Severus stared at Erin unblinkingly for a moment and then, with a sigh, he closed his eyes and leaned his head against the back of the chair. So, they had reached the place where he would have been perfectly happy never to go…at least with Erin in tow. He had had her for such a short time. He didn’t want to lose her, but he was positive that once she learned about his murky past, she would not wish their relationship to continue. Surely no amount of affection could get past the terrible things that he had done during his lifetime.

Erin watched Severus’s dear, unattractive face fall into the emotionless, harsh lines which had been her first impression of the Black Prince. There was no sign of his beautiful smile now. Erin’s brows drew together slightly and her heart stuttered with several ectopic beats that left her slightly breathless with distress. She didn’t want to go back to what there relationship (or perhaps non-relationship was more to the point) had been in the beginning. And though she realised that they had only known each other for a short time, in her mind, it felt like forever; so much had changed in her life! Not least her perception of the real world.

“Severus…” she said tentatively.

Severus gave her thigh a slight nudge to get her to stand and Erin’s feeling of distress intensified as she clambered to her feet with much less than her usual grace. She stepped back hurriedly as Severus surged to his feet and stalked to the chair upon which he had earlier placed the large hold-all.

“Severus, will you please talk to me?” begged Erin. “It can’t be that hard, can it…I want to know who you are…all of you.”

Severus spun to face her, his fist clenched around the handle of the thick fabric bag. His face was a death mask and when he spoke, his voice was a chilling, whispered hiss. It was as if the man who had pulled her into his arms a few minutes earlier had disappeared and this harsh, bitter stranger had taken his place.

“No, you don’t! Believe me you don’t want to know anything…and you most certainly do not need to know!”

Erin’s lips thinned mulishly and her eyes narrowed. “Don’t tell me what I want,” she bit out in her own version of his malevolent tone. Hers of course, fell far short of the mark if it was supposed to intimidate Severus Snape.

“Very well,” said Severus in an even quieter tone, and his eyes were now obsidian chips. “Far be it from me to tell you that you will want to go to bed shortly because we have an early start tomorrow. But if I may…” here, he made a mock bow to her, “I will tell you that you in need to go to bed, because it would appear that lack of sleep seriously undermines your usual talent for clear thinking.”

Erin was now shaking with rage. “You sanctimonious sh…” she pulled herself up with obvious difficulty but she managed to temper her outburst. “…so and so!” She didn’t feel any better for her restraint. “You would rather start this massive fight with me than speak to me about your past!

“I am under no illusions that your past will be able to be held up to close scrutiny, Severus. Your reticence to make any comments about yourself, your inherent dislike of most people, your suspicious conversation with that Selwyn man near the Goblin’s bank…you must think that I’ve been walking around with my head in the clouds if you think that I’m expecting to hear a fairy tale.”

Severus glared at her for many uncomfortable seconds. Erin watched a nerve ticking like a metronome in his jaw. Finally, he turned away from her and with a decided lack of enthusiasm, he hoisted his bag into his arms. Erin heard several heavy objects clunking against each other within its capacious depths. “Just go to bed, Erin,” he said in a dead voice as he moved towards the stairs.

“So, you’re not going to talk to me? You’d rather leave things as they are? After how far we have come…after I told you today exactly what you mean to me?” The anger had faded and Erin was unable to keep the devastation from her voice.

Severus had halted at the base of the stairs. She saw his shoulders rise and fall with several deep breaths.

“It’s because of how far we have come that I refuse to talk to you. This way, I can pretend that you’re still happy to be a part of my life.” He turned away from her again and looked at the stairs as if the effort of climbing them would be equivalent to conquering Everest.

And before he could even lift one foot, Erin flew across the room and insinuated herself between Severus and the stairs. She actually stood on the bottom tread to be closer to his height. When she opened her mouth to speak, Severus held up a hand to silence her. “Please, don’t push this any further. This is not a conversation I can even contemplate having at this time, Erin.

Tears blurred Erin’s vision and she bit down on the corner of her bottom lip to prevent herself sobbing. Severus shut his eyes. He didn’t want to see her distress. “I love you,” she whispered in a husky voice. She put her hands on his shoulders and leaned towards him over the top of the holdall. “Nothing…nothing you tell me is going to change that, Severus.”

