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A/N: Sorry this chapter has taken so long to get out! Thank you to all the reviewers! I'm always checking for reviews and they really motivate me to write. Even simple comments encouraging me to keep writing I really enjoy. I recently hit 100,000 views which is also exciting!

Chapter 35: The Artefact Case File

A beef wellington with a golden lattice crust sat in the middle of the long table in the basement kitchen, attended by steaming bowls of carrots, peas and potatoes. Most of the seats were taken and Harry and Ron darted over to the free chairs beside the twins, both of whose eyebrows looked suspiciously darker and crispy, while Hermione sat beside Ginny.

Róisín, still red in the face from learning about Harry's trip into Snape's memories, startled as the door opened behind her and let in the rumbling voice of her Defence professor, who was saying something to Black behind him.

"Róisín, how are you?" Lupin asked, sounding genuinely interested.

She turned awkwardly in the crowded space, taken aback by his use of her given name.

"Er… good, sir." Her eyes flicked behind him to Black and she noticed the darker wizard suppress a smirk.

During dinner she had the feeling she was the cousin in a large family who rarely visited and no one knew well. On one side of her Bill was talking to his mother about a stubborn migraine curse on a shelf in the library, and on the other Lupin was talking to Sirius about the board of governors commenting on his monthlies during his last review while Sirius sniggered and said something under his breath which made the werewolf snort. Róisín leant forward as she ate, pretending to follow the conversation Mr. Weasley was having with Harry across the table.

"Oi, Róisín," Ron called out, "Get Lupin to pass the carrots."

"Em, professor, could you-?" Róisín began.

"-I've got it, professor," Black said and with a flick of his wand sent the dish floating down the table. Lupin turned and said,

"Please, Róisín, call me Remus."

Before she could reply, Ron exclaimed,

"Hey! We don't get to call you Remus!"

"Well, you're three years younger than Miss Feral."

So Lupin knew she was a year older than the rest of her year.

"What about us then?" Fred asked, "we're also in Final year."

The Defence Professor snorted and said, "You two would find a way to abuse the privilege."

"Fair enough," George replied while Fred muttered,

"Who knew being a mythical creature gave you such envious benefits?" Only Lupin and Black heard the remark, and the former put his glass down without taking a drink, his normally warm eyes still. Black raised an eyebrow and growled,

"Enjoy your witty quips while you can, because if your charming potions professor hears, you'll be sporting a wicked post-obliviation headache."

Róisín stilled, her fork half-way from her plate to her mouth, blushing fiercely. George raised his eyebrows as if to say, point taken, and continued eating.

After watching Ron finish his third serving of pudding, Róisín was finally herding the three Gryffindor fifth years up the stairs when Lupin asked her,

"Could I chat with you a moment?"

Róisín followed him into the parlour, wondering what he could want to talk to her about. Was it because her Defence work hadn't been up to its usual standard recently? Or -Oh God- was it something about her and Snape? The click of him closing the door behind her made her chest squirm. She was very aware of her crumpled sweatpants and old t-shirt.

"How are you?" he asked.

"Ok, thank you, sir."

His green eyes were very warm in comparison to Snape's back ones.

"I wanted to let you know that you can come to me if you need me to contact Professor Snape."

"Oh yeah, er… he told me that. I will tell you if- I mean, thank you, sir."

"How are you feeling?"

"-Good," Róisín replied hastily. "I mean, nothing… unusual."

"Are the others making you feel welcome?"

"Everyone's being great. Hermione and I studied a bit together and er, Mr. Black helped me beat Ron at chess, well, really he beat Ron for me but still…" A small frown appeared between Lupin's brows. "Harry doesn't seem to like me though."

"Well, I think he's embarrassed about what he did," Lupin muttered.

Róisín's eyes widened.

"You know about that?"

Lupin sighed and gave a small nod. "I'm sorry that happened, that must've been stressful for you."

