Chapter Sixty-Five: Test Flight

PART SEVEN

Chapter Sixty-Five: Test Flight

Sunday, 21 March 1999

Poppy looked up at Severus. He had entered the Great Hall for breakfast after she had, but had eaten quickly and was on his way out already. He paused by her chair, though, and now touched her shoulder lightly.

"Are you returning to the Hospital Wing after breakfast, Madam Pomfrey?"

"I was actually going to go to the library this morning," she replied. "I made arrangements to meet Laura there after breakfast. Did you need to see me?"

Severus hesitated. "It . . . it is not school business," he said softly, "but somewhat important."

Poppy nodded. "All right. If you like, we could meet at ten-thirty or eleven. Unless it's very important, then I could tell her I'll be late."

"No, no need. I cannot meet later this morning, however. I will be away from the castle until sometime in the afternoon."

"This afternoon, then? When you return to the castle, just come up and find me. I'll likely be either in my rooms or in the infirmary."

He nodded once, then was gone without another word.

"Something wrong?" Pomona asked after he had left.

"I doubt it. We are working on that project together," Poppy replied.

"He's really coming to life these last few months," Pomona observed. "I was very pleased he came to our party the other week. He always was reluctant to go to any social events that he wasn't required to attend. He even seemed to have a good time...you spent some time with him that evening, I remember. Didn't you think he had a good time?"

"Yes, it was a good party, though the drinks were a bit strong," Poppy said, avoiding any response about Severus. "A lot of folk were looking for Headache Potion the next day!"

"Severus came out to the Three Broomsticks with us the other night, too. He didn't seem very comfortable at first, but he relaxed after a bit, even got Rosmerta to get the Barghest's Howl to play for the crowd...for Filius, in particular. I think it's good for him to get out amongst others and not just hang about the dungeons. I tried to encourage him to socialise with Helena, and I hear that he left with her."

"Really. Yes, he mentioned he had gone to the Broomsticks with you all," Poppy replied. So, Severus might be moving on, or perhaps at least having another little fling. She ignored the pain that clenched her heart. She had had a date herself, after all. A wonderful evening with Quin, a wonderful, intimate evening with Quin. And she had wanted Severus to move on and have a relationship with a younger, more suitable witch.

"Filius, I am afraid, had a bit too much to drink," Pomona continued, "so we didn't stay as long as we might have."

"Filius? He can usually drink everyone else under the table," Poppy said, her brow furrowed. "Is everything okay? Is he troubled about anything? You two aren't having any problems, are you?"

"Oh, no, I think it was just the Fwooper's Song...that's a very powerful drink. He does seem . . . I don't know," Pomona said, shaking her head. "There may be something bothering him, but he claims not. I thought it might have to do with the holiday, but since he's coming for a couple days, too, at the end, I can't imagine why that would bother him."

"Perhaps he wanted a holiday on his own with you," Poppy suggested.

"But he is encouraging me to go with you all and to help Gertrude to have a good time."

"That doesn't mean that he doesn't wish he could have it both ways...have you have your witches' holiday with Gertrude and the rest of us, but also be able to get away somewhere alone with you. You didn't really have a holiday this summer, after all."

"We were on our own most of the time. It was hardly like it is during term," Pomona said. "It felt like a holiday."

Poppy shrugged one shoulder, distracted by thoughts of Severus out with another witch. Perhaps that was what he had wanted to tell her, that he had thought about what he wanted, and he had moved on. "Whatever it is will pass, I'm sure."

"Everything does," Pomona said philosophically.

"I'd better be going. I need to meet Laura," Poppy said.

On her way up to the library, Poppy considered her reaction to Pomona's news that Severus had left the pub with Helena Benetti. They were probably just both leaving at the same time. Perhaps he saw her home afterward. It would have been a civil gesture, nothing more. Suddenly she remembered the two riders whom she and Quin had seen in the sky that night as she was walking him down to the gates. Just coincidence . . . many people had broomsticks and rode them at night, returning home after visiting family or after a long day of work. And even if it had been Helena and Severus, that didn't mean anything. It certainly didn't imply that they were warming the sheets together. And if they were, well, that was a good thing for Severus, Poppy told herself. He should have more experience with witches...with nice ones, not like Bella, who had abused him when he was a young man just out of school. And he should be with younger witches, ones of appropriate age and temperament. It would be good for him.

Poppy sighed. Regardless of any other factors, she had to acknowledge that she was simply too old for Severus by a good fifteen or twenty years. She should be glad they had even had a fling, that he had thought to look at her twice, and to be so good to her, as well. He should find a nice young witch, and she should be happy for him.