Severus raised a disbelieving eyebrow. Erin dug her fingers into the black fabric encasing his shoulders and leaned in closer to his face. She cursed the large bag that prevented her wrapping her arms around him.

“I know what kind of a man you are right now, Severus Snape. Quick tempered, inherently nasty, sarcastic and bad tempered…”

“You already said that.”

“No, I said quick tempered. You’re quick tempered and bad tempered, but you are also a good man.” She tried to shake him a little but he was as immovable as a monolith. “You object strongly to doing certain things, but you do them none the less because an old man tells you to do them. An old man who exasperates the hell out of you, but whom you obey implicitly anyway.”

“Albus Dumbledore is my boss,” said Severus in a bored voice.

“Professor Dumbledore is the headmaster of the school in which you teach, so yes, I grant that he is your boss. But rescuing students who are in danger away from the school environment and outside of school term, escorting strange women around the countryside and playing babysitter to both the student and the strange woman do not come under the heading of teaching duties. Those duties are definitely extra-curricular, just as your disappearance the first night I met you was; the disappearance that took you away from your seriously injured patient.

“And though I know how much you profess to despise Harry, I saw how upset you were when you had to leave him when he was suffering so much.”

Severus shook his head and sighed in a long-suffering way. He gave a slight shrug to dislodge Erin’s hands before he grasped the handle of the holdall and lowered it to the floor. Then he took Erin by her upper arms and pulled her down off the stair and into his arms. He didn’t kiss her, but ran the fingers of one hand through her hair, watching the red-gold lights dance in the lamp and firelight. “My story is not a pleasant or a happy one. My past life is something that I have relegated to the furtherest recesses of my mind.

“I wish that you could be happy with what you know of me…though how you have come to care for me even as I am now is something that will never cease to amaze me. “He now cupped her cheek and looked into her eyes. Erin wrapped her hand around his wrist to keep his hand on her face.

“I accept that you have many questions that you wish to know the answers to, but I cannot do it tonight.”

Erin opened her mouth to object, but Severus put a long index finger against her lips to silence her. “Tonight, I wish to pretend that you and I might have some kind of a future together. I wish to remember the time we have had together, albeit that it has been so short.”

Erin pulled his hand away. “Severus…”

He interrupted her again. “When we have delivered Potter to the Weasleys, then I will tell you. I beg the next few days of your good opinion and affection. Because after I tell you my story, you will no longer want to be with me.”

Erin shook her head, but before she could verbally refute his words, Severus had claimed her mouth in a desperate kiss. Though she wanted to force the issue, she couldn’t deny him this. Though she wanted to refute his words, she knew it would be pointless; he would not believe her. And if the truth be told, she was more than a little nervous—more so now after his refusal to speak to her—of hearing about his history. He was so sure that she would cast him aside.

Erin cupped Severus’s lean, whisker roughened cheek. “Please don’t shut me out, Severus. Severus’s smile held no humour and Erin saw that his eyes were heartbreakingly sad.

“I won’t have to,” he said softly. “You’ll want to go of your own free will.” He took her arm in a gentle grip and shunted her gently to the side. He leaned down and kissed her softly on the lips.

“I’ll see you tomorrow morning.” And he passed her with a look of deep regret and sadness. And Erin watched him ascend the stairs and cross the landing without once looking back down at her.

Erin felt as if the last twenty-four hours had never happened. It felt as if the lump in her throat had assumed the approximate proportions of the Isle-of-Lewis, and she lowered herself to sit on the stairs and cried until she was bereft of tears. But by the time she had readied herself for bed, she had found a new reserve of tears and she shed them as well.

8888

When Harry slouched into the dining room the next morning at five to six, with Pumpkin padding along behind him, he found Erin sitting alone with her elbows on the table and grasping her cup of tea with both hands in front of her face. She looked absolutely devastated.

Harry’s stomach plummeted. It looked as she though had asked Snape about himself and it looked as if he had told her the ugly facts. And it most definitely looked as if Erin had not liked what she had heard.

So why didn’t he, Harry feel pleased with this turn of events? It had to be good didn’t it, if Erin wanted nothing more to do with Snape? But it was impossible for Harry to feel pleased or vindicated when Erin looked so thoroughly miserable…when it looked as if she had lost the love of her life. Although how Snape could be the love of anyone’s life was something that Harry knew he would never be able to fathom.

