“Well, that went well,” Arielle said to break the silence that stretched in the room. She looked to her Papa and saw him still glaring at the place Dobby last stood at. She crawled over her bed on his lap and leaned against him, putting one of her hands on his chest as she snuggled her head under his chin. Fingers quickly came to play with her hair as his free hand hugged her closer to him.

“Do you know whose house-elf that was?” he asked her after a long pause. She shook her head and leaned back to see her Papa. She was a bit curious as to whose house-elf would like her so much that he would risk coming here to warn her.

“His master is Lucius Malfoy,” Severus told her quietly. She blinked up at him trying to put the name to someone she knew and then widened her eyes as she remembered Draco Malfoy. Draco Malfoy was in the same year as she was and apart from that accident on the grounds when they had their first Flying lesson, he never pulled his wand on her again. He only insulted her every time he saw her, but that was it. She learned to ignore his repeating insults over the course of the year and when it finally dawned on him that she simply didn’t care, he ignored her too. They had a quiet agreement to ignore each other as much as possible after that.

“Is he Draco’s father?” she asked her Papa curiously. After she received a small nod from him, she went on to ask something else, but her Papa interrupted her with a soft voice that she rarely heard come from his mouth.

“He was a friend of mine, before the Dark Lord was Vanquished.”

She blinked up at him and then it all made sense. Her Papa had told her of his involvement in the last war and about being a Death Eater. So, if this Lucius Malfoy was a friend of her Papa’s then that meant that he was a Death Eater as well. She looked up at him with a question in her eyes and he gave her a small nod. Biting her lip, she asked him quietly,

“Do you think that he sent Dobby here to prevent me going to Hogwarts?”

Severus Snape thought for a moment and relived the memory of the house-elf. Then he shook his head and said,

“No, I do not believe so. The house-elf has come on his own volition. He will have to punish himself for this.”

“Poor Dobby,” Arielle couldn’t help herself uttering. A small twitch of her Papa’s lips had her grinning at him and hugging him again. She really loved doing that. She felt him put her on his lap again as he stood up. She put her arms around his neck so that she wouldn’t fall off as he took her to the Living Room. The cottage they lived in was located in Cornwall and was only a few feet of the sea. She loved going there when it was warm enough to splash around in the water and on the occasions when Severus joined her as well he taught her how to swim – after she almost drowned (he threw her in for the fun of it) before she got a chance to tell him she couldn’t swim.

When they entered the Living Room she was greeted by various exclamations of “Happy Birthday, Elle!” and she was put on the floor so that she could run to her family to hug them senseless. First was Uncle Moony, who threw her in the air as always, and she giggled at the affections. She kissed him on the nose and he put her down so that she could go greet her Grandpa, Auntie Minerva and Uncle Filius.

After being thoroughly hugged and kissed, she went back to her Papa, who had settled himself on the armchair and sat on his lap. There was a small table in front of the armchair with lots of presents on it. Her eyes lit up when she saw them and remembered her first Birthday present. It was from her Papa and she loved the owl that he bought her. She still remembered how she bawled all over him for it. She leant back on her Papa’s chest and smiled as she felt his arms encircle her waist and his chin on her head.

The others sat around the small table as well. She was curious as to what she had gotten for her Birthday, but knew better than to just grab the presents and open them. After a moment’s pause, Uncle Moony picked up a small book-shaped package and passed it over to her with a small smile. She grinned at him and gently took the present from his hand. She opened it carefully, not wanting to tear the beautiful wrappings and discovered that it was a book. It was Latin to English and English to Latin Dictionary for Curious People, by Fennimore Glyn. She looked up to Uncle Moony with a curious expression. Reading her expression, he quickly explained,

“I thought that you would be interested to know from where most of our Latin spells are originated. Take Expelliarmus for example. Expello means to disarm in Latin and Armus means weapon. So there you have it.”

Her whole face lit up at that and she quickly listed through the book to find some more definitions. She put the book next to her after she had enough and grinned up at Uncle Moony.

“It’s wonderful! I’ll love reading it, I’m sure! I was always curious from where the spells come from! Maybe I’ll even be able to make my own spells one day!”

Her Papa shifted a bit at that and she wondered why, but forgot about it as Auntie Minerva put her present in her little fingers. It was another book. She grinned excitedly as she read the title, The Guide on Becoming Animagi, by Gus Aiman. She thanked her profusely and promised she would never try it out by herself. Next was Uncle Filius’s present. She giggled at the title of his present, Charming Charms for Charming Girls, by Madam Bettine. It was a book on make-up spells, like charming the finger-nails another colour, charming her hair to stay in place with a special hair-style, ever-fresh breath, and other charms. She shrieked in glee and jumped on her Grandpa’s lap as she saw what he had gotten her for her Birthday. It was a brand new Broomstick – Nimbus Two Thousand. It wasn’t as new as the Nimbus Two Thousand and One, but she didn’t care. She had her own Broomstick and she could fly all she wanted… under her Papa’s watch of course. She would never fly alone, as she hadn’t gotten to fly much.

After settling herself back on her Papa’s lap, she was given the last three packages from her friends. There was a box of sweets from Blaise, Sakura seeds from Neville, so that she could plant that Japanese Cherry Tree in their garden, and a small crystal figurine in the shape of a phoenix from Cedric.

