TW: Improper use of Legilimency. AKA Magical Assault.

The girl was too light in his arms.

Severus Snape knelt in the dying embers of flame, one arm beneath Elara Willow's back, the other curled under her knees. Her head had lolled forward against his shoulder, hair singed at the ends and tangled with soot. His hand, without thought, had risen, absurdly, to brush the ash from her temple—a soft sweep with the back of his fingers.

He froze mid-motion.

Too much. Too much.

He did not cradle. He did not brush. He certainly did not kneel in open fire, scorched and trembling with the residual force of someone else's grief.

He scowled immediately after — not at her, but at himself. This… this was not the kind of proximity he allowed. He loathed being touched. Used closeness as a weapon, a form of intimidation, not… not this.

Not cradling a student.

Not her.

His brow furrowed sharply. The moment stretched too long.

He exhaled, short and sharp, and shifted his grip so her head rested more neutrally against his arm. More practical. Less... intimate. Her skin was warm. Not dangerously so. But her breathing remained shallow and her eyes did not flutter. There was a faint tremble in her fingers. Wandless magic still buzzing beneath the surface.

And his.

Who saw.

He jerked his head up.

The flames had finally receded, leaving trails of smoke in the air and a ring of blackened stone around them. The students had been cleared swiftly—he could tell by the sudden silence, a space too large and too still. Sprout and McGonagall had moved quickly, he'd give them that. No children screaming, no gawking. No Potter with a bloody hero complex or Weasley calling for help. Just the smoke, the seared benches, and the heavy footfalls of staff.

The professors.

Flitwick. Sprout. McGonagall. Hooch. Vector. Sinistra. Dumbledore.

Damn it.

He adjusted Elara slightly, just enough to make sure her head was supported, and began cataloguing exactly what they might have seen.

They saw him disarm her. They saw the explosion. The flames.

But not the Legilimency.

No one would know he'd pressed his forehead to hers like some half-mad prophet and invaded her mind with a force he'd reserved only for Death Eater missions.

No one saw that.

The fire would've obscured that. No line of sight. No way to tell. They might have assumed he cast a flame-suppressing charm from within. Unusual, but not impossible. No one would suspect he entered her mind. And no one would mistake his gesture as softness. The smoke would've covered that. Had to have.

All they saw was this: Severus Snape, striding into the fire. And then catching a student as she fell.

He could work with that.

Except… Dumbledore.

He didn't move his head, but his gaze flicked up.

The old man was watching him with that same maddening serenity — the kind that meant he knew exactly what had happened, even if he hadn't seen a thing. Severus could feel the knowledge radiating off him like heat. He wondered, just for a bitter moment, if Dumbledore had felt the violation. The act of it. The raw, unrepentant force of Legilimency in its most brutal form — not for interrogation, not for cruelty — but for rescue.

The kind of thing that was still a crime—a forced intrusion, without consent, into a student's mind. Illegal. Inexcusable. Especially against a child.

But necessary.

His eyes dropped back to her. Her brow twitched. Her breath hitched in uneven bursts. She looked peaceful now, but he knew better. She had been screaming when he entered her thoughts.

He shifted.

He could not linger here. He was not a savior. This was not a display. The last thing he needed was Flitwick choking out some well-meaning nonsense or, Merlin forbid, Dumbledore making this into a lesson. His reputation was built on shadow and silence. Not sentiment. He would not sully it here.

But no one else could touch her. Not yet. Her magic still vibrated faintly in the air around her—invisible, but hot, wild. Instinctive.

So he stood. Wordless.

The movement drew the eyes of the others. His robes, still singed at the edges, flared behind him as he gathered her up, her small frame limp in the crook of his arm. She was feather-light, her body falling naturally into his hold. A curl of hair stuck to her cheek with sweat. Her wand, long since blasted out of her grip, was nowhere to be seen. Her magic had likely flung it across the Hall.

He'd retrieve it later. Or not.

Flitwick stepped forward, stammering, "Severus, is she—"

Snape didn't even glance at him. The look he gave in passing could have withered ivy.

