Musings and Missions

"Do you think he knows?"

Pomona looked up from the cake stand and over to the window, her brow furrowing delicately. Her thoughts skittered over the blunt questions, seeking purchase in their recent chats and aims. "About the fountain?" she asked, seeing the sudden tension in Minerva's shoulders and her jaw muscles flex. She'd often seen her young friend by the fountain, tending the beds. She knew it wouldn't be long before he began to put the pieces together. When she'd arranged the beds, she'd never anticipated a natural herbologist like Neville coming to the school. She shrugged and plucked a lemon finger from the stand; he'd see the power in the arrangement, but it was a big leap from that to knowing what the purpose was. "I wouldn't put it past him to have seen some pattern in the planting, but I can't see him knowing about the Pensieve, dear."

"I wish I could be sure..." Minerva drifted off as the ramifications of her distrust unfurled in her mind like black clouds.

Pomona bristled slightly. "Neville is a good friend of this school," she uttered unwaveringly. "Even if he were to find out, I know he'll feel as we do. He has his feet firmly planted."

Minerva sighed and moved away from the pane and back to her seat. For some reason, Pomona's words weren't as reassuring as she'd hoped. Too much rested upon Neville: Severus' secret... and now, it seemed, his happiness. Neville's parting expression had warmed her heart, but by the time she'd reached Pomona's rooms, she was less than certain and her amusement had petered out. Oh, she knew there was a risk in letting someone get close...she'd learnt that often enough...but she couldn't bear the thought of the level of pain that Neville could inflict with one careless word. The weight of it pressed down, and she sank back into the plush cushions. Usually, Pomona's fondness for pillows was an annoyance, but today, she leant into them, seeking some comfort and warmth from their soft, velvet embrace.

Potting plants and tending to seedlings taught you two things: patience, and the assurance that with care and diligence things turned out alright at the end. Armed with this, Pomona poured another two cups of tea and waited for Minerva to tell her the real reason for the early coffee-morning. It took less time than getting a flower from a seed.

"They seem to be getting on well," Minerva snapped out, almost as if getting it out sharp and quick would ease the sting. The words were there, hanging, and she hoped the answer to her unspoken question would fill the growing void between asking and getting. She jerked forward and gathered up her cup and a sandwich. It would excuse her silence.

The words stilled Pomona. This was where Herbology didn't offer much in the way of life skills. Plants didn't do subterfuge or drop hints; they didn't hide motives behind observations. They didn't watch you like a hawk, waiting on you to offer something that you didn't know you had. She swallowed and licked her lips. They also didn't give you the impression that you had to be careful about what you said next.

"They have a fair bit in common," Pomona said carefully, settling back to watch her friend; she couldn't fail to see the frustration flicker across her pinched features. Herbology did teach you to be sparing when it was in the best interests of the plant: some wilted when fed or watered too much. It would do Minerva good to rummage through her own feelings... doing her own weeding.

Minerva's lips writhed over each other as she chewed over her next words. They must have been bitter because she winced when she swallowed them. She had to wash them down with a sip of tea.

"Yes," she finally agreed, with an impatient wave and a hint of irritability. She knew this. Hadn't she already pondered their similarities? What had happened between Severus' spare rooms and Pomona's parlour? Muscles bunched and twitched beneath her skin, her breath was shallow, and she could feel a cool patina of sweat on her palms. What had her so riled and anxious?

Pomona was no help. She sat there with a calm air, sipping tea and casting discreet hungry glances at the iced buns, offering nothing to help resolve the mystery that was Neville. The frustration swirled in her belly, making her nauseous and pummelling her to move, to do something other than sit and drink. It was quite ridiculous.

For her part, Pomona was waiting. Observation was a prized Herbology skill. Plants couldn't explain their ailments, so the mark of a good herbologist was the ability to see what was wrong before it damaged or killed the plant. She could see what had upset her friend. It was quite obvious... especially since she empathised with it.

