Hi everyone! I just wanted to say that I am sorry it took me so long to upload the next chapter. Not to get into too many details, I've recently been dealing with a break-up from a serious relationship that was supposed to lead towards marriage and a life with the man I loved. Well, that didn't work, and having a broken heart really sucks! I forgot, however, that writing makes me feel better, so hopefully I'll continue updating this periodically.

I hope you all are doing fantastic, and again, I am sorry for the long wait. I hope you all are happy to know that I will be updating two chapters at once, though!

Enjoy!

Chapter 4

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Al wasn't quite sure what he was expecting the book to do, but it surely did not fall along these lines. Severus Snape stood in front of him; solid, sixteen, and not dead. He seemed real, and Al couldn't remember to move. All he could do was stare at Severus Snape and know he was going crazy.

Severus Snape, however, did not stare back at him. Not directly, anyway.

His mind was going a thousand miles a minute. How did he know his name? Hell, when Severus Snape was sixteen, he didn't even know who Al's father was. This truly had to be some kind of dark magic. Rose was right.

Al turned his head and scanned the floor he was lying on for the Potions book, but there was nothing except the quill he was holding just minutes before, resting a few inches from his right hand. He stretched his hand out and grasped it with his fingers.

"Well, aren't you going to get up?" Severus Snape asked him as he peered down to the mess that was Al spread across the stone floor of the Hogwarts dungeons. His face was scrunched up and ugly with mild boredom.

Al blinked back up at Severus and struggled his way to his feet and tried to regain his balance. He looked down at the quill in his hand and felt awkward holding it. "Keep that, Potter. It's the only way you'll be able to go back to your time," Severus Snape told him in a deep voice that still cracked here and there. "That is, if you want to go back."

"How is this quill going to bring me anywhere?" Al asked in an escalated tone. He wasn't mad; he wasn't sure what he was other than impossibly confused. He wondered if this was some sort of trick Agatha was playing on him. Or maybe his Dad. Maybe both.

"Well, the same way you got here, Potter," Severus said lamely with a shrug of his shoulder. "Just tap it and let the ink fall down. Then you will go back."

Al thought for a brief moment that he should try it. Tap it and let the ink fall. He figured it would be worth a shot, and he definitely needed to get the hell out of here before he went even more insane. He reached his hand back in his pocket, pulled out the quill, and held it between his index finger and his thumb. Lifting up his index finger, he held his breath and went to tap it.

"Wait, you can't leave yet," Severus said at once, and his large, strong, cool hand grasped Al's to keep it from moving any farther. With his other hand, he caught the droplet of ink that fell from the tip of the quill. It bled onto his skin, but Al was still standing in front of him. "We still have a lot to talk about."

Al looked down at the hand that was holding onto his, and was shocked at how real it felt. He could feel Severus's sweaty palms, the lines in his hands and the curves of his long, thin fingers, and his cool touch that made Al shiver. He seemed so real, but Al knew he was dead. He felt dead. He was cold enough. "We have to talk?"

"Yeah, well, we don't have to do anything, but you've finally figured out how to get here. I've been waiting ever since you got my book," Severus told him simply, and let go of Al's hand.

Al wondered if Severus would stop him again if he tried to go back now. "What did you want to talk about?" Al asked stupidly, and decided against his better judgment to put the quill back in his pocket.

"Well, we can't talk here. A class is about to let out, and it would not be good for me if we were overheard," Severus told him simply, grasped Al's hand again, and led him off in an entirely different direction. Al wasn't that accustomed with the dungeons of Hogwarts, but even if he was, he still wouldn't know where they were going. Hogwarts looked so different back then. Then stone walls were newer, the lights of the halls shone slightly duller, and the corridors were quieter. Al wondered what kind of Headmaster must be running the school. Was it Dumbledore?

"Where are we going?" Al questioned when he remembered how to speak. His mouth felt slightly numb and his heart was pounding against his chest. Every step they took, Al's hand inched closer to his pocket where he knew that his supposed saving grace was held.

