October, 1994
Groaning, Liz flopped over onto her back, after a moment of concentration cast a time charm with a snap of her fingers. And then jerked upright, almost painfully stiff, her heart jumping up into her chest — she was supposed to be in Severus's office in three minutes.
She jumped out of bed, still light-headed and her knees a little wobbly, she nearly fell right over again, almost bashed her head on the bedpost, leaned against it for a breath before shoving away again, kicking her pants closer toward the laundry basket. Scrambling, her fingers twitching with nerves, her wand flew to her hand with a thought, she swept herself with cleaning and scent-neutralising charms — that should take care of the sweat and, er, other things — hit her duplicated pillow with a dispel, wiping at her face with the back of her hand, sniffling, ugh, stupid— A fresh pair of pants, levitating her old ones up into the laundry, hitting them with a scent-neutralising charm on the way — she doubted the elves cared, but it was still embarrassing — where the hell had her shorts gone to, ended up just summoning them, how the hell did that charm to clear her nose go again...
Once she was done sneezing (bloody thing), she grabbed a random muggle-style dress out of her closet, roughly pulled it over her head. Her scarf could stay partially under her collar, she kind of liked the way that looked, but it'd gotten turned around weird, she fiddled around straightening it, at least so it didn't look quite so sloppy. Her hair was a mess as it always was — but the bits right around her forehead had gotten damp, stringily sticking to itself the way hair did sometimes, she carefully layered a few weak drying charms over it until it looked mostly normal, ran her fingers through it a few times. There. Her bag could stay where it was, she'd never needed it on previous meetings, so she thought that was it?
She thought she looked...mostly normal. Her eyes were maybe a little red, but it wasn't super-obvious or anything, and the charmwork should have taken care of any other signs. So. Yeah, she thought that would do.
If she hadn't lost track of time, like a fucking idiot, this wouldn't be a problem, but of course her brain had to be a pain, couldn't possibly expect anything else, fuck...
Taking a quick moment to breathe, clearing her throat, shaking out some of the shite that'd stuck in there — just swallowing the stuff she'd worked up, which was kind of gross, but she didn't know what else she was supposed to do about it — and she started off for the door. It wasn't until she took the first step outside, the tile cool on her bare foot, that she realised she'd forgotten shoes.
...Eh, fuck it. She realised most rich purebloods, at least, considered not wearing shoes outside of private areas to be really unsanitary, and, kind of embarrassing, she guessed? Almost like being underdressed (which it was), but with more a vibe of poor person. But she didn't give a damn, she wouldn't be leaving Slytherin, and also she barely cared about what the nobles thought was appropriate anyway, so. If she stalled getting shoes on she'd be even more late than she already was, not annoying Severus was more important than not offending the silly purebloods.
(And also embarrassing herself, but Liz was pretty embarrassing in general, it hardly made a difference.)
She rushed down the hall, going as fast as she could and still technically count as walking, fast enough she could feel her ridiculous hair fluttering a little. Going up the stairs, she was kind of running up them, but she often got a bit of a hop in her step going up stairs anyway, it wasn't that different than normal — unfortunately, Liz was too fit for these few stairs to get her out of breath or red in the face at all, so she couldn't use that to cover anything she'd missed. There were people in the common room, more than there used to be, Liz still not used to the increasing student population. People did notice her walk by, but then she was walking very fast, the motion drawing their eyes. She caught thoughts from multiple people, noticing she wasn't wearing shoes, because of course, there hadn't been any chance that would slip by anyone...
Liz skipped to a stop at Severus's office door, hanging open a crack, she pushed it open a little further, stuck her head in. "I'm late, I know, I'm sorry."
"No matter." Severus hadn't even looked up yet, eyes still on a scroll on his desk — grading papers, by the look of it. Well, at least he'd had something productive to do while waiting for her, she hadn't completely wasted his time. "Have a seat, close the door behind you."
Sucking in a deep breath, force her heart to calm down, she stepped into the familiar office, tried not to wince at the privacy spells snapping into place as she closed the door. She felt annoyingly self-conscious, walking toward his desk, but Severus wasn't even looking up at her, finishing whatever bit of the essay he was reading. Wordlessly, she sank into one of the chairs across from him, waited for him to finish, fidgeting nervously with the hem of her skirt.
After a handful of seconds, Severus made a tiny mark at the end of a paragraph, saving his spot for later, before sliding the scroll aside. He glanced up, "Good afternoon, Elizabeth," and immediately turned away, leaning back to reach for a cabinet behind him.
"Hi. Um. Sorry I'm late, I was doing homework and lost track of time." Which was technically true, even if she was leaving a couple things out.
"It's alright, Elizabeth — it was only a couple minutes." He did sound a little exasperated, though she didn't think he was lying about it not being a big deal, so she wasn't really sure what he was exasperated about. Maybe apologising multiple times already? Just, Severus wasn't the most patient person in the world, she didn't want to annoy him...and she really didn't want him to ask what she'd been up to, either...
Trying not to squirm in her chair, it seemed like shutting up was the safest option.
Severus set a very familiar file on the desk between them — it was the same folder from first year, identifiable from the ink spots around the top edge she'd noticed in second year, he'd just been adding papers to it over time — and finally turned back to her. "It's been some weeks since we've spoken in private. How has fourth year been treating you so far?"
...It had been a while since they'd seen each other, hadn't it? He didn't even teach her Potions class anymore. That was...weird. Passing that weirdly uncomfortable thought off, Liz shrugged. "Fine. The hallways and the common room and stuff can get noisier — mentally, I mean, gives me a headache going between classes sometimes. It's not a big deal, really, and the enchantments on the tables in the Great Hall are great, much easier to make it through mealtimes. Was that your idea?"
"No, our new Deputy Headmaster suggested it. It seems his sister is an empath, perhaps a particularly sensitive one, and had some significant difficulty during her own years at Hogwarts."
"What's an empath?"
One of Severus's eyebrows ticked up, surprise sparking from his head, but he answered the question easily enough. "A more limited form of mind mage. Their minds instinctively adopt the resonance of those nearby, like proper mind mages, allowing them to pick up echoes of feelings and the occasional thought; however, they cannot channel magic into their minds the way mind mages can, preventing them from extending influence beyond their own aura."
...That was weird, Liz hadn't realised you could be a half mind mage. And they just got the annoying part of it too, without the benefits, so, sucked to be them. "Right. Anyway, yeah, it's been fine so far. I still hate Transfiguration and Herbology, and actually having to go to History now is a pain, but other than that."
"And you haven't any issues with the new professors."
"Nope, they've been fine. Morris, the new Charms bloke, was kind of annoying about the Girl Who Lived thing at first, but he got over it. Um, Miss Eva noticed I'm a Seer right away, and that I can actually do scrying already, she keeps calling on me to answer questions whether I raise my hand or not, which is kind of annoying, but it's not a big deal. Other than that, fine. Oh, and Yaxley keeps bothering me, I don't know what that's about."
"She has spoken to me about it," Severus admitted, moving one of his papers aside, revealing another page scattered with notes. Upside-down, Liz couldn't really read any of it, Severus's handwriting for his own notes tended to be pretty illegible. "Experienced witches — that is to say, practitioners of witchcraft — sometimes develop a sense for whether people they are in close proximity to have the talent or not. The feeling is hard to describe, more an instinct than a reasoned conclusion. By engaging you deeper into her subject matter, Madam Yaxley is attempting to help you draw out the talent."
"Um, I already know I'm good at witchcraft, though — I play around with enchanting and potions and stuff all the time." Liz wasn't sure whether subsumption technically counted as witchcraft or not, but that wasn't something she should be telling Yaxley about anyway. "And scrying and spirit-walking, everyone knows I'm a Seer by now, honestly..."
Feeling vaguely amused, Severus said, "Yes, I did tell her as much when she approached me about it. Madam Yaxley is...old-fashioned, shall we say — she is of the opinion that a witch must be more in tune with the turning of the world around them in order to properly practise their craft. As misguided as she may be, she is trying to help you further develop your talents, in her own way. I've already suggested she leave you be. If she continues to trouble you, you are allowed to tell her to back off."
"Well, I kind of have been already, but now that I have your permission, I guess I'll be ruder about it."
Severus's lips twitched with a badly hidden smirk. "Speaking of further developing your talents, I understand you've refused to join the specialised sessions for Seers."