But surely if she had found out about Snape’s past, shouldn’t she be looking happy to have escaped his clutches? She must have been shocked to hear that he was a Death Eater, and as such had probably murdered and tortured countless people—wizards and muggles alike.

Of course, Harry knew that Snape was a spy for the Order of the Phoenix and that Dumbledore trusted him implicitly, but that didn’t entirely negate what he had once been, did it? Nor did it take away from the fact that he was a deeply unpleasant man. Harry had never even seen him smile…not really. He sneered…he didn’t smile.

He had never heard Snape say a kind word to anyone. He was at his most amiable when speaking to his Slytherins, but even then, his voice was laced with sarcasm bordering on disdain. He was reasonably respectful to the other teachers, but not necessarily friendly. He had pretended to be pleased to see Professor McGonagall recovered when she had returned from St. Mungos, after the attack on her person during the last school year when she had been going to Hagrid’s aid. Harry supposed that that display of bonhomie had been for the benefit of himself, Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle. They had all been present in the Entrance Hall that day.

In fact, he and Malfoy had been ready to duel each other and Snape was in the process of taking points from Harry because he had beaten Malfoy to the draw and Snape had caught him with his wand pointed at the blonde, ferret-faced, Slytherin. Of course, if it had been the other way around, and Malfoy had been caught with his wand pointed at Harry, Harry would have had the points deducted for provoking Malfoy.

Except there had been no remaining rubies in the bottom bulb of the Gryffindor hourglass to deduct—a fact that had produced one of Snape’s trademark sneers—because Snape’s lousy Slytherins had been running around in the guise of a quasi-Nazi student group dubbed the ‘Inquisitorial Squad’, taking points from fellow students for made up misdemeanours. This behaviour had left Gryffindor without any points at all and Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff with very few.

The Inquisitorial squad had been made up entirely of Slytherins and they had made sure that they would win the house cup and thoroughly embarrass and ridicule the other three houses—Gryffindor in particular—in the process.

Snape, of course, had known that his students had been running around docking points willy-nilly. And he had just exacerbated the unfairness by continuing to unfairly dock his own points.

The other three heads of house awarded points to any house if they were deserved, but Snape never did. And if he could find a way to turn a point winning exercise into a misdemeanour, he did, and deducted points where they should have been won. These were not the actions of a nice or a just man.

Harry shook his head a little as he slipped into a chair opposite Erin. Really, what was there to like? But, he could not deny the fact that he was looking at Snape and seeing him as most of the students at Hogwarts saw him, an unfair and nasty teacher. And of course he, Harry had even more reason to dislike the man as Snape scaled new heights of unfairness and nastiness when it came to him. Snape’s history with Harry’s father and Godfather were the reasons for that, of course. So naturally, Harry was prejudiced against the man.

It was impossible for Harry to look at Snape and see what Erin obviously saw. But she had said herself that she did not know why she was attracted to Snape. And as Erin was a Muggle—and Harry was pretty sure that muggles and muggle-borns were not high on Snape’s favourite sub-species list—then it stood to reason that his attraction to Erin was just as blind as hers was to him.

Erin didn’t seem to have noticed Harry up to now, but when he reached for the pot of tea she seemed to come out of her sad reverie and she noticed him for the first time. She started a little, but then she lowered her cup and smiled; Harry could see how forced it was, and when she said, “good morning,” her voice was husky.

Erin put her cup back in its saucer and pretended to be interested in a slice of toast on her plate. After taking a sip of his tea, Harry reached for his own slice of toast, but like her, he wasn’t much interested in food. But he went through the ritual of buttering the warm, crisp bread and adding a dollop of marmalade.

They both ate mechanically and in complete silence. Neither of them knew how to broach another subject when the previous nights happenings were so prominent in their thoughts. Erin was no longer angry with Harry, but she was too upset about what had happened with Severus to try to engage Harry in conversation. And Harry didn’t want to see Erin looking more upset than she already was by asking her what had happened.

And where was Snape anyway? The man was usually such a stickler for time. Perhaps he was trying to lay low after his and Erin’s little chat last night. And then a truly horrible thought made Harry choke on a mouthful of toast.

“Are you all right?” asked Erin concernedly as Harry coughed and spluttered.

