Chapter 4

A Present

Severus Snape was feeling more than just prepared by the time that he arrived at the door of the Kent household. He was feeling deliciously ready to tangle wits with the two people responsible for spawning the girl that had been tormenting his mind for months. Snape had not felt this much concentrated loathing in years. It was a fresh sensation that he rather relished, since it was easily drowning out the more bewildering feelings that he held for the girl.

As Snape tugged on the front of his cloak, which was not at all necessary in the late August heat, he raised his other hand and pulled the knocker on the door. After several moments, the door was pulled slowly open by Patience herself. Instead of destroying his confidence, this unexpected appearance of the very person he most wanted to forget emboldened him. He sneered viciously at the shocked, frightened look on the face of the young woman in front of him and drawled, "Good evening, Miss Kent."

"P-professor!"

"I have business with your father, Miss Kent."

"I…won't you come in, sir?"

As he passed the girl, he noticed that there was a purplish looking bruise on the side of her neck, which was imperfectly concealed by a scarf that she had tied over the collar of her robes. Directing his thoughts away from the girl to the business at hand, Snape replied curtly, "Yes, thank you."

As he followed Patience into a showy marble entrance hall, Snape heard a strident County Armagh voice call out from somewhere nearby, "Who was it, Eurydice?"

Snape smiled unpleasantly at Morag, whose hair was casually tied back instead of worn swept up into her usual formal style. She was also wearing a set of slightly wrinkled house robes that Snape suspected she would have rather died than have any outsider see her wearing. Still unaware of his presence, Morag stepped into the corridor and stopped short. He was absolutely satisfied with the reaction his unexpected arrival had effected upon Morag. It was of little importance to him for the moment that she would not forget her embarrassment quickly.

"Why, Severus! Such a pleasant surprise. We did not expect to see you so soon."

Snape, who was perfectly well aware of what Morag had expected, spoke in a smooth voice, "I thought it best to settle the business proposition that William forwarded to me today. I understood that he considered the matter urgent, in fact."

Snape watched Morag's face carefully. She seemed to be undecided about what his reaction to the proposal had been, but he was quick to note the appraising look she gave her daughter before turning her eyes back to him. After a very brief hesitation, Morag replied, "Of course. If you will allow Eurydice to take you into the drawing room, then I will let William know that you are here."

Snape cast a practised, bored look at Morag before he allowed himself to be led into the adjoining room by her timid, pale-faced daughter. After he had refused a drink, Snape sat gingerly on the edge of a white armchair and allowed himself to take a frank appraisal of the sacrificial lamb to the slaughter. He suspected that Patience had absolutely no idea of what her parents had planned for her, since she did not appear to be any more than normally afraid of him. He could see that she looked as if she had not slept well in days and her face seemed thinner than it had just a few days before.

He could hear Morag's high-heeled shoes approaching them and was not surprised to see that her hair was now carefully coiffed and the wrinkles had been magically released from the front of her house robe. "William would like for me to bring you back to his office, Severus. Will you please follow me?"

Snape was beginning to feel some twinges of anger seeping into his consciousness and had to concentrate the sap-focus on working his way out of whatever snare William was hoping to set for him. After Morag had opened the door to the office, Snape confidently strode through and spoke immediately. "I was unimpressed with your offer, Kent. You ought to have come to me personally instead of writing, but, as it is, I see nothing that you have which would be useful to me."

Morag was slipping quietly out of the room with a self-assured smirk on her face as Snape watched William step out from behind his desk to greet him.

"Why don't you sit down Severus? I think that I can show you that there is a lot of benefit to you to take what I have to offer."

Snape sat in the seat proffered to him and waited for William to speak. It was Kent's move and Snape needed to know what Kent was planning to do. "Very well, Kent, speak."

"I don't think that there is any point in playing games, Severus. I know what you are."

Snape, who knew exactly what William was implying, but who had dealt with this accusation enough times to be unconcerned, stated, "Oh? And what am I, Kent?"

William shook his head and said only, "Do you think that it will do you any good in your position to have this become a piece of public knowledge?"

It was only the influence of the sap that kept Snape from betraying his hatred of the man sitting confidently in front of him. "What do you think that you are saying to me, Kent? What information do you actually propose to tell and how would this affect me?"

William made a gesture of disgust, "You know precisely what I mean. I know what you have carved into your forearm there, Snape. I suggest that you would prefer not to have this information publicised to the parents of the precious little children whom you so lovingly instruct in the art of potion making. In fact, I imagine that your past and present affiliations would likely not bear looking into by the Ministry, which would make your comfortable life somewhat difficult."

