A/N - you know, I am not entirely sure this was the chapter I intended to write. Still, whatever works right? Thanks for the reviews and continued interest in the story.
Part 7
Minerva stretched as she pushed the book she had been reading aside. As she looked around her she was dismayed to learn it had grown dark outside, leading her to the conclusion that she had spent the whole of the afternoon in the library. It was a cold and wet Sunday, just a few weeks before Christmas – so her inclination to venture outdoors had not been very great. Still, she hadn't intended to spend the remainder of her weekend poring over old and increasingly esoteric texts.
Perhaps she should have expected her research to come to naught; perhaps there simply were no answers to her questions. But as the weeks passed, at odd moments when her mind was not occupied by other things, she had found herself dwelling on the powerful flash of light at her wedding ceremony. People might find it odd that she was researching her own wedding ceremony – especially after it had already taken place - but her curiosity had got the better of her.
This was the first opportunity she'd had to devote any real time to the subject and everything she had come up with so far was frustratingly vague. As far as she could tell the flash of light did portend something – and whatever the something was, it had power, but that was it. Not the best use of her afternoon. She'd never enjoyed divination; she preferred logic, systems and patterns to portents and omens. She was prepared to concede that there were such things as genuine seers, but she was equally clear that she hadn't met many of them.
She rolled her shoulders – wincing as she felt the stiffness in them. Packing away her books it occurred to her that the greatest wizard of his generation, possessor of mysterious powers, defeater of the dark wizard Grindelwald and, incidentally, her husband might be able to help. Her attempts to get him to discuss the subject had been fruitless so far; he was being vague and mysterious. But then Albus was frequently vague and mysterious – he was a man who could make a puzzle out of the simplest things.
She was sure she could ask, but shewasn't convincedthat if she did she would get any sort of answer out of him. Experience had taught her that he was more likely to give information when you already had most, if not all, of the pertinent facts at your disposal. Besides, there were other questions on her mind that only he could provide the answer to – the ceremony would wait a little longer.
Several hours later, with a late supper inside her, a glass of wine at her elbow and the prospect of another chess victory before her - she eyed the subject of her speculations warily. Albus, she had learnt, was very much like a game of chess, one needed to find the right strategy and even then the outcome was unpredictable.
"Checkmate," she said making her final move and seeing the flicker of amusement in his eyes as he realised the trap she had so carefully lured him into.
"Your strategising would make a Slytherin blush," she decided that was probably a compliment.
"I'm fairly sure that snakes don't blush."
"Very true my dear, have we time for another game? I'd like to try to salvage some of my dignity."
"Actually I thought we could talk for a little." Their eyes met and she made herself look steadily back at him until he asked,
"Is something wrong?"
"No." She curled herself into the chair she most often occupied in his study. The room was silent save for the crackling of the fire - Albus was very good at using silence, but this was a subject she had been wondering about since the conversation she'd had with the Governors' wives. "I just wondered, I mean it's not something you talk about, I know it's not any of my business but…" she stopped, annoyed at herself for stuttering.
"Under the circumstances I'd say it was very much your business." She knew he hadn't read her mind, she trusted him to respect her privacy. But, sometimes Albus knew things without needing to be told and this was clearly one such occasion. "You want to know about my marriage, my first marriage?"
"I suppose I do. You don't have to tell me though."
"I know I don't have to – however, I can choose to tell you." He was silent briefly; fingers pressed together, eyes far away. "I'm sure you've heard the essentials of the tale. When people write about me they generally mention that I was married to a muggle. Well, I met Penelope when I was very young, when we were both very young, I was 25 – she was barely 20. Her father had died two or three years earlier, leaving Penelope and her mother with very little money. When I first met her she was living with the family of one of her father's friends, they were rather wealthy and Penelope was a companion to their daughter. I was in Oxford to further my studies in alchemy and, somehow I was invited to a party she attended. I fell in love with her almost at once – she was very beautiful – like a Princess, but she was also quiet and shy. We were married a few months after that first meeting and were together until her death 25 years later."
"She didn't know anything about magic and our world when you first met her?"
"No. To be honest she was never entirely comfortable with wizards and witches and she preferred the muggle way of doing things. She remained very much a woman of her time and up-bringing. We were happy despite that, or perhaps because of it."
"Is that why you never re-married?" She could hardly believe that she had asked the question and somehow it was important that she had not added "until now." Hearing him talk about his marriage had made her realise just how different their current circumstances were.
"Not exactly. It isn't loyalty to her memory that kept me from remarrying, until now, but rather the insight our time together gave me. I'm not the young wizard who rescued the princess from a life of drudgery and poverty anymore. I don't want the same things I wanted in my youth and, even if sometimes I want them, I know enough to realise they aren't good for me." Minerva was reminded of the conversation she'd had with Madame Claybridge and she wondered how much he knew about his reputation.
"I've always assumed your life was the epitome of balance," she said with a lightness she didn't feel, "and now here you are, apparently dispelling all of those myths."
"I suspect you've never believed me that perfect Minerva, after all you've seen my filing system."
"Albus, you know very well that the way you store documents is hardly worthy of the term system."