"She's stable."

He stalked through the remaining professors like a blade cutting through fog. The staff parted like the Red Sea. Vector stepped aside so quickly she nearly stumbled. McGonagall exchanged a glance with Sprout. Hooch looked uneasy. Sinistra looked pale. Dumbledore was the only one who remained maddeningly unmoved, his gaze steady behind those blasted half-moon glasses.

Severus turned without a word, black robes swirling behind him like smoke. He walked — not fast, not slow — straight down the aisle between the Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw tables, Elara tucked against him. His steps echoed in the hall like a metronome, sharp and sure.

He didn't break stride.

Let them look.

Let them wonder.

Let them whisper later in staff meetings or scribble careful little notes in that damned record Dumbledore kept of every student's "unusual magical events."

The rumors would spread. They always did, but he remained as impassive as stone.

What do I care of the whispers of old men and the gossip of children. Let it fill the halls. I don't need to explain myself. Not to them. Not to anyone.

And anyone who knew Severus Snape, knew better than to say it in front of him.

He climbed the stairs to the Hospital Wing in grim silence. His boots echoed. Elara didn't stir.

He glanced down at her with narrowed eyes.

Inconvenient, he thought acidly, though his movements were precise. Disruptive. Dangerous.

She was dangerous. Not in the way most dangerous students were. Not loud, not arrogant. She moved like a whisper and left ruin in her wake.

When he reached the door, he shouldered it open without knocking.

"Poppy," he barked.

Madam Pomfrey appeared from behind a curtain, brows rising. "Heavens, Severus—what—"

"A magical outburst. Severe exhaustion. She needs Dreamless Sleep, immediately." He laid her down on the nearest bed, adjusting her head with more care than he meant to show. "No visitors. And under no circumstances is she to be questioned until further notice."

He listed it all like a potion recipe, clinical and exact. His voice was clipped, offering just enough information to be useful without inviting questions.

He did not mention the fire.
He did not mention the Legilimency.
He did not mention that he had violated her mind with all the gentleness of a battering ram.

Pomfrey opened her mouth, but his glare cut her short. She nodded.

"Very well."

Snape turned to go, then paused. From his robes, he pulled a pair of vials—soft violet and cloudy blue.

"For the mind. She'll need both."

And then he left.

No parting glance. No lingering sigh. Just the swish of robes and the echo of footsteps.

The door to the Hospital Wing clicked shut behind him.

He did not linger.

His steps were sharp, precise, echoing off the stone in crisp defiance of the chaos that had just unfolded. The shadows clung tighter the farther he walked from the light. With each turn of the corridor, with each hiss of torchlight against his boots, he layered the mask back on.

Snape. The cold, cruel bastard of the dungeons. The one who didn't blink at fear. Didn't soften. Didn't burn.

The one who didn't kneel in flames.

He descended into the dungeons like a wraith, robes billowing, heat still ghosting across his skin like a fever dream. He could smell it—smoke, ash, the phantom tang of her magic, like ozone and damp earth.

Inconvenient.

His fingers flexed at his sides.

And then he paused.

His office door was ajar.

Which was, in and of itself, unacceptable.

He stepped inside with the kind of measured slowness that suggested whoever had breached his sanctuary was already on the verge of deeply regretting it.

The fire was lit.

The torches flickered.

And Albus Dumbledore sat in the chair across from his desk like he belonged there.

Severus stopped, only a fraction into the room, and let the door swing shut behind him with a definitive click.

"Not often I find you without an acid retort, Severus," Dumbledore murmured, folding his hands in his lap. His tone was light. Conversational. As if they weren't about to tread dangerous ground.

Snape said nothing.

He walked around his desk, slow and deliberate, eyes never leaving the old man. Then, without a word, he conjured a tumbler and poured himself two fingers of firewhiskey from the glass decanter near the edge of the bookshelf. He didn't sit. He downed it in a single practiced movement.

The burn was immediate.

Good.

Dumbledore waited, ever-patient.

