Hi,
Pls, don't forget to review!
Rowling's world, not mine!
Chapter 36. By the Road of Freedom
… It was the very essence of freedom since he drove with a sense of being awaited….
What Severus never expected in this atypically turbulent night was a camp buried in silence, unwelcoming, without a shred of light. Upon entering the enlarged tent, he heard soft noises from the four sleeping occupants, one of them bent on the table, her book's edge peeking out from under her arms. The candle end still hovered above her – the charm gave out later than the light.
Tenderness washed through him, overwhelming enough to force him down near the sleeping witch. Severus crouched next to her, trying to find the courage to touch her arm or back. Finally, he resolved to just whisper her name, but that didn't wake her.
"Beauxbaton," – he tried again, now louder, and had to shake his head with some disapproval. He could never sleep this deeply. She also should be more aware of her surroundings. "Sage," – he whispered, leaning closer, this time touching her arm softly, and she moved so fast, he almost lost balance. Then, facing a wand and the unforgiving eyes of a disoriented witch, Severus held up both palms to show they were empty. "It's only me, witch. Put down that wand!"
Sage closed her eyes with a sigh, and after a moment, she let her wand down. "You frightened me." She yawned.
"As you should be frightened," – Severus told her with a smirk. "What were you thinking, falling asleep without re-enforcing the wards around you?"
Sage grimaced before she tried to work some crick out of her neck. On second thought, he was glad she didn't answer. Probably she thought he would be around…. Severus waved away the guilt, recalling Vincent's words. "You won't fail you, so you won't fail anyone." Was that possible? He didn't fail himself yet. Not completely. Not tonight…. And talking about that "anyone"…
"Sage, may I talk to you now?" – those words came out easier than he expected, though still the hardest seven words he'd uttered in these past sixteen years since he'd asked Dumbledore to "save them all." Bastard! – the anger came in one forceful wave, so violent it blurred his vision, so he didn't see the witch nodding, only heard her ask if he was all right.
He wasn't. Losing control over most of the dams that held back his emotions was not something he would call all right, but Héloïse had trained him well to know that it was better to lose his grip on his emotions when not directly threatened than losing his hold on his magic. It was surprisingly dormant in these past few weeks, probably because he let it swirl about him enough to keep away the kids. Whatever they perceived, it was miraculously efficient to sustain his isolation.
Sage reached for the candle end to spell it whole again, but he stopped her with a light touch on her arm.
"Walk with me," – he asked her shyly, and almost heard her smile in the darkness before she stood and led the way outside.
A few dozen steps and several attempts to finally speak up later, just after he let out another lungful of air he took so he could begin his tale, Sage stopped and turned to him.
"You know, I appreciate it," – she told him. "And I find it very kind of you that you still can't speak up and just tell me off, I–" –she sighed, caressed his arm and walked on as if she made any sense at all. Severus followed her, confused and wary.
"Please don't think I haven't noticed how much of a burden we have proven ourselves to be!" – Sage went on with great determination. "I am ashamed. And I'm resolved to pay you back to the last knut whatever I owe you. Gold cannot stand in the way of friendship, and I've learnt already that a strong friendship can only stand on clear grounds in business. You don't need to worry about it, I promise! I'm just don't know yet to find out how to assist you even while we are here."
The last sentence she only told to the empty night air because Severus halted, stunned, moments before.
"What on earth are you talking about?" – he asked the witch when she finally noticed his absence and turned around.
"Well, your money, of course!" – Sage walked back to meet him, and the dim starlight showed her features. She wasn't mocking him. On the contrary, Severus saw that no-nonsense expression on her face he initially valued in her the most. She still didn't make any sense. "You cannot think about me so low to believe I would fail to notice how we have eaten you out of your reserves, how you work day and night, even after you are the one who offered sanctuary, let us invade your privacy, peruse your books, your devices, your–"
By this point, he felt he would do about anything to stop her flow of words. Since she offered no point to cut in, Severus simply stepped closer and grabbed her arms.
"Come." He pulled her through the small clearing, swiftly enough for her not to talk, and sat her up on the working surface of his bench, so he could look into her eyes even when she hung her head. "I didn't mean to talk about the money," – he began, but the witch was quick to argue:
"Well, I think you should. It's absurdly unjust to–"
"Beauxbaton!" – Severus used the only way he found efficient to make her listen and held her by the arms again. "If you must have this out of the way, you need to know I haven't been more grateful in my life than the day you took that damned money and chose clothes and whatever sanitary for the brats. Merlin knows, had I had to do it, Granger would still be whining in that bathroom, and I would probably be as far away from here as the Moon and back. About you doing my other chores-"
"Severus, I don't do any chores! It is clearly you who work yourself to exhaustion while I don't do a thing but sitting around and disciplining Gryffindors, for goodness' sake!"
He honestly couldn't believe her incomprehension but tried to be as calm about her silliness as he possibly could. So not letting her arms go, Severus looked deep into Sage's eyes when he told her:
"That is very much a thing, Beauxbaton, more than any of my questionable deeds. And you should know, I realize… in depth, how much of a mistake I–" – he thought he could say it with one breath, but in fact, he was too much ashamed about his dealings. So Severus closed his eyes and just said the words: "I should never have left you alone," – only to have his eyes popping open with disbelief when the witch screamed:
"But you've never left me!"
"The hell I haven't!"
Severus pushed himself from her, her arms, her rare moment of naïveté, and turned to watch the night till he calmed. His outburst must have been surprising enough for her to finally wait him out.