There was no point in thinking about it. She had told him it was best if they took a break, and if that break meant that they returned permanently to their usual friendly collegiality, that was the way things should be, and she certainly shouldn't wish for anything else. It had been a sheer fluke that they had ever been intimate, in any case. She should simply pretend it had never happened, Poppy told herself firmly. She could continue seeing Quin casually. That would be nice.

No matter how nice the prospect might be, the thought of seeing Quin more frequently didn't cheer her. Not that she didn't want to see Quin again, but it was no trade for giving up Severus. Besides, she and Quin would always be friends, regardless of whether she was in a relationship with someone else or not. Not, of course, that she would have physical relations with Quin if she were seeing another wizard. That was something that Poppy simply would never do, no matter how attractive some other wizard was. If she wanted to have an intimate, sexual relationship with another man that much that she had to fight the temptation, then that meant that the relationship she was in either needed a great deal of work and attention or simply needed to come to an end. She had never been in such a position before, but she knew what she could live with and what she couldn't live with. Cheating was something she knew that she couldn't live with. Revulsion would overwhelm any temptation. That was a part of her Hufflepuff nature.

Loyalty and adherence to commitment were essential qualities in a Hufflepuff...not inviolable or perfect in all members of the House, of course, but very strong ones. Even Pomona, for all her occasional flightiness and indecision, had never cheated on Filius. Of course, it also was quite likely that she would never broadcast it if she had cheated, but Poppy didn't believe Pomona ever would have. That sense of commitment was likely one reason that Pomona had broken up with Filius that first time all those years ago, after they had only been together for a few months...she had become bored and wanted to see someone new. Pomona had mistaken the uncertainty and desperation in her previous relationships for excitement and passion. She hadn't been used to being treated as well as Filius treated her, either. Although Pomona had wanted devotion and loyalty from a wizard she was with, there was some part of her that had foolishly distrusted Filius's devotion, as it seemed so freely given and easily won.

The couple eventually overcame their initial problems, and Pomona learned that a relationship didn't have to be volatile or uncertain in order to be exciting, and now the two were nearly inseparable. Poppy sometimes wished that she and Murdoch had done the same all those years ago, that they had resolved their disagreements and she had married him. But that would have meant compromise on her part, not on his, and that compromise would have meant her leaving Hogwarts. Perhaps her life would have been wonderful if she had married Murdoch and gone to work in his apothecary or at St. Giles, but she loved the life she had made at Hogwarts, and she wouldn't indulge in any regrets about what was long past and beyond changing.

As she pushed open the door to the library, Poppy felt another twinge of regret, though, for a more recent loss. She shoved it aside forcefully. Telling Severus that they should take a break had been the right thing to do, she told herself once more. The very fact that he might be seeing another witch was testament to the truth of it. And the fact that she wished he weren't seeing anyone else spoke loudly to the fact that it was better for her, too. She would have become too attached to him. Good to have nipped it in the bud.

Laura helped Poppy find the materials she was looking for on the effects of trauma on children and teenagers...all Muggle sources, since the wizarding materials on that were sparse and derivative from the Muggle work...and Poppy brought them over to a table next to one of the large windows. That first day of spring was sunny and bright, and Poppy was hopeful that boded well for a nice spring. Hard to believe that on that day two years before, Albus Dumbledore had been declared dead and they had been preparing for his funeral.

She gazed out the window, recalling the white tomb that had been erected around the Transfigured corpse, able to see it there on the lawn in her mind's eye. She had grieved Albus then, and still was grieving him on the day she learned that he hadn't died. That had been a shock, a trauma of sorts, though certainly good news.

Poppy's attention was caught by the sight of Severus walking across the grounds toward the gates. Of course, she remembered: he had said he would be gone from the castle that morning. Something seemed different about him, and it took her a moment to realise that it was his clothing. Poppy stepped closer to the window.

Severus wasn't wearing a long robe, a long cape, or even a long coat. Not only that, but he wasn't wearing one of the longer suit jackets that he affected during the school year, most of which were almost like an old-fashioned frockcoat in appearance. She couldn't tell precisely what he was wearing, but his black jacket was short, coming just to his waist, and below the jacket were close-fitting black trousers, possibly jeans. Poppy didn't think she'd ever seen Severus dressed that way, even when he was a student, although she presumed that when he was away from school, he dressed differently. She had seen him in a Muggle suit a few times, always a conservative black suit with a white shirt and a Slytherin House green and silver striped tie. He looked like an undertaker in it, she'd thought the first time she saw him in it. She'd even seen him in fancy dress on the rare occasion. But never casually dressed in Muggle-wear.

