Chapter 17

Snodgrass

As he Apparated into the side street of Hogsmeade, Severus Snape looked round himself for any undesirables. Satisfied that he was alone, Snape tapped the top of his head with his wand. When he felt his nose stretching back out to normal, he then tapped his shoulder to remove the charm making himself Untraceable. It did not matter if he was found in Hogsmeade.

After brushing off the front of his robes and refastening a silver clasp on his travelling cloak, Snape began to walk down the alleyway towards the High Street. However, as he turned onto High Street, two owls approached him. Having likely been waiting in Hogsmeade for him to return whilst he was Untraceable, one of the owls almost collided with him, as it landed on his outstretched arm. Snape took the letter from the smaller owl and gestured for it to go away. He knew who had sent the message and what it contained. However, the second owl looked like Rem's Gwynedd, which concerned him. There should be no need for Rem to contact him now.

Snape pulled the rolled parchment from the owl's leg and shook his head to indicate that he was not carrying any owl treats. As the owl flew home with an affronted shake of her wings, Snape hastily opened the scroll and realised that the letter was not from Rem, but his wife. Feeling a premonition that whatever it contained would not be good news, Snape stepped back into the alley for privacy and leant against the wall of Snarbuckle's Cauldrons and Fire Supplies to read it.

By the time that he had read the contents three times, Severus Snape was filled with a type of rage that he had only felt a handful of times before. Robert Fleming could not be this unintelligent. Did Fleming actually think that he would not hear about this? Or did Fleming have so little respect for his former teacher that he thought that Snape would do nothing? If it were not for the fact that the bastard had managed to install himself as junior secretary to the head of Magical Law Enforcement, Snape considered that he would make his opinions known immediately. However, he had to keep his head. This called for something better than brute violence. He would have to find a more subtle and far more effective and long-term punishment for Fleming.

Snape reached into his pocket for his sand needle case, but remembered that it was empty. Casting a string of nasty curses on a rat scurrying past, Snape pushed himself off of the wall of the alley and marched out into the street. Dredgewood's Special Apothecary was near this corner. Dredgewood's inhalant-grade sand needle stocks were not as good as Beadle's, however they were the best to be found in Hogsmeade. Snape pushed past a pair of elderly witches who were looking at an ugly display of hats in a shop window and hurried down the street towards Dredgewood's.

He did not know what he was going to do with his wife. She was a stupid witch, surely, but the fact that she had written to apprise him of the encounter with Fleming showed that she had some cunning. What remained to be seen was whether she was clever enough to devise this scheme for deflecting blame from herself for an indiscreet encounter with Fleming or if she had really been assaulted by her former fiancé. Snape knew from personal experience that reason had little to do with attraction. It was possible that she still cared for Fleming and had been lying when she claimed that she would be meeting Eva Rosser for lunch and had instead intended to meet Fleming for an illicit rendezvous.

One single thing made Snape almost willing to accept his wife's version of the facts before he had even interrogated her. She would have been wearing her ring, since she could not exit the Wygracket Road property without it on her hand, which ought to have kept her from betraying him with Fleming. The only member of the Prince family who could give her permission to betray him was Gideon, who was too intelligent for such a coarse scheme. Snape had quite good grounds for believing that Gideon had an entirely different plan to strike him down. Therefore, Patience should have been unable to participate voluntarily in an affair. However, he did not feel any degree of certitude that there was not a way to work round this magic if the witch or her intended lover were determined enough.

Snape barged into Dredgewood's and grimaced when he saw that neither old Dredgewood nor his son were behind the counter, but their assistant, Arnold Snodgrass. Snodgrass had nursed a hatred towards Snape since he had discovered that no amount of bribery or influence from Snodgrass' family would persuade Snape to allow Snodgrass into the NEWT level Potions class with only an E on his Potions OWL. Snape had no desire to be entangled with Snodgrass' infantile attempts at sarcastic, barbed conversation.

"Professor Snape. What can Dredgewood's do for you today?"