"I imagine that Severus and Neville are spending quite a bit of time catching up on things."

Minerva glanced across sharply, her eyes narrowing as her lips thinned. Pomona couldn't help it. She could feel it building up under her diaphragm. The first chuckle rumbled out, quite unsure of itself, but the next burst forth without shame. Her vision blurred as tears of merriment dripped down her ruddy face; through whoops and hasty gulps of air, Pomona tried her best to apologise, but the stern, rather non-plussed, face just kept tickling her fancy.

After a few coughs and hiccups, Pomona relaxed back with a sigh, wiping tears from her cheeks and gracing Minerva with a sympathetic expression. "Oh, Minerva," she uttered gently. "Can't you see what's the matter with Neville?"

The Scottish witch bristled and lifted her cup and saucer defensively. "That's why I came here, Pomona," she replied stiffly.

"You're jealous."

Minerva scowled, but shrank back, as though the words had struck her. "Don't be silly!"

"Oh come off it!" Pomona snapped good-naturedly. "You've had Severus pretty much to yourself for the last ten years, woman!"

"Pomona Sprout, I have never heard such nonsense! I am not some love-sick fifth-year, pining away for some... some.... Such a thing is just preposterous. I'm old enough to be his gr...mother! "

Pomona had to bite her cheek not to laugh. "I'm not saying you are, dear," she soothed. "I felt rather put out myself. For some silly reason, I'd thought that Neville and I would hit it off, but I found myself being avoided, and all for a fountain and Severus." She sniffed and smoothed down her skirts, avoiding the almost pitying look flash across Minerva's face. "I was foolish enough to let it get to me."

The fire popped and crackled amiably, filling the silence and ousting the heavy atmosphere. They sat for a few moments, contemplating what they'd snapped out at each other.

"I had these grand ideas of sharing some research and my dreams with Neville," Pomona continued sanguinely. "I remembered a brave boy who lit up when in my classes and forgot that he'd grown into a man." She sank back into the cushions and let out a wry laugh. "I had wrapped myself up in the all possibilities and my imaginings of what it would be like that I just couldn't see what it actually was like. I'd sit in the greenhouse and wait, thinking that he'd just tootle in like he did when he was here as a student." She closed her eyes and sighed. "When I realised that he wouldn't, it... well, it hurt a little bit. But it was my fault... I assumed, and it made an ass of me."

The realisation had lost its potency, but Pomona could still feel a small, hollow place behind her ribs. The iced bun with its glistening cherry filled it quite nicely. While she chewed, she saw Minerva ponder. The only reason she knew that the woman was pondering deeply was the frown and the flaring nostrils. It was something teachers learnt quite early on: when posed with something difficult, look as though everything is under control and nothing can flummox or slow you down. No one did impervious supremacy like Minerva. But if you knew her, you could see the small chinks.

After a few moments of intense thinking, Minerva sighed softly, her features relaxing, and took a deep, fortifying sip of tea.

"You're perfectly right," she admitted gently, tucking a stray strand of grey hair behind her ear. "I am very fond of Severus, and I may..." her lips trembled and she glanced upwards, as if begging gravity to help keep her tears from falling, "... be seeing troubles where none exist." Her head dropped and she fixed Pomona with a piercing glare. "But Neville had best be careful," she said softly, but with the underlying hint of bad things should her advice be ignored.

Pomona snorted and arched an eyebrow. "I can say the same for Severus; it's not as if you'd be ecstatic should your child bring him home asking for your blessing."

"Oh merlin!" Minerva breathed, pressing a hand to her chest in alarm. "I can just picture Augusta's face...may-she-rest-in-peace."