"I asked you to talk because I realized I needed to make some… amends," – he carried on when he felt composed enough. "First things first, if someone needs to apologize, that surely must be me. This place… well, as Mr. Weasley so aptly put it the other day, it is indeed a rat-hole. Furthermore, –"
"You know, if it's about mocking my skills with household charms again, you may very well save your breath!" – This time Sage sounded less contrite and more worked up, something Severus was at least familiar with still none of the outcomes he hoped for. "I am definitely improving, there's no denying that, and–"
"This is not about your being a sitting duck without your elves. I've never mocked you" – Severus made a hasty gesture to swipe it all away, but… "Have they had the nerve to bring it up with you? I will make sure to–"
"Please, you shouldn't get into this. I need whatever authority I still have to deal with them. If you chime in, you can only make it worse. And I only needed some practice anyway, please don't think that I–"
Severus returned to his stratagem of holding her hand and staring her down. He doubted how long this would still work, but it seemed the only way to make her silent and stop defending herself. As if she should…. He refused to even try to understand that idiocy, but she looked so contrite he couldn't think up a way to begin to tell her what he should.
"You're impossible," – Severus sighed, and somehow the witch found amusement in his assessment.
Her silent chuckle brought back that odd feeling of having a pal from their shared autumn and eased him into a better mood, too. He watched her eyes sparkling up brazenly, and he reached to caress her cheek. Sage leaned onto his palm, and her fingers found their favourite haunt on his chest to play. Severus' gaze involuntarily sought out her lips, and the damned witch slowly licked them. For some seconds, the stars revolved around each other faster, producing a strange bend in gravity that pulled his lips toward hers… it was not the way.
Severus pushed his forehead onto hers with a sigh and began more hoarsely than he expected: "Sage, I called you here because you're the only one who never asked me why I chose this place to hide, and I need to tell. But I can only do so if you let me."
She caressed his face and pecked a kiss on his nose, none of which helped much to compose his thoughts, but then she obediently sat back on the bench. Her smile was still inviting, and she didn't occlude. A voice from his younger self began silently cursing him for the risk he was taking.
To risk this all and deliberately head into what could only lessen him in her eyes…. Severus told himself it was only just and probably too late anyway. If he ever had a chance to have her love him, he was foolish enough to wish her to know him first. Even if that risked the success of the whole affair. And there was no other he trusted on this world. Not like this.
It was arguably the hardest half an hour of his recent life, but – maybe in staccato – Severus told the tale about his father's dream.
Tobias was a little more than ten years older than his wife, Eileen. Fighting through the Second Great Muggle War, he must have seemed well-travelled, wise, and strong in the eyes of a young witch, just within a year or two after leaving Hogwarts. A woman, who must have had the ability to cheer him and to admire him – two things he must have had been in want for those years. Eileen was silent, obedient; she had a love and appreciation for the simple life by nature – priceless qualities in Tobias' eyes for certain.
Severus put these things together while travelling with other world war veterans along the Road. It was easier to lament their relationship among these men, for their tales and disposition were not far from what he remembered from his earliest years with Tobias. It was undoubtedly harsh for a small child but understandable for the man he became since. One who also knew war, blood, betrayal, fear…. He travelled with these men, all in their twenties, early thirties, just like himself. All sought freedom from their own demons to become someone who established a life worth living. Without their demons if they could. Tobias probably could not lose his.
The oddest realization Severus had about his parents was that they must have been happy for a while. All his readings about Muggle history proved that. Tobias must have joined the Trade Union when the wages were rising when he found a job and accommodation easily after the war. He had a young wife, maybe without great beauty but one whose outlook on life complemented his, who must have made a wonderful housewife with all the charm work she had learnt to use, even if he didn't know about those at the time. They moved into an area that didn't wear the ugly patches of the bombings. They travelled to the sea for holidays. They were probably theatre goers with their friends on Fridays, definitely churchgoers on Sundays, and had a pass to the public library…
After more than a decade of marriage, for a thirty-year-old witch masquerading as a Muggle wife, cut from her relatives and previous life, the last thing on Eileen's mind must have been giving birth. Also, a child must have been a very late surprise for a man at Tobias' age. An ugly surprise to ruin his way of living at a time when his lifestyle was already threatened. The changes in the Muggle government, the Trade Unions' influence failing or questioned, the wages freezing – all added up for a less certain era, leading to the great strikes and a failing economy. Severus knew very well that his parents never had savings. He might wonder if they should have had, but the fact remained, they had none.
He had indeed seemed to ruin a life his parents built, with the economic failure to coincide with his birth, and that ruined life resonated in his father's daydreams. Those were about the Road of Freedom, which he regretted he didn't take instead of coming home after the Great War. If Tobias Snape could have taken a different path going back in time, he would have joined his Muggle friends and war-buddies to search for freedom in America, instead of joining his life with Eileen's in Cokeworth, fathering a child he could never love.
"Why are you telling this to me?" Sage asked when Severus went silent. He felt her attention fixed on his face and words all the while he talked, and her fingers never ceased to caress the hand he pulled down from her face. He had to pull it away.
"Because that's the reason we are here." He said dryly. "This is my legacy, Beauxbaton, this big fucking Nothing in the middle of the bloody Nowhere, and I finally can tell you why my father left me with this worthwhile prize!" – Severus spat the words with untampered anger, and his rage was only to rise. "It is all him," – he showed around in the pitch-black night. "Whatever you can see here! Because he was a big fucking nobody and nothing, and he made no sense at all. His life made no sense, he regretted it, he destroyed it, and he pulled us all with him into his big fat personal abyss!
"Because I made no sense for him or anybody, including me. Because all, and I, and life is just an empty canvas. Because that is what he left for me to have. Can you even sense that meaning with your amazing heritage?"
The witch eyed at him thoughtfully long enough, he began to think he should have tempered the cynicism in his outburst, but when she spoke, it felt like a punch in the gut.
"Do you mean the one I'm wasting away?"
"You are way too good to recreate this kind of nothing," – Severus finally said after moments of contemplation.
He knew he hurt her, but this time he was beyond regrets. He was angry and disappointed but didn't feel guilty for this moment. The big screw-up his life was, now uncovered, was not only his fault. He had no chance and had always been worthless, and Sage finally had to understand that. "I have nothing, witch. Whatever I wish for, this you have to know."
Unsurprisingly, she pulled away. It hurt, but it was just, and Severus could only accept her retreat after all. What didn't sit well was her anger. Sage's eyes flared for long moments before they turned wickedly cold.