"Yeah, um..." She kind of didn't want to talk to him about that. Trying not to squirm in her seat, her hands fisting in her skirt — which should be under the edge of the desk from his perspective anyway, out of sight — Severus watching her making her feel annoyingly, just, bluh, she gave up after a few seconds. "Um. I thought it would be too distracting."
"How so?"
"Um. Miss Eva is kind of...pretty? It's a smaller group, than the whole class, so..."
There was a sharp flutter of amusement from Severus, enough the motion made Liz a little nauseous, but he didn't show any reaction on his face at all — she had no idea how he did that so well, it was honestly ridiculous. "The group is being lead by Professor Trelawney."
"...Oh." Too self-conscious to meet Severus's eyes, dropping down to her hands, she shrugged, trying not to notice the warmth on her face. "I'll think about it, then, I guess. I am kind of busy, don't know if I want to bother..."
"Yes, you do have a full schedule. You're still meeting with Madeline on Sundays as well?"
Of course Severus knew that — he'd arranged her Latin tutor for her in the first place — but Liz jumped at the subject change. "Yeah, we're still meeting at the Three Broomsticks every week. I kind of suck at actually speaking Latin, but who cares about that, it's only a written language these days anyway, and my reading's coming along. I think? I'd be screwed without a dictionary, and the grammar is, just, stupid sometimes..."
"You'll find that relying on a dictionary is not unusual, even among scholars. At our last meeting, Madeline said she planned to start you on classical rhetoric in the near future."
"Ugh, yes — old wordy bastards..."
Severus smirked, more in the feeling of slanted amusement around him than on his face. "Quite. I trust that if your workload becomes overbearing you will tell someone about it."
That didn't seem likely, since this was Liz they were talking about, but she wasn't a complete idiot — if it came down to it, she'd just fix it herself. "I don't think it's going to be a problem. I mean, when homework and stuff picks up later in the year, I might have more trouble finding time to revise the Competency stuff, but. I am still trying to do that, but it can be kind of hard to— Is the alchemy club happening?"
"You should see a notice announcing the first meeting in the common room sometime next week."
"Neat. Right, um, some of the magic things I don't know can be kind of hard to figure out without someone to show you how it's supposed to work, you know? And, I'm not getting through as much of that as I would like in general, I'm still reviewing their second-year stuff, but." Their second-year Transfiguration curriculum was where the physical alchemy started coming in, so, the alchemy club should help with that...
"You will have more time for in fifth year, as your classmates revise for OWLs. If you are truly pressed next year, you may forego some of the homework for your fifth-year classes to free more time — most subjects in fifth year don't give out scores at the end of the year at all, as everyone will be taking the OWL anyway. I would avoid doing so in the class of any professor you wish to write you a recommendation letter, of course."
Oh, well, that was convenient. "I'll probably ask Flitwick, I like Charms anyway." She would ask Severus, but she probably shouldn't, since he was her guardian now and everything. Conflicts of interest and all that.
"He would be a good choice," Severus agreed, nodding. "I would also suggest Ashe — she's been very impressed with your work so far."
She better be, Liz had started enchanting her own stuff barely a month into their first term. "Right, good idea. Anyway, yeah, it is kind of a lot, especially since I'm expected to do a lot more in duelling club now. I don't really mind, duelling club is fun, but... Well, Draco would think I've gone mad, but I'm kind of relieved there isn't quidditch this year? In fact, I'm considering not taking it up again next year."
One of Severus's eyebrows ticked up, surprised. "Oh? I thought you enjoyed quidditch."
"I do, but, with all the studying I have to do, my full class schedule and Competencies and stuff, I don't know if I'll have the time for both quidditch and duelling. And if I have to pick one, it's going to be duelling."
There was some kind of feeling coming off of Severus, too subtle and vague for Liz to decide what it was. Relieved that she was taking care not to do too much, maybe? "Mister Bletchley will be pleased. According to Filius, he intends to groom you as his replacement for next year."
Liz opened her mouth, to immediately call that ridiculous, before silently letting it fall closed again. That actually made sense, when she thought about it. Once all the fifth-years aged out after the summer tournament, Liz would have seniority — Susan was only one term behind, but Liz was the better duellist of the two of them. It was just a...weird thought. "Is that a good idea? I mean, I'll be transferring out of Hogwarts after next year. Hell, by the time the summer tournament happens, I'll probably already have been accepted somewhere else..."
"You will be finishing out your fifth year here regardless. You have as much right to participate in school activities as would any other fifth-year."
...Right. Okay. If that did end up happening — and it was a surreal thought, so who the hell knew — she had the feeling some people were going to be a pain about it, but she guessed she'd deal with that when (if) it happened. People were going to be a pain about their precious special Girl Who Lived going to a foreign school anyway, Liz didn't think the duelling team thing would make it any worse. "Um...was there anything else we had to talk about? Not sure why we keep doing these meetings, it's not like anything is going on..."
Severus gave her a flat, unamused look, but he didn't justify the continued one-on-one meetings. She meant, she did get that there were kids who probably needed help with things, she just didn't...and also, he was literally her guardian now anyway, so, if she was having problems, she theoretically didn't have to wait for one of the regular meetings to come around. But he ignored all that, moved on to, "No, I have very little to discuss this time around. Since the...change in our relationship, my colleagues seem to feel the need to speak with me about you far more often — but the majority of what they tell me is gossip, very little worth addressing with you at all."
...She probably should have guessed that the other professors would be talking to Severus about her — adults did tend to gossip about their kids, she'd figured that out eavesdropping on Petunia and her 'friends' when she'd been, like, five — but it somehow hadn't ever occurred to her. The thought was making her kind of nervous, honestly...
"Though there is one small matter. Curinna tells me— Excuse me, Professor Vitale."
"I know who you meant." Severus had a habit of unthinkingly using the first names of the professors he got on with well at all when they were in private. Liz hadn't actually remembered Vitale's first name, but it wasn't hard to guess — "Curinna" sounded obviously foreign, there were only two foreign women on staff, and it wasn't Vector, so.
"Of course. Curinna has noticed a decline in your partner work relative to my notes from last year. While speaking to me of the matter, she mentioned you've been partnering with Miss Perks so far this year." Severus hadn't actually asked a question, but raised a prompting eyebrow at her, which was just as good.
"Yeah. A few people in our study group have been having trouble, and the material has been getting more difficult. So, we decided that, for partner stuff, we'd have the people who are really good at Potions — me, Daphne, Susan — pair up with someone who's having trouble. I got Sally-Anne."
"You speak as though you didn't have a choice in the matter."
Liz shrugged. "We assigned partners randomly — Sophie wrote our names on strips of paper, and pulled them out of her pocket one at a time, you know? We'll redo it after Hallowe'en, and then again after the holidays. I might not have picked Sally-Anne if I did have a choice, but it's not a big deal, she's fine. But she is terrible at Potions. I've still been splitting the work, since she won't learn everything if I just do it all by myself, sometimes it can be a mess — I barely managed to stop our Pepperup from smoking, that could have been bad." It turned out, Pepperup was one of those potions the Potters had a patent on — the fact that it'd been invented by a William Potter in the late 18th Century had been in the explanatory paragraph before the formula in their textbook — but it was perfectly legal for people to brew patented potions for educational purposes or personal use, as long as they didn't sell them. Not that Liz cared, she was just saying, this shite was wild sometimes.
"Yes, that could have been bad." Severus grimaced a little at the thought, which was fair — if mandrake and jewelweed were allowed to smoke in a spring environment, it...um... Well, Liz didn't know enough about Healing to say what would happen, exactly, but she knew inhaling that would not be good for you. "You know a physical barrier to prevent such fumes from spreading."
"Yep, but I caught it in time. And Vitale was there too, of course, she already crossed half the room before she noticed I had it taken care of."
He nodded, the edge of anxiety gradually fading from his head — Liz would guess he wasn't entirely comfortable not supervising all the brewing days himself, even if he had put them with people he trusted. Weirdly neurotic, but she'd figured out by now that Severus could just be like that sometimes. "I understand it may be quite frustrating, but it is kind of you, assisting a struggling classmate." Not exactly an adjective people applied to Liz very often, kind, but whatever. "The noted decline in your partner work is only expected, then — I expect you and Miss Black were well-adapted to working together."
"Maybe, but we weren't going to be partnering together anymore anyway."
"Oh? Why not?"
...Had she...never told Severus about that? Now that she thought about it, she was pretty sure she hadn't — it wasn't something she ever really wanted to talk about, and there'd been plenty of other shite going on over the summer, it hadn't come up. Huh. "Me and Dorea aren't friends anymore. Didn't you know?"
