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Welkin in the Wizarding World (COMPLETED)	By : welkin_cooper Category: HP Canon Characters paired with Original Characters > Het - Male/Female Views: 14600 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 2
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or any of the characters in it. I don't benefit financially from the production or display of this work of fanfiction in any way.

Chapter List
- 8
- 9
- 10
Chapter 9 - A Very Brief Engagement

Welkin tells Dumbledore her theory of how she came to be at Hogwarts. Hermione takes Welkin on a shopping expedition to Hogsmeade, in search of a wedding gown. Welkin tries to remain chaste until the wedding.

"Is it true, Miss Cooper?"

Hermione was the first of the Hogwarts students who dared to approach her and ask directly. It was opening day of the term at the school, and talk had been swiftly circulating that the unthinkable had happened. Hell had frozen over, and Professor Snape was taking a bride.

"Is what true, Hermione? And it’s Welkin, remember?"

"Is it true that you and Professor Snape are going to be married?"

"Well, I guess it had better be true. Otherwise, I think I’ll have to give this ring back."

Welkin held out her left hand, where on the third finger there now resided a sparkling emerald and diamond engagement ring. The large emerald-cut stone in the center was flanked by two circular diamonds, set on a band embellished with art nouveau-style floral designs at the sides. Welkin had fussed at Severus for spending too much, but she did so love the ring, with its antique look. Still, on a teacher’s salary, she realized that it was a definite extravagance.

"Oh, it’s beautiful!" Hermione exclaimed. "Is the wedding soon?" Hermione had already heard rumors that the nuptials were being rushed, and wanted to confirm them.

"Necessity apparently dictates, sooner than I would have anticipated," Welkin said. Or wanted, she thought to herself, but didn't express that part to Hermione. "Otherwise, the delightful people at your Ministry of Magic are poised to give me the old heave-ho, and toss my happy ass out of here. It’s Monday, here at Hogwarts, in the Great Hall. I would have preferred something a little more simple, but…"

"It’s tradition," Hermione finished for her.

"Yes, so I’m told by Minerva. She’s a very persistent woman," Welkin said, choosing her words carefully in front of one of Minerva’s students. "How I’m supposed to find a wedding dress that soon, I have no idea."

"Classes don’t actually start until day after tomorrow. I could take you to Hogsmeade tomorrow," Hermione offered, a little too eagerly. "I’m sure you could find something there."

"Could you? That would be fantastic!"

This would save her from having to spend more ‘girl time’ with Minerva, an activity that wasn’t currently high on Welkin’s list of fun and frivolous things to do.

"We can go after breakfast. It’s going to be such a lovely wedding," Hermione sighed, sounding uncharacteristically romantic for a girl with such an academic bent. At least, Welkin thought so. The girl seemed to be going all mushy at the thought of the wedding. Perhaps it was fueling her fantasies about Ron Weasley, who seemed to be thick to the fact that Hermione had eyes for him, even though Welkin had noticed her interest in him right away.

"Miss Granger." Professor Snape called to her, diverting her from her companions. "I understand that you are accompanying Miss Cooper into Hogsmeade this morning."

"Yes, sir. I am."

"I would like you to take this." He handed her a black velvet pouch. "See to it that she gets whatever she desires. Anything that she desires," he emphasized. "Should more payment be required, I am sure that my credit is good at any establishment in Hogsmeade. Simply mention my name."

Snape strode away quickly without waiting for her assurance that it would be done as he wished.

"What did he want?" Ron asked, when she rejoined him and Harry.

"He wanted to make sure that Welkin gets ‘anything that she desires’, and he gave me this," Hermione said, handing Ron the pouch to examine.

Ron opened it and gulped. "It’s full of gold Galleons!"

"Don’t you have anything a little less…umm…virginal?" Welkin asked, after rejecting the first six gowns she’d been shown, without even bothering to try them on. "Maybe, something in an off-white?"