He looked quite fine, striding down the drive, filled with vitality and intensity, ignoring the stares of the students who had stopped tossing a Quaffle around to watch Severus Snape in Muggle casual dress, and they continued to watch as he approached the gates and raised his hand, opening them with a mere flick of his finger. A tingle passed through Poppy, all the way down to her crux. What power Severus had in that finger, and what pleasure he had brought her with it.

As he reached the now-open gate, Severus paused and looked over his shoulder, back up at the castle toward the window where she stood watching. Poppy stepped back and turned away quickly. He couldn't see her in the daylight, she was certain; the leaded glass of the library windows gave too great a glare in the sunshine to allow someone outside to see in unless the person was much closer than she had been standing. Still, she had the feeling that he had known that she was there watching him.

She didn't know whether that was wishful thinking or not.

Poppy sat back down to her reading, and focussed on that for the next hour, making copies of information she found particularly helpful. Laura was increasing the size of the Muggle section of the library, beginning with the sciences and medicine, two of her own interests, but there still was relatively little available. Poppy thought that she might have to make a trip into either Edinburgh or London and go to a Muggle library. She disliked that idea, though. The Muggle world was becoming increasingly confusing to navigate, she found, with all the new apparatuses and computers. Trying to cope with it all made her feel like a child...and an unintelligent one, at that; half the time, she didn't even know how to formulate the proper questions to ask how to operate the machinery that the Muggles used so quickly and easily every day. Even using the Tube was more complicated than it had been when she was a young witch living in London in the early fifties, although she had managed to adapt to the changes to the transit system over the years. It would be easier, she thought, to simply go to one of the larger Muggle bookshops and purchase new books using the Hogwarts Muggle credit card. Gladys Glyndwr could probably give her copies of any Muggle journal articles she thought worth reading. No, no point in struggling with the Muggle world of library identity cards, copier machinery, and computerised indexes, she decided.

Poppy was just gathering together her parchments and the two books that she was going to borrow when a large Eagle Owl flew up to the window and began rapping on the glass. Owls were discouraged in the library, Poppy knew, but she opened the window, anyway. The impressive owl hopped from the window ledge to the sill and gave a screech, looking up at Poppy. For her, then.

"Sorry I haven't any treats, but if you go to the Owlery, you'll probably find some," she said, taking the letter from the bird.

Poppy smiled when she saw the seal, emerald green wax impressed with the image of a cup with cracks running through it. Quin. She closed the window and broke the seal. Her smile grew. Just what she needed. A night out with Quin.

Quickly, she sat back down, found a piece of fresh parchment, and scrawled her reply. She wished she hadn't sent the bird on its way, but she had, so she hastened to the Owlery, hoping to catch it or to find another fast bird to deliver her response.

The first day of spring was a mild one, and there were several groups of students out enjoying the fresh air that morning. Severus ignored their stares, but worked to avoid glancing at the spot where the white tomb had once stood, erected just a few days after Dumbledore had apparently succumbed to a lengthy illness. Severus was glad the tomb was gone, and the reason for it, but on this beautiful morning, it was unsettling to remember the terrible grief, guilt, and anger he had felt on that same day two years before. He was alive and Dumbledore was alive, and now he was very glad...and very relieved...that he had not survived the war to live in a world without the old wizard, as irritating as Dumbledore might sometimes be. Severus supposed that he could be irritating, himself. More than irritating.

He remembered Poppy and her hurt. He had hoped to make it up to her . . . perhaps he still could. She must be in the library at that moment, working. Reflexively, as he reached the gate, he looked back up at the castle toward the library, wondering whether Poppy could see him from the library windows, and whether he should have gone to the library before leaving the castle . . . but he prized punctuality, and he was due at Helena's flat in a few minutes. He stepped through the gate, exiting the grounds, and Disapparated for Bog End.

Severus knocked briskly on Helena's door. He hadn't brought his own broomstick with him, which he hoped was as she expected. His broom was a twelve-year old Comet, something that Albus had given him one Christmas. Perfectly serviceable, and quite a good broom when he first got it, but Severus thought that the worst broom in Helena's cupboard had to be better than the one he had. Besides, she was going to test the new Nimbus Victory, after which she was going to show him a few tricks on the Thunderbolt. He wouldn't need an additional broomstick.

The door opened, and Helena looked up at him with a bright smile on her face. "Good morning, Severus! You're punctual! I was just having a cup of coffee, would you like some?"

He nodded and stepped in. "Thank you, it smells good." He sat at her kitchen table as she poured his coffee. "It's a nice day, but a bit windy."

"That will help me test the Victory at high altitudes," she said. "I think that's one area where they're going to have to work on the stability charms if they really want this to be a first-class broomstick. Milk or cream?"

