They Didn't Know We Were Seeds
While browsing defense theory books in the library, Severus notices a figure quickly approaching him from his right. Fingers falling away from the spine of a book he is about to pull from the shelf, Severus turns his head to see that it is Sirius's little brother hurrying towards him. He acknowledges the boy with a dip of his chin.
Regulus fidgets in place a moment before he pulls an envelope from his pocket and holds it out to Severus. "Narcissa asked that I give you this on her and Lucius's behalf."
Severus silently takes the envelope from Regulus and turns it over in his hands. He has an idea what this might be, but finds it curious she has her cousin giving it to him rather than send it by owl. As he begins to open it, Regulus locks his hands behind his back and takes it upon himself to explain the strange method of delivery. "Lucius insisted she couldn't invite you the usual way. You're half-blood and, well, you know, they can't have people thinking they actually want you there – especially not his father, or Uncle Cygnus."
He tears into the envelope and opens the little card inside. "What, pray tell, do they plan to say to their fathers when they see me at the wedding?" mutters Severus as he looks over the wedding invitation.
Regulus flushes and looks down at his toes. "Ah, well, they hope to blame the Montagues and say they brought you along as an uninvited plus one…"
Severus frowns. Oh no, that will not do. He will not let the Montagues and their reputation be hurt in such a way because of him. Severus couldn't stop the blow to their name when Aunt Vesta insisted on taking him in, but he can this. "Then I will have to regretfully tell you to inform your cousin I cannot come."
The boy startles at his reply. "You have to! Narcissa will need your help to keep Sirius in check."
"I'm sure he can behave himself for one day."
Regulus begins to worry his lip. "Um, I don't want to sound disloyal to my brother or call you a dunderhead, but this is Sirius we're talking about. He can hardly be in the same room with my mother for five minutes without picking a fight with her…"
Severus puts a hand to his forehead and sighs. "Tell Narcissa and Lucius to come up with a reason for my presence that does not involve throwing the Montagues under a griffin and then I will consider coming to their wedding."
"I will, right now, in fact," agrees Regulus with an eager nod.
Mildly bemused as he watches the younger hurry off, Severus finds the only true reaction he can have is to give a short laugh. He's curious to see what story Regulus will come back with later, but, until then, he has more pressing matters to expend his energy on. While he knows he should be thinking more about what he will say to his grandfather and what he should prepare himself for the man to say back, or how to bring up the possibility of Priscilla Rookwood being the final time-traveler to Lily and Cresswell, Severus can't.
Instead, his thoughts keep meandering back to the weddings. Severus is especially focused on how different they will be. Narcissa and Lucius's wedding without a doubt will be a production. A beautiful and magnificent one, but a show nonetheless. It will not be for the couple, but an affair for their families to show off their wealth to their friends and peers. The wedding will have so little to truly do with Lucius and Narcissa and their love for one another that it almost makes him feel pity for them.
But then he only has to remember Clara and Benjy don't even have the option of a production to banish the feeling entirely. They will go to the Ministry and be married in a little courtroom with only Severus, Bones, and his girlfriend there to watch and celebrate with them. It's sure to be an intimate event and he doesn't believe Benjy or Clara will regret forgoing the typical wedding experience, yet it is still terribly unfair the couple has to marry quietly at the Ministry to keep the Parkinsons from finding out and potentially sabotaging the union.
In any case, it's certain the summer will be very interesting – perhaps even more so than last depending on what bludgers are sent his way.
-o-O-o-
In the end, Severus decides he'd rather deal with the Rookwood issue before his grandfather. Before dinner Thursday evening he stops Lily on her way into the Great Hall and tells her he has something he wishes to discuss with her and Cresswell in their classroom later and asks if she won't pass along the message to the Ravenclaw.
Lily's face is one of anxious confusion. "Of course," agrees his friend. Tentatively, she then asks, "Has something happened?"
"No," Severus answers, then, after a moment, corrects himself, "Not yet."