"Well, I have to thank you for telling me all about that," – she began in a matching cold tone. "Maybe I deserve a complete understanding of the situation then, would you agree?"
Severus swallowed warily, but he nodded.
"So you told me your father's point of view. The great length you went assessing it is truly remarkable." The pitch of sarcasm in her voice he couldn't place made Severus tense. Sage went on. "As a witch, I miss your mother's point. Or was it always complimentary?"
Severus snorted. "No way in hell. I hardly remember a day they didn't quarrel."
"Oh, how odd! So her stance was different on the situation… would you relate that too, or are we to rely solely upon the Muggle side of your upbringing?"
Her tone was confusing, and Severus felt instantly aloof, as always when a conversation turned about his mother. He struggled against shyness and his strong sense of privacy when he tried to form an answer.
"She… Eileen Snape was never famous about having strong opinions… she wasn't… she was no fighter…" – he finished lamely, never knowing what Sage was looking for.
"Yet you say they kept arguing," – Sage pointed out. "So what were their arguments about? Or can't you recall?"
Oddly, it was hard to recall indeed. Severus realized whenever he remembered their quarrels, his mind shied away from reciting their exact words or screams. Nevertheless, there were some remarks he remembered his father said.
"What good has your so-called magic ever done for me?" "Did magic make you younger? Nicer? Has it ever put bread and butter on the table?" "The boy is useless! A dreamer! I should have strangled him the day he showed those so-called talents like you get rid of a damaged pup!" "What good is that foul little twerp for me?"
Somehow his mother's responses were less clear in his ears.
"She… They argued about money… magic… and me" – he finally stuttered.
"Am I to understand then that she had a higher opinion on all those things than he had?" – Sage pushed on, her voice losing its coldness completely lost on Severus.
"You can't magic money. It doesn't multiply, it is not to conjure… neither food… he never understood that–"
"I've asked about your mother, not Gamp's laws."
This tone was frighteningly familiar. He wasn't used to getting called to account lately, maybe only by his masters. Still, this voice…. he was trained to reply.
"She kept … explaining. She tried to protect me when…" – recalling his mother's voice, posture, words were devastating. Severus soldiered on, "She baked after he hurt her… or me… whenever she could. She sent me to my room… and later away…. She said he loved us. She said… she trusts me to understand… I need to be a good boy– Damnit, there's no good in watching her die! She's wasting away…."
"But what does she say?"
Severus never noticed his words changing as he slipped back in the time of his memories. Sage's question seemed to come from that longed passed time, another place... Another realm, a different life…
"Take my wand and practice; they will never know… I should never come back for the Holidays… I must be good and calm… hide my rage, my talent… and hide, so he won't get provoked… That it's none of his faults – That's a lie! He's a fucking Muggle, just a Muggle! Why cant she stop him? Why does she accept this? He is not worth more, his peace of mind, his bloody pride and delusions… Fuck, he doesn't worth more than us… THAN ME!
"But he was worth more than me. She said he did because he was my father. Always respect thy father! Well, damn me if I would! Then damn you – that's what she said to me." Severus opened his eyes wide and stared up at the witch as if waking from a dream. How she managed to push him back in time, he had no way to know, but it felt as if he came through from nineteen seventy-seven, just leaving Eileen's sick-bed behind, with words of farewell he should have never heard. "Are you happy? Are you happy with me? I'm damned; my own mother said so!"
The witch's steady gaze didn't leave his eyes while she calmly asked what happened after.
A school year later, Eileen was ill again, that time unsalvageable. She didn't let him run a medical scan, but Severus did it in her sleep anyway and brewed her three different kinds of draughts. She never took them, but she said she loved him before she died. He remembered that one. But the penultimate farewell somehow slipped away from him along the years. Eileen Snape did protect her son. Multiple times, actually. But she failed to give him the ultimate protection. Hope for salvation or a belief in a possible escape.
Tobias died about a year later. Without a wife and alone in the house. Without a job, a decent friend around, and most definitely without a son to ever break the door on him. He drank the rest of his health and sanity away in ten short months, leaving Severus with a house at the end of the row, on the wrong side of the river, and a bunch of memories he'd only wished to forget – and now to make sense of.
"Let me see if I understand it right," – Sage's calm voice was almost startling. "They hurt you, so now you decided to measure yourself by a Muggle scale. I could fault your logic here, but rest assured, I will not. I guess this is the reason you hardly used magic since we've arrived here. Surely not more than warming charms in the mornings since we passed, transfiguring everything we needed.
"Let's measure you then, Severus!" She crossed her arms before her chest, and cold dread ran through him. "What weighs here more? You have no benefit from a trade union, no rising economy, no fixed wages. You built up a complete praxis, a clientele of Muggles ordering your services within about two months, thus providing for five in the middle of your nowhere, as you say, without any kind of help from another. You provided roof, food, safety, clothes, an opportunity to learn and evolve for three kids, and kept a woman feel nice about you. Is that something your father could do after you?"
Severus stared, but she looked impatient for his answer. Finally, he pushed out the words,
"Did I?"
Sage's strictness turned against him. "Did you not, in your opinion?"
"Well…" – it took some moments of surprise, but actually, if she put it like that, and especially if she said he kept her feel nice, whatever that meant… "I guess I did."
"Good," – Sage nodded. "So you passed your exam in Muggling, even without mentioning you are creative, well-read, sophisticated, eloquent, entertaining and talented by even Muggle means – so obviously superior in your set of skills than I imagine your father by your recollection. And we are still yet to talk about you're not being a Muggle. Let's correct that, shall we?"
Severus swallowed but eagerly nodded.
"So you say your mother didn't protect herself, and she obviously didn't do enough to protect you. However, she trusted in your talent in magic. You are the youngest to acquire his Potions mastery on this side of the world, the youngest Head of your House, proficient in mind magic, a natural in wandless and experimental magic, inventor of spells and potions, and a practitioner of the One True Art, an Alchemist if I ever knew one, still not even half a century old… Would you think your mother would approve? Did you prove her point by preventing "getting rid of you like of a damaged pup"?"