"Yeah, em-" Suddenly Róisin wanted to cry, thinking about that night and how angry Snape had been. "Professor Snape wasn't happy." Her voice sounded weirdly tight.

"I can't imagine he was."

Róisín looked away from Lupin's green eyes.

"Harry has been burdened with saving other people from real danger many times," Lupin said. "I think it was only a matter of time before he saw a threat in something he didn't understand."

Róisin gave a shaky exhale.

"I can talk to him if you want," he added.

"Oh God no! Please forget I said anything. Hermione and Ron are being really kind and the twins, well they're slaggin' me but it's harmless. Ginny doesn't know so…"

"Yes, well, the others aren't supposed to know either." His angry tone surprised her and Róisín had the urge to state it wasn't her who told them in case he didn't already know but he continued, "Ok, I just wanted to make sure you were alright. Professor Snape is busy the coming days so he might not get to check on you himself."

Lupin smiled and opened the door for her and Róisín murmured a thank you as she left.

Róisín was forced to drag the Gryffindors to her own room because Ginny was reading Quidditch magazines in the one she shared with Hermione.

"What were you guys talking about earlier?" Róisín demanded as soon as the door slammed shut. "What do you mean Snape was looking for me?" She punctuated her words with a banged fist on the door, using her magic to expand the wood to block sounds from leaking through the gaps. Ron watched her magic glisten as it spread across the door and gulped.

"Well, we don't exactly-" Hermione began.

"If she doesn't know, we shouldn't tell her," Harry interrupted. "There might be a reason they haven't told her."

"In fairness, they didn't tell us either, mate," Ron said. The other boy ignored him and asked,

"But if you didn't know Snape was looking for you, how did he approach you? How did he justify-"

"Well I'd just left my friend splattered on the fuckin' Defence classroom floor, hadn't I?" Róisín barked. She was certain they had heard what had happened with Anna, the whole school had. "And it wasn't the first time my magic was erratic, so any solution I was offered to stabilise it I was going to accept. Also it wasn't Snape anyway, it was obviously all Dumbledore's idea, Snape was clearly vehemently opposed." Her chest felt tight.

"And where they like, look, Snape's a spy on the good side so you need to hook up with him before the other side recruits you or what?" Ron asked light-heartedly.

Róisín snorted. "No, 'course not! At that point Anna was still unconscious in the hospital wing, and I was kind of preoccupied with the fact that I'd almost killed my best friend. I was feeling worse than I ever had in my life, and the headmaster said that Snape could help me so I agreed." Her voice dropped as she continued, "Also, they didn't really imply the other side would recruit me so much as…" She left the last part unsaid and ignored the grim looks on the Gryffindors' faces. "So how did you guys know he was looking for me?"

"Because we spied on Order meetings last summer," Ron stated.

Róisín narrowed her eyes, incredulous that a secret society formed to combat the darkest wizard ever known could be so easily compromised by a bunch of teenagers.

"We didn't learn much from the meetings, Ronald," Hermione corrected. "It was from mutterings of people coming in and out of meetings. From that we learnt that the potions professor was looking for something or… someone. Then one night late after a meeting I overheard Professor Snape and the Headmaster arguing. Professor Dumbledore said, "Would you prefer to drag the síog into it or Riddle to?"

"Who's Riddle?"

"Voldemort," Harry supplied.

"Right," Róisín replied in the same matter-of-fact tone he had, but her chest clenched painfully.

"So I decided to research what a síog was," Hermione said. "We also knew there was something in the Department of Magic that was important to You-Know-Who." In the corner of Róisín's eye Harry's jaw clenched. "And that something had happened there. From what Harry saw -I mean heard- we thought a weapon had been fixed or activated."

Róisín gestured for the Gryffindors to sit but she stayed standing, her whole body tense.