Snape stared at the glass for a moment, then set it down too carefully. His hands, he noticed, were still faintly shaking.

"You're trespassing."

Dumbledore turned, slow and infuriatingly calm. "I'm visiting."

Snape shot him a glare sharp enough to curdle milk.

Dumbledore, naturally, ignored it.

"You could have let Pomfrey handle her," Dumbledore said softly.

"I did," Snape replied, voice low and clipped. "Eventually."

"You could have let someone else put the fire out."

Snape's eyes flicked up sharply.

"I was the closest," he snapped.

"You were not."

Silence. Heavy. Absolute.

Dumbledore did not press further.

Snape sat at last, slowly, lowering himself into the chair like gravity had turned personal. He folded his hands. Tensed his jaw. Leaned back like he had nothing to hide, even as the remnants of soot clung to his cuffs.

Dumbledore's gaze was steady. That infuriating, knowing sort of gaze. The kind that didn't judge. Just… understood.

Snape hated it more than actual condemnation.

"If you've come to report me for breaking the law, kindly do it and leave."

"I've come to speak," Dumbledore replied, "not to reprimand."

Snape scoffed.

Dumbledore studied him a moment. "It wasn't cruel, what you did."

"I invaded her mind," Snape said flatly. "It was forceful. It was unauthorized. And I did not ask permission."

"You saved her."

"I broke her."

"She was already breaking."

That silenced him.

The fire popped softly behind them.

Dumbledore's voice dropped. "What did you see?"

Snape exhaled through his nose. Long. Controlled. He did not answer.

Not at first.

Finally, "Fire. Screaming. A house. A child's mind full of memory that does not belong in any child's mind."

"And you called her back."

Snape looked away. His expression was unreadable, carved from something colder than stone. "She would not have heard anyone else."

"Why you, then?" Dumbledore asked, voice mild.

That, for some reason, set Snape on edge.

"I don't know," he muttered. "She doesn't know me. She's known me four days."

"But she looked at you."

Snape stiffened.

"Since the sorting," Dumbledore went on gently, "she's been watching you nearly as often as you've been watching her."

"I was not—"

"Watching her?" Dumbledore tilted his head. "Studying her like a volatile potion? One misstep from explosion?"

Snape's lips thinned.

"She unsettles you," Dumbledore continued. "That magic, Severus. It wasn't just accidental. It was wild. Ancient. I haven't felt anything like that since…"

He trailed off. Snape didn't ask.

"She trusts instinct more than instruction. That will be… difficult to teach." Dumbledore said.

"She doesn't need teaching," Snape bit out. "She needs containment."

Dumbledore hummed. "You mean she needs protection."

Snape flinched like the word had struck a nerve.

"She's eleven," the old man added softly. "And she's already afraid of herself."

Snape said nothing.

Dumbledore gave him a long look, then stood. "You caught her," he said, almost lightly. "After you brought her back. You held her."

Snape's gaze snapped up.

"Is that your point?" he said coldly. "That I displayed… affection?"

"No. My point is that you didn't let her fall."

A pause.

A long one.

Then—

"She was already falling," Snape murmured, so quietly it could've been a thought.

Dumbledore nodded, then turned toward the door. But he paused in the frame.

"She'll come to you again," he said. "You know that, don't you?"

"I'm not her confidant," Snape hissed. "I'm not her protector. I am not some—some emotionally available—" He gestured, searching for the right slur. "Hufflepuff-sympathizer."

"No," Dumbledore said, almost fondly. "But she's a puzzle. And you do love puzzles."

The silence stretched again.

Then, a final thought. Bitter. Bone-deep.

"She's going to be a problem," he said.

Dumbledore gave the faintest smile.

"So were you."

The door clicked behind him.

Snape sat in stillness for a long time after that. The fire crackled. The silence pressed in. And the echo of her mind, of her scream, of the heat that did not burn him, lingered like a curse.

Eventually, he poured another glass.

This time, he didn't down it. Just stared into the amber depths, as if the answer might be hidden in the sediment.