"I had suspected some personal drama was ongoing, but I hadn't wanted to intrude. What happened?"
"Nothing." Severus, naturally, didn't buy that for a second. She hesitated, but it wasn't a big deal, whatever, she might as well just get it over with. "She's never been comfortable with me being a mind mage, and she took it badly when she found out about...the lesbian thing, you know. I just don't want to be around her thinking that stuff around me. Nothing bad happened, really, and I'm not super broken up over it, but I don't want to talk about it."
For a few seconds, Severus just watched her, his mind ticking away — Liz felt herself go stiff, nervous, she really didn't want to— "...Fair enough." The tension flooded out of her, now that they definitely weren't going to have a terribly uncomfortable talk about that, she barely managed to stop herself from audibly sighing. "Was there anything else you wished to discuss, so long as we're here?"
"Um, not really. Oh! Er. I've been thinking, since I live in Ireland now, it might be a good idea for me to be able to speak Irish? But, I'm already studying Cambrian and Latin, and adding in Irish probably wouldn't work...and I agreed I wouldn't do more language subsumption stuff without you..."
There was a pulse of exasperation from him, Severus's eyes turning away for a second as he let out a little sigh. "As I recall, you did, in fact, not agree to that."
She blinked. "...Didn't I?"
"No. When I discovered you'd acquired French without my involvement, you gave your word that you would not experiment with apparation alone before I agreed you were ready to do so."
Oh, right, she remembered that now. "Yeah, I know I agreed to that, I haven't been trying to apparate on my own, I just thought... I thought I'd agreed to not copy any more languages without you, I don't know where I got that from. Never mind, then."
"Hold on a moment," Severus said, his exasperation flaring a little brighter. "You may not have agreed to not subsume additional languages on your own, but it may be a wise idea regardless. At the very least, there are certain techniques that can be used to ease the process you might like to know. Also, while the French spoken on either side of the divide is more or less similar, the dominant magical dialects of Gaelic are quite distinct from muggle Irish — you will need to copy the language from a mage, and you will find subduing one such that you may do so is rather more difficult."
"...Irish is still spoken on the muggle side?" She'd kind of thought they all spoke English in Ireland now. Granted, Liz hadn't seen very much of muggle Ireland, basically just parts of Dublin, but everyone she'd run into had been speaking English. (Or Arabic, she guessed, in that one grocery store...assuming that was what they spoke in Lebanon, she didn't actually know for sure.) She'd assumed she'd have to get it from a mage, but what with the mind-control superpowers, and the potion she'd used with Valérie, she hadn't expected to have a problem with that.
"In certain isolated communities, yes. There is a degree of mutual intelligibility, but you will have unnecessary difficulty attempting to get by in Gaelic-speaking areas having learned one of the muggle dialects." Severus paused for a moment, eyes unfocused in thought, one finger idly tapping at his desk. "You may recall, Saoirse Ghaelach owe me a favour — I will ask, you will hear from me when I've made arrangements."
Oh, well, okay then. It didn't seem quite fair, Severus using the favour he'd earned helping prop up their wards and healing people, while Liz had been uselessly unconscious — but it was his favour, she guessed he could spend it however she liked. "Thanks."
"Of course. I trust you're still taking your nutrient potions."
That was a sudden subject change. "Yeah, I just made a new batch a few days ago."
"It's been some time since you've come to me for a refill of your calming potions, so I assume—"
"Fuck!" Severus cut off at the interruption, giving her one of his trademark eyebrows. "I, um, I meant to bring the box with me, I just... I was in a rush, and I forgot. Sorry."
She'd half expected him to be annoyed with her, but he just rolled his eyes, all she was picking up from him a vague mixture of exasperation and amusement. "No matter. Return the box with the empty bottles to me and I'll replace them. Or you can go to the Hospital Wing and get a refill from Poppy if I'm unavailable."
"Um, I can just run to my room right after our meeting and bring it straight back here." She really didn't want to go to the Hospital Wing if she didn't have to. "Or, do you have another meeting right after me?"
"If our meeting goes long, you may need to wait." Right, she could do that, not a big deal. The box Severus had gotten to keep her potions in was pretty innocuous, so. "Assuming you just ran out in the last day or two..." He slowed for a moment, waiting for her to disagree, so she nodded — she'd emptied her last bottle just this morning. "...it would seem you have gone through them no slower or quicker than usual. However, my baseline is from last year, while there were dementors in the Valley, which may or may not be meaningful. Has anything in particular been especially troubling you of late?"
...Not anything she wanted to talk to him about, anyway. Definitely not the thing that'd been bothering her lately that also happened to be responsible for her being late.
She didn't know what the hell was happening to her. Maybe, she'd hit some kind of developmental milestone, or something — she didn't know, she didn't know shite about how puberty and stuff worked. Whatever the hell was happening internally, the thing Liz noticed was feeling super randy all the fucking time.
Well, not literally all the time, but a lot more than before. It was very annoying.
It'd come on suddenly, to the point that she could remember the exact moment it'd happened. They'd been in Charms class, and Liz had been bored. She did like Charms, of course, and Flitwick was one of the better professors — and he did like her, so he'd sometimes let her get away with not paying attention in the slow moments, and had apparently suggested Morris do the same — but she was good at charms, and sometimes her classmates could be painfully slow. Morris had been giving a lecture, which Liz had only been half paying attention to, not even bothering to take notes (it was all in the theory section of their textbook, which she'd already read), her thoughts wandering. She'd randomly noticed how Olivie's hair was flipped over her shoulder, showing most of the side of her neck from Liz's angle, just a little bit of her shoulder and back before her collar started, and Liz had been unthinkingly staring, and before she realised what was happening she'd been very turned on — she had no idea how that— She hadn't even been thinking anything that sexy! She didn't know what— Ugh, whatever, it was stupid, her body was fucking stupid and she hated it, that was all.
Before, when she had a random sexy thought — which had happened now and then, because teeangers, hormones — most of the time she could just distract herself, think about something else for a moment until it went away. But that time, it hadn't fucking worked. Her face warm and her breath not quite cooperating, could feel her heartbeat in her throat and her fingertips and between her legs and— Aaaahhhh, stop it stop it stop it! Gritting her teeth, arms folded on her desk with her hands gripping her forearms (slightly awkward around her wand holster), her foot tapping, it'd taken serious effort to keep herself from squirming in her chair — partially since that might be obvious, partially since that would, er, shift the way her clothes were sitting on her, which would not help — to the point that she was, just, not hearing Morris anymore at all. There'd maybe been twenty minutes left in the class when it'd started, and the whole time she'd been, just, ugh...
(They'd had lunch after that, Liz had detoured down to her room with the excuse of dropping off her bag. If anyone had noticed it'd taken her longer to get back up to lunch than it should, they hadn't said anything.)
And that was hardly the last time it'd happened, it... She was very distractible these days. She tried to keep herself occupied, thinking about one nerdy thing or another, or listening to what the people around her were talking about, but it was far too easy for her to notice something, or for her thoughts to wander even for a minute, and by the time she noticed her slip it'd already be too late. And once it started it was annoyingly difficult to get it to stop, because of course her fucked-up brain and her stupid shitty body couldn't cooperate for two fucking seconds, why should she ever expect otherwise. Once she was set off, it could be going on for hours, sometimes stronger and sometimes weaker, but never entirely going away, itching at her, and itching and itching and itching, very distracting, making it hard to pay attention to what anyone was saying or do her fucking homework, and stop it stop it fucking hell stop it!
Finding a moment to sneak away and get off helped, but sometimes only for an hour or two. When it'd come back later that first day, while they'd been in Runes — Daphne sat next to her in that class, and that day she'd been sitting rather close too, warm and distracting and ugh — Liz had unthinkingly let her head fall to clunk against her desk, letting out a frustrated groan. It hadn't even been that long! For fuck's sake, stupid body, stop it!
As much is it often didn't help for very long, it did still help, and she got so incredibly distracted sometimes she couldn't pay attention to class, there was really nothing else for it. Most of the time she could sneak down to her room to take care of it, but she'd actually done it in a random closet, once — between Divination and Defence, she'd had fifteen minutes at most, not enough to make it all the way down and back up, and her skin had been practically crawling off and she could barely think about anything else and even trying to walk was making her knick— Ugh, she wouldn't have been able to make it through Defence, that was all. She'd been very nervous about it, but she'd been half-mad at the time and just completely fed up, and she knew all these locking and sealing charms. Being caught would have been very very bad, but she hadn't been, so.