"We snuck some folders out of Dad's briefcase," Ron said, "And found documents from the Department of Mysteries. I dunno what Dad did to get his hands on them, because he works in the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Office, which has barely any dealings with the unspeakables but-"

"There were pages from an artefact case file in there," Hermione said. Róisin had seen such files during her internship. They were imprinted with the crest of the Department of Mysteries, a raven carrying a skull and a bleeding heart. "Most of it was redacted, but it said it was a Dark Detection Device and it dated from the late twentieth century British wizarding war."

"Did it classify what type of Dark?" Róisín asked.

"Grade 7, Type 3, Orientation 210 degrees."

Róisín was impressed. "Did you know what that meant?"

"No, but I figured it was important. I couldn't find any information on it though."

"You wouldn't, the Department's classification system is infamously obscure. The grade is how dangerous or "dark" the object is." Professor Smith hadn't let Róisin near anything above a grade 3. "The type is how it was made or came to be; Type 3 means it was wizard-made. Orientation denotes the purpose, and I'm not sure but I think around 200 degrees is for some kind of weapon. Although you said it was defined as a detection device…" The three Gryffindors were looking at Róisín with confusion. "I did an internship there last summer," she explained.

"Oooh," Ron said slowly as though something had fallen into place.

"What?"

"Well, that's how it detected you."

Róisín stared at him, confused.

"Detected me?"

"The artefact detects síoga," Hermione said.

"Sióga?" Róisín repeated, the word sounding strange like she'd never said it before, or hadn't been using it correctly. She went to sit and immediately stood again. "How does it work? Is it like a Dragon Detector or a Vampire Seeker?"

"We don't know."

"Does it have a name?"

"The Stirring."

Róisín looked at each of the Gryffindors in turn, her stomach twisting at the idea that they had known things that had happened to her that she hadn't. "That's why Snape was looking for me," she realised aloud. "They never told me -the headmaster and Snape- they acted as if they only realised I was a síog because I had these symptoms and my magic was so out of control, but really…." She felt betrayed and foolish. "And if he'd always known he'd have to, why was he so…"

"Snape was tasked with finding the sióg for the Order, but I don't think he realised Professor Dumbledore would ask him to partner with her," Hermione said. "Most sióga show signs much younger, so he probably thought that the Order wouldn't consider a partner for her at all, and simply shelter her during the war."

"Did you know when you approached me in the library? Is that why you asked me about him?"

"You asked her about Snape?" Harry asked.

"I didn't realise you were the sióg yet, no." Hermione answered Róisín and then said to Harry, "To be honest, I was a little curious about what you'd seen on the map, with them together so late at night, but I didn't say anything because I was almost certain it was nothing and well, I didn't want to make you even more paranoid about the potions professor. So I asked Róisín about the professor, to see if I could gauge her reaction, but she seemed relatively normal about him, intimidated sure, but who isn't intimidated by him? And then, after you told me about what you saw in the pensieve, I researched sióga and the wizards they partner with and well, Professor Snape was a likely candidate."

"What do you mean?" Ron asked.

"Well, he's powerful and he's in the Order."

"So's Sirius, so's Lupin," Harry argued.

"Yes but Snape was an exceptional student, incredible at potions, one of the best duellers Hogwarts had ever seen, and when he left Hogwarts You-Know-Who personally mentored him. He's probably one of the most powerful wizards in Britain."

"Someone's a fan," Ron muttered.

Hermione rolled her eyes.

"How do you know he was such a good student?" Harry asked.

"In third year when we were trying to figure out how Sirius escaped I read about his time at Hogwarts. He was in the same year as Snape."

"-Yeah, I know," Harry interjected sharply.

"So you figured the Order would partner the sióg with Snape after they found her?" Ron asked, clearly impressed. Then he snorted and added, "You probably realised that before Snape did."

Róisín remembered Snape's stony expression in the Headmaster's office, when Dumbledore explained he'd have to sleep with her. She also thought of Hermione saying he was personally mentored by You-Know-Who, right after he left school, which meant he'd been working as a spy for a really long time, since the beginning of the first wizarding war.