Hearing those words from her, with her voice adding just enough disbelief and outrage to them to make her point clear was a gift he couldn't have expected or taken lightly. Severus swallowed hard, but some forgotten part of him risked a shy look at Sage's face and gave a crooked boyish smile.
"I should think so…" – he offered.
Sage didn't share in his amusement. "Yes, you should," – she swooped down on the word. "Now about the big fat abyss you believe to possess by legacy. Would you be so kind as to recall what your own bloody answer was to Mr. Weasley when he dared to suggest about this land that it was empty?"
He could only hang his head for seconds while all their talk about hard-working Muggles and Sage's opinion about the alchemical meaning of copper replayed in front of his mind's eye.
"I'm sorry for angering you," – he said softly to her shoes, calmer than he ever remembered to be without using mind magic or potions.
"I'm not," – she replied quickly, and Severus looked up to see her half-hearted smile. "And I'm not sorry for getting angry. It was only just." Then, after some moments of consideration, she added: "You know, I also get the impression we'll both be through hell before the war will end. So I think it must be enough for us not to ever be afraid of damnation."
The air felt thicker around him again, but this time Severus felt something new, a sense of strength and hope, which was usually alien to his private musings. How on earth she managed to take the worst, divest it of its poisonous edge and twist it to the point it became an asset, he didn't know. But his mind stuck on one word, replaying it again and again.
"Us?"
The witch shrugged and shyly turned her head away, making him almost regret asking back. It was not the time for pushing his luck. He recognized how far their words got him already. He might have not feared of being damned any more if that meant being damned with her, selfish as it may be, but he suspected Sage already gave more than she should have had to. Thus, her linking her fingers together with his in the dark was startlingly unanticipated.
"Thank you," – he said softly, and it was scarcely enough.
She shrugged again, but this time she didn't turn away. Instead, she leaned closer, planting a small kiss on his nose again, just like that time in his study when he thought she would let him make love to her. It was chaste and cheeky, and when she chuckled seeing his surprise, it made him want to snicker with her on their shared lunacy like in the autumn, all too many months ago.
Severus lifted their entwined hands and kissed the tips of her fingers, looking into her eyes. The next he knew was her lips were softer even than what he remembered, and his nose caressed across her cheek, gratefully drawing in the scent of her skin. Sage slipped into his arms from the bench, and he hugged her close, burying his face into her hair, and never knew how long they stood in silence under the stars.
The next morning was different. Particularly because it finally felt like a morning should, with some hope, some determination, and some grumpy sleepiness while touching after a strong tea in the kitchen. The three kids joining them at breakfast was inevitable, and the boys' waxing about his bike made him think about their circumstances from a new angle.
It was more than clear that Weasley and Potter wanted nothing more than to take a ride again, but it never occurred for a moment to Severus to let that happen. However, their ramblings reminded him of a problem he kept facing in this age that wouldn't have been this conspicuous in another era… engine oil.
Soon Severus found himself busy between his bench and potion storage, elbow-deep in the pieces of the Black Shadow's clutch and within a swirling fog of ideas about producing a lubrication oil with a higher viscosity than what the fifties had seen. Preferably even in colder weather. If he could just solve this riddle with his knowledge about later solutions, even perhaps using magical brews to enhance the properties of the materials. In that case, he could substitute the detergents and dispersants not yet in use, thus minimizing the oil sludge building up in the damped compensator and the clutch baskets fixed in an oil bath in this particular motor's building…. Of course, it would open the possibility for the oil getting dusty and messy sooner, but he supposed he could find a way there with some magic.
Anyway, if he just found the right balance, not yet making the clutch slip but still with a high enough viscosity to save energy, he could spread the "brew" among the travellers. He wasn't the only one aware of the need for better motor oil, and Vincent would also profit from the business. He wouldn't need to look for a day job while providing for all their needs and finally focusing on their real problems.
His heart swelled now that he was rid of a big part of his guilt, and suddenly every unnecessary moment spent here with the brats was a waste of time. Unless Potter showed some progress. Which he did not. At least not at the level Severus would welcome or acknowledge it, but at least he could hear and observe him practising with Sage for hours on end.
It took some time until Severus became aware of the silence, consumed in his work as he was, then the shadow Potter cast on the edge of the bench was no longer negligible. The nerve of the brat!
"Mr. Potter, I'm sure you have chores to do. This must be the time to see after them."
"Erm… they're kind of ready… sir."
"Kind of" – Snape grumbled.
"I was thinking…-"
It even began on a bad note. Snape's hands didn't stop at his work while he tried - he really tried - to rein in his temper, or at least just to not get rattled by the simple presence of the boy. "You knew them all, haven't you? Sirius, and Professor Lupin and even my–"
"Get the hell out of the way, Potter, you already had your curiosity satisfied on your own way, I believe!" – Severus menacingly grumbled. Still, curiously, Potter seemed more agitated than afraid.
"No!" – The boy gasped with what might have been a hint of shame – not that Severus cared. "I-I wanted to say… I wanted to say I'm sorry. I should–"
Snape extinguished the small portable flame in front of him with an impatient wave of his hand.
"Spare me!" He tried to turn and walk away. Anything else but that brat and his false claims and whining! But he stopped short when Potter yelled.
"It's not about them but my mother!" – The boy only went on when Snape froze. "I mean, you were in the same year… she was in the same year… Everybody talks about my dad and how great and wonderful he was but you… and I see… I mean… I understand why you are not, but… but no one ever mentions my mum!"
Safe with his back to the kid, Severus gave himself a second to swallow the lump in his throat, and for a moment, he closed his eyes to collect himself. Eloquence, or rather the lack of it, but that he understood. That he always found unjust and rich in a twisted way. Goddamn Potter had all the praise while he wasn't worth a finger of the witch he–
"What do you want?" – he barked out, still facing away from the kid.
