The manor was asleep. Some of the crowd had gone home, a few were passed out on sofas and chairs, and the rest had gone off to back bedrooms to fuck. Snape stepped lightly on the way to the front hall, afraid the clack of his boots against the stone floor would wake them up. Narcissa would understand why he'd left early, she always did.

Someone was sniffling and breathing hard and he knew who it was, he could see her out of the corner of his eye, the dark hair and short black dress robes. If there was anything in the world he couldn't stand, it was crying teenagers. Sixth-years sobbing about their O.W.L results, seventh-years carrying on about their breakups, fourth-years crying because their hormones had addled their brains. He'd had quite enough of that nonsense. He pretended he couldn't see her and lengthened his strides. Just three more and he'd have his hands on the door handle...

Miss Parkinson had the nerve to let out such a loud gurgling sob he couldn't pretend he hadn't heard it. He stopped mid-stride and adjusted his traveling cloak as though he'd meant to do it all along and hadn't been caught completely off-guard by a teenager.

Miss Parkinson started and let in a sharp breath. "Oh shit-I mean, I'm sorry, I didn't see you there..."

"No matter," said Snape.

Miss Parkinson pulled a handkerchief out of her pocket and wiped her nose with it, her movements formal and stiff, trying for a bit of dignity. "I'm terribly sorry, I don't know what's got into me."

Snape searched the front hall to make sure they were alone. "You don't have to join us, Miss Parkinson. You haven't been Marked, there is no shame in simply being a supporter-"

Miss Parkinson scowled. "I know what you're thinking, but his has nothing to do with what happened last night."

Snape ran his hand along the top of the banister. "You're far too young. Wait a few years, and then reconsider."

"Draco was sixteeen when he joined."

"That was a matter of necessity. And you can't tell me you don't notice his obvious reluctance? He's hardly a shining example."

"And I'm not him. I can fight, I'm perfectly capable-"

"So capable you couldn't even shoot a hex at an unarmed woman."

Miss Parkinson shoved the handkerchief into her handbag and Snape sensed her frustration rising, his own tension rising with it. Bloody teenagers, always so dramatic about everything.

"Why does everyone assume I'm incompetent? I got four 'Outstandings' and I worked so hard for them and no one cares, not even my family-"

"It's not a matter of technical skill, if that's what you think. It's the ability to shut down your emotions, to do what needs to be done-"

"I am not delicate!" Miss Parkinson gripped the edge of the step and glared at him, leaning forwards, willing him to believe it. "I can do this, I just wasn't ready at the moment-"

"Then you'll never be ready. What happened here tonight was nothing, if you can't even shut down your emotions for that-"

"But I can shut them down-"

Snape slapped the banister with the palm of his hand, his icy numb indifference cracking, breaking, letting his frustration to slip through and he hated it, why was he feeling again?

"Why would you want to?"

Miss Parkinsons' face crumpled in confusion and her mouth opened, fumbling for words, but Snape turned on his heel and reached for the door.

His mark must've burned at least a hundred times but the pain of it still shocked him. He'd clap his hand to it like a reflex, every single time, no matter where he was or what he was doing, rubbing it a little to lessen the feeling.

"Go," he said to Miss Parkinson. "The Dark Lord will be here any moment, and he may not be in any mood for introductions."

"But-"

"Get out of here!"

Her good sense must've prevailed over her infernal stubborness, because she Summoned her cloak and pushed past him, shutting the door behind her with a sharp snap.

Snape sat down in the drawing room and waited. Either the Dark Lord had the thing he was looking for, or he had the boy, nothing else would bring him back to the manor. There was little he could do. The boy had to die anyway, he didn't need Snape to swoop in and save his arse this time.

Had he done the thing, had he destroyed it, or would Snape have to? Would he give himself away? How could he sit there unfeeling and numb when the life when out of those eyes, when they mutilated his body? He'd never know who Snape really was.

Shut up. Stop being a damn fool. You hate him.