"Cream. Are these your notes on the earlier test flights you've made?" Severus asked, gesturing toward a disorderly pile of ruled paper at other the end of the table.

"Yes...and they're not the mess they may seem to be. I've just been going over them. I have to write this report up for the company, and that's going to be a job. I should have gotten an earlier start, but . . ." She shrugged. "It'll be done on time. I'm glad I haven't any duties up at the school for the next couple days, though!"

"I presume you received my owl about the new security precautions."

"Yes. Thanks. I won't be up to the castle until Tuesday evening, though, when I have dinner duty in the Great Hall." She hesitated. "Are you in charge of drawing up the schedules?"

Severus raised an eyebrow. He could sense a favour waiting to be asked of him. "Yes."

"Could I ask that, if possible, I not be given duty on Tuesday nights any longer, at least for a while? Or Thursdays? I've been doing a yoga course in Inverness on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and I'm always late on Tuesday. I know it's not a high priority, but..."

"Of course. If you have conflicting plans, let me know in advance. I can't guarantee that I can always accommodate people, but I try. And I don't have duty this Tuesday evening, so if you wish, I will take yours, and you can take one of mine at some point. And I will make changes to the schedule for the upcoming weeks and redistribute them at next Wednesday's staff meeting."

Helena smiled her brilliant smile, her blue eyes lighting up. "Would you? Oh, thank you! I am really enjoying it, but I get dirty looks when I walk in late while everyone's doing the opening meditation."

"If they were in a truly meditative state, they would be able to ignore you, or not even notice you," Severus said.

"Yes, I suppose, but we're not very advanced," Helena said. "I can't blame them. It must be irritating."

"Hmph." Severus finished his coffee.

"Let me just get our brooms, and we can be off, then!" Helena said, swishing her wand to deposit their coffee cups in the sink. "If you'll grab that basket, it has our lunch in it."

The covered basket had a long, wide leather strap, and was slightly concave on one side. Severus slung it across his chest, then shifted it so the basket hung at his back.

When they stepped out the door, Helena looked him up and down. Black leather jacket, soft black woollen jersey, a starched white collar peeking out from beneath it, black jeans, and black dragonhide boots. "You're still in black, but this look suits you. And you carry it off better than most British wizards I've met...you look normal. What I mean is..."

"I am aware of what you mean. I do not know whether some wizards don't have eyes in their heads or whether some variety of brain fog overcomes their good sense when they dress Muggle, but some of them choose the most atrocious combinations. I was raised in a Muggle neighbourhood, however, and my father was a Muggle. I went to Muggle school before I came to Hogwarts. I am well-acquainted with Muggle habits. In addition, it is usually older generations who have more trouble with Muggle dress. Perhaps changing styles over the decades confuses them."

"Oh, I see." She thought for a moment. "You're a half-blood, then. I thought that the Death Eaters were all about purity of blood."

"You must know that Riddle was a half-blood."

"Yes. I presumed that it was some form of self-hatred that led him to his extreme views about racial purity."

"Likely...and not only hatred for his Muggle ancestry. He hated purebloods, too. He never wanted to be one of them. He wanted to have the pureblood world at his feet. He believed himself better than them all, and he blamed them for the circumstances in which he grew up. He wasn't particularly logical in his beliefs, although they had a kind of peculiar internal order to them, as long as you didn't think too much about them."

Helena shivered visibly. "Sociopaths are like that, I guess. They have a psychopathic logic that doesn't make sense to the rest of us." She looked up at him, then quickly looked away. "Let's get the flight tests over."

Severus knew that look in her eyes; he had seen it many times before when people remembered that he had been a Death Eater. A killer in the Dark Lord's army, a volunteer in service to the Dark. Merciless and without empathy. And she would be right. He had been such a Death Eater at one time. It was an undeserved grace that he had received a second chance and an opportunity to reclaim his soul and to recover his long-buried conscience. And it was a grace born of guilt: guilt for Lily's death, for his betrayal of her. Always would his own redemption be inextricably bound up with his guilt.

He had heard that redemption washes away guilt, but it did not, not in his case, neither the responsibility for the guilty deed nor the debt incurred by it, and it certainly did not wash away the sense of having wronged someone nor the remorse that now accompanied that sense. Redemption was about the future, Severus suddenly realised, and about reaching beyond that moment of wrong-doing and having the opportunity to do something new, not being mired in past transgressions. Redemption gave him a new future and the possibility for change. Whatever had passed through Helena's mind when she had remembered that he had been a Death Eater, he would have to try to remember that he was not the psychopathic Death Eater she might imagine...his nightmares of his own evil deeds not withstanding.