It was very annoying at times, but, it wasn't all bad. Orgasms were nice, obviously, and she thought they were actually better now — which was part of why she thought she might have passed some kind of developmental milestone, like, some aspect of the weird squishy machinery had clicked into place correctly, and all the sex stuff worked right now? She didn't know, not an expert. She didn't think she'd ever done it more than once in a day before — normally not even once a day, probably only a couple times a week on average — but over the last week she thought she'd been averaging two a day. Some days more than that — she'd been terribly worked up after a duelling team meeting on Saturday, and then the club meeting immediately afterward, and, ah, she'd been very tired by the time she'd fallen asleep that night, put it that way.
Two times a day (and as many as four times, that Saturday) seemed like it was a lot, she felt annoyingly embarrassed whenever she let herself think about it — or whatever the fuck that feeling was, she wasn't sure, she sucked at feelings — but she wasn't certain it was, actually? It wasn't like she'd ever asked any of her girl friends how often they masturbated, because that would be a seriously bloody awkward conversation, and also just a weird thing to ask, she was pretty sure? She knew for certain some of them did, from idle thoughts she'd caught here or there, but she didn't know, like, details.
(She was kind of curious sometimes, honestly — because it turned out that, in addition to being a queer, she was also a pervert — but she knew that was crossing a line. Which she didn't actually care about in isolation, but being caught at it would probably result in a terribly uncomfortable argument she definitely didn't want to have, so.)
And her, um, private moments with Daphne could be...kind of a lot, now. Not bad, just. A lot.
Also, the last couple times, Daphne could tell she was getting super turned on — Liz wasn't certain how she could tell, she just did — which was weirdly humiliating. Though, it really shouldn't be, when she thought about it? Getting turned on kissing your girlfriend was, just, a thing that happened, like that was normal? But of course Liz's brain never stopped being stupid useless fucking trash, so...
(If she could stop being a neurotic mess one of these days, that would be great.)
Of course, there was a downside to orgasms seemingly having gotten inexplicably better now — because Liz's brain never stopped being stupid useless fucking trash, and couldn't react to anything in a way that was remotely normal, a few times she'd ended up crying. Which bloody hell, that was humiliating, what the fuck was wrong with her, honestly. It didn't happen very often, like...two or three times, so far? She wasn't entirely certain about one, she hadn't really consciously noticed it happening, until she felt the wetness on her face, and her nose was leaking, like, the fuck...
That was what had happened to make her late for her meeting with Severus just now. She'd been studying Competency stuff, in her room — she did most of her homework with the study group, but she didn't want anyone to notice her Competency materials (obviously not Hogwarts class stuff, since they were all in French) and ask what that was about. Liz's thoughts had wandered, as happened far too often lately, but she'd stalled for a while. She'd known she had somewhere to be, yes, but also, it seemed to be better the more worked up she was — halfway paying attention to her note-taking, squirming in her chair, all, yeah.
The fun part hadn't even entirely finished before Liz was curled up in her bed crying, and she did not know why that happened, it was extremely weird and confusing and embarrassing. (And also vaguely scary — Vernon hated it when she cried.) She didn't know what was happening to her, and it was frustrating, and she hated it.
Though, as unpleasant and irritating as the crying was, it wasn't bad enough to give up the fun part to avoid it. So.
Yeah, hormones might have randomly decided to fuck with her for no apparent reason, and it could be very frustrating, but Liz didn't think she wanted to actually do anything about it. She probably could, undo her sterility curse thing so she could re-freeze the cycle at a less, um, intense spot, but it wasn't worth it. It was distracting and irritating, but she had to get used to it at some point — this couldn't keep going on forever — so this was fine, she could deal with it. Most of the time.
(Besides, it was kind of fun sometimes, orgasms were nice...and the happy brain chemicals you got from it were probably good for her overall mood anyway...)
That was something that had been especially troubling her of late, but she sure as hell wasn't going to talk to Severus about it. That would be, just, agonisingly awkward, no thanks. But, when she thought about it, she... There was something that'd been bothering her for a while, that Severus might be able to help with — he was the healing and mind magic expert, after all. It would also be awkward to talk about, there was a reason she hadn't brought it up before, but she didn't...
He'd seen her do it before — as much of a neurotic mess as she could be about this sort of thing, she was pretty sure it should be fine. Pretty sure.
Her eyes randomly wandering around the room — random trinkets Severus had gotten from one student or colleague or another, his bloody packed bookshelves, Severus owned so many books — she cleared her throat, make sure her voice would work. How the hell did she even start with this?
"You shouldn't do that."
Liz twitched. "What?"
"You were clicking your lip ring against your teeth again. You could chip a tooth doing that."
"Oh, right. I just do that without thinking sometimes, I'll try to remember." It wasn't a big deal, there were potions that could easily fix chipped teeth, but whatever. The thing she actually wanted to talk about was uncomfortable, but, maybe start with another, somewhat less uncomfortable thing, work her way up to it... "Um. I have been having nightmares — that's why I finished off my last calming potion this morning. I mean, I've always had nightmares, but these are...different. Mostly a lot of random stuff, confusing nonsense all running into each other, you know, like a normal dream, if just...kind of intense, I guess. Not even that scary, for the most part. But then, every time, it ends with screaming and a flash of green light, and I wake up cold, freaking out enough I can't even breathe. The calming potions help with the freaking out, but not the cold — but a hot shower takes care of that, and then I'm normal again. Or as normal as I ever am," she admitted, shrugging.
There'd been a thoughtful, faintly anxious flickering in Severus's head at first — but then, when she mentioned the screaming and the green light, he'd gone smooth, cold, quiet. He stared at her, silent for a long, dragging moment. Liz wasn't looking, her eyes still wandering the room, but she could feel his attention on her, shifting awkwardly in her seat. Finally, his voice low and thick, he asked, "Have you any ideas what that...recurring feature might be?"
Liz rolled her eyes. "Lily being murdered right in front of me, obviously." Severus twitched, a bright lance of something shooting through his head. She probably shouldn't have put it that bluntly — Severus and Lily had been close, and she'd expect he didn't like thinking about that — but whatever. "It started after we talked about the Unforgivable Curses in Defence class." Which was true, if not the whole story — Liz was positive that actually seeing the curse, going out to the forest to practise them, was what had triggered the nightmares, but she didn't know how Severus would react to that. Probably not too badly, but it wasn't worth it. "I think... I used to have nightmares like this before, when I was really little. I remember, the Dursleys told me it was a car crash, that killed my parents and got me my scars, but I didn't... I thought the green light must have been a traffic signal, or something — but that never felt quite right, it was the wrong colour, and too bright. But, I was really little, maybe I was just remembering it wrong, I didn't think about it that hard. Of course, I know what it really was now. But that still doesn't make sense — should I be able to remember that at all? Even the little flash I have, I mean, I was one and a half at the time..."
"You were even younger than that — precisely fifteen months." Severus was silent a long moment, thoughts in his head fitfully turning, little flickers of nameless dark emotions dancing in the air around him. The only external sign of whatever was going on in there was how he was fiddling with his pen, which — in anyone other than Severus bloody Snape, such a scary dark wizard, see how my cloak swishes — she might have called a nervous tick. "The development of the brain over the course of one's life is something that is still poorly understood — by both muggle and magical experts, in fact. Memory in particular is a difficult subject. Though both muggle and magical experts will tell you that memory is extraordinarily unreliable. If you pay close attention to the minds around you, you may realise that the recall of a memory is an active process, and that the memory is being actively re-encoded as it is being recalled. It was once thought, long ago, that memory acted much as a physical record, events inscribed into one's brain as though carved into stone, but we now understand memories are far more fluid than that — simply recalling a memory inevitably results in changes being made to it, unconsciously, your present mental state and subsequently attained knowledge colouring past events. It is even possible for people to construct fictional memories, to come to truly believe they personally experienced an event that never happened, a tendency which makes implanting false memories — via mind magic or memory charms, yes, but also mundane means, such as hypnosis or sustained persuasion — far easier than can be explained with the classical model.
"There is a phenomenon known as infantile amnesia — or developmental amnesia, in magical scholarship — wherein an adult can be expected to remember nothing before the age of four. However, as with anything to do with memory, this phenomenon is not well understood either. There are multiple theories as to the cause, the matter complicated by there not seeming to be a hard line. A person's earliest memory may have occurred anywhere between the ages of four and seven, and in some cases as early as two — major life events, such as the birth of a younger sibling or moving house, tend to be retained for longer, if in a distorted form. And the phenomenon is one that gradually develops as well. Young children are likely to remember events from well before the age of four, much more clearly than any adult ever could, the earliest memories gradually fading as they age, before they acquire a degree of infantile amnesia similar to an adult's by the time their age is in double digits. This phenomenon, as well, is poorly understood.