He nodded and when he could drag in a much needed breath, he grabbed for his cup and gulped down a hasty sip of tea. His eyes were streaming and pushing his glasses up on his forehead, he ground the heels of his hands into his weeping eyes to stem the flow of tears. Erin passed a napkin across the table and Harry grabbed it and wiped at his eyes. After a minute, he seemed to finally have himself under control and straightening his glasses for the last time, he found Erin watching him with concern.

“I’m fine,” he croaked out for her benefit, adding a quick grin to convince her he was telling the truth.

But Harry was far from all right! He had just realised that if Erin and Snape had talked last night, then it had probably come out that he had pushed Erin to ask questions. And if things had gone badly, as it seemed they had, then Snape would probably be even more down on Harry than he normally was. Harry was not looking forward to seeing Snape any time soon, but it was inevitable.

And as if the thought had conjured him, the front door opened and closed with what Harry imagined was an angry snick. What had Snape been doing outside? Harry cast a surreptitious glance at Erin and he saw that her face had become set and her mouth pinched. That was just about what he felt like inside! As they heard Snape approaching, Erin hurriedly reached for another piece of toast. It was obvious that she wanted to appear busy when he entered the room, which he did a second later.

Harry followed Erin’s lead, deciding that it would be prudent to appear busy, and he hastily grabbed a plate and began shovelling scrambled eggs onto it. Harry was surprised when Snape uttered a quiet ‘good morning’, and his eyes darted upwards as Snape pulled out a chair and sat down.

Harry couldn’t help it, his mouth dropped open and the hand holding his plate sagged at the wrist and scrambled eggs spilled onto the tablecloth in a fluffy, moist, golden cascade. He felt his face catch fire as he plonked his plate down and began to hurriedly pick up lumps of messy scrambled eggs with his fingers.

When the mess on the cloth suddenly disappeared, Harry looked up to see Snape putting his wand away. And the second shock of the day came when Snape drawled, “Do try for a bit more decorum, Potter,” by way of an admonishment, instead of the expected blast of furious irritation.

Snape was wearing muggle clothes and his long, black hair—his clean long black hair—was pulled back and caught with a leather thong! This was the shock that had caused Harry’s total lack of coordination. He had never seen Snape in muggle clothes before, and the sight of old, faded jeans and a thick grey cable knit jumper with a white shirt collar at the neck was just too much for his early morning sensibilities. Harry didn’t know why he was so shocked; obviously, now that he thought about it, Snape couldn’t be seen travelling around the countryside in a car wearing his very distinctive wizarding robes. Though he supposed that anyone who saw him might take him for a priest. At another time, that thought would have had Harry collapsing in fits of hysterical laughter.

But the fact that the jeans were so old and faded made it seem likely that Snape had donned them many times before. And Harry couldn’t deny that the casual clothes suited the wizard very well indeed, emphasising long, slim legs and surprisingly well built torso and arms. Wizarding robes did nothing to advertise one’s true build; Snape always looked like a long streak of misery in his unrelenting black robes.

Harry managed to drag his fascinated gaze away from the older man so that he could serve himself some more scrambled eggs and then attempt to eat them. He had to eat them, lest Snape think he was a total idiot for spilling the first lot when he had had no intention of consuming them. Harry supposed Snape couldn’t think him more of an idiot than he already did, though.

Breakfast proceeded in a very uncomfortable silence and Harry kept on shooting covert glances between Snape and Erin. Snape was concentrating on his meal and Erin had gone back to nursing a second cup of tea between both of her hands and holding it in front of her face as an incomplete shield. She kept her eyes on the platter of scrambled eggs. Harry’s stomach was a roiling, churning acid filled cavity that was objecting strongly to his efforts to introduce any more food into it. When he gave up and lowered his fork to his plate, Erin also lowered her cup back into its saucer with a loud clink of fine china.

She stood up and excused herself to the room in general, saying that she needed to finish her packing. Not once did her eyes stray to Snape. Harry wanted to race after her but Snape addressed him before he could move.

“Have you packed your trunk?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Well, I suggest you double check your room. I’ll be up in a few minutes to shrink the trunk. It might be an idea if you keep some books out to read; we have a long journey ahead of us.”