"You asked me about something else in the library," Róisín said. "Something about thestral blood?"

"Well, I thought maybe that was why you and Professor Snape had met late at night." Róisín gave her a confused look. "Because at that point I knew someone was brewing veritaserum."

Róisín's heart leapt into her throat.

SMASH

The vase of flowers on the dresser exploded and all four of them flung their arms up to shield their faces from the shards.

Trembling, Róisín looked around the room. Water dripped down the dresser and the flowers were strewn on the top. Tiny glass shards hung in Hermione's hair like morning dew and Harry had a cut on the side of his hand. Róisín's hands tingled from the magic that had just ripped out of her.

"I'm so sorry. Is everyone ok?" she asked, her voice shaking. "God, I'm like a bloody magical toddler."

After the initial shock, the three Gryffindors waved away Róisín's apologies. Hermione healed Harry's hand while Ron used a drying charm to clean up the spilled water and Róisín concentrated very hard on transfiguring the glass into sand before evanesco-ing it away.

When they finished Hermione asked her kindly,

"Would you prefer if we didn't talk about the veritaserum?"

"It's just, that night, the party-" Róisín felt her jaw quiver, and it was like someone else's face was crumbling on top of hers, because she couldn't possibly be crying about this, she didn't even know she was still upset about it. "I was so scared, and I was so stupidly drunk. My fucking ribs were even broken, I was in so much pain and he" -her voice broke, but she pushed past it- "Snape was raging at me, like he couldn't believe how stupid and reckless I'd been, and I was just" -a sob escaped her, and now tears were running down her cheeks, and Hermione placed an arm around her shoulder- "I was just trying to act normal around Anna. Like, what could I say? Oh sorry bestie, thanks for organising a party, but actually I'm a freak and no one can find out, and all the while I'm trying to deal with the fact that I'm sleeping with the potions professor, who I still find fucking terrifying and who's now furious at me and reading my mind because I'm literally too off-my-face to even explain what happened." Róisín sniffled and rubbed her eyes."I still don't understand what happened, not really."

Ron, frowning, looked away and Harry glared at his palms in his lap, his jaw taut.

"I was there actually," Hermione said. Everyone looked at her, confused. "I heard the twins talking about a party for you and snuck in with Harry's cloak. By that point I guessed you were the sióg because of the professor's memories and with someone brewing- well, I thought maybe I could look out for you but obviously I didn't help in the end. It was so crowded and I suppose I'm just not used to drunk people. Then you disappeared but I heard your friend Ida say that you'd gone to bed so I thought you were ok."

"You should've told us," Harry said to Hermione, "we could've helped."

"It wouldn't have been fair on Róisín to tell you her secret," Hermione replied and then said to Róisín. "I'm sorry I didn't take you to Professor Snape as soon as things started getting out of hand... How did you break your ribs?"

"He didn't break your ribs, did he?" Harry asked sharply.

"Who, Kun? No-" Róisín began.

"-Snape."

"What? No. Why would you think that?"

"You said he was furious with you."

"Yes, but he didn't hurt me." Róisín remembered the pain of Snape tearing through her brain and looked down at her hands. "No, I crashed my broom into the Whomping Willow."

The three Gryffindors winced.

"Oouch," Ron exclaimed. Then he snorted and said, "Been there. Did Snape tell you off for damaging it? That's what the git did to us."

"So it was Zoltan Kun who brewed the veritaserum?" Harry asked Róisín. Her fingers tingled and the lamps on the bedside tables flickered. She took a steadying breath.

"Yeah, I think so. I mean, I dunno, he's almost definitely the one who gave it to me, or at least Snape thinks so. How did you guys know someone was brewing veritaserum?"

"Well Hagrid really," Ron replied. "He told us he'd been arguing with Professor Sprout because she'd accused one of his Baumidgers of destroying her loquitflos plant. Then there was the thestral foal with the blood taken from it. And of course Hermione, just casually knowing the ingredients to veritaserum off the top of her head," Ron said mockingly, but Róisín could hear the fondness in his voice, "realised someone was brewing it."