"Now," he said, some of the casual smoothness in his voice weakening with the change in subject, "fifteen months is very early. There are some theories that infants that young cannot encode proper memories at all — at the very least, not before primary language acquisition. But there is some disagreement in the literature about this as well, it's...very complicated, and technical. But, as I said before, the recall of a memory is an active process, the memory retranslated and re-encoded each time it is accessed. Is it possible, for a traumatic event experienced at that early of an age to create a primitive, unstructured memory that, when recalled over the next months and years, is reinforced such that it is retained in a mutated form, beyond the point by which we might expect such early memories to have long since faded? It would be an...exceptional case, but, especially as you remember having similar nightmares after the usual threshold..." Severus gave a helpless sort of shrug. "It is possible that green flash is exactly what you think it is. However unlikely it may seem."
"Oh. Okay." Good to know, she guessed? She'd kind of wondered if it was just a weird Seer thing or something, but Severus's explanation made more sense — if it were a Seer thing, she'd expect it be more than just green flashes and feeling cold.
And why the hell couldn't any of the exceptional things about her be pleasant? Well, okay, she liked the talent she had for some kinds of magic, and of course there were the mind control superpowers — kicking in as early as they had was very unusual, and thank god for that, she couldn't imagine how much more fucked up she'd be now if they hadn't — but she was just saying.
"Also, I would expect..." Weirdly, Severus trailed off, eyes flicking away, as though uncomfortable, which was wildly out of character. It was kind of surreal, honestly. "You said a moment ago you believed the green flash you see was the curse taking Lily. I think it is more likely that what you see is the very curse that failed to kill you. While Lily's ritual did save your life, it... I was the first on the scene, as I've mentioned before, and when I arrived you were unconscious. In fact, at first I believed you were dead — the...magical residue from the curses and the explosion were intense, and there were protective wards carved into the cot, I couldn't feel your mind under it all. Until you woke up, and started crying. As you might imagine, from the scars you still carry, there was...some significant damage. I tried to close the wounds for a time, though I was having difficulty with that — the magics associated with them were interfering with everything I tried. Until your godfather arrived, and— I didn't wish to be caught at the scene of the crime, as it were, especially by a man so volatile as Sirius Black, so I fled. Dumbledore arrived with that bloody phoenix shortly after. I'm told Fawkes sang over you for hours before you finally calmed, and the lingering magic settled enough for Kate Turner, Poppy's predecessor, to treat you properly.
"I'm not surprised the memory of the pain was lost — the brain tends not to recall pain very well. But neither would I be surprised if being struck with the Green Death, and surviving, leaves one feeling very, very cold, and for the association between that flash of green light and feeling cold to be retained. If for no other reason, it's unlikely you understood what happened to Lily, but being harmed yourself doesn't require context to decipher."
...Right. Right, that made sense. The green-light nightmares when she'd been a little kid had made her feel cold too — she remembered laying in that tiny bed in her bloody cupboard, wrapping herself up in the shitty too-thin blanket she'd been given, shivering from cold and struggling not to cry (Uncle Vernon hated it when she cried) — and, she thought they also used to hurt, too? Like, vaguely, her scars would ache afterward, not really bad, just. So. She didn't know how to feel about that. "I can't decide if kind-of-not-really remembering almost being murdered myself is better or worse than kind-of-not-really remembering my mother being murdered in front of me."
There was a flicker of black amusement from Severus, which was fair, she realised she was being kind of silly. She, just, didn't know what the fuck to say now, this was an odd conversation they were having. "I would imagine. As to how to manage these nightmares. They were triggered by the discussion of the Unforgivables in Defence class, correct?"
In a manner of speaking, "Yes."
One of Severus's eyebrows twitched, probably guessing she was keeping something to herself, but he apparently didn't think it important enough to ask about. "Then it is quite likely they may diminish on their own. There are potions that may prevent nightmares — I haven't mentioned them before, to help manage your pre-existing difficulties with sleep, because they are habit-forming, and can cause serious long-term problems if misused. Especially for young people, as it happens. However, if these nightmares become so persistent that you are having serious difficulty getting enough sleep, it is something we may consider trying, on select nights — no more than two nights a week at the most, I'm afraid."
Yeah, Liz had read about that. Standard sleep potions, if used regularly, can make it so the brain had trouble falling asleep on its own, so eventually the person needed the potion (or some other aide) to sleep at all. Dreamless sleep potions, on the other hand, had even weirder effects if overused — the brain needed to dream, apparently, and if it couldn't do it while asleep, well, it'd just start doing it while awake instead. (More to the point, as soon as the potion was out of their system.) So, people who overused dreamless sleep potions would eventually start having crazy hallucinations constantly, and losing time and stuff, what fun. "Okay. Yeah, it hasn't been that bad so far, but I'll keep it in mind."
"Good." One hand coming up to rub at his face, Severus let out a heavy sigh. "Though it hardly seems like enough. I do wish there was someone you could talk to, but clinical psychology is terribly underdeveloped on the magical side — talk therapy is not a concept that exists here whatsoever. Mind 'healers'—" The word was said with obvious sarcasm. "—most often attempt to ameliorate mental disturbances by compelling the patient to act normal."
"Christ, that sounds horrifying." Liz was, once again, very glad that the Wizengamot hadn't decided to switch the trusteeship to someone else — as fucked up as she was, she definitely couldn't be sure someone else wouldn't have tried to force her to see one of those people. Though, she was a mind mage, it probably wouldn't work on her anyway...
"It often does more harm than good, yes — but, as the technique has some success when it comes to moderating the patient's troublesome external behaviour, many consider it sufficient."
...Liz couldn't say she was surprised, honestly. Just wanting crazy people to stop being crazy around normal people, no matter how miserable it made them privately where no one could see, sounded like exactly what she should expect of the average arsehole. "Have I mentioned today how much I hate people?"
Severus just shrugged. "And, of course, sending you to a muggle specialist, who might be qualified to help, is complicated by Secrecy — as far too many things often are, it seems — leaving us with no feasible options. It is very frustrating."
A tinge of stale fear clawing at her chest, an echo of eyes on her skin like ants, Liz tried to swallow it down, took a slow breath before trying to talk again. "Let's not do that anyway. I'd rather not get locked up in an asylum, thanks."
"I don't believe I ever suggested institutionalisation was an option," Severus said, frowning, his voice slow and uncertain.
...Liz was having the sudden realisation that Vernon and Petunia's talk about shrinks and madhouses probably hadn't been representative of what that stuff was actually like. "Never mind, more stupid your aunt and uncle lied to you stuff — fucking hypocrites..." They were all on about Liz never lying, but they'd lied to her all the fucking time, because of course.
(It wasn't that lying was bad — Liz was bad, so things were bad when she did them, even if they were fine for other people.)
"Yeah, if they get really bad I'll say something. Anyway, that's been a thing going on, but it's not the thing bothering me I was really thinking of," she continued right on, a little rushed — she didn't want to keep talking about maybe seeing a muggle shrink, or Vernon and Petunia at all, for that matter. "Um. This is really embarrassing, and stupid, and I kind of don't want to talk about it, so, I'm just going to... I've been crying a lot?"
There was a flicker of surprise from Severus, one of his eyebrows ticking up. "Oh?"
"Yeah. I mean... Not even for any reason, I don't think? It just kind of...happens, at really stupid times for it to happen. Like, I'm doing okay in general, I think — like I was saying earlier, I'm fine. Besides the nightmares, I guess, but that's normal for me. But really, I think I've been doing...pretty good, lately? you know?" Honestly, this first month or so back at Hogwarts was probably the easiest time she'd ever had here. She expected it to go to hell on her again eventually, but for now she was doing fine, at least. "But, it's when I'm doing especially good that the crying happens, and I don't know why."
"I see. In what kind of situations does this happen, precisely?"
...Liz kind of didn't want to tell him that. But, if it helped him figure out why it was happening, so she could make it stop, fine. She kind of really didn't want to, nerves crackling over her skin and her chest tightening, but she was being stupid, Severus already knew about them, nothing was going to happen, she was fine. "Um. Honestly, most often, it happens when I'm, um...kissing Daphne?"