Hermione raised an eyebrow at Ginny Weasley and Luna Lovegood, who had both tagged along for supposed moral support, but were actually just curious about this Muggle woman. What sort of person was so willing to sacrifice herself in marriage to the sarcastic, and somewhat sinister, head of Slytherin House?

The saleswoman scurried away in search of a more suitable selection for ‘Madame’.

Welkin hated places where they called you Madame, and lied through their teeth about how gorgeous you looked in everything. This establishment was the only one in town that offered bridal apparel, however, so she didn’t have any choice in the matter, pretty much like everything else in her life lately.

Ginny’s choice at that moment was to ask a very awkward question. "So, you and Professor Snape have…done it, then?"

"Ginny!" Hermione frowned at her.

Thankfully, Welkin found very few personal questions awkward.

"Well, of course we have. Don’t be silly," Welkin responded frankly, as she examined some strange looking items on the shelves.

"Are you pregnant?" Ginny blurted out the question for them all.

"Good Lord, no," Welkin laughed. "It’s an entirely different kind of a shotgun wedding than that. Thank heavens for that pregnancy protection charm."

"But, there isn’t…" Hermione poked Ginny in the ribs with her elbow to shut her up.

"But, there’s no such thing as a charm for protection against pregnancy," Ginny whispered, as Welkin walked away to explore the shelves on the far side of the store. "Do you think Professor Snape lied to her?"

"That’s none of our business, Ginny," Hermione said emphatically.

At that moment, the saleswoman returned. "We do have this lovely antique-white satin gown, Madame, although it’s a bit less modern than some of our other selections."

"I’m marrying a man who writes with a quill pen, and dresses like Jack the Ripper most of the time. He's like something straight out of a Victorian novel. Something a little more vintage would be entirely appropriate," Welkin assured her.

The girls all giggled at Welkin’s description of her intended, Professor Snape, as a man out-of-step with contemporary fashion.

Welkin turned to look at the gown and old-fashioned wedding veil the saleswoman was holding, and broke into a smile. "That’s it. That’s my dress," she announced. "Where can I try it on?"

"No, you can’t see the dress," Welkin told Snape. "Not until the wedding. It’s bad luck."

She was, at last, getting a tour of Snape’s dwelling quarters in the dungeon area of the castle, where she would be residing with him after Monday’s ceremony. The massive, wooden canopied four-poster bed was very much to her liking, and her fertile little imagination began picturing any number of activities that might be undertaken in it.

"Would you like to try it out?" Snape read her mind without the need for Legilimency, as he watched her running her fingers over the intricate carvings in the dark wood of the footboard. He gathered her into his arms in eager anticipation.

"No. No more sex, until after we’re married. I want our wedding night to be special," Welkin demurred.

Snape crushed her against himself, and attempted to kiss her, confident that she would soon change her mind, as she always did.

"I said no," Welkin insisted, shoving at him. "I mean it this time. Calm yourself down!"

"But, that’s six days," Snape said in protest, finally surmising that Welkin did, indeed, mean no.

"Don’t sound so aggrieved," she told him. "I’m going without sex too, you know. It’s not all about you. It can be done. We just have to have a little self-restraint. You’re very good at that, remember?"

Snape scowled at her. He did not want to be good at it, in this circumstance. Why had she asked to see his bedchamber, if she had no intention of allowing him access to her?

"It will be worth the wait Monday night," Welkin purred a promise at him, as he continued to scowl at her, like a child whose favorite toy had been locked away from him.

Professor Snape’s students had been looking forward to a new, improved version of Snape when classes began Wednesday, owing to his impending marriage. What they got instead was Snape at his worst - sarcastic, arrogant and overly-exacting, demanding perfection, and heaping ridicule upon the students who failed to live up to his unrealistic expectations. Even Draco, his favorite, and other members of Slytherin House, seemed to annoy him.

By Thursday, both Snape and Welkin were demonstrably out of sorts, sparring verbally with each other at meals in the Great Hall, and other public venues all over the Hogwarts campus. The Weasley twins began to take bets on whether their nuptials would actually take place as scheduled.