Snape waited. In twos and threes the rest of them shuffled into the room and sat down or stood and paced the floors. The nervous anticipation was palpable. They'd celebrate their victory or plan their final battle or be Crucio'd within an inch of their lives, one of the three, and they wouldn't know which until the Dark Lord got there.

The front door banged open from down the hall and there were only two footsteps, steady and controlled. He didn't have him.

The Dark Lord never raised his voice or smashed things against the wall the way some people did. The signs were more subtle, a long silence, an exposed vein, a wand played between the fingers.

He stared round at them all and Snape knew what a sorry sight they were, pale and disheveled and badly hung-over. Everyone knew, and they waited and they steeled themselves but really, the anticipation only made hit worse. The silence was loud, unbearable, and the Dark Lord waited and waited and waited, until the room trembled and a faint whimper escaped from somebody's lips.

"Crucio!"

Snape dropped to his knees and screamed into the carpet.


Snape thought he'd Splinched himself when he stopped spinning at the gates, his arm ached like a bastard. He slipped his left hand down his robes ran it across his upper arm, where the aching was worst, but the skin was dry and intact, and aside from his sore muscles he was fine. Good. He didn't want an excuse to go back to her. He turned his back to the village and didn't look behind him as he hobbled up the path to the castle. But he thought about her on the way there. Stupid and weak, that's what he was.

He didn't want to go inside. Most of the students would be gone and it'd be just him and the staff and how could he face them? But he had to, he couldn't go back to Spinner's End. Phineas was bound to find out the boy's location eventually, he was clever enough, and Snape would need to be there when he did.

The sun was just risen and the castle had that lazy holiday-morning feel, of people lying-in and having breakfast in their common rooms or private quarters. The Great Hall was nearly empty. Snape followed suit and summoned an elf for some sweet bread and coffee to have in bed.

He couldn't hole up in his room for Christmas dinner though, Dumbledore never would've done it and anyway, Minerva would think he was too cowardly to face her. He wasn't afraid of her, he wasn't afraid of anyone. He hated them all. They expected a Death Eater and that's what they'd get.

He supposed he'd chat with Amycus and Alecto about the party but Amycus and Alecto weren't there. The Dark Lord had left not long after he'd punished them; they must've stayed at the manor to recover. Snape looked round for Minerva, Flitwick and Sprout and did a double take. They weren't sitting at the staff table, but had taken up a smaller table with Slughorn and Filch and the handful of students who'd stayed for the holidays. Well. Now what the hell was he supposed to do?

Snape sauntered over to them as though he didn't care one way or another about seating arrangements, eyeing an empty seat at the far end next to Filch, but the moment he got near them the staff half-turned away and leaned towards each other, their raised voices like a shield against his presence, shutting him out.

Snape had two choices. He could go and sit in the Headmaster's chair like an idiot and watch their smug faces, or he could sit down with them and endure the most uncomfortable meal of his life.

Snape pulled out the chair next to Filch, who slapped a crooked hand down and pushed it back in. "Seat's taken."

Snape knew perfectly well it wasn't. "I don't see anyone here," he said, in his coldest voice. Filch seemed to shrink a little as Snape yanked the chair out of his hands and sat down.

There was a two second silence as the staff and students held silent conversations with their eyes, and then the chatter started up again, as though he weren't there. He wished Minerva would shoot out of her chair and hex him, call him names, something, but she sat there, silent and cold as a glacier, not even hating him just...indifferent. She just didn't care.

Not that it mattered. He cared nothing for these people.

He stared down at the plate that he'd filled with turkey and potatoes and cranberry sauce, but he couldn't shut them out. He was so tense his fork shook in his hand.

"Crackers?" said Minerva, handing out the brightly wrapped cylinders to the students and staff. He didn't get one of course, but they were stupid anyway.

A small girl was sitting a few seats down from him, a first year by the looks of her. She grasped the end of her cracker in her fingers and tugged. The thing went off like a firework, singeing the sleeve of his robes.