Severus's lips twitched, letting out a flicker of amusement. "Ah. I see."
She tried not to glare at him — his amusement only got brighter, though, so she assumed she wasn't doing a very good job. "It's not funny, Severus, it sucks. It's embarrassing, and crying hurts, and I end up leaking everywhere, and I hate it."
"I don't imagine Miss Greengrass is particularly bothered by it."
Good fucking guess, where the hell was he getting that from? "Well, no, but I am! And it's so stupid — oh yes, you're kissing your girlfriend, and it's nice, clearly this is the time to start crying! It does happen at other times, but... Well, it almost happens at other times, but I can mostly stop myself, if I step back for a second and try to calm down, you know? Mostly when good shite is happening, which is stupid, or sometimes when I'm really frustrated about something — like about how I keep crying for no fucking reason, because yes, I have cried about crying at least once, because it's stupid and I don't— It's not funny, Severus!"
"Of course, I apologise." His voice came out just slightly unsteady, wavering, as though he were trying not to laugh. Which was very annoying, because this wasn't funny, damn it... "Unfortunately, I'm afraid I don't have much to say on the matter. Nobody is entirely certain why humans cry in the first place. It is known that not all beings do — for example, goblins don't cry, and yet house-elves do — but what function it serves remains an open question. The only explanation I have heard that I feel holds any weight is that it functions as a means for the brain to expend intense, pent-up emotion — I suppose, analogous to lifting the lid from a pot to prevent it from boiling over."
"Nice culinary metaphor." There was a little flicker of uncertainty from Severus, so she added, "Hermione says I use a lot of culinary metaphors, because I'm surprisingly domestic, apparently."
There was another pulse of amusement from Severus, which at least wasn't quite as annoying as laughing on the inside at her crying-for-no-reason problem — even if how very girly she was sometimes could be kind of embarrassing. (She realised that was irrational — as Severus had said once, I hate to break it to you, but you are a girl, and obviously it was fine for girls to be girly? — but her brain was never not stupid.) "Yes, well, one must tailor one's message to one's audience, after all," he drawled. Because Severus thought he was funny. "Crying when one is especially frustrated is perfectly ordinary, and it isn't unusual to cry from happiness either. For mind mages in particular, remaining open to the feelings and thoughts of others can make it easier to reach the threshold at which an episode may be triggered. When it comes to these moments with Miss Greengrass, your auras would be in direct contact — which means you are attempting to manage the emotional output from both yourself and Miss Greengrass, simultaneously. It is truly no surprise that you find it overwhelming. It's an effect that I have also noted myself, if you find that at all reassuring."
"Wait, really?" It was kind of hard to imagine Severus crying, honestly.
"Yes. Although for myself, it...occurs only in rather more intimate situations."
...Sex, did he mean sex? Did Severus just imply that he cries after sex?
While she was processing that — weird bloody thing he'd just out and told her, but okay... — Severus just continued on. "So, I'm afraid this isn't a problem I can help you with, for multiple reasons. I can't tell you what may be happening in any more detail without further interrogating precisely what you are thinking and feeling in those moments — I assume that is not a conversation you wish to have, but I am also not a qualified clinical psychologist, so I would not be confident in my ability to properly do so. But it is also possible that there is no problem to address in the first place. This may not be a Liz is broken thing, so to speak," said with a slight note of displeasure (Liz was aware he didn't like it when she talked like that), "but simply part of being human."
She'd kind of been afraid of that, honestly. That Severus wouldn't be able to do shite about it, she meant. Slumping back in her chair, crossing her arms over her chest, Liz puffed out a sigh. "Well, it sucks."
Another pulse of amusement from his head, his lips curling, Severus said, "Sometimes it does, I'm afraid. I can look into finding someone for you to talk to — the obligation to maintain Secrecy does present difficulties in doing so, but I'm certain it can be done."
Liz scoffed. "No. I hate talking about this shite anyway, why the hell would I want to, just, make myself more miserable talking to a total stranger about it?"
"As unpleasant as it might seem, talk therapy does help, Elizabeth — I have read the studies that demonstrate as much. However, it is far less effective if the patient is in any way coerced into it, so I will not press you on the matter. The option is available if you change your mind. I can find you literature on the effectiveness of that sort of treatment, if that will help."
...Honestly, she'd rather not read that sort of stuff, because then she wouldn't be able to help wondering if it would maybe be worth it. She didn't think it would help, not really, but it was easier to insist she didn't want to torture herself talking about shite she didn't want to talk about with some stranger (whose job it was to fix her), without facts floating around in her head about how it sometimes helped other people — normal people, who weren't fucked up devil child whatever the fuck. Besides, even if Severus found someone they didn't have to hide the magic stuff from, there was still stuff she wouldn't be able to tell them anyway. It would probably be a bad idea to tell some shrink that she'd accidentally broken a woman's mind trying to instantly learn French, and then ate her soul, because, hey, she was practically dead anyway, what difference does it make. For example.
Severus was the expert, and certainly knew what he was talking about, but Liz was extremely sceptical. Unfortunately, Liz was pretty sure she was just...like this. She could get better at working around her fucked-up-ed-ness, gradually — frustratingly slowly — but she was pretty sure she couldn't be fixed. It was probably better to, just, accept that idea, and try to live with it, than get her hopes up that she could be fixed and actually be fucking normal for once.
(Personally, she thought being realistic like that was actually better for her long-term mental health, but she wasn't going to argue about it.)
"Anyway, I think that's all I had to talk about? Other than the Green Death nightmares and the crying for no reason—" And also being inexplicably horny all the damn time, which she was not talking to him about. "—I've been doing pretty good actually, so. I mean, if the last three years are any indication, I'll probably feel shite next month, but I'm good for now." Her mood had crashed pretty badly in October first year, even worse through November and December in second year, and even worse last year. Which was honestly a little intimidating, when she thought about it — there was an observable trend of her down moods getting worse over time, but she wasn't sure how much further down she could get from thinking killing herself sounds like a good idea, and she didn't want to find out.
"That is something we should keep an eye on. In fact, we might consider taking a regular evaluation of your mood."
"...Why?"
Severus gave a careless shrug. "Sometimes your behaviour strikes me as reminiscent of hypomania — it is something I noticed over the summer. Though it is possible that you have simply grown less uneasy in my presence, and I'm reading too much into it. Regularly taking a baseline may also allow us to catch early warning signs of incipient depressive episodes, and take measures to mitigate them, so it may still be worth doing."
"That makes sense." Liz wasn't sure what hypomania was — like with other technical terms Severus used sometimes, she could piece it together from the roots, but she didn't know if her guess was anywhere close to what he meant by it — but if it was something Severus had noticed over the summer, her summer had been kind of great, so it clearly couldn't be a bad thing, didn't seem worth worrying about. And, she didn't know if there was anything they could do to stop her down-swings — if they caught it early enough, maybe there was a potion that could, like, reset her brain and stop it from being dumb before it started? Whatever, didn't seem like something that would be real to Liz, but Severus was the expert. "And how would we do that, exactly? Like the long list of questions you asked me in that first meeting? Because doing that regularly sounds very tedious." Not to mention seriously uncomfortable, some of those questions had been awkward.
"If you prefer, I could simply send you the evaluation to fill out on your own time. You would then send it back to me — perhaps via Nilanse, if you wish to avoid drawing attention. We needn't even speak of it at all if we find nothing concerning. Though, as I would not be in the room to feel out the honesty in your responses, this could only be done with the understanding that you must be absolutely truthful while filling out these forms."
"...I can do that. Honestly, I think it'll be easier without you sitting there watching me the whole time."
A little flicker of amusement in his head — not a mean kind of amusement, more laughing with her than at her (Liz would guess Severus didn't exactly enjoy talking about his feelings either) — he nodded. "Very well. I will begin sending the papers to you every other week. We may later decide to do it more or less frequently, depending on the results, and how much they tend to vary over time."
Severus paused, as though waiting for some kind of response from her, but she had no idea what. "Okay?"
"Okay. There was one other matter I wished to speak of, briefly." Severus straightened from where he'd kind of halfway reclined in his chair, replacing Liz's papers in her folder and gently slapping it closed. "It is a personal matter. Given the complicated politics of the moment we find ourselves in, as well as...our personal renown, it is very likely that it may become public knowledge in short order. I thought I would warn you, before you see it in the Prophet's asinine society pages one morning — or Witch Weekly, god forbid."
