Cynthia had explored the castle both with Liyya and on her own, been presented with 2 sets of black wizard robes and a yellow scarf, and met several friendly students. The troubles from her recent past had quickly faded and things were looking up.
At least, until the weekend before classes resumed. Cynthia had spent every spare second obsessively reading whatever materials she could find regarding the dark arts and, with the help of Liyya, planning the first week of lessons. To make things easier, Liyya was planning to stop by the classroom as a special guest to help out with the magic demonstration since Cynthia couldn't actually perform any. A few distractions and some sleight of hand, and nobody would know any better.
Despite the good preperations, doubts were surfacing worse than ever. And Cynthia was getting sick, but didn't dare go to Madam Pomfrey out of fear of being found out. It was safer to just deal with the headaches and chills until they went away on their own.
It was a beautiful Sunday afternoon; still cold, but the sun was out for once. Cynthia was skimming over "Hogwarts: A History" when someone timidly knocked at the door to her office.
After regaining her composure and taking a deep breath, she gave the mystery guest permission to enter.
The door opened and an awkward looking boy, probably 4th or 5th year stepped in.
"Uh, P-Professor Gray?" He slowly made his way to the desk. "Um, hi. I'm Neville Longbottom and you haven't met me yet, but the Headmaster wanted me to bring you this note..."
She ignored the steadily worsing pain in her head to stand up and meet the student halfway across the room.
"Nice to meet you" she said, taking the folded over piece of parchment "I look forward to seeing you in my class." Neville looked taken aback and her smile faded.
"Is everything okay?"
Neville looked down, biting his lip. "No, Professor. It's just, well I don't know how to say it. It's sort of a joke around the students that the Defense class is cursed, seeing as we've had 7 different instructors in the last 5 years. They're already taking bets on how long you'll last before M-Malfoy-" He stammered, unable to finish. "No, nevermind; I don't want to get into any more trouble..."
"No, it's okay," Cynthia offered, wanting to hear the rest of what he was about to say but just as afraid of knowing.
Neville took a deep breath and looked for a second like he was going to continue, but looked down and shook his head. "I'll be late for something. I'll see you tomorrow Professor Gray."
She frowned and followed him to the door of the classroom, more nervous than ever. Maybe taking a walk would help. And it couldn't hurt to start interacting with the others here. Liyya had mentioned that the professors were already commenting on her lack of presence in the great hall, so she resolved to eat with them that evening no matter how sick she felt.
--
Cynthia closed the door to her office and stepped out into a dimly lit hall that was lined with heavy suits of armor. For a second, she thought she saw one move just outside the field of her vision, but decided not to think about something so creepy.
She stopped short after hearing urgent sounding voices around the corner, catching the end half of Neville Longbottom desperately pleading.
"...really sorry Professor, but I'm going to be late and McGonagall will kill me if I miss another private lesson! She took 10 points last week!"
"And I suppose you would like me to take 20 points from Gryffindor," responded Severus Snape in a tone that gave Cynthia flashbacks of a much hated algebra teacher from her high school years.
Neville was near tears. "No sir, please, I just-"
The dark haired man towered over Neville, glaring down with plans to verbally abuse him further when Cynthia forced herself to intervene. Neville was less surprised by the interruption than the potions master, who froze momentarily before taking a step back from the boy.
"Good afternoon Professor Gray," Severus greeted her, forcing out the words and sounding less than sincere.
She nodded in his direction. "I apologize for the interruption, but I need to finish speaking with Mr. Longbottom privately."
A look of terror washed over the kid's face as he seemed to be considering which professor to be more afraid of. His fears were realized as Cynthia continued, "I wasn't done discussing the terms of your punishment."
"My punishment..?" he barely managed to squeak out. Snape could barely hide his pleasure at seeing the kid in distress.
"You heard me" Cynthia replied in a neutral tone. "I'm on my way to the Headmaster's office for an urgent matter, so you can walk with me and we'll talk about it on the way."
"What have I done now?" he grumbled quietly, more to himself than anyone else.
Cynthia turned back to Severus and forced a fake smile. "Don't worry; I'll try my best to make sure he returns to you in one piece, though I can't promise anything." She gripped Neville's hand and pulled him along. Severus didn't move and Cynthia refused to look back and see for herself, but she knew he wasn't happy.
---
She pushed a door open, and light from the several huge windows flooded the main hall.
"Professor, did I miss something?" Neville finally asked. "I'm not sure of what I did wrong and-"
She shook her head. "Just do your best to stay out of Professor Snape's way for the rest of the day because I can't help you out a second time."
Disbelief rose in his face, followed by thankfulness and relief.
"Thank you so much, Professor."
Neville started up the stairs, but hesitated at the last minute, wanting to return the favor.
"You might want to keep an eye on Draco Malfoy." With that said, he turned and quickly disappeared into the upper castle.
Cynthia unfolded the piece of parchment still in her hand and looked at it, confronted with a bunch of wizarding terms that made little sense, having to do with something called Quidditch. All she could figure out was that Dumbledore wanted her to participate in something at the end of the week; she made a mental note to ask Liyya about it next time they ran into each other.