Harry just nodded. He was unable to speak. He had expected Snape to be ranting and raving all over the place, particularly in light of what must have taken place last night to make Erin so upset. And not only was he not ranting and raving, he was speaking in a voice entirely devoid of the usual sneering disdain he reserved especially for Harry. Perhaps he didn’t blame Harry for the conversation he and his girlfriend had had last night.

Harry gave a mental shrug as he left the room. Surely Snape must have known that Erin and Harry had spoken together before she had asked Snape about his past. This was all just too weird. Erin was really upset about something…and what else could it be but that Snape’s revelations had been too much for her to cope with? But then, if that was the case, surely Snape would be upset too, and surely that would translate into him lashing out at Harry.

Harry entered his room and began to go through the drawers and wardrobe, double checking that he had everything, and still pondering Erin’s uncharacteristic behaviour. She was normally so upbeat. And if Snape wasn’t upset, then it seemed unlikely that her misery was anything to do with Snape at all. Perhaps she was feeling particularly down about the destruction of her mum and dad’s house. Perhaps she was missing her family. That would certainly not be beyond the realms of possibility. She loved her family…her mum and dad and brother.

He, Harry had been pretty down on and off about Aunt Petunia and Dudley, and he didn’t love them. No, there had certainly been no love lost there, but Harry most certainly had never wanted them dead. If he had, he could have easily left Dudley to the dementors last summer, and he hadn’t. He felt incredibly guilty about his aunt and cousin’s deaths though sensibly he knew that he could not be held responsible for a car accident. Dumbledore had said that no magic had been used to cause the accident. And they had ways to determine these things, didn’t they?

But still, if uncle Vernon had not felt the need to beat Harry practically to death, then perhaps, Aunt Petunia would not have felt the need to leave the house that evening. Maybe if Harry had not been so defiant, Uncle Vernon would have kept his fists and feet and belt to himself. But really, had he done anything so very bad? Had he ever done anything bad enough to warrant the cruel and unusual punishments that his great bullying git of an uncle had felt the need to dole out? If anyone had had to die that evening in that car, why couldn’t it have been Vernon Dursley, instead of his wife and son. Harry didn’t think he would have felt any regret if it had been his uncle who had died.

But with the loss of Aunt Petunia and his cousin, Harry was now truly bereft of any living relatives, and that was a pretty lonely place to be. Harry sighed as he crossed to the window to look down on the front yard. Of course, the Weasleys had been a surrogate family to him since he had first gone to the Burrow in the summer before his second year. Mrs Weasley had actually been looking after him since the Christmas before when she had sent him a jumper and delicious homemade Christmas treats to eat. At that time, she had only seen him for less than five minutes at Kings Cross Station. And then last night Erin had said that she considered herself to be a surrogate older sister to him. Harry’s face burned again. It was her way of letting him and his burgeoning romantic feelings down gently. But he had another surrogate sister. Harry knew that Hermione cared for him like a sister would, just as he cared for her like a brother. He wasn’t so badly off after all. He did have people who cared for him, which was more than his real relatives had ever done.

Harry’s eyes immediately fell upon a car parked just beyond the edge of the wards. It looked like a Ford Escort; similar to a model that Uncle Vernon had owned a few years back, until he had upgraded to a bigger and fancier car. Now that the unpleasantness of last night had passed and Harry’s excitement about going to the Burrow had settled down, and he was actually looking at the car that would carry them south, Harry actually began to think about the logistics of the journey. He wondered how the car had gotten here. He also wondered how Erin was going to cope with the long hours of driving.

Unless…no, surely that wouldn’t happen. Harry shook his head definitively. Snape was the quintessential wizard…surely he couldn’t know how to drive. Could he? Harry had absolutely no idea how much Snape had had to do with the muggle world during his lifetime.

Harry’s lips thinned. The vision he had seen in the pensieve in May; the one where Snape had called Lily Evans a mudblood with such obvious disdain and hatred would indicate that the Slytherin would steer clear of the muggle world if it was at all possible.

Harry headed for the door, glancing around one last time. He nearly tripped over Pumpkin who had slunk around the half closed door. He picked her up and tickled her under the chin, talking nonsense to her as he crossed the landing. But before he could start descending the stairs, he heard quiet voices coming from behind Erin’s closed door. Harry paused for an infinitesimal time and then he crept down the stairs as noiselessly as he could. He didn’t want either Erin or Snape to think he had been eavesdropping. He headed towards the kitchen to say goodbye to Dobby. The little elf would be able to take his mind off what was going on behind that closed bedroom door. And maybe Dobby would know what Snape’s travel plans for Pumpkin were.