The girl gasped. "Oh my God, I'm so sorry, it was an accident, I'm so sorry-" She stared at his wand hand, practically sobbing.

Sprout rushed over and sat between the girl and Snape. Shielding her. "There now, it's alright, nothing's going to happen to you."

Minerva looked at him for the first time since he'd sat down, looked him right in the eye, daring him to try anything. And he became the thing they all saw, and there was nothing he could do to stop them, what if he did do something? What if he dragged her away and locked her up like the Carrows?

Snape finished his mince pie and shoved his plate away, wiping his mouth off and tossing a careless napkin onto the table. He supposed they were all muttering amongst themselves, looking smug, we showed him didn't we. Idiots, all of them.

He went straight to his bedroom and lay down on his bed and stared up at the ceiling. He didn't know why he kept glancing at the bollan cross. He didn't want to feel human.

The sky outside the window was dark when the coin in his pocket burned against his chest. He fished it out without thinking.

Meet me in the alley.

Snape set the coin down and stared up at the ceiling. He shouldn't have wanted to. He didn't want to. But he didn't want to stay in his room either, and before he really knew what he was doing he'd draped his traveling cloak over his shoulders and slipped on a pair of leather gloves. What was wrong with him, he hadn't even put up a good fight.

The Dementors weren't out yet, the lights shining from the windows of the cottages were warm. He caught glimpses of people sitting around tables, snatches of singing. Domestic scenes so far from anything he'd ever known they didn't seem real, like they were out of a film he'd only ever seen playing in the background.

The Corlett woman opened the door for him, dressed in a plain white shirt and jeans.

"Nollick Ghennal," she said, smiling. "Happy Christmas. Come on upstairs."

He couldn't understand why she was happy to see him, or what to think when he saw her room. She'd taken a large wooden box and covered it with plates of turkey and stuffing and mash and glasses of mulled wine, with a pine bough wreath in the centre and a few candles flickering in glass jars. The chair was on one side, an upturned crate on the other.

Corlett gestured to the makeshift table. "Aberforth had some leftovers, so I thought maybe you'd like to have Christmas tea with me."

Snape toyed with the silver serpent fastening on his cloak. He hadn't been expecting this, he thought she just needed help with the antidote. "I don't-I can't stay long-"

"That's alright. I just thought-I mean, I'm not doing anything and if you aren't either..."

He might've been, for all she knew. Only twenty-four hours ago he was with his comrades watching people die. She had no idea.

"And what makes you think I'm not doing anything?"

The Corlett woman smirked. "Well, you're here, aren't you?"

He was in no mood for her teasing. He threw his cloak aside and sat down. "Let's get on with it then."

"Let's get on with it then? You'd think I was giving you surgery. Relax. Have a drink."

She pushed a glass of mulled wine towards him and took a long sip of her own. She'd had a few before he came up, he could tell by her loose, easy voice.

He cut up his turkey without looking at her. She couldn't have wanted him there. She just needed something from him, or she was plying him with food and drinks so he'd spill his secrets. He wouldn't let ler.

She was quieter than he thought she'd be, and the silence was comfortable, punctuated by clacks of forks against plates and the faint sound of chewing. He couldn't remember the last time he'd been with someone and just...was. And yet, who was he?

Corlett reached for the gravy and dumped about half of it on her mash. "Do you have any family, Professor?"

"No."

She paused with the gravy boat in her hand. "None at all?"

"Isn't that what I just said?"

She set the boat down and looked at him too closely. "I'm sorry to hear that."

Snape ignored her and stabbed at his turkey. He didn't need her pity.

"And here I was feeling sorry for myself because I haven't heard from my family," she went on.

"It's best that they don't know where you are."

"I know." She swirled a bit of cranberry sauce around on her plate and tapped the edges with her fork. He could always tell when she was about to get sincere, she'd fidget or play with her sleeves or run a hand through her hair like she was psyching herself up for something.