She felt her Papa shift nervously then and turned around to face him. He was the only one that she hadn’t gotten a present from. She heard the others stand up and leave the two of them alone. She blinked at them in confusion. What was going on here? She turned back to her Papa, who had cleared his throat by then and opened her mouth to ask a question, but he put his fingers on it and she went silent before even starting on her question. She settled more comfortably on her Papa’s lap and watched as he tried to find the right words.

He was nervous, went through Arielle’s mind at that moment. She gave him an encouraging smile and put her arms around his neck again as she snuggled to him. His hands came around her as he hugged her back. She put her head on his shoulder as she waited for him to speak.

“Arielle?” he finally asked. She hummed softly to show that she was listening.

“Do you really see me as your father?”

She pulled back and blinked up at him. Where did that come from? She smiled at him anyway and said,

“Of course I do, silly. Why wouldn’t I? I mean, you took me under your care. You saved me from the Dursleys, you’re always there when I need you, and even when I don’t. You care about me, you do your best to teach me how to behave in the Wizarding World. Why wouldn’t I see you as my Papa?”

She was pulled in his hug again and she sighed in content. There was a small pause, in which Severus played with her hair as he gathered his courage up.

“Would you like to make it official?” he asked softly. She gasped and quickly looked up in his eyes to see if he was kidding. He was not. There was a serious look in his eyes. The most serious of all she had ever seen. She saw that he did mean it. She gave him a watery smile as she buried herself in his arms again as she whispered,

“Yes, I’d love that.”

She remembered the scene in the Mirror of Erised and smiled even more widely as she realized that one of her deepest desires of her heart was coming true. She looked up to him and with a big grin on her face told him.

“You know, I found a Mirror of Erised last year at Hogwarts.”

She saw him frown, as he didn’t quite understand where she was going with it.

“I think if I looked in the mirror now, I would see only myself.”

A small sigh escaped his lips as he crushed her to himself once more. They stayed like that for a few minutes more, until she felt him move his wand arm, and heard him summon something. She looked up and saw some papers and a vial of a potion sailing towards them through the air. She smiled as the papers drew near. They were adoption papers. She didn’t know what the vial was for, though.

Severus put the papers in her hand and the vial was left in his. He nudged her to read them, but she didn’t need to. She saw that he had already signed it, with today’s date scribbled in the date field. She looked up with another smile as she wished to have a quill so that she could sign it as well. There was a small rustle on the writing desk in the corner of the room and a quill floated to her. She blinked at it and plucked it out of the air. With a shrug of her shoulders, she put her hair behind her ear as she put the paper on Severus’s chest to sign it as well. She looked up to see Severus staring at her with a strange expression on his face and asked,

“What do I sign it as?”

That seemed to break him out of his stupor and he answered her in a quiet voice.

“Whatever you wish to sign as.”

She grinned at him again and put the quill on the paper again. What did she want to sign it as? Finally, she signed the papers with a flourish. There was a wicked grin on her face as she read what she wrote again. Arielle Lily Snape. She gave the paper back to Severus and waited for his reaction. It was instantaneous. He put the papers aside and drew her to himself again as he kissed her forehead gently. She sighed in his arms and closed her eyes. That was the best present she had ever gotten.

A few minutes later, they both stood up and she ran off to share the news with her family. They all congratulated the two of them and the cake was distributed. It was a lemon cake with the same icing. She never had a cake before and wasn’t sure what to do when her Papa put twelve candles in it. She looked at him, waiting for an explanation. It came quickly.

“Just make a wish and blow the candles out, child.”

She grinned and nodded. She closed her eyes to make a wish – to stay with Severus forever – and blew the candles. Each and every one of them was put out. She grinned at the success and happily distributed the cut cake to her family.

That evening, Severus came to her room holding the vial of the potion that he summoned along with the papers. The papers themselves were now sent to the Ministry to be made official. Grandpa made sure that they would be. She was sitting on her bed, waiting for their nightly ritual. Severus would come in her room and tuck her in, then kiss her goodnight and stay with her until she fell asleep. She still had nightmares from where she almost died and it helped that he was always there when she woke up. It seemed as if he had an internal alarm in his head to know when she was distressed.

She raised her hands up to his as he sat down on the bed next to her. He smiled at her softly and after putting the vial on the nightstand, pulled her up to his chest as he leaned down on the wall behind him. She snuggled up to him so that she was half lying on him and felt him pull her blankets up so that they covered her to the chin.

“Stay with me tonight?” she asked him softly. She felt him put his fingers in her hair again as he told her that he would. She smiled and blinked up at him. He was fingering the vial again and watching it with a peculiar expression. Then, he looked at her and asked her,

“Would you drink this potion? It’s a part of the Adoption ritual and creates a bond between a child and a parent. I would be able to feel you in my head then and always know where you were, so that if you were in danger I could get to you and help.”

She pulled the vial from his fingers and with a smile gulped the potion down. It wasn’t tasty. It tasted more like metal than anything else. She shuddered and slipped back down on her father’s chest. In mere moments she was asleep, smiling at the sensations with having her hair stroked.