Snape frowned, as he stepped out of the strange establishment. He hadn't exactly approved of their reactions, and rather thought he could do better for a disguise. It took a moment's hurried glance to find the alley he was looking for, and he crossed the street rather diffidently, not bothering to look for cars. It was late enough that they were few, anyway. As he did so, he thought of exactly the look he wanted. Stepping into the alley without a backward glance, his wand started waving in the darkness, in spells so practiced he needn't speak a word. Anorak, he thought, and conjured the vision, coiling it over himself in glamours and transfigured reality both. A calf-length mouse-brown cloak, something ordinary - and extremely Muggle, where a cloak was enough strangeness to bear. A palid face (far less sallow than his own), complete with pimples. Snape hunched, trembled for only a second, and then scampered out of the alley like a mouse skittering towards safety. No one had watched him enter, and the few that remarked on him slipping away would think it only natural - that a coward's caution had gotten the better of his shreds of lingering bravery. Perhaps they might think it a dare. His face was half covered - enough so that people could catch a glimpse of pearly teeth, or that nose that curved gracefully, or, if they cared enough, his warm hazel eyes. It wasn't a disguise so unlike himself that he'd have trouble with it, and that was the point.

"Perhaps so," the raven-haired lady said softly, as Draco leaned closer to hear. Her fingers drummed a steady beat on the four inch table. "Your face displays a curious mix - doubt and confidence all at once." Draco leaned back, a bit wary - he hadn't thought a Muggle could read him so well.

"Oh, don't look at me like that - I'm no mindreader," she said with a dismissive giggle. Did even Muggles have mindreaders? She speaks as if they're normal, or something. I know they don't have magic...but, aside from that, what do I know about them? Draco considered his answer softly, using his day spent among them to paint a series of impressions, I know that they're decent enough towards their children, and that old men sit together and drink. "I've felt the same often enough, when the world's decided to shift and my feet haven't quite kept up yet."

"And what do you do, when the world's turned on its head?" Draco Malfoy asked, leaning closer, his stormy eyes resembling blue chips of icy hail.

"Why, you turn the doubt into your guide. Think of everything with a skeptic's mind, and where you can't find sound reason, find proof in the pudding."

"And, when none of that exists?" Draco Malfoy says quietly, his troubled eyes looking down.

Someone else might have held his hand. But the Muggle across from him simply brushed her fingertips up his arm, a light touch that faded even as his arm tingled. Her small smile turned wry, as she said, "Then rejoice. For only then can you see the world anew, and remake your mind in the process."

Draco Malfoy looked at her, retaining yet enough presence of mind (and soberness) to not gape like a gap-toothed idiot. "I'm not sure I can do that."

Her blue eyes glittered, and turned calculating - somehow retaining warmth in the process, which Draco envied instantly. "You're here, aren't you? I'd say that's a start." Draco Malfoy tried not to start, containing himself behind well-practiced manners of deception. She doesn't know I'm a wizard, she can't know I'm a wizard.

[a/n: Draco's right. Up Next: We'll replay that last 'graf from Granger's point of view. Oh, and Snape finally comes through the door!

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