"I want to know who she was. She didn't even seem to like my father. I want to know more than that she was nice and that bullshit about having her eyes. That's nothing! I don't even know if she liked Quidditch or Gobstones? Or if she had friends… Maybe they're still alive and could tell me about her! I don't know anything about her, only that she was nice and died for me, and it's…." – the boy's voice trailed away until it was hardly more than a whisper. "It's just not enough."
Severus stood motionless for a long time, wrestling with himself so long he doubted the boy was still behind him. Then he heard Potter's feet shuffle on the ground and decided to answer with a deep breath.
"She hated Gobstones," – he quietly said. "She thought it was ridiculous and messy, and she made fun of it like of everything she disliked. Which didn't buy her many friends at the time. Then she took up with the girls from her dorm, and they were cheering for Quidditch because Mary Macdonald thought it was cool. Mary got married not long after your mother did, and I haven't heard she died. They were friends with a girl called Marlene Price. She died before the end of the last war. Her husband was a MacKinnon. You may ask Kingsley. His sister was their friend, too; her tale is not mine to tell.
"There were not many other girls she was friends with. She was the kind everyone liked, and very few knew. She married your father because she loved him, and I am the last one in the world to tell you why."
He could sense the boy wonder's surprise in the length of the stunned silence that followed his words. Eventually, Potter risked another question:
"Is there anything that I have from her? Or is it just–"
"You do have her eyes," – Severus silently admitted, "however, you lack her wit and grace. She joked about everything when she was happy, and happiness came easy for her. I doubt it's similar for you. But she wasn't less stubborn than what you prove yourself to be." The fact they both hated him, he omitted. It wasn't completely true anyway. But she'd also been quick to judge… Severus didn't want to say bad things about her… but maybe… "She hated everything dark with a passion, and she believed in the conventional ways to judge what was right and wrong, even in magic." Here, he said it. Even if it might very well go way over the brat's head, this time of all, he wanted to be just.
Potter obviously enjoyed the rare opportunity. "What classes did she like?" – he risked yet another question.
Severus snorted to avoid laughing out loud. This one the boy had coming for such a long time!
"Potions." He turned and looked into Potter's face for the first time. He didn't know what he expected to see there, but the honest hunger for every word was surprising enough to erase the challenging look from his eyes. "Her talent didn't seem to touch you," – he couldn't help adding. "And now you have your answers regardless of what you deserve. We won't make a habit of discussing your family, Potter. You'd better go now back to your peers."
"Yes, sir," – this was maybe the first time he heard the honorific without having the feeling the boy was going to choke on it. "Erm… thank you for–"
"Get away!"
The brat finally got the message, but it proved hard to sink back into the routine that afternoon. His prize came hours after dinner when everyone finally went to sleep in the tent.
Severus listened to Sage's sheets rustling and the small noises of the witch's turning in her bed with resignation. He gave himself about five more minutes before his usual late-night walk. Then shuffling feet, some fabric rustling, and she appeared in the doorway. She wore outside robes, and she stopped for a moment to look at him before she left the tent.
He got up and followed her as if in a dream. The clearing bathed in the moonlight. Some magical flowers popped up their heads and were now shining in the small grass, adding to the eerie feeling of walking through an illusion. However, the kiss he received when the witch stepped out of the shadows was unmistakably real.
After the first shock of surprise, Severus' arms circled Sage's waist, holding her closer than anyone valuing sanity should, especially with three Gryffindors nearby. But her tongue found a way between his lips, and at the moment, there was nothing farther from Severus than to think at all. Her hands caressed the back of his neck, his shoulders, her tongue played with his, smaller kisses landed on his lips time and again, and her body comfortably heated his. Chest to chest, waist to waist – within a short minute, he found his hands grabbing for her wherever he could reach, his breath hitched, and his blood ran wild. Mostly in one direction.
As sudden as the attack came, Sage pulled back to smile at him like the proverbial cat with the cream.
"Here," – she proclaimed. "You deserved that."
Severus did his best to calm his breathing and make sense of her words.
"Wh-What? Why?"
When the witch laughed, he could only hope she didn't mock his eloquence.
"A reward," – she repeated, licking her lips as if she was treasuring feeling him upon them. If she sought to make him wild, this was a certain way to accomplish such a feat. "You merited a reward, and I had nothing else to offer, but you know, I'm a witch…."
"I've already pieced that together…." – Severus tried to step closer.
"Oh, I didn't mean like that," – she waved his words away. "Haven't you heard those tales as a child? The Muggle tales? Those witches keep saying things like one good turn deserve another and good deed reap the meed of praise."
"Are you sure about those tales, Beauxbaton?" – He reached for her arm and tried to entice her into another hug.
"Well, some of them," – she seemed hesitant for only a moment. "You shook up Potter in a good way, and I'm grateful," - she told him.
It wasn't the way Severus imagined this night to proceed. "I hope this was not all about that brat," – he pulled her as close as he dared.
"Of course not, silly," – Sage's arms finally circled his shoulders again. "I'm sure I could have found another way to reward your assistance if I really wanted to…."
"Would have been a wasted effort, madam. Your approach couldn't be more splendid… or more welcome."
Sage laughed into his mouth while she let him continue their previous wordless exchange. It was so lighthearted a kiss, he couldn't remember anything like it. It was divine.
"How come you have such a thorough understanding of Muggle things," – he finally asked her when they were trying to catch their breath. "Last time their television, now their tales…."
"Oh, it must be because of Stéphan," – she said absently and trailed small ticklish kisses along his chin. When no more words came, Severus pushed on suspiciously.
"Who?"
"Well, I think he was my first boyfriend."
Severus started.
"You think?"
"You know how these things are. You're not always sure what to make of what goes on…." – she turned and walked towards his bench. Severus followed with suddenly mixed feelings.
