The next morning
It was with some serious trepidation that I made my way back down to the dungeons the next morning. Gingerly I sniffed the air, only to find the lingering scent of house elves, sighing in relief I pushed through the cat flap that appeared in the main door. I scouted out all of my Masters private rooms, save the bedroom, before relaxing in front of the fire in the lounge; I wasn't going to take any chances. Normally I would have no qualms about waking Severus up in the morning, however since he had company and the state of dress that they were in was questionable I decided to steer well clear and wait for the humans to emerge.
I didn't have to wait long; Severus emerged first, dressed in his silk pyjamas and slippers and wearing a ridiculous grin on his face. I waited for him to greet me, only to be completely ignored as he walked into the kitchen. My fur bristled slightly, after all I had done my Master couldn't produce a simple thank you! Well that's what you get for helping humans I suppose. My tail lashed backwards and forwards on the hearth rug, looking up only when Hermione entered the room dressed in one of Severus' white shirts. She too failed to greet me and walked in a sort of daze to the kitchen where I could hear my Master clinking china around. Snorting in disgust my tail lashed faster, I was glad to hear them talking and chuckling quietly together in the kitchen, but could not help but brood over their disinterest in me.
An hour later, and they both emerged, smelling faintly of coffee and toast. I raised my head slightly, hoping that now I would receive some attention. They both settled together on the sofa which was only a few feet from where I was laying on the rug. I watched with an open mouth as Severus calmly put his arm around the girls shoulder and pulled her close, still without noticing me. Angry and upset I buried my face into my fur and closed my eyes trying to put aside their ignorance and focus instead on their happiness. It took a few minutes until I could block out my emotions but it seemed that Severus had finally thought to check our bond, and sat up quite suddenly, startling Hermione, as he sensed my upset.
"Sophie, where are you?" I thought not to reply but decided that this would only cause him to try to find me, probably resulting in him stepping on me in the process and instead let all the emotions come pouring out, it is said to be cleansing after all.
"Down here you oaf!" I exclaimed angrily as he finally caught sight of me.
"How
long have you been there?"
"Over an hour" I replied,
narrowing my eyes and lashing my tail once more.
"What's the
matter Sophia?" God he had the nerve to ask such a question.
"Nothing"
"Come I know it is something, are you feeling left out?" he said in a teasing tone, a tone which I was not in the mood to hear. I dodged the hands that reached out for me, my fur bristling completely now.
"Yes" I hissed "I am feeling left out, especially as I have spent the better part of two days attempting to make the two of you see sense about each other, I've been running all over the castle correcting your stupid mistakes only to be completely ignored this morning. Fine then, if you think you can do so well without me then I'll leave you alone!" I exclaimed running from the room. Within minutes he was after me, but there was only so far you could run in only your night clothes and slippers. I may have been acting irrationally, but I was emotionally wound up and although some people don't know it ferrets do have hormones, and mine were in a complete state, I needed some desperate me time and somewhere quiet to have a little cry. I ran with no real destination in mind, only to get away from Severus, I needed to calm down and he was only serving to aggravate me. This time instead of running up the floors of Hogwarts I decided instead to head deeper into the dungeons, I had had enough of running up flights of stairs.
None of the students knew that dungeons went so far down, even Potter who had entered the Chamber of Secrets did not realise how deep the chambers went. Severus and Dumbledore were perhaps the only two who knew of the lower dungeons, but many of them were inaccessible, to humans. Several cave-ins had blocked many of the entrances but there was enough space between the old stones for me to squeeze through. I sneezed several times; the layer of thick dust covered everything causing me to leave small footprints on the floor. Salazar Slytherin had built these passageways before the school had been built without the knowledge of the other founders. I had found them years ago when Severus was still in school, I had been unable to sleep and so had decided to prowl around the castle, I had chanced upon the hidden dungeons accidentally, mainly be falling into one of the corridors. Over the year I had visited them only a few times but I still knew my way. Eventually all the corridors met in one huge hall, easily twice as large as the great hall, the ceiling arched upwards to form a huge dome, how far it went up I did not know but it was tall enough for one small window to be put in. Allowing a small band of light to breach the darkness before hitting the opposite wall, so far up that one had to squint to see if it was real or just a hallucination of a light deprived mind. Raising my tail high so as to avoid getting it coated in dust I walked over to one of the walls. A mirror stood there, aged with time yet still allowing me to see a faint reflection of myself. Human eyes would have failed to see anything in the blackness. Nudging it with my nose caused it to swing gently on its hinges that connected it to the wall I assumed that a spell had been cast on the mechanisms in order for it not to rust. Before long mirrors place all the way up the walls had began to move in synchronisation to the mirror nearest the floor, reflecting the small beam of light all the way down until it lit a small area on the dusty floor. Anxious to get out of the darkness I moved towards it, although the floor was coated in dust I allowed my tired paws to collapse beneath me before curling myself up into a small ball. Finally I allowed myself to fully let my emotions lose, Severus was too far away to feel them through our bond and for that I was glad. I was nearly always the strong one but the stresses of the Final Battle, almost losing Severus, the fiasco with Hermione and finally being forgotten when I most needed to be remembered had caused my emotional barrier to break. And burying my face in my silver fur I began to cry.