"Listen, I'm really glad you came up. I was sort of dreading spending Christmas alone, actually."

Snape muttered something in reply. He felt like someone half-awake, with only a vague idea of who he was, yet the picture was becoming clearer and sharper the more time he spent with her, and he didn't know what he felt. Part of him just wanted to stay numb.

She busied herself with a piece of turkey and he glanced up at her, at the bare arms sticking out from under the sleeves of her shirt. She was wiry, muscular. All those years of chopping ingredients and lugging cauldrons around, probably. There was something on her forearm-something black-but it was just an ordinary tattoo, a Celtic knot, nothing sinister. Loose strands of hair fell over her forehead, almost to her eyes, which were sharp, alert, full of thoughts.

Corlett caught him looking and smiled.

"So do you always stay at the castle for Christmas?" she said, and he wished she'd stop smirking, he'd simply been looking at her, there wasn't anything in it.

"Usually," said Snape.

"Where do you live during the holidays, if you don't mind me asking?"

Snape took a long drink and considered her over his glass. The Order had long known where he lived, so it wasn't as though she was fishing for information. He wasn't risking anything by telling her.

"Cokeworth."

"Is that where you're from?"

Snape cut up a piece of turkey and didn't look at her. "Yes."

"So what kinds of things do you like to do on your holiday?"

Snape shrugged. "The usual."

If he thought his vague response would deter her, he was mistaken.

"Do you do any specimen collecting?"

"Sometimes."

Corlett picked up her glass and grinned like she'd heard something funny.

"What are you smirking about?"

"You'll see."

She finished her food and reached for the Christmas pudding, setting it right on the dirty plate rather than getting herself a clean one-something Snape himself did when he was back in Spinner's End and didn't feel like doing dishes, but still. At least he had an excuse, she was just being lazy. When she'd finished eating she wiped her hands on a crumpled napkin and let it fall to the floor.

Snape cleaned his plate and wiped his hands on his own napkin, setting it down beside him rather pointedly. No wonder her room was such a mess.

"I've got something for you," said Corlett, who didn't seem to have noticed. She went over to a shelf she'd put up along one wall of the room and handed him a book bound in brown leather. "Happy Christmas."

Snape held the book in his hands and stared down at it, at a complete loss to understand what he was feeling.

"You can open it, you know. It's not cursed."

Snape flipped the book open. An eagle-feather quill and a magnifying-glass were tucked inside the front cover, with an inscription.

Someday you'll be in the field again and all this will be a distant memory. Would you take me with you?

Nollick ghennal as blein vie noa

Your friend,

Graihagh

The rest of the pages were blank.

Corlett stood behind him, looking over his shoulder. "It's a field journal. I thought maybe when the war is over, we could go somewhere and collect specimens."

Snape's hands were shaking so hard the book shook with them. He tried to steady them but he'd been too late, she'd seen. She knelt down beside him and closed her hand over his, warm and dry and strange.

"What's wrong?"

He snatched his hand away. He didn't want to feel, and he wasn't going to tell her a thing, he couldn't see any other reason she would've done this for him.

"You do realise that even if we do survive the war, it'll either be a lengthy sentence in Azkaban for me, or a lifetime in hiding for you? Neither one is really conducive to specimen collecting."

Corlett's smile faltered. "Yeah, but-"

"And furthermore, it was stupid to write your name in the front cover. Do you know how that would make me look if the book fell into the wrong hands? It's not exactly common."

Miss Corlett stood up, eyes flashing. "You know what, stop. Just shut up. If you don't want the book just say so."

"I don't want it." He tossed it onto the table, where it lay with its spine up, pages open. The magnifying glass had cracked.

The Corlett woman stared at it, face strained, odd, like she was trying to keep something in.

"Get out."

Snape couldn't leave fast enough. So why wouldn't his legs move?

"Did you hear me? Get out of here. Now."