Soon it turned out that Stéphan was a muggle kid in Héloïse's neighbourhood. As much as the little witch used to be obsessed with the stranger she had once seen in the attic on a fateful afternoon, she still had some time and energy to waste in the following years to watch TV in a Muggle house or to learn how to wind up an old muggle record, especially when Stéphan's parents had all the nineteen records Françoise Hardy produced between '62 and '74.
"Gods, I would have thought you were too young for that!" – The forgotten boy growing up not far enough from Manchester wheezed when he heard that. But, sweet Merlin, she would surely mention Velvet Underground next! The darker streak matched what he preferred, though not Black Sabbath, Joy Division or Bauhaus… talking about it, not even The Dead Kennedys or the Sex Pistols, he also had to add.
"Of course I am! We both were! I told you those were his parents' records!"
Her outrage about him mocking her age was such an easy target; the boy from Slytherin found it hard not to push her. However, riling a woman who sat close enough for more kisses didn't seem a wise course of action under the moonlight. So he asked about the music instead and spread his legs on both sides of the bench to pull her to sit between. It worked like a charm, and he was finally happy with his achievement:
Sage waxed on about music, mentioning more of his one-time favourites than he expected, even Van Halen, without which he couldn't imagine surviving his youth. All the while, she seemed perfectly at ease, comfortably nestled so close to him he hardly dared to move. His only remaining problem was now this Muggle kid, featuring in much too many tales.
Stéphan loved the outdoors, played the guitar probably too well, went entirely too much to the cinema – and inconsiderately, it seemed he never went alone – and he seemed repulsively apt with roller-skates. Severus hated him without reservations within less than five minutes. Then came the nuclear bomb.
"So after the film, we'd decided to practice kissing, which probably makes him my first kiss. His brother mocked us being together, but it was hardly true with everyone knowing my grand-mère and all… Who was your first kiss? I guess not some Muggle girl from your neighbourhood?"
Now, it would have been the simplest of things to repeat the lie he'd said in the common room in the sixth year –the last time this had been an issue – and point to Aurelia Wilkes, strengthening his standing among the Slytherin strong-boys and also diverting attention. She'd said she hadn't minded, but….
"She–" – Severus stopped and cleared his throat, suddenly Sage seemed to sit way too close for his comfort, and he wished his faculties worked more smoothly… "Well, she… erm. She wasn't a Muggle."
Sage's cheeky laughter wasn't welcome this time. "If I knew the question was so hard to answer, I would have never–"
"She was more or less a neighbour," – Severus quickly interjected. He had a wonderful witch basically sitting on his lap. He'd been through and through this all year, even had broken his silence and talked about her to the boy. How hard could it be? "We met before school. She was the only child with magical ability around, and she was… something else. We became friends, then went to school together, she was sorted into Gryffindor and… well, I guess the rest was inevitable to a point, however I…."
When breathing got harder by the second, he had to realize it was indeed more challenging to share anything about her than he'd hoped. Severus wiped a hand down his face, trying to gather his thoughts and courage when long fingers stopped his motion.
"I didn't know I hit a raw spot, I'm sorry," – Sage said with tact. "You don't have to answer. I didn't mean to pry."
It was tempting to sink back into silence, but Severus couldn't shake the image of her looking at him at Headquarters before Christmas. The memory of Sage staring at him first puzzled, then with confusion, finally with red-faced embarrassment before she dashed away – and closed that door. No.
"I loved her," – he said it out loud perhaps the first time in his life, and his voice was embarrassingly hoarse. "I never deserved her, and she knew it. The last time we shared a summer was after the third year. We played and talked, and… it was short, and it probably meant more for me than for her. She… wanted to have fun, and I was only too ready to oblige. No one knew."
"Oh," – Sage sounded confused. "Sorry. Or not, actually, it must have been beautiful in its own way…." - She stopped when she heard that somehow she'd made him break down in laughter. "What?"
"Hardly beautiful!" – for his own shock, Severus couldn't stop snickering. Probably embarrassment. "It was messy and strange at best. Of course, I had no way to compare for a long time but looking back… those feelings were justifiably platonic."
"Certainly more special than what I did." She tried to search his eyes, but Severus turned his head away with unease. "I don't understand whatever you meant by not deserve her. Such things are not about being deserving or not. Do you honestly think she thought about it that way?"
Severus had only seconds to look back at her, utterly perplexed before they heard the motorbike's engine roaring to life.
"POTTER"
Severus cursed savagely while they both jumped and started towards the other side of the clearing – for no good reason, of course, since there was no way to catch them. Two silhouettes on the bike, two shadows vanishing into the dark. Onto a dark cart road! – Severus suddenly remembered, and changing direction, ran towards the edge of the line of trees, doubling his speed. What idiots!
He tried to even his breath to have a good aim with his wand. He cast a shield- and a cushioning charm on his bike and the two dunderheaded Gryffindors. Unfortunately, there was not much else he could do from this distance.
Thank any deity on duty that night, Weasley seemed capable of ruling the engine – so far anyway. Fuming, but now a modicum calmer, Severus was ready to follow them when he heard Sage by his side.
"But why would they do such a thing? There's nowhere for them to go, and they couldn't have expected not to be seen!"
"You want to see subtlety or common sense in a Gryffindor? I suggest you don't hold your breath," – Severus grumbled and watched his motorbike gaining speed as the road smoothed towards the main road. "I'll try to catch them before the turn," – he intended this as if saying goodbye, but the witch put a hand on his shoulder.
"I'm coming with you."
There was no time to discuss it, so Severus just turned on his heel to show up next to a funny-looking cactus he remembered standing in the curve leading up the high road. He must have overestimated the boys' speed because he couldn't hear them yet. Hopefully not because they'd crashed already.
Now the tricky part – he thought to himself. How to stop them without frightening Weasley out of his fragile senses? Unfortunately, he was better equipped for the job he wanted to avoid now. It wasn't very late yet, the main road wasn't as busy as daytime, but he thought it better not to test the kid's skills even in this small traffic. Lorries, delivery trucks were still frequent, and somehow it was hard to see Weasley having a chance against them.