8888

As soon as Potter had left the room, Severus quickly downed a cup of tea and a slice of toast and marmalade. He was still chewing when he took the stairs two at a time. When he put his ear to Erin’s door, all he heard was total silence. He didn’t knock; he didn’t want Potter to hear. He pushed the door open just enough for him to slip through.

Erin was standing at the window and had been looking down into the side garden. There were actually a few hardy plants down there because this was the sheltered side of the garden. Her head had shot up when she heard the door and with her heart in her mouth, she watched Severus enter and close the door.

They stood staring at each other for several highly charged seconds. Severus spoke first.

“Did you sleep?” Erin caught the corner of her bottom lip between her teeth. Then she shook her head.

“Nor I,” Severus said. “The day is not going to be pleasant.” Erin turned back to the window and stared unseeingly at the view.

“I suppose not,” she whispered.

Severus crossed the room and stood behind her. Erin tensed but she did not turn to face him. “It would be so much more tolerable if I knew that you did not hate me.”

Erin spun back to face him. “Hate you!” she whispered, and then a little louder. “Didn’t you hear me last night? I love you. I know it doesn’t make sense, but I love you.” She shook her head. “I know that you have terrible things in your past. If I didn’t know before last night, then I would know now because of your inability to level with…”

Severus dragged her roughly into his arms and crashed his mouth down on hers. Erin froze for a moment…the attack had been unexpected. Then she wrapped her hands in the rough wool of his thick jumper and hung on for dear life as he plundered her mouth. There wasn’t much else she could do but hold on. This wasn’t a kiss to be shared; this was a kiss to be endured. She let him have his way because then it would be her turn.

Finally, after more seconds that she could keep track of, Severus eased the pressure on her mouth and on her arms. His hands rose to cup her jaw and then he peppered little kisses across her bruised lips and then upwards to the tip of her nose and then her closed eyelids. After another eon, Severus rested his cheek against the top of her head, breathing in the seductive scent of her apple scented shampoo. “I don’t want to live without you,” he said huskily, his mouth pressed to her hair. “I don’t think I can after having had you in my life.”

Erin lifted her face and kissed the point of his chin. “You don’t have to,” she said, her voice laced with tears. “I don’t want to live without you either, Sev, but you’re going to have to open up to me…you know you are.”

Severus closed his eyes and shook his head, and Erin grasped his face between soft palms and gazed at his tortured features. “I-love-you! Do you understand?”

“You shouldn’t,” he growled softly. “You won’t when you know.”

‘When I know what? That in your past, you were a follower of this Lord Voldemort?”

Severus went absolutely still. Even his breathing was suspended. Finally, he got up the courage to open his eyes. Erin was gazing at him, not with disgust and abhorrence, but with love and sympathetic understanding. He tried to turn his face to escape her hands but she hooked them behind his neck, preventing his escape. He grasped her wrists to break her determined hold but she pulled hid head down until they were eye to eye.

“Don’t shut me out like you did last night. If I’m right, and I think I am, then I know the worse, and I still want you…I still love you.”

“That bloody boy told you!” said Severus in a dangerous voice.

“No, he did not,” Erin said emphatically. He wanted to, but in the end, he couldn’t. He realised that it was your place to tell me.”

“Then how did y…”

“I guessed Severus. You have a secret that you are too ashamed to tell me. It has to be something really appalling. I put all the things together that I mentioned last night and came up with the worst possible conclusion that I could. In your world, it seems that the thing that is most abhorred is Lord Voldemort and his Death Eaters. You are not Lord Voldemort, so it stood to reason that you were a Death Eater. ”

Severus finally managed to prise Erin’s hands from around his neck. Then he walked across to the window and leaned on the sill, grasping it hard. He couldn’t believe that she knew…that she knew and she was still here, in the same room as he was.

“Why?” he asked softly. Erin walked to him and put her hand on his back, rubbing a soothing circle between his shoulder blades. Severus hunched his shoulders up around his ears.

“Why what?”