By Friday, Snape had assigned so many of his students to detention, that there was a long waiting list. He was sitting in his office, morosely going over the lesson plan for his next class of intermediate level dunderheads, when there was a brief knock, before Welkin barged in.

Her lips pursed in an uncharacteristic frown, she flung herself dramatically into the chair nearest his desk, and cursed. "Damn it all to hell!"

Snape looked at her quizzically, knowing he needn’t bother to ask.

"I just told Albus Dumbledore to fuck off," she announced.

Snape’s eyebrows rose higher.

"I’m beginning to think that I might have made a rather spectacular mistake about the no sex before the wedding decision," she begrudgingly admitted. "I don’t know about you, but I can’t concentrate, I’m crabby to everybody, and is it my imagination, or is every other object at this school shaped like a huge phallus? And now, I’ve told poor Albus to fuck off, just because I'm horny and in a bad mood."

"This was one of your more spectacular mistakes, in a lengthening list," Snape confirmed.

Welkin ignored the insult.

"Okay then, here’s the new game plan. No intercourse until the wedding night, but anything else is fair game. How’s that sound to you?" Welkin bargained.

"Like an offer I cannot, and will not, refuse," Snape said, rising to his feet quickly, before she had time to change that mercurial mind of hers. "We have precisely thirty-three minutes until my next class. Shall we go to the bedchamber?"

"No time," Welkin said, flinging herself at him, her arms wrapped around his neck, her legs around his waist. "Oh, God, we’re pathetic! We couldn’t even last three days!"

"I can’t believe he gave Malfoy detention," Harry whispered to Ron and Hermione.

"There’s practically no one left who he didn’t give detention to, the three of us included," Hermione sighed.

Snape’s Potions class students sat glumly awaiting their professor, when suddenly, the muffled sound of breaking glass came from behind the door of Snape’s office, quickly followed by the sound of a female voice, seemingly in some form of distress. "Oh…oh…OH…OH…YES!" The loud affirmation was repeated at least five more times, each time punctuated by a slightly quieter, unmistakably masculine groan, before silence finally resumed.

A nervous sniggering rippled through the boys in the class, until the girls killed it with their looks of annoyance.

All eyes were quietly glued on the office door when, several minutes later, Welkin Cooper opened it, her back to them, and paused in the doorway. "I’ll see you later, Sweetie," she called out affectionately.

Sweetie? Harry and Ron looked at one another and grinned, not daring to laugh out loud, however, since the door was still open, and Snape might hear them.

"Sorry about the glass jar with the floating thing," Welkin apologized, not exactly sure what it had been. "I hope it wasn’t something irreplaceable." She turned towards them as she closed the door, looking a little flushed, but also somehow serene. "Oh, you're all a little early, aren't you?" she asked, glancing at the wall clock. "It’s a lovely day, isn’t it?" Welkin smiled, sashaying towards the classroom door, behaving for all the world like they hadn’t heard what they’d all just heard. She stopped at Draco Malfoy’s desk. "I never got a chance to thank you, Draco, for…you know…helping me in the library." She bent to kiss him on the cheek, as his friends gaped. "Got to go! Everybody have fun." She grinned, making her escape.

"Way to go, Malfoy!" His seatmates pounded him on the back, as if he’d just executed some particularly desirable conquest, although they had no idea what Welkin had been referring to.

At that moment, Professor Snape emerged from his office, looked a little startled at seeing them there too, and also glanced at the wall clock, as Welkin had, before slinking quickly to his desk.

Snape cleared his throat. "Before we begin today, I would like to announce that the detentions received yesterday are rescinded." He hurried over the last word, glared at them as if daring them to snicker even once, and ordered them to open their books to page 267, once again assuming the mask of the imperious Potions Master.

Albus Dumbledore was at a table in the Hufflepuff common room, having a spot of tea, when Welkin suddenly appeared at his elbow.

“How did you manage to acquire the password this time, Welkin?” Dumbledore asked.

“Oh, I just know some people,” she said nebulously. “Professor, I just want to apologize to you for being so rude earlier, when I told you to…" She hesitated, searching for a more polite way to put it.