"An empty chamber, classroom, anywhere we won't be overheard," Severus told him as he dragged Al along behind him. As he passed open doorways, he peered in to see if they were unoccupied enough for his tastes.

"I can walk on my own," Al told him as he tried to struggle his hand free from Severus Snape's grasp, but all Severus did was snort and grab onto Al's hand with a firmer grip.

When Severus Snape finally found an abandoned room that he wanted, he stopped on a dime and Al ran into his back so hard that it nearly knocked him off his feet. Al groaned, but managed to pull his hand from Severus's and glared at the boy as he walked into the classroom.

Severus shut and locked the door behind them with a few spells, some of which Al had never heard before. He gulped. With every passing moment, he thought for sure that it was a bad idea to stay.

At first, Severus Snape didn't say anything. All he did was stare at Al as he sat down on one of the twenty or so chairs in the classroom, watch his hand graze over the pocket of his trousers, his arm tense at his sides, his foot tap in nervousness, and his lips pull into a stern line. When Al's eyes moved to meet his, Severus quickly looked at the floor and spoke, "You have no idea how long I've been waiting for you to finally figure out how to get into my book."

Al blinked at him. "How did you even know that the book was mine?"

Severus's jaw clenched. "That book is mine, and how I knew you had it was because it was practically obvious that your father would pass it down to you."

"Then did you put all of the spells on it to make it magical?" Al asked as his brows furrowed.

"Spells?" Severus asked with what Al thought must have been a snicker. "It's not exactly a spell that has been placed on it."

"Then what is it?" Al's mouth was hanging open slightly. He gripped the edges of the desk he was sitting at, and Severus noticed that his knuckles were white.

"I can't tell you. It's something that you'll figure out eventually," Severus told Al as the corners of his mouth turned up slightly in a wonky sort of smile. "Hopefully."

Al liked the Potions book a lot more when it didn't talk back to him. Severus Snape was starting to get on his nerves.

The two of them sat in silence; Severus was waiting for Al to bring up his next question, but Al refused to talk to Severus. His hand kept going back to his pocket like some kind of nervous twitch, but each time he thought to himself now is the time to go back, he figured that it wouldn't kill him to stay a minute longer.

Al gave up and broke the silence when it rang too loud in his ears, "Why me?"

"What do you mean?" Severus asked, sitting on top of the desk across from Al, who shuffled uncomfortably in his seat at how close Severus was to him. He was supposed to be dead, after all, even though he didn't look or smell like he was.

Because he's not dead now, Al thought to himself, he's just his sixteen-year-old self. "Why are you trapped in a book that I'd inherit?"

Severus didn't speak at first. His black eyes glazed over and he looked at the floor. Al guessed that he was thinking very hard of an answer, and when his forehead waved with worry-wrinkles, Al was certain that he wouldn't be getting whatever answer he was thinking. But Severus's mouth was open, and he was speaking in a low voice, "Your eyes are the brightest of green, Albus Severus Potter, did you know that? Like your father's," he said, and Al thought that he had spat some on the last word he spoke, "Like his mother's."

Al's mouth hung open slightly. How was that answer supposed to give him any kind of information? Was it even an answer? "Er, what does that have to do with me getting the book?"

Severus sighed and chuckled a bit; derange dripped from Severus's every sound like a fatal poison. "Write your father about this meeting, but don't give him too many details."

"Why?" Al asked, trying not to hold his breath.

"Perhaps your father could provide answers that I cannot," Severus said simply, his eyes focused only on his folded hands in his lap. It was then that Al noticed that the whole time he had been trapped inside this bloody book that Severus Snape would not look him directly in his eyes whenever Al was looking at him. He never got a good look at Severus's eyes, except one that was long enough for him to deduct that they were black. Al wondered why this was, but guessed that it probably had something to do with them being blank with death. Perhaps that was the only way you could tell that the figure standing in front of him was something far different than real and actual.