They both sat for a moment, each playing out the scenario of Augusta meeting her grandson's intended. Minerva snorted first, and then the room filled with impish, healing laughter.

oOo

Neville sat in his rooms, his fingers drumming a steady beat on the desk. His eyes were aimed at the notes from the morning's mentor meeting, but his gaze was fixed on a memory by a gentle river along the Aberglaslyn Pass. It had been almost three months since he'd interrupted a gang of Aurors tormenting Snape. He'd never talked about that day, just as he was grateful that Snape had never talked about it either. He could still recall the expressions crossing his former Headmaster's face as he talked the Aurors down with the threat of Pergatin poisoning. It caused his lips to twitch. But he could also recall the weight of Snape's body crushing him against the rock in anger...or possibly fear...and his breath, hot and moist, on his skin as he held him at wand-point. Neville swallowed.

He could have passed it off as the heat of the moment, and his recent fascination with Snape as merely being due to the difference in the man, but Minerva's parting words and expression had pulled his deepest musings into something solid and defined... and into the public domain. He groaned and closed his eyes. Snape had found the whole thing amusing, that strange belly-laugh of his filling the room. Neville had been forced to smile and agree with him that their plotting had not gone unnoticed, but the idea that Minerva had meant something entirely different gloated at the back of his mind.

With a burst of pique he opened the desk drawer and brushed the papers off and into the gaping drawer. Still in the grip of confused irritability, he slammed the drawer shut. The bang was gratifying, but some small, tinkling sound punctuated the noise. His breath caught and his heart leapt behind his ribs. The needle phial! Carefully, he slid the drawer open and used his fingertips to slide the papers aside. Biting his lip, he silently prayed that the phial was intact. Light glinted off something and he gratefully wrapped his fingers around the thin and unbroken phial. He remembered the charms he'd seen on it and snorted at his sensitivity. The phial was well protected: a troll couldn't crush it.

Teaching and worrying had pushed all thought of the strange thing out of his head. He twirled it between thumb and forefinger, his mind dwelling upon the questions that had plagued him when he'd first seen it in the soil. Whose was it? What did it contain? Who to hand it in to? As he watched the pearlescent liquid swirl languidly inside, another question elbowed its way up through the throng: why hadn't anyone mentioned it missing?

What he held was an expensive and exquisitely protected phial. He knew it couldn't have been in there for long...he'd weeded almost religiously right up to the start of term, and he'd busied himself in the sage and feverfew, seeking a balm for his stress headaches since then. It was highly unlikely that it belonged to a student, which limited it to the staff, but aside from Pomona, he couldn't recall any other teacher paying the fountain much attention or having any reason to rummage in the soil. A small frown marred his forehead. It was precious to someone, and yet no one had even hinted at its loss. Either they weren't aware it was lost, or they didn't want anyone else to know that it existed. It still begged the question of whom to return it to... or maybe, who to talk to about it?

His musings were interrupted by the soft chime for lunch. Thoughtfully, he tapped his fingernail against the glass. He knew he should hand it in... to Minerva at the very least, but for some reason, the thing intrigued him, and deep down, he felt a protective instinct flare. This required protection, and just handing it in didn't qualify. The tempting idea to miss lunch flittered in his head, but he knew he had no reasonable excuse to be reclusive. He straightened and placed the needle phial in the drawer and gently closed it; he could play detective for a while. After all, it wasn't as if Snape was eager to start; this would be a welcome distraction to his almost unbearable impatience.

oOo

It was in these quiet, bridging, moments...the lull between events, things, thoughts...that he struggled, flailed. The path suddenly stopped before him, leaving him bereft and directionless in swirling, choking smog. His hands clawed at the emptiness, seeking something solid to keep him grounded and guide him. He felt himself weaken as he seeped... dissolved into the greedy nothingness with nothing but eternity to restrict his dilution. It was the ultimate in loss.