Finally, they heard the engine, and Severus still contemplated the best course of action – then he saw them, and he could only curse.
Potter driving on the cart road must have seemed a wonderful idea for the two Gryffs. They were not slower than he thought. They must have stopped to change place. He saw in Potter's eyes when the boy recognized him. Weasley's loud whoop filled the air just before a sudden bump in the road, and two helmet-less boys were flying through the air.
"Arresto momentum!" – Severus heard Sage chant with him, and both spells hit their targets, slowing the free-fall to levitation, then let the kids glide smoothly to the sparse grass by the roadside. No one could spare a moment to see after the bike, which slid undetected off the road, ricocheted on some rock, and flew out on the main road still operating.
Snape was ready to give a piece of his mind to the Gryffindor heroes, words already forming in his mind as he ran towards them when he heard honking and squeaking brakes from a short distance, and more disturbingly, a single French word.
"Merde!" – Sage was also running, but to the other direction, pulling her wand in haste, she only had time to begin "Arresto-"– when the lorry ran up the beautiful Black Shadow, slid, tilted, finally crashed over, sliding straight into a truck coming from the opposing lane.
Shit indeed – he absently thought before that horrible sound, a bang and a clash, screaming metal and broken glass, combined as loud as a detonation, sliced through the night air. He saw Sage rushing down to the main road, but someone had to see after the kids. It was enough to turn back to them to see the clear understanding of their own stupidity this time on their faces. Then, maybe for the first time, he saw them recoiling pale-faced, and not only of his evident rage. His sense of duty pulled Severus into two different directions, which momentarily speared the prats a sermon.
"Are you two all right?"
Potter hurriedly nodded.
"Fri-" – Weasley swallowed, still staring towards the main road. "Just frightened. Sir."
Severus suddenly felt he could strangle him, if only for using the honorific now of all occasions. Instead, he turned on his heel and Apparated close to the lorry to spare some time and self-control.
The driver was standing by his ruined vehicle, green with shock and so obviously scared out of his wits that he instinctively followed his gaze to the truck's driver seat. Sage's Diffindo already opened up the door, and the witch was too preoccupied to disturb now. He didn't need to see the result of her diagnostic charms to know the driver was in bad shape.
Momentarily neither of them needed him, so Severus' attention turned to slowing and stopping cars on the road. A well-aimed Confundus made them believe they only saw the results of an earlier accident. When he saw no more cars, he cast the same fog he saw upon London in the summer towards both ways and hoped it would slow the traffic. It would have been a gift of fate if it also concealed them, but he couldn't trust that bitch after so many years on this world.
His gaze fell upon the remains of his bike, and the feelings that awoke were mostly akin to grief. If it was a pet or a loved one, he would have kneeled beside her to hold and caress it for the last time; even if such gestures were obviously in vain, it would have given a sense of a final goodbye….
Severus swallowed his pain and stepped to the lorry driver, lifting his wand. The poor bloke's eyes rounded out like saucers. His fright made the decision easier. With a silent Legilimens, he searched through the most recent memories and cast a targeted Obliviate. The Muggle fainted as was expected. No one stood the double intrusion on their minds very well. Severus levitated him off the road, then returned to lift and repair the vehicle with practised wand moves.
If there was indeed an entity watching about them, he hoped she would grant the small mercy of working unnoticed. The whole business could be hushed up as if it never happened. Damned idiots get lucky again because they couldn't afford the presence of the local Aurors. He had no idea at the moment what he would tell them explaining his presence, not even talking about the Muggle casualty – that if Sage wasn't up to a straight miracle, and the sooner, the better! Watching her wand work reminded him of that long-ago discussion at the Malfoy table and the follow-up in the Hogwarts library. She was from a long line of acknowledged healers. Severus only hoped she knew what she was doing because he didn't have his lab and potions to help her out.
Finishing up, he moved the lorry to the side road and sat by the unconscious driver. The man would wake with a severe headache but in a functioning vehicle and without major wounds. He even cast an Episkey to vanish the driver's scratches and the line from the seat belt. Walking up to the other driver proved his suspicions about his wounds, which were not similar. Oh, the fifties and the trust in metal without the later protections!
Sage lay the man on the road by now, and Severus finally heard the sign of life. Coughing. His relief was short-lived, though, when he coughed up blood. The witch didn't seem to mind it.
"Good, don't be frightened. Your lungs are healing," – she told the man. "Spit it out. That's the way. Now, let me see to your leg."
She never stopped talking, always waiting for a reply, a noise, a word, a motion. Her soothing voice made Severus marvel about the fact that not an hour ago, he had held this same witch in his arms! It was beyond any futile concern about being worthy or earth-bound longing of the flash. He felt almost pure just by being able to marvel at her presence.
But he couldn't just stand there watching. When he offered assistance, the witch brushed him away with an absent move. He made himself useful looking after the vehicle. He used different variations of Reparo with skill and practice and moved the truck out of the way. By that time, the driver was coherent in his words and could move, though with pain. Sage escorted him to his seat and refused any explanation. After a silent Legilimens, she Obliviated the driver and turned towards the cart road with a disturbingly indignant face.
The two boys stood there, undecided and contrite. Severus was also ready to give them the reprimands and censure they deserved, but the witch's fury surprised him. She rushed through the road so quickly, he barely saw her move. Wand in hand, she flew into their faces, alternately yelling in French and English, making her words harder to follow than her passion and intention.
Some words stood out though, Severus could catch vil cochon, dare to show face and bâtard idiot – among other phrases, and her delivering her point so viciously would have been amusing… but something was off. When he recognized in her hasty flow of words she said killed her, something began to dawn on him. There had been a sound like a detonation, and she kept rescuing and Obliviated a Muggle ever since, refusing help.
"Sage," – he tried to deter her attention. Nothing happened. Not even the kids dared to look away from her fury. "Beauxbaton!" – he tried again, stepping closer, but still with no avail.