She turned away from him, rubbing her face with one hand. Snape pushed past her and left the room, leaving the book spread out on the table.

He went straight to his room and sat down on his bed, rubbing his eyes with the tips of his fingers so nothing would come out.


Snape spent most of Boxing Day asleep in his bed. He slept so long that he was wide awake when night fell, couldn't even keep his eyes closed. He left his room and sat at his desk, rummaging around in the drawers. He had a potion there, something he'd made over the summer, with extra Valerian and a bit of Salvia. He'd have a few sips, and forget everything.

"Severus?"

Snape snatched his hand out of the drawer. Of course the old man would have to interrupt him.

"What?"

"No need to be short with me, my dear boy. I was merely wondering if you've had word from Phineas?"

"No. I haven't heard from him in the past week."

"Well, better stay alert, Severus, in any case."

Snape shoved the bottle back in his drawer. Just like the old man, to make sure his most useful tool was in good working order.

He summoned a book from one of his shelves and began to read, but he couldn't focus. He set it down and stared out the window.

"Headmaster!" shouted Phineas. "They are camping in the Forest of Dean! The Mudblood-"

Snape whipped around. "Do not use that word!"

"The Granger girl then, mentioned the place as she was opening up her bag and I heard her!"

"Good, very good!" said Dumbledore from behind him. "Now Severus, the sword. Do not forget that it must be taken under conditions of need and valour-and he must not know you give it. If Voldemort should look into his mind and see you acting for him-"

As if he wasn't aware of this.

"I know."

He pulled at the portrait and drew the sword out from the hidden cavity behind it.

"And you're still not going to tell me why it's so important to give Potter the sword?" he said as he draped his traveling cloak over his shoulders, an edge to his voice. Not so much a question as an accusation.

"No, I don't think so. He will know what to do with it. And Severus, be very careful. They may not take kindly to your appearance after George Weasley's mishap-"

The omission was so glaring Snape wondered if the old man was trying to spare his feelings, or if he really was that clueless. If he cared for him at all, or was merely ensuring the survival of his pawn.

"Don't worry Dumbledore. I have a plan."

He concealed the sword inside his robes and swept away without another look at him, not stopping until he was outside the gates.

He'd been to the forest before, to forage for mushrooms and herbs in the quiet, out-of-the-way places, far from villages and roads. He'd always liked the stillness, the vastness of the place, as though he'd gone back in time, thousands of years even, before any people lived there.

He was overwhelmed by it now. The forest was massive, it would take him days to find them, if he had to walk. He'd Apparated to its westernmost point, along the River Wye on Welsh border, but there was no reason to think they were there.

She'd know where he was, though. She could be charmed to find him, much like an owl, but the only problem was that he wasn't sending the boy a message. Perhaps the spell could be tweaked.

He closed his eyes. He couldn't focus, couldn't feel a damn thing, as though the cold air had numbed his insides. He squeezed his eyes shut and gave it everything he had, until he was sitting by himself in a corner of the playground, poking at the cracked asphalt, and Lily was walking up to him, hesitant, wary, but looking straight at him.

"Expecto Patronum."

She leapt from his wand and watched him, waiting as Severus stood beside her, taking her in, running a hand along her head even though she wasn't anything but light.

He pulled a compass from his pocket and murmured a long incantation. "Can you find him?" he whispered.

She raised her head and cantered through the tree, headed east.

He followed her for what must've been an hour, occassionally Disapparating to speed things up, loosing track of her and conjuring her again. Finally, when he was out of breath and cursing the day Potter and Dumbledore were born, she stopped. Snape vanished her as quickly as he could, before the boy got a glimpse of her, and raised his wand, searching for any disturbances in the air, until it hummed like a tuning fork. He couldn't see a tent but he knew they were around somewhere.

He had a rough idea of where they were. Just a few miles east of Cannop brook he thought, in a part of the forest filled with streams and ponds. Snape marked the spot with a stick in the ground, just in case he needed to come back, and set off in search of a suitable pool.