"Two packets of inhalant-grade needle, a tade of diricawl claws—and do make certain that they are properly preserved unlike the last lot, and a pickled Whargle foot."

"Yes, sir. Do you have a Crup, sir?"

Snape glared at the sandy haired young man and did not reply. Since the only possible use for a pickled Whargle foot was to placate an unruly Crup, this question was pointless. Snape held out his hand to inspect the inhalant-grade sand needle, ripping open one end of the paper parcel and placing a pinch on his hand.

"This is not acceptable, Snodgrass. This needle is barely potions-grade. Do you not have any Siberian grown?"

"No, sir. We do have some Mongolian, but it is, perhaps, a little expensive."

Snape's lip curled as he replied, "The price is my concern. Show it to me, boy."

With a bright red face, the assistant returned from the back room with a thin black envelope and handed it to Snape, who broke the red seal and looked inside. "This is better. I will take three packets of this."

Snape waited for the assistant to wrap everything and began to look round the walls at the preserved ingredients. Did he have everything that he needed for his home laboratory? Perhaps he needed some more…

"I believe that I saw your wife in town yesterday, Professor."

Snape turned his gaze on the young assistant and thought irritably that it couldn't be possible…this idiot could not have seen…

"Yes? That is entirely possible Snodgrass. My home is in Hogsmeade, so Mrs Snape is often in town."

"I remember Mrs. Snape very well from school, sir. Patience Kent, she was, correct, sir? Of course all of us would remember her, as beautiful as she is."

Snape's eyes were narrowed almost to slits as he stared down at his former student. Snodgrass could not be hoping to ingratiate himself with a compliment to Snape on having managed to secure a beautiful wife. That was entirely out of character and foolish besides.

"Yes, very likely, Snodgrass. Are you quite finished with my parcel?"

"Almost sir. I must say that Freddie Couth and I were surprised to see how friendly Mrs. Snape still is with her former fiancé, sir. I had understood that the engagement was broken under rather unfortunate circumstances."

Snape narrowly managed to control his urge to pull the young assistant over the counter and throttle him. Instead, he took a deep breath before speaking in a deceptively silky tone, "My wife is a very gentle, forgiving witch, Snodgrass. Perhaps she chooses not to nurse grudges. I, however, am not so forgiving, which you would do well to remember."

Snape could see the flush on the assistant's face, but understood that Snodgrass would still most likely spread the tale of Patience's encounter with Fleming to everyone he met. "It would be rather unfortunate if anyone were to form any misperceptions about my marriage or my wife, Snodgrass. It would be very tiresome for me to be forced to take time away from my work to visit you or Mr Couth."

Snape tossed the exact amount for his purchase on the counter, paused long enough for Snodgrass to note that Snape had not added anything additional, and turned on his heel—satisfied that Snodgrass, at least, would keep his tongue.

By the time that he had reached his house and begun to undo the Protection Spells on the front door, anger at his wife had begun to gnaw at Snape's mind. There had been no reason for her to stop to speak to Fleming. If the conversation had been unwelcome to her, could not Patience have walked away? Fleming would not have used magic openly in the street on her. Surely Rem was with her and should have afforded some protection. Fleming would not know that Rem was essentially a Squib, but anyone could see that Rem was half-hag, which was no less dangerous than a full hag was when it came to the sadistic exploitation of and violence against those weaker than she. A hag servant, who still enjoyed killing for her dinner and eating the meals raw, should be enough protection even for an incompetent witch such as his wife. So perhaps there had been no altercation.

Snape was beginning to feel that his mind was slogging through mud. He did not know what to believe or how to proceed. His love for his wife was causing his brain to leak out his ears. He desperately wanted to believe that she would not betray him because he knew what he would do if she had and...it did not bear thinking.