In a wild moment, Al wished their eyes would meet, but all Severus did was avoid him. He'd look at the space between his eyes, his eyebrows, the tip of his nose, the structure of his cheekbones, anywhere but his green eyes that he had commented on.

"You should probably get back, Potter. You've been gone for a while," Severus told him as he got up from the desk he was sitting on and walked to the doorway of the quiet classroom. "Come back and see me. I'll be waiting."

And then he was gone.

Al sat frozen for a while in a world that toyed with reality and what he figured was make-believe. Everything around him seemed real, but that couldn't be because he was real. So this all had to be made-up. Drawn to life.

Severus Snape was the artist. He was the one with the pencil in his hand.

Al clutched his head at how crazy this was. He pushed his hand into his pocket, and as he withdrew the quill, he promised himself that if doing what Severus Snape told him to brought him back to his time, that he'd never, ever, travel back here again. No matter how curious he was or how much Severus Snape wanted to see him again. He could wait. He could wait for an eternity, but nothing would change. Maybe it was a good thing that Severus was dead; he had all the time in the world and whatever sort of cruel purgatory his battered soul was trapped in that allowed him to torture Albus Severus through the means of his old Potions book.

Al held the quill out in front of his bright green eyes, tapped it lightly with his finger, and he was falling again.

*

Al was back on his bed with his potions book sprawled out in front of him and his quill in his hand. He dropped the quill like it was molten lava hot in his hand. Al brought his hands up to his face and touched his mouth, nose, around his eyes and forehead. It had worked and he was back.

Al slammed the book shut and tossed it to the floor along with the quill. He cursed himself for being too curious for his own good. All it did was get him sucked into Potions books that got him stuck in different realities.

The door to his dormitory pushed open, and Al bolted up so that he was standing next to his bed; wand in hand. Lorcan walked through, and his eyes bulged slightly when he saw his friend in such a stance. "Um, Al? It's just me, mate."

Al sighed and lowered his wand. "Sorry, I just thought it was someone else," when he noticed how strange he had sounded, his mind worked quickly to try and come up with some sort of excuse. "Rose or someone. Coming to lecture me about my book."

My book, he thought. He looked down, and the Potions book was at his feet. He kicked it under his bed.

"Oh," Lorcan said, nodding as if he understood completely. "Nah, it's just me. I forgot that my Mum wanted me to write her when we got here."

"Write your father about this meeting, but don't give him too many details," Al thought, and wondered if he should or not.

Lorcan stared at him. "You sure you're okay, Al?"

"What? Oh, yeah, I'm fine," Al said as he turned back to his bedside table and dropped his wand. "I just remembered that I promised to write my Dad."

"Parents," Lorcan said with a roll of his eyes, and he knelt down to dig through his trunk for things to write with.

Al reached for a piece of spare parchment and a quill from his bedside table. He didn't want to write to his father, and he had no idea what to say, but he had no way out of now.

He considered for a moment, and then started to write:

"Dad,

First day back has been pretty hectic. I've already got a lot of homework to do. James and Lily are doing well, I imagine. James has his own friends and Lily doesn't think it's cool to talk to her brothers at school, so I don't talk to either of them too much. Rose, Lorcan, and Lysander all say hi, though.

What I actually meant to write to you about was the Potions book you gave me. This is going to sound really weird, but I think that thing must be magical. When I touch it, it feels cold, but I don't think it does that to anyone else because Rose and the twins haven't commented on it. It's like the book has – feelings – that only I can read. Something really strange happened with the book today. I am not even sure what it was, or if it was real. I don't know how to explain it, but I think I was transported to a different time. I am sure you think I am insane for saying that, so I won't give any more details.

I just want you to know that it's acting funny. I think I am meant to tell you that. And I am also a little scared to use it. I wish you'd send me a new one.

Hope you and Mum are doing well,

Al"

He dropped his quill and read over his letter. Al hoped that Severus Snape was right, and that maybe his father could give him some answers.