As if she were a potion he could brew if only he knew the ingredients.

He returned later.

Not immediately. That would be suspicious. But near midnight, when the castle had gone still and even the portraits had turned in for the night.

He didn't enter with noise. Just the soft creak of the door, the hush of robes against stone.

She lay in the same position. Someone—Pomfrey, likely—had cleaned the soot from her face and tucked her under a blanket. She looked younger now. Too young.

Snape stood at the foot of her bed. Arms crossed, lips pressed into a line. He said nothing.

Her fingers twitched again. A dream.

He should leave.

Instead, he moved closer.

Stared.

His eyes traced her features like puzzle pieces. The crease between her brows. The faint scar near her temple. Her magic buzzed beneath the surface even now, golden and strange. A force of nature masquerading as a first-year.

What are you, he thought again.

She shifted slightly in her sleep. A small sound escaped her lips—not quite a whimper, but close.

His expression changed. Not softened. Never that. But it... shifted.

He reached forward.

A hand hovered above the blanket.

And then, with fingers precise and nearly imperceptible, he adjusted it. Tucked the edge of the blanket just slightly over her shoulder.

The gesture vanished as quickly as it came.

He then turned, cloak billowing behind him, and vanished into the night.

September 6th, 1991 - Day 5 of classes

The castle was still, and the dawn light filtering through the stained-glass windows did nothing to warm the dungeon corridors. Even the portraits had the good sense to keep their mouths shut when Severus stalked past. But the silence, for once, did not comfort him.

Snape's boots struck the stone steps with a slow, measured cadence as he ascended from the dungeons toward the Hospital Wing. He had not slept. He'd barely moved from his desk all night—save for a single moment when he nearly hurled the inkwell across the room. A rare show of temper. Fortunately, he'd caught himself before the impulse could manifest into something more physical. He had no excuse for tantrums.

Five days. Five days since she arrived. Five days since the Sorting Hat nearly had a seizure on her head, spilling riddles and cryptic prophecy into the Great Hall. Five days since he'd first sensed that peculiar undercurrent—an anomaly.

Five days of watching, measuring, second-guessing himself into a corner.

He had told himself—repeatedly, with increasing venom—that she was simply a child. That his instincts were overreacting. That he was projecting old ghosts onto a girl who, by all logical measure, should be utterly unremarkable. And he had almost convinced himself. Almost managed to chalk it all up to his usual flavor of cynicism. A product of too many years playing double agent, seeing daggers behind every smile, weapons in every wand.

Five days waging quiet war with his own mind—ripping apart the pieces of what little he knew about Elara Willow and holding them up to the light like ingredients in a potion gone horribly wrong. Just a girl. Eleven years old. Polite. Soft-spoken. Forgettable. Respectful. Muggle-raised. Hufflepuff. Friend of Potter's band of idiots. Introspective. Observant. Quiet.

Too quiet.

"Just a child," he muttered under his breath, bitter as wormwood. "Just a girl…"

His jaw locked.

She was not just a girl.

She was a threat.

No. Not even that. She was an unknown. A volatile, unpredictable force wrapped in eleven years of softness and confusion.

Five days. Five days trying to decide if he was overly paranoid—or merely correct ahead of schedule. Five days trying to convince himself he was simply being overly cautious, that his instincts—honed by years of deception, danger, and war—were simply misfiring.

He'd watched her carefully, noted the flashes of brilliance and the odd hesitations. The way she felt things too deeply, too sharply, and how her magic responded to her like a dog to a whistle—eager, raw, and wholly untrained. And yet… he had told himself it was coincidence. Immaturity. An unusual wand pairing. Nothing more.

Then she'd gone and blown up the bloody Hufflepuff table.

Snape's fingers twitched at his side. His scowl deepened.

"'Just a child,'" he muttered under his breath in a scoff, "Right. And I'm the bloody Tooth Fairy."

She wasn't just a child. She was unrefined. Untrained.

And now? She was unconscious in the Hospital Wing. Still. A full night later.

"Unacceptable," he spat, the word laced venomous irritation.