Snape stared for a moment at William and then laughed aloud. He stood up, leant forward over the large mahogany desk, and shoved his well-covered arm in front of William and leered, "Do you want to see it, Kent? Would you like to validate your useless bit of information yourself? Go ahead."

William looked nonplussed for a moment and then smiled broadly. "I do not need to look, Snape. I know what the mors mordre tattoo looks like. I have seen it before."

Snape narrowed his eyes and thought with anger that Kent was calling his bluff and had succeeded. That did not mean that he had to admit as much, however. "I am not going to marry your daft little fluff of a daughter. As I have said, she is of no use to me and will only be an unwelcome burden. I cannot imagine any reason that you or Morag would wish to ally yourself with my family either, since both of you hate me almost as much as I detest you and I have nothing to offer you."

Snape could see that William knew that he had gained a point and could sense from the pleased expression on Kent's swarthy face that he believed that he was about to score another one. "I have absolutely no desire regarding my disappointing bit of offspring other than to be rid of her. She is an expense I don't care to keep and a bother to me, since she takes up too much of my wife's time. I am tired of having to listen to an endless succession of possible plans for how to marry the girl off advantageously. We both know that formal marriage contracts are a thing of past generations, so it won't be easy for even someone as skilled as Morag to pull it off."

Snape sat back in his chair and watched William, who continued to speak in an irritable drone, "The cold fact is that the girl is a bother to me and I would rather have Morag's attention more profitably and beneficially placed. For some reason best known only to her, Morag has decided that she wants to manipulate you into taking the girl off our hands. I do not know why and I do not really care. She is willing to attach a dowry to the bargain, as much as 200,000 galleons, which I am pretty certain would be of great use to you."

Snape sneered with a viciousness he normally reserved for first-year students, "It has been a long time since I was so surprised, Kent. You cannot seriously expect that I can be forced into marrying your spawn, Kent, especially one as brainless as that little chit."

Unfazed, William smiled and said carefully, "Yes, since you taught her you must know that she is remarkably stupid, but that only means that she will be as obedient as you want her to be. And no one will deny that the girl is beautiful."

Severus Snape knew that he was beaten. He could not allow his careful plans or either of his masters' plans actually, to be ruined by a denouncement of his involvement with the Death Eaters yet. There was a time for public declarations, but that hour was not now. Dumbledore was not in a position to protect him at that moment and he could not risk displeasing the Dark Lord, who wanted him to stay at Hogwarts for the time being.

Actually, Snape had to admit to himself that the money alone was sufficient inducement. He would bed Romilda Warpole, a pimply Ravenclaw who had graduated three years before and whom he had roundly detested, for the sum that Kent was so artlessly flaunting in front of him. The ability to acquire certain useful items would be of great help to him in some of his research. He had no qualms about purchasing the clout he wanted to wield over some of his 'colleagues' either. Yes, the money was more than enough of a reason.

"I am offering you a ludicrously soft proposal, Snape. You would be a fool to pass it up, since Morag is a fool to waste the girl and her money on you. You know that you wouldn't be able to obtain a wife like this one on your own, Snape, so take the offer before Morag changes her mind."

Snape, who was generally thought by everyone including himself to be quite skilled at manipulation, could not help recognising the determination that Kent seemed to have to win. He was desperate to persuade Snape to marry his daughter, which did not make any sort of sense to Snape himself. However, although he knew that he would bitterly regret agreeing to let Patience become his wife, Severus Snape was aware that to refuse the offer was an error that he could not make.

"You do not know what I can get on my own, Kent. Send a copy of the contract to my Jurisconsultant and one to my home in Hogsmeade. I want this done soon, Kent, since I will be returning to Hogwarts in a week's time."

Snape rose and extended his hand to Kent so that they could shake on the agreement. As if understanding that it was wisest to escort Snape from the house before there was a chance for him to change his mind, William hastily showed Snape out of the office and led him down the corridor to where Patience was sitting forlornly on a bench, before bidding him goodbye and retreating to his office.

Left alone with the very person he most wanted to avoid, Snape snarled, "Where's my cloak, girl?"

Patience scurried forward to get the cloak from the closet. She handed it nervously to Snape, who looked at her as if she were a squashed flobberworm. As she opened the door for him and stood back so that he could pass her, Snape opened his mouth to speak. The desire to know that he could hurt her, that he was not the only person twisted into doing something undesirable, led Snape to spit out cruelly, "You had better run and thank your father, Miss Kent. He has just bought you a present." He could see the confused, frightened look on Patience's face and laughed mirthlessly as he turned his back to leave.