Chapter 3

Sarah stepped out of her rose-scented bath and threw a towel around her as she padded into the bedroom, dripping water all over her old, wooden floor. Rose for love, she thought, and the flower of St John’s Wort under your pillow on the night of the solstice and your true love will come to you in your dream.

She hurriedly dried herself, humming as she did so. She made sure her skin was lathered in rose scented moisturiser after she was dry. It felt like Yule, she was so excited! Calm down, she thought to herself as she fluffed her pillows, ensuring the little yellow flower was placed just so. I hope I’m not too excited to sleep, she thought as she snuggled down, pulling the duvet around her.

***

Seven weeks is a long time to wait, thought Severus irritably. There were things he wanted answers to right now. Like, the rosemary in her love spell: what other similarities were there between magical uses of herbs and flora within his world and hers? And what of Harry Potter’s birthday falling on Lughnasadh – surely not a coincidence? And what was this festival, what did it mean? His investigations seemed to be coming up with more questions than answers, and when it came to gaining knowledge, Severus Snape was not a patient man.

He exhaled, putting his hands behind his head. He would stay in the damn library all night if he had to; he needed to put his mind at rest.

***

Sarah slept deeply, and her dreams were filled with vivid images. There were arched corridors of an old building, like a church or university, with a black-cloaked figure walking quickly ahead of her. She called out to him to stop and tried to catch up with him, but he was always one step ahead, disappearing around corners. Then suddenly she held her wand aloft, and a stream of white light came from the tip; the man halted and slowly turned around. He was pale, with chin-length dark hair that framed his face, with the most intense beetle-black eyes she’d ever seen. She was at once both transfixed and afraid. Before she could speak, the man vanished on the spot, and she woke up feeling restless.

***

Snape had spent every spare evening at the library over the forthcoming weeks. With summer in full swing and the term drawing to a close, there were never many students in there of an evening. His research was drawing blanks, but he was damned if he was going to ask for Madam Pince’s assistance, even though she obviously sensed his frustration and hovered haughtily behind him at inopportune moments, trying to see what books he was reading, as if she knew he was up to something extracurricular. Each time he saw her lurking, he would fix her with a warning stare, and she would reluctantly return to her desk, eyes flicking up at him from time to time over her glasses, with a mistrustful expression carved on her putrid old face.

After exhausting each of the avenues available to him in the main library, Severus’ mind turned to the Restricted Section. How to get rid of that interfering old bat, he wondered. Her suspicions would definitely be aroused if she saw him in the Restricted Section, but she rarely left the library at all, unless Filch had come to show her some forbidden book or other he’d confiscated. Filch! That’s it! A lazy smile crept to his lips as a plan formulated in his mind. The pair of them had been dancing around each other for years, neither brave enough to voice any interest in each other. He knew just what to do. He’d replicate one of his particularly nasty private tomes, maybe Draughts of Death or something similar, and leave it on Filch’s desk with a note that he’d found it just outside the Gryffindor common room, and could he please speak to Madam Pince about this? He chuckled to himself; a chance to have a dig at Gryffindor at the same time could not be missed.

***

Sarah meanwhile spent every day desperately looking out for her dream figure. To her annoyance, he wasn’t at work, or at the college, or at her local pub. With desperation, she even visited places nearby that had similar architecture to the place in her dream, but the town hall, church and grammar school all appeared fruitless. Wicca had never let her down before, and yet she felt a crushing sense of disappointment the more time wore on. Forget about him, she thought firmly. Look to Lughnasadh and ask the Goddess again.

***

Severus’ plan worked beautifully; the very next evening after placing the book in Filch’s office just before dinner, he was down like clockwork at 7pm with that blasted cat of his, mumbling about “if Madam would be so kind, I have something important to show you in my office.” Severus gave a crooked smile at this as he watched them both from the shadows of a bookcase. I bet you do, you filthy old pervert. He had to resist a shudder at the mental image of his two elderly colleagues rutting like beasts on Filch’s desk whilst his mangy cat observed them with her orb-like amber eyes. He watched Madam Pince flush with pleasure as colour rose in her wrinkled cheeks before following him breathlessly out of the library, whispering in hushed and scandalised tones.

As soon as they left, Snape turned on his heel and walked swiftly towards the Restricted Section towards the back of the library. He wasn’t convinced he would find anything but it was the last avenue available to him, and he was nothing if not thorough. He knew he would not have long to look before Madam Pince came back to lock up.

After skimming the names of spines, he settled on a heavy, old-looking book called Magick Moste Ancient and hurriedly settled down on one of the worn-out armchairs to read. To his great surprise, not only did it mention “Muggle-magick” but also “Black Magick”, which was to all intents and purposes the Muggle equivalent of the Dark Arts. Fascinated, he read with interest about the inverted pentagram with the sign of the goat as the demarcation of Black Magic, along with descriptions of blood sacrifice and scourge rituals. Interesting, but not what I’m looking for; my Muggle-witch is a good little Wiccan, he thought, turning back to the section on Wicca. As he’d discovered previously, it described the eight sabbats, but this time it also mentioned the Wiccan tools. Wand, cauldron, broomstick, he thought. Most curious. Flicking on, he discovered a passage on casting the circle and banishing the circle. As far as he could tell, these were opening and closing rituals, but there was no other description of any spells that actually took place within the circle once it had been cast. The frustration was maddening!

With a sigh, he placed the book carefully back on the shelf and made his way out of the library. So, Lughnasadh it is. First-hand observation will undoubtedly be more beneficial, he reasoned as he turned and made his way to his quarters in the dungeons, his cloak billowing in his wake.