Not because he feared for her health, of course, but because—if her mind had fractured under the weight of what he'd done—of what he'd seen—he needed to know. Quickly. Before someone else did. Before she remembered enough to start asking questions. Or worse—talking.

No one could know he'd used Legilimency. Especially on a child. Without consent, it was more than illegal—it was a kind of assault. Magical, yes. Mental, certainly. But no less invasive. No less condemnable.

If word got out—if she told anyone—

His career. His reputation. His life...

He'd violated her mind, her privacy, her personhood, and if she spoke of it to the wrong person…

Not the Legilimency, perhaps—few eleven-year-olds understood the mechanics of mind magic. But the feel of it. The intimacy. She might tell someone. Whisper to a friend about how the icy Potions Master had held her like a father, had murmured her name like it was something sacred. How he'd spoken gently. Pressed his forehead to hers like some… some Gryffindor dunderhead in a romance novel.

And then what?

Snape pinched the bridge of his nose and let out a slow, shuddering breath.

He had called her by her name. Not Willow. Not girl. Her name.

The thought made his stomach twist.

He had been soft in that moment inside her head. It was revolting.

He wasn't even sure which fate he feared more—that she'd report him and have him thrown into Azkaban for violation… or that she'd believe that moment meant something. That she'd tell others he'd been kind.

He could already hear it: "Professor Snape was gentle with me."
He nearly gagged.

If she remembered...

Snape's jaw locked.

He had told Pomfrey—firmly—that Elara Willow was not to be disturbed. No visitors. No questions. No exceptions. Not even her precious Hufflepuff den-mates.

He'd spun some story about her magical exhaustion being uniquely volatile. About needing rest. Containment. Observation. It wasn't a lie.

But it wasn't the truth either.

The truth was, he couldn't risk anyone getting close enough to ask, "What happened?"

He especially couldn't risk her saying his name with anything resembling softness.

He wanted to scrub the memory from his own mind.

"Elara," he had whispered.

Reckless. Weak. Sentimental.

But necessary.

Because it had worked.

She had listened.

She had come back.

But regardless, he, Severus Snape, dark wizard, murderer, traitor and spy, had done something he had no explanation for.

He had spoken to her.

Not with cruelty. Not with control.

But softly.
He had said her name.

He had pressed his forehead to hers.

He had held her.

He had caught her.

He had carried her.

And he had not let go.

His fists clenched in his sleeves.

What in Merlin's name was wrong with him?

It wasn't compassion. It couldn't be. Not for a student. Not for her.

He didn't do softness. He didn't feel tenderness. He didn't comfort.

He was not Albus.

And yet… the image of her in his arms had refused to fade. Fragile. Cold. Magic flickering around her like smoke after a storm.

As he descended the last staircase to the infirmary, a deeper thought slithered in, unbidden.

Why save her at all?

He could've walked away. Let it burn. Let her burn. The castle would've survived.

He scowled.

Because no one else would've done it properly, he snapped inwardly. Because I couldn't allow a wild magical event to claim a student on my watch. Because if she's dangerous, then I need to know how and why—and you can't study ashes.

But a whisper trailed behind the logic.

Because she looked at you like she knew.
Because when her mind opened to you, it wasn't just fire—it was fear.
And you recognized it.

He shut that thought out as quickly as it came.

It would be easier if she remembered nothing.

It would be safest if she never woke at all.

And the thing was? It was possible. Probable even.

You entered the mind of a child. Not just entered—forced. Violated it.

Legilimency—true Legilimency—was not without risk. Especially on young minds. He had torn her from a spiral with sheer will and magic. Had forced his way in, forced her out. If she had resisted, if he had mis-stepped, if he had applied too much pressure…

He could have shattered her.

And he didn't know if he had.

He wouldn't until she woke up.

If she woke up.

Or if I broke her.

The thought settled in his stomach like ice.

He couldn't say which possibility was worse.

If she was fractured, it was his fault. His crime.

If she wasn't, she could talk.