Róisín felt guilty that she hadn't figured out Bumbly's injuries were caused by a person, although in her defence she couldn't actually see the thestral foal.

"Who was Kun working with?" Harry asked. "Even if he takes potions, surely veritaserum is well above even NEWTS level? Could Snape have helped him brew it?"

Hermione rolled her eyes and Róisín snorted and said,

"Well Snape definitely didn't help him, he was enraged when he found out someone had slipped me veritaserum."

"Maybe because Kun wasn't supposed to use it on you, he was supposed to use it on someone else, like Dumbledore?" Ron said and Harry nodded vigorously to endorse the idea.

"For the last time guys, Professor Snape is on our side," Hermione groaned. "He's teaching Harry Occlumency, he's protecting Róisín and he gives reports on You-Know-Who's plans at Order meetings."

Harry held his hands up as though to say he didn't want to have this argument again.

"So Kun suspected Róisín was the sióg, and wanted to confirm with veritaserum?" Ron asked. "Do we know if he has any links to the Department of Mysteries, do his parents work there or something?"

"Does he have any connection to Rookwood?" Harry asked.

Róisín's heart beat faster.

"Why would he?" she asked quickly.

"No reason, but Rookwood's out of Azkaban, and he used to be an Unspeakable, so maybe he found out about the Stirring and told Kun."

Róisín's eyes widened. "He was an unspeakable?"

"Yeah, that's why he was so valuable to Voldemort."

"Has he definitely escaped?" Róisín asked. "I thought maybe that was just a rumour." She'd hoped it was just a rumour.

"No, Dad says he's definitely out," Ron said gravely. "The Ministry is just keeping it hush-hush because they don't want to admit You-Know-Who is back."

Róisín wrapped her arms tightly around her waist. It felt like the room had dropped ten degrees. She caught Hermione giving her friends a look before saying,

"Don't worry, Headquarters is the safest place you could be."

"Yeah, I know," Róisín replied firmly and then added casually, "Anyway, I better get some study done, I'm really far behind."

Hermione hopped off the bed and said briskly, "Yes of course, I can't imagine what it's like to have your NEWTS on top of all this… Come on guys, we might as well let Fred and George use us as guinea pigs."

"Guinea pigs?" Ron asked.

After they left, Róisín paced back and forth, ignoring her half finished sketches and essays.

She didn't want to think about that night. About the blinding pain of hitting the whomping willow, vomiting on Snape's office floor, and how he'd snarled at her and tore through her mind. How she didn't even remember talking to Kun. How it had all been her fault.

And now the Gryffindors, who casually discussed deadly threats like other teenagers discussed TV shows, thought Rookwood could have something to do with it. To do with her.

She wanted to throw up.

Rummaging through her notes, she found a blank scroll and sat down heavily at her desk.

Dear Anna, she began. Then she poured her heart out over three feet of parchment. She wrote about finding out she was a síog, and how it felt to have sex with Snape, how it'd hurt and felt good at the same time, how he'd grabbed her wrist when she'd pushed at his chest the second time, and her horror when she'd seen the Dark Mark. She apologised for being cold to her, and forced herself to write about Kun, about how afraid she was, even about how she was a bit resentful of Anna because she'd cheerfully thrown a wild party, oblivious to all the shit Róisín had to deal with.

Her wrist ached by the time she finished. She knew she should burn the letter but instead she hid it in a corner of her suitcase, wanting to pretend that she would send it. As she did so her hand bumped against the bottle with the black potion Snape had given her. Glancing at the pile of flowers on the dresser where the vase used to be, she took a tiny sip. It tasted salty like butter but thick and sweet like syrup. Instantly, a pleasant calm washed over her. Grabbing her favourite Creatures Textbook, she curled into bed and fell asleep memorising fairy markings.