Adult-FanFiction.org : Harry Potter

Vespertine	By : BrownRecluse Category: Harry Potter > Het - Male/Female > Snape/Hermione Views: 3610 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 2
Disclaimer: All characters and elements that comprise the wonderful world of Harry Potter belong to J. K. Rowling. I’m just borrowing them for a bit of non-profit fun. Also, I used to be known as BrownRecluse, but a name change was long overdue. ;D

Chapter List
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While London’s fog lifted, morning came late to the Highlands, dragging her feet and trailing her misty skirts through the mud. High in her new apartments, Minerva gazed out the turret’s long window over the grounds. Terrible weather for the workers; mortar wouldn’t set, varnish wouldn’t dry, and all that waterlogged wood was a nightmare in itself. She sighed. “I don’t care how many spells they would’ve used, today’s just not a good day for repairs inside or out.” As she scanned the battlements and the buildings below, great hulks of stone wrapped in fog and shadows, uneasiness crept upon her and seeped into her bones. “I can’t ever remember a spring so dank and dreary,” she said, rubbing her arms. Behind her on a nearby wall, a grey wizard snored in his throne chair.

“Damn the weather. If you ask me, the sooner you set the castle to rights, the better,” said a soft voice from higher on the wall. “Once word gets out, they won’t come back at all.” The honorable and extremely-late Headmaster Archibald MacNabb tipped his tricorne. “Dwarves are a superstitious lot.”

“You’re right, Archibald: I didn’t ask you.” She left the window and returned to the settee, but neither its cheery tartan throw nor her dining companion, who was just now rubbing her tongue with a corner of her shawl, could lift the fug that had settled over her. “What on earth are you doing, Sybill?”

“I feel like I’fth sthwallowed a cat.”

Minerva settled stiffly next to her. “I’m surprised you can feel at all.”

“That firewhiskey’s a deadly quaff. In my day, a real lady wouldn’t have touched the stuff.” MacNabb drew a lace handkerchief from his sleeve and dabbed a spot beneath his nose.

“It’th not the firewhithskey. I alwayth fell like thith after I’ve had a premonithion.” She took a sip of her tea, and then looked up at him. “Why wouldn’t they come back? Wath it something I thaid?”

“Archibald...” Minerva shook her head.

“You said that Professor McGonagall wasn’t the rightful Headmistress. Well, more or less.” He tittered behind his handkerchief. “I’ve been anticipating his response; we all have.” He waved at the portrait of Snape behind Minerva’s desk. “Still, there he sits, mute as a stone with a stare to match.”

“Not Headmistress?” Stricken, she gazed up at him.

“Not while the last one’s still at large. I’m no seer but I could’ve told you the same thing,” he said. “Don’t give me that look, Minerva. While she was diving deeper into her cups, it was all you and Hagrid talked about.” He settled into his throne chair with a flourish. We portraits like to listen as much as we like to talk,” He huffed. Then to his peers, he said, “But we see things, too, don’t we, friends?” Around him, former Heads of Hogwarts murmured in agreement.

“That’s enough, Archibald,” said Minerva.

“If what you’re saying is true, then where’s Severus? If he’s here—and alive—then why is he hiding from us?”

“Why have all the spirits gone? What makes the moon weep and blood run cold? When does a dragon supplant a doe?” Archibald smacked the chair arms so hard his gilt frame rattled. “Are you third eye-blind, woman?”

“Voldemort hexed him! Dark magic should die with its caster but his didn’t and now, Severus is out there, wounded and alone. We have to find him!” Sybill leapt from her seat and ran to the door. “Oh, I can’t wait to tell Mr. Filch the good news!”

“Find him? Yes and when you do, put a stake through his heart and seal his ashes in a silver urn,” Archibald said, although by then she had gone. “That act should seal your tenure too, Minerva.”

She glared up at him. “You have no proof.”

“Do you think we portraits—all of us, mind you, not just we here—were put up just for show? We watch and listen; and we’ve been watching Master Snape since he was a youth, watching him mix his special brew...”

“No, you mustn’t!” Helga Hufflepuff shrieked from the opposite wall. “We are bound by the wishes of the Headmaster! To break that vow—”

“A tincture of Asphodel and Aconite to quell the undead appetite. Isn’t that right, Sir?” He gnashed his teeth at Snape. “You see, he does not refute me: his very silence substantiates his guilt.”

“You’ve doomed us all.” Helga dissolved in tears. Ever chivalrous, Phineas Nigellus Black slipped into her frame to comfort her.

“Sybill’s predictions are often flawed. If they weren’t, over half our student body would be dead. She was simply overcome by grief. Tell them, Severus!” Minerva looked up at Snape, but when he continued to stare stonily into space, she turned to MacNabb. “You’re mad, all of you.”

“He knew.” Archibald stabbed a finger at Dumbledore. “The proof is in the Patronus.”

~~oOo~~

Argus Filch lay in his Infirmary bed. Eyes closed and still muzzy headed from his sedative, he listened to the gears click-click on the tower clock. Gears, because the old timepiece had lost its hands and much of its face in the skirmishes. While its metal heart stolidly counted down the day, turning the great wheels within wheels that formed its iron carapace, gusts of wind whistled through its broken spaces. One of these errant breezes now whispered to him.

Argus listened, letting it tickle the hair in his ears. It spoke comfort to him and then, shared a secret in a voice that was low and soft, and so familiar. Still caught between dreams and waking, Argus smiled; he nodded. And moments later, when Professor Trelawney burst into the room, he obeyed the wind in his dream and lay completely still. The wind had something it wanted to share with Sybill. It wasn’t a secret like the one it had just shared with him, but a gift—the kind that would keep on giving, regardless of the wishes of its recipient.

The wind’s gift, wrapped in a whiff of green smoke, was a single word. One that would make her go wherever the wind wanted her to go and know only what the wind wanted her to know.

Imperio.
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Vespertine