifted but have earned the accomplishment through sheer hard work. I am Deputy Headmistress at a prestigious school, have the opportunity to consult with transfiguration masters from all over the world; I've written research papers and had them positively received. I have colleagues I respect, whose company I enjoy and I have friends, dear friends. What is it that you believe my time with Grindelwald robbed me of?"

"You aren't married, you don't have a family of your own." She almost gasped as he spoke the words aloud. For all the intimacy of their friendship they were heading into deep waters now, this was an area they had both been careful not to venture into before.

"But I could have married, if I'd chosen to," she said carefully, aware just how private her personal life had been over the years, that he had no way of knowing what she did when she was not at the school. "I've had relationships, I've refused two proposals – that I have chosen not to marry isn't a reflection of what happened to me."

"Isn't it?" She hadn't expected the challenge, certainly wasn't prepared for the harsh edge to his voice. "It seems to me that someone who went through what you did might find it hard to trust others and as a consequence might very well hide behind barriers." The tenuous grasp on her temper was rapidly unravelling now and she could feel herself starting to get angry. He was right – to some extent anyway – but she had learnt long ago that attack was the best form of defence – it was one of the lessons he had watched Alastor teach her.

"I might be cautions about who I allow to get close to me, but I am quite capable of intimacy. I'm not the one who holds people at arms length, who refuses to see others as equals." She saw his wince of pain and knew she had gone too far, but for once she was not inclined to spare him. "None of this has anything to do with me, it's all about your guilt. You are the one who sees my life as ruined, you also appear to believe I am incapable of having relationships – and you insist on treating me as a victim. I don't need you to act as though the sight of me causes you pain Albus, I have faced my demons. I'm not the one who is a prisoner of the past!"

A long silence followed her words, until at last he said, in a voice hoarse with emotion, "it may be that I have behaved as you describe, but in my defence there are things you don't know, couldn't know."

"Then tell me, explain to me. What damage could it do now?"

"It could destroy something I place great value in. One of the most important things in my life." His voice and the weight of his gaze left her in no doubt about his meaning, but her head swam with confusion. They had strayed a great distance from the familiar ground of their friendship and she had no idea what to do or say next.

She was fortunate when an interruption meant that she did not have to decide immediately.

TBC