A long time ago, his mother had played vinyl records when Father was away, and over time, they had lost their eloquence, tiny scratches causing the needle to skip so that discordant hisses and crackles punctuated the beautiful music. It had infuriated her. He'd silently laughed at her frustration, not understanding that it had been a fraction of bliss she afforded herself in an otherwise miserable life; to have it ruined was a stab in her already weakened sense of self and joy. For those mere seconds of discord, she was lost, the world turning on her and taking all that she had left. What he had seen as a petty nuisance, she had suffered as one more moment stolen from her, one moment closer to obliteration.

Snape closed his eyes and staggered, his breath coming in rapid and strained wheezes. Bile crawled up his throat, and sweat beaded on his forehead and chilled the skin down his spine. Fingers reached out for some support, and he collapsed against the side of the fireplace, clutching it as a falling man would cling to a ledge. One day, the needle had skipped and never restored itself, and his mother had died in all but body, never finding the next moment to continue in. The record-player had been sold by his father, and the woman had become lost between the last clear strains of a long-forgotten melody and her eventual death. A shell was all that remained: empty, hopeless... and pitiful.

With the door closing on Neville's back and the rising emptiness, he felt something akin to what he had witnessed in her eyes: lost. It was disorientating and destructive. An overwhelming sense of confusion and despair flooded him: who am I? What am I doing? It stole his sense of self. And it was happening with increasing and alarming frequency. Soon, he'd be a shell... empty and dead.

Fingernails bit into the mantelpiece as he tried to gather himself together, pulling on the vaporous tendrils of his thoughts, memories and dreams, weaving them back into Severus Snape. Every time he was forced to do this, he lost strands, and the cloth of his life and self was become increasingly fragile and transparent. He knew it was the Ministry and that damned Pensive, but he couldn't draw up a single memory to suggest they were doing anything other than sifting through his most hated and disgusting memories and seeking a cure for the curse that Voldemort had left his surviving followers. It was all primal instinct. They were teasing his life from him just as those hiss-filled skips had leeched his mother. A bitter laugh erupted from his scarred throat. If it wasn't the Ministry, then it'd be the leering and ever-patient Dark Mark.

Slowly, his careening thoughts coalesced into something solid and controlled. Straightening, he pushed all weakness down, hiding it under his wrath for all the ills and wrongs he'd suffered and using his bond with Minerva to keep his anger under control. It was madness. But sometimes, sanity just can't take the strain.

He didn't know how long he'd stood by the fireplace, weaving himself together, but the chime for lunch informed him that it was half past twelve. It was odd that this disintegration of self didn't affect his responsibilities or abilities as a teacher or deputy headmaster. His potions knowledge was as keen as ever; his manner with pupils and peers wasn't impaired or made him feel at risk. His duties wrapped around him like a soothing blanket.

An image of his mother cooking breakfast burst into his mind. She was humming tunelessly while frying bacon. All the tasks and duties ascribed to wife and mother were performed, but the woman was... just not there. Was that happening to him? Was he slowly disappearing? As if trying to escape his questions and dread, he lunged away from the hearth and stomped around the parlour. He wouldn't allow himself to become lost and empty. A mirthless grin stretched his lips. The music had stopped for his mum, but someone kept jogging the needle along for him. The irony of it made him chuckle; they had left him with the very skills that he'd use to defeat them. Neville's request was now something so much more than just a means to annoy and frustrate the Ministry; after all, weren't Neville's parents lost somewhere in their own minds?

The thought gave him energy, and he quickly tackled the small buttons on his collar. Their minds and identity had... escaped? Perhaps submerged? There was a kernel of something useful to himself in Neville's research. He must have seen it that first night but not connected it until he'd realised that his current plight mimicked his mother's collapse. It was thrilling and energising.

His fingers suddenly fumbled with the last button, and his breath snatched. He knew the cruelties of hope. It would be foolish to accept that this was the route to his salvation; better to just admit the possibility and live with that... for now.

Author's Notes: Thank you for your patience. I have a slight issue with my hands which is making typing rather hard work. In short, the updates are going to be slow-going. I can only apologise and hope that you can bear with me. Thank you for reading... it means a lot.