“Why are you still here? Why do you still love me?”

“Severus, I always knew that there was something. You were so bitter and you kept yourself apart from all of your colleagues except perhaps for Dumbledore. But even there you seem to hold a small part of yourself back and yet, I sense that you really care for him.

“But that day when you met that man on the steps of the bank, and the conversation I heard…well, there was really only one conclusion to be gained from that.”

Severus raised his head and stared out of the window, but he wasn’t really seeing anything. “So if you were so sure of what I was back then, why did your affection continue to grow?”

“Because I saw the other side of you. Behind the nastiness and the bitterness, behind the terrible temper, I saw a man who was capable of kindness and consideration.

“I saw how you looked after Harry, despite your obvious aversion. The same applied to your care of Remus Lupin, and you abhorrence of him seemed to equal your negative feelings for Harry…behaviour that I still don’t know the reason for, incidentally. That is one of the things we have to discuss.

Severus’s heart sank anew. How was he going to explain to her the reasons behind his ill-treatment of the boy? Even if he had recently begun to feel a degree of contrition for his harsh behaviour towards Potter, he still had to explain why any of it had happened in the first place, particularly as Erin felt a great deal of affection for the pestilential Gryffindor.

“But the one thing that cemented my opinion of just what kind of man you are, was your rescue of Pumpkin…despite all the reasons you gave me as to why you wouldn’t go.”

Severus turned to face Erin. He rested his very attractive denim-clad butt against the windowsill and pulled her between his legs and into his arms. He stared down at her lovely face, his expression a mixture of disbelief and wonderment. “The fact that I rescued your cat was enough to put your mind at rest even though you had convinced yourself that I was an associate of Selwyn’s...even though you knew how ruthless Death Eaters were, knew that they had been responsible for the destruction of your home and the deaths of most of your neighbours, your feelings for me continued to grow?”

“Erin snuggled closer to him. “I could see the other side of you…oh, you made it really hard; you were determined to show yourself in the worst possible light, but actions speak louder than words.”

“You gave as good as you got.”

“You infuriated me. But despite my best efforts to dislike you intensely, I kept on being drawn to you.” Erin took his slim face between her hands and kissed him deeply. “You fascinate me, Severus Snape,” she whispered against his lips. “And I know you are not an evil monster.”

“Many would argue that point with you.”

“Only because you’re determined to exaggerate that side of yourself. I’ve come to the conclusion that most of it’s an act. And as you are really Dumbledore’s man, I presume that a lot of it is an act.”

Severus sighed. “So, you’ve worked that out too.”

“Severus, as you’re here with Harry Potter, a boy you purportedly hate and who is the person that Lord Voldemort wants above all others and you’re here under Dumbledore’s orders, then it stands to reason that you’re working for Dumbledore.” Erin draped her forearms over Severus’s shoulders and began to fiddle with his hair. She looked worried.

“You’re a spy, aren’t you?”

Severus sighed. He gently pushed Erin backwards so that he could get to his feet. Then he framed her face with his slender hands. “Now that I know you’re not going to bolt, because you already know the worse, I promise that I will tell you everything there is to know about me. It isn’t a nice story, any of it…except the end where I found you.” He claimed her mouth in a gentle kiss but after only a few seconds, he pulled back.

“We have a long journey ahead of us, but I promise that once we have delivered our charge, I will tell you a very dark tale.” When Erin frowned, he added, “The telling will take more time than we have now…we should already be on our way. Can you be happy with that?”

Erin bit that corner of her lip that often found its way between her teeth. But then she nodded. “And you’ll tell me all about Harry too? And why he is at the centre of everything and why you seem to hate him so much?

Another sigh escaped Severus’s mouth, this one long-suffering. He nodded. “My story can't be told without including the name, Potter,” he said bitterly. But before Erin could remonstrate with him, he stepped away from her and indicated the open bag on her bed.

“Are you all packed.”

Erin allowed the change of subject and she nodded. She moved to the bed and zipped up the bag. Then she hoisted the empty cat basket onto the bed. “What are we doing with Pumpkin? She won’t enjoy a long car trip.

Severus took the basket from her and opened the door, ushering Erin onto the landing. “I think Dobby should take Pumpkin back to Hogwarts with him. As the castle is going to be your home for the foreseeable future, your cat can become better acquainted with its environs.”