...There'd been issues with articles about her shite showing up unexpectedly, and yeah, that sucked, but for them to be blabbing about her personal shite, there...kind of had to be personal shite going on? There was Daphne, she guessed, but Liz was certain she'd get some kind of warning from Skeeter before that got out, with their arrangement and everything. So, it couldn't be a personal thing about her, it must be a personal thing about Severus — Liz would say that wasn't her business, but since Severus was her legal guardian now, she was sure people would bother her about it when whatever it was came out. "Right, what's up?"
Folding his hands on the desk in front of them, Severus paused for a moment, his head flickering. He seemed almost uncomfortable, awkward, which was bloody weird. "For going on a month now, I've been seeing Síomha Ní Ailbhe."
Um, that was the Saoirse Ghaelach woman who'd talked to them after the riot, right? the really infamous one? Liz had been kind of out of at the time, she— "Wait a second, you mean 'seeing' like dating?"
"Yes."
...Okay, then. Didn't see that coming. Liz had been vaguely aware that Severus dated occasionally, but mostly through Narcissa setting him up with various women, like the nosey meddler she was — besides complaining about that a couple times, he'd never directly said anything about it, or mentioned anyone by name. He was very private about it, really. With his reputation and how stupid people could be about him sometimes, Liz guessed he was trying to keep it out of the public eye. But still, a particularly infamous member of the big Gaelic nationalist militia was...unexpected. "How did that happen?"
"I honestly do not know." Liz blinked at him in confusion — how could you not know how you started dating someone? — for a few seconds before Severus let out a sigh, his eyes tipping up to the ceiling. "Soon after the beginning of term, she wished to ask some follow-up questions pertaining to the riot, to check whether I had noticed anything her comrades-in-arms had missed. At some point during the meeting, the...tenor of our conversation shifted — I honestly cannot tell when, precisely, it transitioned into something one might call a 'date'. I didn't notice it happening at the time."
Was that a thing that, just, happened? Business meeting, talking about a bloody riot, and probably the politics and shite behind it, blah blah, except oh hey, it's a date now — that didn't sound like a thing that could just happen. But then, Liz was terrible at people, she was fully willing to admit that she had no fucking idea. And, that Severus was actually dating someone now was kind of a weird thought — especially that they were sitting here talking about it, which was awkward — since this was Severus bloody Snape they were talking about, totally a scary dark wizard, see how my cloak swishes. (He still had that Saturday morning cartoon villain goatee of his, because of course.) It was hard to imagine him going on dates and doing cutesy romance stuff like a normal person, honestly — she was imagining it, right now, and it was almost hilariously out of character, she had to bite her lip to keep herself from smiling.
(She idly wondered whether Síomha minded him crying after sex, which was apparently a thing he'd admitted to her just a few minutes ago, but that was definitely a thought she should keep to herself.)
Of course, as bloody odd as the thought was, it was good news. Liz had thought before that Severus seemed kind of lonely — though she couldn't put her finger on what had given her that impression, exactly — and could definitely use a girlfriend. And Lily had obviously thought the same thing, telling Liz in that letter to tell him to stop being silly and get himself a wife already. So, if he was seeing someone, and liked her enough and the relationship seemed stable enough he was actually telling Liz about it, for the first time ever, that was probably a good thing? Yes, Liz decided, this was a good thing, okay.
The more she thought about it, she realised she had seen this coming, actually. Or, to be more specific, she'd Seen it. "I told you you'd be meeting someone important that night. Remember?"
An odd fluttering in his head she didn't know how to read, Severus raised a sceptical eyebrow at her. She remembered he hadn't taken he prediction seriously in the first place, so. "I recall. You think this premonition of yours was in reference to Síomha."
"...Maybe?" It was hard to be sure, Seer stuff could often be super vague. The black hair was right, and Síomha's magic had also felt pretty dark the one time they'd met, which was also right. Liz remembered thinking the woman Narcissa tried to set Severus up with at Consualia was wrong, both her hair and her magic too light. Also, that Rosier woman (forgot her name) had had a French accent, which had been wrong — she vaguely remembered Síomha had a faint Gaelic accent, which...might or might not be right, she didn't have a strong feeling on that point. Much more suggestive, when Síomha had come by after the riot Liz remembered thinking she seemed familiar. She hadn't put any significance on that at the time — Síomha's picture had gotten in the papers at some point, she was sort of famous, Liz had just written it off — but it wasn't like Liz paid much attention to the papers, if it'd actually been a Seer thing... "Yeah, I think it was her. Can't say a hundred per cent, you know what divination can be like, but I think so."
"You'll forgive me if I remain sceptical of her long-term importance that your vision suggested."
Of course, Liz would hardly expect anything else — Severus was a pessimistic bloke like that. She was unreasonably certain, though, for no particular reason, because being a Seer was weird sometimes. In fact, she had a feeling that Severus was going to get that wife and 2.5 children and a bloody dog, in one of those nice houses with a walled garden or whatever that Lily had joked about in that letter. "Sure, if you want. I bet you a hund– er, twenty galleons that you two get married." She'd belatedly realised that Severus probably couldn't afford to throw around a hundred galleons on a whim — especially on a wager she was pretty sure he would lose.
(Liz knew there was gambling and stuff in the magical world, did they check if people were Seers first? Hmm.)
His mind flinched, before settling into something hard and cold. For a long, silent moment, he gave her a flat, steady look, hardly seeming to blink. It was making her kind of uncomfortable, honestly, she didn't like being stared at. Finally, he let out a sigh. "Hold that thought for one moment." He stood, walked over to the door into the common room...and pushed it open, stepping halfway outside. "Miss Deirdre, if I could have a moment of your time. I'll be ready for you in a couple minutes, Mister Zabini."
"That's alright, sir, I'm not in a rush." Liz couldn't feel Blaise's mind from here, the enchantments in the walls blocking off the common room, but she recognised his voice well enough. Apparently their meeting was running long, oops.
Severus walked back toward his desk, leaving the door open behind him. Before sitting down, he pulled out a blank sheet of parchment from one of the cabinets against the wall, pushed her file aside so he'd have a nice open space to write. Just as he put pen to parchment, Deirdre appeared at the door. "Did you need something, Professor? Oh, hello, Liz." Deirdre tended to use first names for all the Slytherins, at least the girls she remembered. Intentionally putting herself in a more informal role in the dorm, Liz thought, but she didn't know for sure and also didn't really care — the purebloods' politeness rules were bloody stupid anyway.
"I would like you to witness a contract for us. Close the door, please."
A flicker of surprise, one of Deirdre's eyebrows ticked up. She glanced between Liz and Severus, but whatever she was thinking she just shrugged it off, stepped the rest of the way into the room and pulled the door closed behind her.
"The Ministry will recognise verbal contracts," Severus said, eyes on his pen scritching across the parchment, "so long as there is corroborating evidence the agreement took place. If feasible, a copy of the memory will often more than suffice. However, most people prefer to make written agreements, as often as is practical — it allows the setting of strict terms that can then be easily enforced in the Ministry's courts, should one of the parties breach the agreement. Of course, should one of us renege on this little wager, I'm hardly likely to press my case in such a manner, I'm simply using it as an example."
...So, Severus was using her betting he was going to marry his new girlfriend as an opportunity to teach her about how a part of magical law worked. That...seemed like a weird thing to do? Liz didn't know, did people normally do this kind of shite with their kids? Whatever, she guessed... "Okay. And they're only necessary for agreements between people in different Houses, right?"
"In larger Houses, you may occasionally hear of such contracts being formed between members, but the Ministry has far lesser power to enforce the terms. It would depend on the particulars of internal House law, and would be heard in the family law courts — family law is different from contract law, resulting in a different set of possible judgements." That was needlessly complicated, but fine. Severus finished what he was writing, turned the paper around to her. "You should, of course, read every contract before you sign it."
"Well, obviously, Severus, I'm not an idiot." Liz slid the thing closer, looked over it. It was pretty simple. There was a heading at the top, naming the parties involved (complete with Liz's silly titles, of course), the location it was being made, and the date. The actual text of the 'contract' was super simple, using surprisingly basic vocabulary and simple sentences — a wager of twenty galleons, to be paid to Liz if Severus marries "Síomha ni Ailbhe" (that didn't quite look right to Liz), or to Severus if the marriage doesn't happen within five years from today's date, very basic. "What, no legalese?"
"You may see some very complex language in professional contracts, but I would recommend avoiding it whenever possible. Although, simpler language isn't necessarily better — you want to avoid ambiguity wherever possible. If you require more technical language to clearly communicate the intent of the contract, so be it. This contract is very simple, and so basic language is sufficient."