Therefore, by the time that he had reached the top of the first flight of stairs, Snape had built himself into a cold fury. The sight of his wife cowering in her chair by the fire when he threw the door to her room open did not help matters. He raised his wand, causing her to be pulled to her feet and dragged like a chess piece across the floor until she stood in front of him. Snape grabbed her upper arm tightly in his left hand and snarled, "Before you say anything, I warn you, Patience. One lie will be the end of you. Now explain."

However, she said nothing. She stared up at him, as if she could not comprehend what he had said, and shook with terror. Snape could see in her eyes that she feared he would kill her. He felt a flash of an unfamiliar feeling—remorse—and shoved her away from him saying, "I read your letter, but I want your explanation. Talk."

"I didn't want him to do it."

"Was Rem there?"

"Yes, but Bobby pulled his wand on her."

Snape asked in surprise, "In the middle of the street?"

Patience nodded.

"Go on."

"He said such insulting things and asked me questions. He didn't want to believe that I would never want him."

"If you do not want him then tell me how he came to be kissing you."

"It was not like that. It was an insult. He forced it on me like a slap in the face."

Snape pulled her close to him and pointed his wand at her forehead, speaking aloud the spell. After only a few seconds of searching, he knew that she was not lying to him. He released her both from the spell and his grasp and turned away to find something to hold for support.

"It seems that you need better protection, Patience." He could hear her gasp and turned round to face her. "Also, I will have to arrange for you to learn to handle yourself better. You are a witch, Patience, so you should be able to wield your own wand. A simple Banishing Charm might have been enough to give you time to get away from Fleming."

"I failed Defence every year, so they wouldn't even let me take the fourth year and beyond."

"Yes, I am aware of that. However, if you learnt to Apparate on your own, then you cannot be as hopeless as it would seem to those of us who have taught you."

"My friends helped me. They lent me their books and I studied with them every weekend for two years."

Snape closed his eyes. Two years of study to Apparate? However, his relief at knowing that she had not betrayed him was so great that not much seemed like an obstacle. "That merely proves that given enough time and instruction you can learn."

"Severus, tell me, please. You do believe me, don't you? I didn't want to see Bobby. I swear I didn't."

"Yes. I know. I will settle Fleming. He will not trouble you again, Patience."

He felt hollow. All the anger at her was gone and although he felt an uncommon hatred towards Fleming, this was not the concern primary in his mind. His emotional balance was completely lost and it was suddenly very important to him that she understand that he did not blame her and that he was not going to harm her. Comforting another person was an act completely foreign to him, especially since he did not think that advances of any sort would be welcomed by her. Therefore, Snape stood awkwardly, finally placing his hand under her chin so that she would look up at him. "I believe you, Patience. You have no reason to fear me."

Patience turned her eyes away as she began crying and pulled back from him. Snape remained where he was and said nothing. After a moment, Patience whispered, "What happens now?"

"About Fleming?"

"No. I mean, does this mean that I can't leave the house anymore?"

"No. I have said that I believe you did nothing wrong. I will have to provide better protection for you and tutoring on defence and perhaps some other basic spells."

"That is all?"

Snape frowned, "What are you expecting me to do, Patience? I'm not going to imprison you or take away your friends again. We have already established that I was wrong to do that, so let us not belabour it. By the time that I return to school, you will have an established account into which will be paid a quarterly allowance to spend on anything you like. I will hardly be a concern to you, since I will not be here except on holidays, so you need not worry. The only changes I shall make will be for your protection."

He could see that she had not expected him to react so leniently and noticed that she was looking at him with an expression that he could not identify as she said softly, "Thank you, Severus."

"You should wear the necklace. It can protect you."

"Do I have to wear it all the time?"

Snape had begun to walk slowly round the floor, pacing between the bed and the large wardrobe. "No, but if you had been wearing it yesterday then Fleming would have been repelled by a curse, which would have burnt his lips."

He heard her intake of breath and a softly spoken, "Oh! You are right, I will wear it."

Snape turned away as he saw her smiling and said, "I am sure that you will want to be alone now. I will eat upstairs tonight."

Snape allowed himself one last glance at her and then swept from the room before he exposed himself anymore than he already had.