Before descending the stairs he strode to Harry’s room where he found the closed trunk on the floor at the end of the bed. Erin watched from the door, fascinated as ever, as Severus drew his wand, waved it over the trunk and said, “Reducio!”

The trunk was now the size of a matchbox and Severus bent easily and scooped it up off the floor. When he straightened, Erin was smiling and shaking her head. Severus quirked an eyebrow in question.

“I still have trouble believing it, you know,” she said over her shoulder as she led the way down the stairs. “It defies everything that I ever learned about physics and…well, about everything, really.”

“I grew up with a magical parent,” said Severus, “so I have known magic and that I was magical my whole life. But as with muggles, not all wizards and witches are overly talented. Many are very mediocre indeed.”

At the base of the stairs, Erin turned around and raised her own eyebrow in question. “And just how do you rate your magical ability, Professor Snape?” she asked saucily.

Severus smirked. “I’m no Dumbledore…but I get by.”

8888

They found Harry slouched sideways in an armchair with his legs thrown over the arm. Pumpkin was lying on his chest purring like an idling engine, with her little head practically under Harry’s chin. Harry was idly rubbing the cat’s ears and gazing out of the picture windows at the sea birds wheeling above the cliffs.

It was several seconds before he realised that the two adults had joined him and as soon as he saw Snape he scrambled to stand, Pumpkin hissing as she was dumped unceremoniously on the floor.

“Ready to go Potter?” asked Severus.

Harry nodded and looked pointedly at the clock on the mantle. It said twenty past seven, but he refrained from saying anything. Severus opened his holdall which was on the coffee table. While he delved inside, Harry shot a glance at Erin, who conjured a tight little smile at him. She no longer looked devastated. Whatever had happened in her bedroom had obviously gone well.

Harry didn’t want to think about what might have gone on in there. Though if that had gone on, it hadn’t taken them very long. He turned away and squeezed his eyes shut. He definitely wasn’t going to go there. He didn’t like thinking about Snape at the best of times, but to think about him having sex was just way, way, way too much.

“I want you to drink this Potter.” Harry spun back around. Snape was pouring a measure of thick, mud coloured potion into a glass. Harry recognised it immediately and he goggled at Snape, who was now opening a small vial and extracting a single hair.

“What!” sputtered Harry, as Severus added the hair and the potion sizzled a little and produced a quantity of steam. “Polyjuice Potion! No one said anything about Polyjuice Potion.”

“I’m saying it now. You need to be disguised. Professor Dumbledore and I discussed it and we feel that this is the best way to keep you hidden until we get to the Burrow.”

Harry remembered all too well the horrible bubbling and churning in his gut and then the pain of the transformation from when he had taken Polyjuice in his second year at Hogwarts. And the taste had made him gag. He shook his head.

“But sir, I’ll have to repeat the dose every hour on the hour. It’ll take forever to get to the Burrow by car and if I have to take that many doses of the stuff, I’ll be sick.”

“I've tweaked the formula, Potter. The potion will not wear off until I give you an antidote.”

Harry didn’t like the idea of that either. What if something happened to the antidote? What if something happened to Snape and he couldn’t make any more antidote? He would be stuck looking like…looking like…

“Whose hair was that?” he asked in a nervous voice.

“I have no idea. I took it from a muggle boy of about your age and build. If it will make you feel any better, I too am taking Polyjuice to disguise myself.” That didn’t really make Harry feel any better. He wished like crazy that they could floo to the Burrow and then Snape could come back for Erin. But for some reason, Dumbledore wanted them all travelling together and he wanted them to do it an a thoroughly non-magical fashion.

Snape thrust the glass at Harry who looked at it with distaste. Then he turned to Erin.

“And I’m going to have to transfigure you too, Erin. Every Death Eater knows exactly what you look like and though it is unlikely we will run into any along the way, we can’t take any chances.

Erin eyed the potion, glad that she didn’t have to drink the stuff. Harry’s glass of liquid had now turned an oatmeal colour. But like Harry, she wanted to know what Severus was going to make her look like.

Fifteen minutes later, Paul Vale, his sister Fiona and his son, Aidan were travelling southwards towards Stornaway and the ferry that would sail them across to the Scottish mainland.

Aidan Vale was so not happy with his father!