Severus lifted his wand in desperation when her stance turned slowly even more threatening. Then, as a last resort, he tried another approach.
"SALBEI!"
The witch's wand turned on him so swiftly, he almost cast a shield, but it would have been an invitation for a duel, which he fiercely wanted to avoid.
"Witch, look around, where are you?" – he tried to use a voice as commanding as he was capable of – it seemed to work to a point.
"I know that," – her voice sounded surprised, but not as if she returned to the realm of the sane.
"And who are they?" – Severus motioned towards the two boys with his head, never allowing their eye contact to fail.
This time she seemed hesitant.
"They…" – Recognition came slowly to her, and with all the pain, confusion and embarrassment Severus expected and wished to never see. "I–"
Her lips trembled, her wand lowered, and Severus was at her side in a flash. He wished to say some nonsense people lie in times like these but couldn't make himself utter any of those. It's all right seemed so false and empty he couldn't put up with the idiocy of saying the words. Nothing was right; it was more obvious than the sky with the Moon.
"I didn't mean to," – she whispered before he could figure out anything to tell her. Her lips dangerously trembled, and her features contorted to a mask of pain and regret. "I'm going crazy…" – she stared at him helplessly. "I don't want to lose my mind!"
Now she grabbed into her hair and face with both palms as if she was trying to hold her wits together. It didn't seem to work. She trembled like a leaf in the wind.
"What got into her?" – Weasley's voice disturbed Severus' thoughts attempting to make up a solution, and his wand turned on the boy, wordlessly promising all kinds of torture if he couldn't shut his gob, just this once. At least that seemed to have an effect.
"You're just going through the hell you promised we would," – Severus silently told the witch then, driven by a sudden idea. It surely wasn't worse than anything else he could choose to say… "You're as sane as expected. Or as I would be and probably have been already. It's not you going mad, Sage. It's the war. And by Merlin, we are going to end it!"
If his voice had a little tremble with the last thought, he hoped it went unnoticed. Sage's first tears escaped, and they opened a flood in the short moment he could reach out to her.
"I didn't want her to die, I loved her," – she cried. "I didn't want her to die!"
Severus caught the witch mid-collapse when her legs gave out, and held her, letting her sobbing uncontrollably. "I didn't want it… I didn't–"
"Hush, I know you loved her," – he finally tried to reassure, more than disturbed by the brats' presence at a moment like this. He tried to recall Mira's memory to find words that might help. "She knew it too; you know I saw her."
Sage's sobs slowly toned down to a reasonable level, if there was such a thing, and she hid her face in his shoulder. Severus turned them away from the audience to give her some privacy, and honestly, to find some for himself too, because he would have lied if he'd said her sudden breakdown didn't shake him. In the last month, he'd forgotten about her misgivings, working out his own, demanding – no, but accepting assistance she shouldn't have been obliged to give. She knew loss, darkness, pain and grief. She made sacrifices and favours. She was just always there, standing strong whenever he needed her, survived months serving a Dark Lord she didn't support in her heart, bowed to him, risked sanity and life, and more. He was almost glad to be there when she finally broke down, and only wished they were alone.
Eventually, the sobs turned into sniffles, and Severus was almost surprised when the witch looked up with a measure of hope in her eyes.
"We will end it," – she repeated. It was hard to decide if it was a question or a statement. Severus nodded anyway.
"Can you Apparate?" – he asked, first time showing his worry.
Sage looked around, taking in the distant fog, the pride of Gryffindor, and the remains of a Black Shadow spread out on the road.
"No, I want to help," – she shook her head.
"And you did," – Severus assured her. "Now is the time to listen to me woman, you have no use anywhere until you are rested. Go back to the camp, we'll follow you shortly."
"You promise?"
He rolled his eyes. "Would you want me to swear? Go, get away!" His good-natured barb and feigned nonchalance did the trick and making her smile faintly felt a true achievement. Sage Disapparated with a silent pop.
"You will not utter a word about any of this," – Severus turned on the boys. "Ever. Do I make myself clear?" Considering his wand was still in his hand, he honestly hoped he did, and the two nodded multiple times.
Severus conjured a sack and gathered all the pieces of his motorbike from the road and the sides, endlessly hoping not to miss as much as a screw or a spring, so he might be able to charm it back together by daylight.
"Sir, who was she talking about?" – Potter's hesitant words stopped him tying the sack. "Did she… did she mean my mother?"
Severus looked up with some surprise.
"Contrary to what the Headmaster might have intended you to believe, not everything on this world revolves around you, Potter," – he replied with a sneer.
Upon reflection, his world and thoughts did just that not long ago, ever since the brat entered the school. Maybe Dumbledore was not completely in error when he tried to discourage Sage and him both from developing feelings. Assuming she also did, of course. His one-year younger self would have said the same, though, which gave back some of his confidence.
"You didn't give attention to your surroundings because you saw me. Instead, your attention focused on avoiding consequences you deserve and so you failed to notice your surroundings, thus endangering others, yourself, and as always, one of your so-called friends. So tell me, Mr. Potter, how does it feel to get a free pass for all the misdeeds you think up? I would so like to know how does it feel to be allowed to play with others' lives without a qualm? Have you forgotten how magnificent a corpse looks in just a short year and tried to kill Weasley, or did you feel entitled to invite Death to Muggle-land?"
"NO!"
"Ah, really, you could have fooled me there. Ever since I've known you, that's the only thing I see you attempting! Or do you have a death wish so severe you don't care how many you happen to take with?!" – Severus didn't realize his voice gradually rising before he caught himself almost shouting, but he couldn't mind. This time there wasn't McGonagall around or the omnipotent Headmaster of Hogwarts to save the brat's unworthy hide! – He told him as much, and would have said a lot more, had a goose made of faint silver mist not flown to him from nowhere, addressing him with Sage's voice:
"Get back here, we have a problem" – with that, the Patronus vanished.
So much about irony – Severus acerbically thought. "We're not finished," – he told both of the kids. He pulled a coin from his pocket, and made a portkey.