He'd been walking half an hour when he stopped to catch his breath, taking his gloves off and tucking his hands under his arms to warm them. He'd have to find something soon but he didn't know what he'd do if he couldn't, he didn't have a backup plan.

He put his gloves back on and kept walking, keeping his eyes fixed on the trees ahead. In the dim light he could just make out a circle of blue-white, even and smooth, like the surface of a shallow pool.

He hurried towards it, hoping to warm himself and eager to get the thing done. The ice was slick beneath his feet, smooth, and so deep it didn't crack.

"Diffindo." The centre of the pool broke open and Snape conjured a long measuring stick and stuck it in. One and a half metres, maybe a bit more. Deep enough to be a challenge, not so deep that the boy would drown. Snape drew the sword out of his robes and dropped it into the pool, freezing the open water with a flick of the wand. He vanished the measuring stick and set about erasing every footprint from the clearing.

He supposed the boy would see it as bragging rights, something to tell his friends; did I ever tell you about the time I jumped into a frozen pond? Barely even felt it. His father and Black used to jump in the black lake sometimes on a dare, while people stood on the shores and cheered. Drunk off their arses, most likely. Fucking pricks.

He stopped to warm his hands again. The forest was so silent, so still, he might've been the only person left on earth. The thought might have been comforting at one time, but it wasn't now.

He closed his eyes and thought of her, but he couldn't focus. He closed his eyes, but he couldn't focus. She was hazy, undefined, trapped in a fogged-up glass. He stamped his feet and rubbed his face and squeezed his eyes shut again. Without knowing why his thoughts turned to Corlett, and she was laughing in that stupid way of hers.

"Expecto Patronum."

The silver doe shot out of his wand and watched him, waiting. He didn't want her to leave, and he knew she wouldn't, not until he was ready.

He closed his eyes. "Go now," he whispered. When he opened them she was gone.

He walked the perimeter of the clearing until he found two trees growing alongside each other, the perfect place to watch without being seen. He murmured an incantation and ran a jet of hot air over himself, wishing he'd worn more layers under his robes. He couldn't remember the last time he'd been so cold his stomach hurt.

There was nothing to do now but wait and hope the boy wouldn't do anything stupid. He stamped his feet on the ground and walked around a bit to keep himself warm, reciting the ingredients to Felix Felicis and trying to remember the lyrics to "Space Oddity." After awhile he just stood and waited.

She sauntered through the trees without a sound, all pearly white light. Severus memorized the shape of her as she stood by the pool and waited. She would have to leave soon.

He listened hard for footfalls, and before long there was a soft crunching through the undergrowth. Potter stopped beside the pool and watched the doe, and for the tiniest sliver of a moment Snape knew they were thinking the same thing. That they could watch her all night.

Merlin forbid he should ever be thinking the same thing as Potter.

"Finite."

The doe vanished. As far as Potter knew, he was alone. He cleared away the snow and stared into the ice, walking along the edge of the frozen pool. Without warning he flashed his lit wand around the clearing, right at the trees in front of him, but Snape stayed behind them, barely moving. This was the closest he'd been to the boy in months, and there was something about seeing him there-not reassuring, that was stupid-but something.

"Accio sword!"

For fuck's sake. Of course the boy would try a Summoning Charm, he was used to having everything handed to him. Snape rolled his eyes and stifled a derisive snort.

The boy stared down at the ice, his plea for help fading into the silent trees. There was no one there this time, he was on his own, as surely as Snape was.

He resigned himself to the inevitable and stripped off his clothes, until he was down to his underthings. So he'd have to work for something for a change. Good.

He stepped to the edge and jumped into the pool. Snape heard his gasp all the way from the trees.

The sword wasn't that far down, it shouldn't take him long. He imagined the boy plunging into the water, kicking with his feet to get some depth. He might have to fumble around for the sword a bit, but it was big enough, it'd be easy to see. He checked his watch. Thirty seconds. One minute. One minute thirty seconds.