So he couldn't allow anyone to speak to her. Not yet. Not until he knew if she remembered. If she was intact.

Hence the orders: No visitors. No questions. He would assess the damage before anyone else touched her.

At the end of the corridor, he heard voices. Low. One of them—far too large for this space, even when quiet—was unmistakably Hagrid.

Oh, wonderful.

Snape stepped into the threshold, dark eyes already sharp.

Hagrid stood hunched near Elara's bed, his large frame turned to Madam Pomfrey, who looked exasperated but sympathetic.

"She's jus' a little girl," Hagrid was saying, his voice thick with emotion. "Yeh can't keep me away from her—yeh can't, Poppy. I've known her since she was smaller'n a Puffskein—"

"Rubeus," Pomfrey said, holding up a hand. "It's not my decision. Professor Snape gave the orders, and for once, I happen to agree with them. She needs rest. No questions, no visitors. You'll only upset her further if she wakes."

Of course Hagrid had come. The man had all the subtlety of a hippogriff in a tea shop.

"I'll just stay by the door, then," Hagrid was saying, pleading. "Won't even talk to her. Jus' wanna see she's breathin', is all."

Pomfrey looked as though she wanted to relent.

Snape did not.

"Absolutely not," he said sharply, his voice slicing through the corridor like a blade.

Hagrid turned, startled.

"Professor Snape—sir—I wasn't—"

"You were disobeying a direct medical order," Snape snapped. "She is not to have visitors."

Hagrid flinched, just slightly, and Snape saw it. Damn it. He was tired. He had spent half the night pacing in his chambers, the other half replaying every moment in her mindscape like a fever dream.

"She's not to be questioned. Not to be touched. Not to bedisturbed, under any circumstances." He leveled a glare at Pomfrey too, just in case she was considering bending the rules. Snape kept his voice calm. Calculated. "She is under observation. Until I determine she is stable—magically and mentally—no one will interfere."

"She's my daughter," Hagrid growled.

Snape blinked once. Slowly.

A beat of silence passed.

"Not by blood," Hagrid muttered, deflated now. "But it don't matter. I raised her. Took care of her. Brought her here."

Snape's gaze flicked to the bed. Elara lay deathly still, her face pale against the white pillows, the flicker of the morning light catching in her hair like stray gold threads.

He remembered the moment she'd called Hagrid "Papa." How the entire Great Hall had stopped breathing.

That had been the first time Snape had truly taken notice of her in all her complexity.

Something that didn't fit.

"She's not well," Snape said, voice low. "Her outburst may have fractured something internal. Until I know more, she is to remain in isolation."

"An' how long d'you plan to keep her caged up like a prisoner?"

"As long as necessary," Snape said, turning to meet Hagrid's glare evenly.

Hagrid looked lost. Hurt. A bear of a man slowly realizing he couldn't protect his cub.

Snape exhaled slowly and added, voice quieter now, "She's… unstable. Magical trauma. If she wakes too soon, it could trigger another incident. I won't risk it."

The lie slid off his tongue like silk.

The two stared each other down—opposite forces. Fire and stone. Heart and logic.

Snape could tell—Hagrid wanted to argue. But something in Snape's expression must have registered. Something unyielding. Unspoken.

Hagrid looked away.

"I'll be back," he muttered, brushing Elara's hair once with a trembling hand. "Yeh tell her I was here, when she wakes. D'you hear me, Snape?"

Snape didn't answer.

Hagrid left. The door clicked shut behind him like a lock sliding into place.

Snape stood over Elara's bed, arms folded, jaw tight.

He hated this.

He hated that he couldn't tell if her silence was a mercy or a threat.

He moved to the side of her bed, and studied her intently. "What thehellare you?" he whispered.

A threat?

A victim?

A puzzle.

Just a puzzle.

And he did not get attached to puzzles.

Snape stared down at her, eyes narrowed, mask in place and pressed tight to his bones.

His secrets would remain his own.

As for hers?

He would find answers. One way or another.

But first, she had to wake up.

And he had to decide who he would be when she did.