She nods, not looking the least bit settled by his answer. "Okay."
Severus watches from just outside the Great Hall's doorway as Lily walks by the Ravenclaw table and brushes a hand over Cresswell's shoulder, making the boy look up at her. When she leans in close and whispers into his ear, Severus only stares back with solemn eyes when Cresswell's irritated gaze meets his own. The prick will learn soon enough just how wrong he was about there not being a Hufflepuff time-traveler.
-O-
Throwing himself into a chair not far from Severus, Cresswell huffs, "What is it you want now?" Crossing his arms and glaring at Severus, he sneers, "Because I don't think I want to help. I've seen your efforts to keep apart Mei and your little chav and I have to say they're pathetic."
Severus rolls his eyes and is about to answer when, Lily, who sits beside Severus, stiffens in her seat and says, "What's this now? You asked Severus to keep two children from being friends?"
"Mei was my wife and Scabior and his snatchers murdered me."
Lily shakes her head. "Mei is a little girl and Scabior is a boy who needs all the friends he can get."
Cresswell scowls at Lily. "What aren't you following? He killed me. He would have killed my wife too if she hadn't managed to get away with the other runaways."
The girl gets to her feet and stands over the Ravenclaw, hands clenched into fists. "Scabior has killed no one. The man you are talking about does not exist here."
"What kind of bloody nonsense is that? That man is a boy here. Of course he exists!"
Severus considers stepping in and diffusing the argument; they need to talk about Rookwood, but he decides against it. Cresswell will never listen to Severus, but maybe Lily can get through to him and make him see sense. This world and the one they came from are different. What was won't ever be again. Some things may happen the same here to there, but it will be only because of coincidence.
"They are different! They've been different from the moment we woke up here and started changing things!" Lily argues.
Viciously, Cresswell snarls, "Not that different!"
"Yes, they are!"
Rocketing from his seat to stand nose to nose with Lily, the Ravenclaw hisses, "Prove it."
Severus starts to get up from his own seat, he knows by far the most intimate example Lily has to show that the people here and the ones from their own world are different is James. He doesn't want his friend to hurt herself while trying to make Cresswell see reason. He's not worth it. "Lily–" he starts.
"Sit down, Severus Snape," Lily orders. Her eyes locked with the Ravenclaw's she whispers, "I can handle this."
Despite her command, he stays on his feet for half a beat before reluctantly sitting back down. He perches himself on the very edge of the chair, ensuring that should he need to come between the two, it will only take but a moment. Fingers slowly wrapping around the hilt of his wand, Severus nods his head. "Very well."
Her chin starts to quiver. "James."
"What?" Cresswell replies with a note of perplexment to the question.
Lily takes an audibly shaky breath before she says, "You said prove it, I am. James is my proof."
The Ravenclaw stares back at her mutely, perspire starting around his brow. Severus thinks he's afraid. James is his Wong and he knows it just as well as she does. Cresswell knows he's going to hear some very harsh truths and fears what they will mean for him. For him and Wong and their future especially.
"When we were both kids, he was the biggest bully for the longest time. He insisted it was all in good fun, but I knew it wasn't. I saw the tears after his pranks, the way others shrank in on themselves when he came into a room in hopes of not drawing his attention, or retaliated when the opportunity arose–" Lily looks at him as she says this and he frowns, displeased. She needs to focus on James, bringing Severus into her speech will only serve to raise Cresswell's hackles and cause him to stop listening. Thankfully, Lily doesn't elaborate on that detail. "Then he started to fancy me and began to shape up when I told him I wouldn't ever date an arsehole like him. It was too late, in some ways, he'd already scarred and hurt and broken too many by that point, but he got better and became a man I could and did love."