Most people could last two or three, at most.

Snape raised his arms to run, not knowing or caring how to disguise himself, thinking only of the boy, but he hadn't gotten more than a few feet before heavy footfalls lumbered through the clearing. Snape stopped mid-step. A tall, long-limbed someone ran to the open water and jumped in, Weasley, he would've bet his life on it.

Snape stood between the trees and listened to the splashing, grunting, the shuddering breaths as he pulled Potter out of the water. As long as they weren't complete idiots, they'd be fine, though given their track record he couldn't count on this. He waited until Weasley opened his big mouth and Potter coughed out a reply, then stole through the trees, vanishing every footprint.

He was so tired. He stopped to rest underneath a tree and sat and sat and sat.

The night air wasn't so cold anymore, he was barely even shivering. Pleasant, really, he didn't even need his cloak. He took it off and set it on the snowy ground near his feet.

He wasn't so cold that he didn't know what was happening. He knew if he stayed much longer he his mind would slip away and he would fall into the snow and that'd be it. But there was a certain logic in it, really, when he thought about it. This was easy, not like the pain of suffocation or swords. He'd fall asleep and he'd be at peace and he'd be with her and that was all.

Everything around him was a slowed-down film and his eyes drooped, he was so bloody tired. His head fell forwards and shot up again and he knew if he carried on like this he'd be too far gone to Apparate or do any magic at all.

He didn't know, he just didn't know.

His head drooped down again and shot back up. He supposed Alecto would take over as Headmistress. He imagined her sitting in his chair, right next to Minerva, a smug expression on her face.

No fucking way.

He pinched his face to wake himself and put his traveling cloak back on, struggling to work the clasp shut. He stood up, dizzy and stupid, and fumbled for his wand, his fingers clumsy and stiff. He'd need to give it everything he had, concentrate harder than he'd ever done.

When he stopped spinning he fell to the ground not at the Hogwarts gates, but in the alley behind the Hog's Head. Without thinking he reached for the bollan cross and held it to his lips.

"I'm in the alley."

The wooden skip behind the inn was overflowing with bones and vegetable peelings that stuck out the top and spread out in the dirt. The stench reminded him of Cokeworth and how all the kids down Spinner's End would pick through the skip behind the corner shop and sometimes they'd find bags of crisps-what was that old advert he saw at Lily's once? Something about Walker's crisps...once you've eaten one...

Someone touched his face, but hers was hazy.

"Lily?"

"...let's get you up."

She grabbed him round the waist and helped him up, dragging him through a door and up the stairs. Snape stubbed his toe on a wooden step and swore.

"It's alright, just take it slow."

He knew her voice-Graihagh. She was dressed in blue pyjama bottoms and a t-shirt and he thought of sleepwalkers.

The stairs went on and on and on and he imagined he was stuck on one of those moving stair-things-escalators, he thought they were called. Only they kept going.

She tapped her wand on the wall and he realised they were walking into the hidden room. He let her lead him to the bed and lay him down.

"You're so cold," she said, hands working the silver serpent on his cloak. She unfastened it and tossed it aside as she worked the buttons on his robes, pulling them open, sliding them off his shoulders. Snape was shivering now, so hard that his chest ached.

"Keep them on," he mumbled.

He thought she'd protest, insist that he needed to take them off, but she covered his chest with the open robes, smoothing the fabric with her hand. "Okay."

The mattress sank as Graihagh lay beside him, drawing the blankets up to their necks and tucking them in.

"I didn't mean it."

"I know."

She pressed her body against his and wrapped her arms around him, her chest against his back, rising and falling with her breath but solid and still against his shaking. And in that moment all he knew was that she was there, and she wouldn't leave him, she would stay with him and keep him warm. He shivered in her arms until he was spent, and fell asleep to the rise and fall of her chest, her hot breath on the back of his neck, her head against his.