The banter was familiar, safe – but still the moment was edged with danger. How did she keep finding herself in these situations with him? For years their friendship had been comfortable and now, suddenly, in a matter of months it had grown in depth and intimacy – but also in complexity. It had been years since she had felt this close to anyone and while she treasured this new aspect of the friendship, she knew that she would only need to recall this conversation to remind herself that a friendship was all it could ever be.
The more she understood him, the more enigmatic he became and yet within the mystery there were tantalising glimpses of what it might be like to be wanted by him. She thought a relationship such as the one he would demand was beyond her now, she didn't have the trust or the heart for it, for the fight it could so easily become. But, the complexities, the honesty, the moments when you were at the centre of his attention could make the struggle worthwhile. Knowing yourself beloved by him might just be enough comfort for all of the times when the rest of the world demanded his time.
"Thank you for telling me," she said quietly, after all she had been given the information she had sought – it wasn't his fault that it had made her a little melancholy.
"Will you return the confidence and answer a question of mine now?"
"What is the question?" she responded – careful, always careful.
"I was wondering if you would tell me about the man who broke your heart."
He saw her flinch at his question and had to make his gaze remain calm – the question had been plaguing him of late, but he wasn't sure what he would do if she told him that someone had hurt her.
Her sadness had always fascinated him. It was a part of her and yet, it never came even close to defining her. It lingered at the edges of her personality – like a ghost too stubborn to move on. He wondered if she even realised how little effect it had on her now, how peripheral it had become. He suspected she held onto it because it was familiar, not because it mattered.
"Why do you assume that's what happened?" She wouldn't meet his eyes and her fingers plucked at a loose thread on her robes. As he pondered how to answer that she almost smiled, "I suppose that's a somewhat foolish question to ask you."
"You don't have to tell me," he said, echoing her earlier remark, yet even as he spoke he knew that she wouldn't let herself back away from this now that he had asked.
"It's not a secret Albus, it's just not something I enjoy discussing." A flicker of strong emotion passed through him and apparently this time he did a bad job of concealing it because Minerva reached out to touch his hand. "Not because of something terrible, I promise it's not that. I just don't like to be reminded of failures." She took a breath and moved her hand away, making him miss the warmth.
"It's not a very unusual story; while I was involved in my post-doctoral research I became involved with a man, I loved him, he said he loved me. But, either he didn't, or after some time had passed he fell out of love with me. As you can imagine neither of those are very comfortable options for me to contemplate. It's easier for me to remember that neither of us was very happy with where our lives were – I was tired of research and he felt that he had made the wrong choices in his career. Neither of us was much help to the other – we seemed to be unable to talk about what really mattered. When his feelings changed he should have ended things between us, but he lacked the courage. Instead he pushed me away, I think he had some idea of killing my love for him – but actually it just made me more desperate to reach him. But, in the process it damaged how I feel about myself and it made me feel rejected. Eventually I realised that I would never change how he felt – so I ended things. Very shortly afterwards he met someone else – they're still together as far as I know."
This was a case when the delivery was as important as the content. Minerva spoke with the same dry precision she used while teaching, but Albus could tell that it cost her to sound so dispassionate. "I'm sorry," he offered and she inclined her head in acknowledgement.
"It was a long time ago – it feels almost like a different lifetime."
"But you haven't forgotten it." He deliberately didn't make it a question.
"No. I didn't like how vulnerable and desperate I became – I know that to love requires vulnerability – but I don't think that love should require you to debase yourself."
"I don't believe it does, if it really is love. There should be vulnerability there, but strength as well."
"I'll defer to your greater knowledge on the subject," she said dryly and then she added, "I decided that I couldn't go through such pain again, it's fortunate that I've never been someone who needed a relationship to make me feel complete."
There was a warning there and Albus knew that if she thought for a single moment that he felt sorry for her she would run away and likely never return. But, he didn't feel sorry for her. He was angry with the man who had done this to her, angry enough to make it a good thing that he had no idea of his identity.Yet there was a strange sort of gratitude as well, since he knew that if the relationship had not ended or if she had met someone else, their friendship would never have become so close.
He agreed with her description of herself as someone who didn't need another to make her complete. Minerva was one of the most self-reliant people he knew, far more so that he. Rather like her animagus form, she chose carefully who she gave her loyalty and friendship to; which made both a prize of great value.
She didn't need him. She had told him about what happened to her and had asked nothing of him. There were no tears, little bitterness – he had absolutely no impulse to rescue her, to save her from her self-imposed isolation, the very idea seemed absurd.
Which made it all the more complicated that it was suddenly entirely clear to him that he was in love with her. He was in love, with his own wife, and he had absolutely no idea what to do about it.
The feeling had crept up on him, taking him completely by surprise. His first marriage had determined the pattern of his subsequent relationships for so many years, until he had wearied of being needed, of being the rescuer, the strong one. He didn't want a princess who he had freed from a tower, he wanted a lover who could be his equal; he wanted intelligence, fierce independence and the kind of passion that only grew from someone who loved with both her head and her heart. In short he wanted the woman sitting before him.
TBC