"Fuck off, was what you suggested that I do, I believe." Dumbledore took a sip after blowing on his tea to cool it slightly, and regarded her with amusement. "Sit down. Would you like a cup of tea, my dear?"

"Sure, why not?" She sat down next to him, and accepted the cup he presented to her, blowing on it and taking a sip. "Sassafras?" she asked.

"Yes. You have had it before?"

"A long time ago. My mother used to make it."

"As did mine."

They were both silent for a bit.

"Professor," Welkin finally began. "Do you really not know how I got here?"

"Do you think that I know something that I’m not telling you?"

He had answered her question with a question, something he had been prone to do with her from the beginning. It had occurred to Welkin recently that the technique would be very useful, if you wished to evade giving an answer, since the conversation could always go in circles, with no real conclusions ever being reached.

"Yes. I’ve always felt like that with you. But I think I know the answer now. I've figured it out."

"What is it that you know?" He did it again.

"I think that you brought me here. You blocked the Obliviate Charm somehow, and I think you maneuvered Severus and me together, assuming that what did happen would happen. Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad that you did, but I’d still like to know why you did it."

"That, I cannot tell you."

"Then, you admit that it’s true? You brought me here, for Severus."

Albus smiled. "Welkin, did you ever know that something was most probably destined to happen, yet wished that you might somehow be able to intervene? Wished that you could do something that might circumvent it from happening?"

"Of course, everybody feels that way about something, at some point in their lives, I think."

"Your love for Severus - can it withstand anything?" he asked, gazing at her seriously with his clear, pale blue eyes. "Will it stand firm and endure at all times in the future, should he have need of you? Will it do so, even if all others forsake him?"

"It will stand against the very Gates of Hell! That, I can promise you," Welkin said fiercely. Welkin felt a chill of foreboding at the direction their conversation had taken.

"Interesting choice of words," Dumbledore said.

You may very well be asked to do exactly what you have pledged this day, Albus thought, taking another sip of tea. All in all, Welkin Cooper was proving to be an excellent choice in his personal bid to change the future that he saw looming ahead for Severus Snape.

Professor Snape finally dismissed class, after keeping them all thirty minutes past time. It was a punishment, they suspected, for their inadvertent eavesdropping on his private session with Welkin.

"Ex-cept…" he announced, "Miss Granger, Miss Lovegood, Miss Weasley, Mr. Potter, Mr. Malfoy, and Mr. Weasley. You will each stay."

What now? Harry thought, groaning inwardly. Was he reinstating their detention, for some perverse reason only he was privy to? It would be so typical of him.

"You are aware, of course, of the wedding ceremony which is to take place on Monday." Snape hesitated, still finding it a little hard to believe that he actually was getting married, then continued his explanation of why he had kept them after class. "Miss Cooper, my bride, has expressed to me that she would like to have each of you as an attendant at the ceremony. Although I would not necessarily have chosen some of you myself…" He looked pointedly at Harry. "I would like to see her wishes respected, and I would urge you each to consider your future in my class, should you choose to refuse her request," he said, his eyes narrowing ominously.

"You don’t have to threaten us," Harry said, with barely controlled anger. "We like Welkin. Of course, we’ll do it for her." His not-so-subtle inflections let Snape know that his wishes on the matter didn’t figure into the equation at all, since obviously nobody liked him.

The girls were much more enthusiastic than the boys, talking excitedly among themselves at the prospect of being bridesmaids. "But, Professor Snape, what will we wear?" Ginny asked at last.

"The proper accoutrements will be provided," Snape said curtly. "You will present yourselves for fitting in the Headmaster’s office tomorrow morning, immediately after breakfast. There will be no dawdling," he warned, looking at Ron.

"What? I’m always on time," Ron protested.

Snape turned on his heel and left them standing there, as he retreated once again into the dark recesses of his office.
- 8
- 9
- 10
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Welkin in the Wizarding World (COMPLETED)

Chapter 9 - A Very Brief Engagement