Lily wraps her arms around herself, gaze shifting away from both him and Cresswell. In a hollow whisper she continues, "James now, James here, has never been that bully. He's had his moments, I admit, but they are few and far between. The pranks he pulls are truly good-natured and usually just on his mates. And… And he has no interest in me. Not as a potential girlfriend, anyway." Lily brings a hand to her eyes to dash away the tears Severus can see building on her pale, red lashes. "All I am to him is his girlfriend's sister and his friend from Hogwarts."
"Girlfriend's sister…?" Cresswell croaks, horror widening his eyes.
She jerks his head in an uneven nod and laughs. "He came by once during the summer and met my older sister and he's only had eyes for her since."
Cresswell takes a step back and shakes his head. "No," he says. "That's – That's not going to happen with Mei. I became friends with her now so I'd have more time with her, so we could start dating as soon as she turned seventeen…"
"Dirk," Lily says, reaching for him. "Dirk, come here."
The Ravenclaw resists for all of a moment before he lets Lily wrap her arms around him and hold him. He buries his face in her hair and whimpers, "I love her. I can't lose her. Not again."
Lily runs her hand up and down Cresswell's back. "I know," she soothes. "I know."
Severus averts his gaze from the two and quietly sighs to himself. 'This meeting has certainly gone off course,' he thinks. With how things are now, he doesn't believe Lily or Cresswell will be up for discussing the possibility of Rookwood being like them. Getting to his feet, he attempts to slip out unnoticed. He can try and have them convene again in a few days. However, Lily turns her head just in time to see him stepping out the door.
"Where are you going?" calls his friend. "I thought there was something important you wanted to talk about?"
He pauses and then slowly turns back around. "What I wanted to discuss isn't that pressing. Why don't we meet again on Saturday to discuss it?" His eyes are on Dirk, who's still wallowing in his own misery, as he says this to her.
Lily dips her chin agreeably. "Sure. If you're okay with it."
"I am," he answers before leaving altogether.
-O-
Much to his surprise, not hardly an hour later, while ambling through the dungeons' corridors to clear his head before bed, Severus runs into Rookwood. He comes to an abrupt halt and stares at her. She stutters to a stop herself and looks back at him, not quite meeting his gaze.
"What?" she asks.
He purses his lips. "Haven't you strayed a bit far from the kitchens and your dorm?"
Rookwood frowns at him. "The dungeons belong just as much to Hufflepuff as it does to Slytherin."
"I suppose that is true," he concedes.
She squints her eyes at him and then nods resolutely. "It is true." Then, as if realizing just how assertive she sounds, Rookwood moves closer to the wall and says, "Now if you'll excuse me, curfew isn't far off and I need to go get back to my dorm."
He steps aside. "Of course." Severus watches as she tiptoes past him; it's as if she's afraid he'll change his mind about letting her pass and attack. He won't, Severus isn't yet ready to confront her about being a potential time-traveler like himself quite yet. Though, once she is a few steps ahead of him, he can't help but ask, "Did you learn anything of interest from that book?"
She pauses. Looking over her shoulder at him with an expression of utter confusion, she replies, "What?"
"That book you were reading on Saturday morning in the Great Hall, Charms of Defense and Deterrence."
Rookwood blanches and whispers, "You saw?"
He shrugs. "There wasn't much else to do but look around while I was eating breakfast."
"I haven't finished quite yet. I'd hate to say yes before I've read it all. I might have a different answer when I'm done," she tells him as her fingers nervously pick at her curls.
Severus smiles at her in a way that he hopes comes off as friendly. "Perhaps when you are we can speak again? I've been meaning to give it a read and I'd like to know if it will be worth my time."
"Sure, alright," she agrees slowly. "But later."
He nods. "Very well."
Rookwood looks at him a moment more before she takes her first faltering step, followed by another, and then another, until she's taking long, quick strides to get away from Severus as fast as possible. He watches her retreating back until she turns into an adjoining corridor and disappears from sight.
'You won't be able to run from me much longer,' he thinks.
Thoughts this chapter? What scene did you find most interesting? And least interesting?
Thank you very much guys for reading :)