"Right, that make sense." Some of the pre-prepared shite from Gringotts was opaque as shite, but. "Looks fine, I'll sign this. What do we do now?"
Severus took the contract back from her, started scritching away again. "In most cases, it is ideal for a contract to be witnessed by a third party. It is not necessary, legally speaking, but it can greatly streamline matters when one or another point is under contention. There is no special qualification one must have to act as witness to a contract — any mage over the age of contract will do." Thirteen, he meant, because magical Britain was ridiculous. Finished with whatever he was doing, he held the page up toward Deirdre, who was now standing over the desk, having silently approached while Severus was talking. "Have a look at that, please."
Deirdre took the page — Liz could tell the exact moment when she got to the meat of it, her eyes widening and sharp shock ringing out of her head. Her eyes flicked up to Severus, a smile twitching at her lips. "I suppose congratulations are in order?"
"That remains to be seen."
"...Liz, aren't you a Seer?" she asked, her voice wavering just a little with...amusement, probably.
"Yep. Severus is just pessimistic like that."
An edge of irritation slipping into his voice, Severus said, "Does the contract meet to your satisfaction, Deirdre?"
"Of course. You spelled Ní incorrectly, but minor errors like that," she said to Liz, obviously realising this was a silly little lesson just as Liz had, "will just be ignored in the courts." Her head continuing to bubble, bright and cheerful, trying (and failing) not to smile, Deirdre set the contract down on the desk between them with a flourish. "Proceed."
Severus signed his name first, then turned the paper around to her. He'd added spots for signatures under the text of the contract — on the left side, his name printed out, his messy signature scrawled underneath it, Liz's name (complete with silly titles) mirroring it on the right. There was a spot for Deirdre nic Cormaic centred beneath them, with a little bit about standing as witness, plus the date, blah blah. Liz went ahead and put her usual squiggle opposite Severus's much more legible (though still messy) signature. Her handwriting was pretty shitty to begin with, but she'd quickly realised it was the act of signing something that mattered, what it actually looked like didn't make a difference, so she didn't even bother trying. Liz slid the parchment to her left, where Deirdre could reach it, handed her the pen. And then Deirdre leaned over to sign...which Liz thought made it official and everything? Like, one of them paying the other twenty galleons depending on whether Severus married his new girlfriend within five years was a legal obligation they had now.
Which, again, was a very silly thing to do, but Liz guessed Severus could be surprisingly silly sometimes.
Once she was done signing, straightening to her full height again, Deirdre said, "So long as I'm acting as witness, would you like me to stand as arbiter as well?"
"Very well." Turning to Liz, "An arbiter is a third party charged with holding the physical contract so long as the agreement is in force, and informing the parties as to their obligations when necessary. It is a common social convention, not a role with any true legal power."
"So one of the parties isn't holding the contract themselves and can't fuck with it, right, I get it." In a real contract, she'd guess Deirdre being the arbiter would actually be unfair for her — Severus was kind of her boss, so she might be biassed in his favour — but they were only playing around, so it didn't matter. "Do I have to agree to that too?"
"Yes," Deirdre said, "you can challenge it at the Ministry if the arbiter isn't agreed on by both of you, but a verbal agreement is fine." She rolled up the sheet of parchment, her wand appearing in her hand for a second to conjure a ribbon, tied the roll closed. "I'll just pop home and stick this somewhere safe — I think the drawer of Emily's desk will do nicely." Severus frowned up at her, she grinned back. "You didn't think I was going to keep this from her, did you? She has a cousin who's an old school friend of Síomha's, you know, she'll love this. We will be expecting invitations, of course."
Severus sighed, one hand coming up to rub at his forehead. The other coming up in a dismissive flick, he said just, "Go."
Deirdre sauntered away, a cocky swish to her hips (Liz tried not to stare, and completely failed), Liz waited until the door had closed with the familiar crackle of wards. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to blow this up into a whole thing." It sounded like Deirdre, and probably Emily, were definitely going to be teasing Severus about this, for who knew how long — and she knew how private he could be, that didn't sound like it'd be fun for him.
(Also, had Deirdre just implied that they were expecting invitations, as in, together? Didn't they both have fiancés they were supposed to be marrying at some point?)
"No matter," Severus said, voice thin and breathy with a sigh. "I suppose I have only myself to blame. Regardless. Unless you have anything else you wish to discuss, I believe we are done for the day."
Yeah, finally — this meeting had gone way longer than Liz had expected. Pushing herself up to her feet, she said, "Nope, I'm good. Um..." What the hell had they talked about anyway? It'd been a while... "Oh, I'll be back with my empty calming potions right after your meeting with Blaise." It sounded like he was waiting outside already, so.
"And I will send you the evaluation we spoke of on Sunday — I believe that will be the most convenient for the both of us."
"Sure. You are going to be around on Sundays, then?" A little tingle of confusion, one of Severus's eyebrows curling upward. "I was just wondering when you're going to be out of the castle. Not really my business, I guess."
Severus glanced away for a second, exasperation prickling at Liz's skin. "I would not depend on my presence here on Saturday evenings — though you may always send Nilanse in an emergency, of course."
"Right." Liz definitely didn't want to interrupt Severus's date night if she could help it — fuck knows this man was far too busy (she still wasn't convinced he ever slept), he could use the time off — but it wasn't like she exactly had many emergencies, so it should be fine. A thought occurred to her, and she couldn't help it, did her absolutely best to keep a smirk off of her face. "And what about Sunday mornings?"
He gave her a flat glare, completely unamused — which might be vaguely intimidating in any other situation, but Liz was too busy trying not to laugh at him. With a flick of his fingers, a faint flicker of magic on the air, the door out into the common room was yanked open. "Good night, Elizabeth."
"Good night." She turned off, feeling the smile pulling at her lips as soon as her back was to him and he couldn't see her face anymore. That meeting could have gone better at some points, there'd been some awkward shite in there, but at least it'd ended on a high note. She'd been thinking for ages that Severus could use a girlfriend, and teasing him was strangely fun, so, yeah, probably her favourite one of these one-on-one meetings she'd ever had. She was slightly surprised Severus was, just, letting her get away with being such a little shite, but he was kind of a snarky bastard himself, wasn't he? Making a whole thing about it would just be hypocritical.
(Besides, at this point she didn't really expect him to turn into Vernon on her anymore. It was fine.)
Twenty galleons was kind of a lot of money, though — or at least it was for normal people, it wouldn't make any difference to her one way or the other. Maybe she'd just put it right back into a wedding gift or something, that seemed reasonable. What did people even do for wedding gifts on the magical side (or the muggle side, for that matter), she should probably look into that at some point...
Liz: *goes on a flustered rant about having normal human feelings for her girlfriend* "It sucks and I hate it!" »:c
Severus: *...This might be the single cutest thing Liz has ever done in her entire life...*
Liz: *pouts* "It's not funny, Severus!"
Severus: *trying very hard not to laugh* "No, no, of course not..."
So that was a thing that happened, woo. Dragged on a bit longer than I expected — though not by that much, honestly — because these two are nerdy, babbly bastards, and it's only been four days since my last update, but whatever. I said I was gonna post when I have a scene done, and I have a scene done, so here you go.
One more chapter, that I may or may not split, depending on how long it goes, and then the delegations from Durmstrang and Beauxbatons will be turning up. Finally. Since Liz doesn't give a shite about all the peripheral nonsense going on, the scene immediately after that will include the selection. Unless my plans go completely off the rails, my current schedule looks like this:
Fourth Year XXI (Liz POV) — personal life stuff (might get split)
Triwizard Tournament I (Dorea POV) — arrival of Durmstrang/Beauxbatons
Triwizard Tournament II (Liz POV) — champion selection
Snake in the Grass V (Tamsyn POV) — Mercy Anne returns
Fourth Year XXIII (Liz POV) — hallowe'en aftermath, weighing of wands (might get split)
Fourth Year XXIV (Liz POV) — first task prep
Fourth Year XXV (Liz POV) — personal life stuff
Triwizard Tournament III (Dorea POV) — first task (non-canon)
And from there we'll have a non-canon second task three chapters later, and then into pre- Yule Ball drama, and of course the Yule Ball itself. Then there's the ICW student tournament immediately after, and the year continues on, with occasional tasks sprinkled here and there, while personal drama with both our POV characters goes on, with politics proceeding in the background. Should be fun.
Right, that's more than enough from me. Bye, now.