"Did you have any place in mind?" Severus asked as he mounted the Thunderbolt and hovered beside her.

"Just to the south of here, there's a valley that's nice. We could have our lunch there, too, if you like."

"That's the plan, then," Severus said with a nod.

They took off, Severus following Helena south a few miles. When they reached the valley, they landed and Helena handed Severus a small pad and a retractable pen.

"Would you mind taking notes for me? It will go faster. I'll let you know what to record."

"Of course."

"And I have a feeling that given the wind, it will be a bumpy test. I'm going to push the Victory to its limits, so don't be alarmed if the broom seems unstable. Unless I actually fall off or the broom loses all its charms and plummets toward the ground, just stand by...no need to do anything."

Severus nodded.

Helena was right: the broom didn't do well at high altitudes. Once she pushed it up beyond a gentle cruising speed, the tail would shimmy, and in sharp turns, it seemed to lose all its stability. Helena always quickly regained control, however, and at intervals, she would fly over to Severus and tell him what to write in her notepad. It was somewhat tedious after a while, but Severus amused himself by playing with the Thunderbolt, taking it up and down, spinning in place, flying in circles, once even attempting to fly backward...though he nearly stalled, and he didn't try it again...always, though, with one eye on Helena, just in case she did lose control of the new broomstick or was thrown off. He took a few notes of his own, as well, based upon his observations, but when she stopped and told him just one final speed test, then they'd be finished, Severus was glad.

Severus watched as Helena climbed higher on her test broom, higher than she'd flown before, and a few hundred feet higher than the top of the highest mountain. He shivered in sympathy for her; it had to be colder at that altitude, the air thinner, and the wind, sharper. He rose higher himself in order to monitor her better, but although the Victory began to shake as Helena reached the top speed, it didn't balk or stall. Nonetheless, Helena's knuckles were white when she drifted back down to him, and Severus didn't think it was merely from the cold.

"Definitely needs more work. If I hadn't retuned the stabilising charms myself, the broomstick would certainly have stalled."

"You were much higher than most people fly, though, and faster, too," Severus pointed out as they slowly flew lower, following a burn to the north end of the valley.

"It's supposed to be their new top-of-the-line model, though," Helena said. "My granddad has a thirty-year old Nimbus one thousand that I could push more than this one. Of course, he's taken good care of it over the years and tweaked its charms, but still, for the money they're asking and the amount of work they supposedly put into its design, the Victory will be a disaster for them if they don't make some changes. Very sloppy design. Not at all up to their usual standard."

"What are you recommending?" Severus asked. He knew next to nothing about how modern broomsticks were made. It was an art, though, and perhaps it was simply a matter of having different witches and wizards casting the charms.

"They need to change the way the charms are layered, I believe," Helena replied, "and they need to interlace the stabilising charms with the others by recasting them as they lay down each of the new ones."

"I see. Rather like layering wards and weaving your base ward through all the others," Severus said.

"Precisely." She nodded toward a open area to the right of the stream. "Picnic there?"

Severus indicated his agreement by banking and heading toward the spot.

Helena hopped lightly from the broom before it had even come to a full stop. "I'd like to take a minute to record my final notes while it's fresh in my mind," she said.

Severus handed her the notepad. "I'll set up the picnic."

"Good...there's a few kinds of sandwiches, including something called 'coronation chicken,' but which just looks like plain old chicken salad to me. Madam Puddifoot assured me it's something special, though. And there's a few different things to drink. I wasn't sure what you'd like, but I figured you wouldn't care for iced tea"...she laughed at Severus's expression..."so there's butterbeer, lemonade, and a big thermos of hot coffee."

As Helena sat on a rock and made notes, Severus took a lightweight blanket from the basket and spread it on the ground. Before he set out any of their lunch, he cast a warming charm over the blanket, then added an Impervius to keep any damp from seeping through the cloth. The sandwiches were wrapped in parchment, and each was marked to indicate what was in it. Severus presumed that "cc" was coronation chicken, "rb" was roast beef, and "egg" was obviously egg salad of some kind. As Severus finished setting out their lunch, including a box that likely contained their dessert, Helena put her notepad away in the pouch at her waist.

"Lovely," Helena said as she gracefully sat cross-legged on the blanket. "It was cold up there. It's nice to have a cozy warming charm." She rubbed her hands together briskly. "I had been going to make our lunch myself, but I found I didn't have the time to do it the way I would have liked. Hope you don't mind Puddifoot's."

"As long as I don't need to actually eat in the café itself, I can enjoy the food from there," Severus replied. "What kind of sandwich would you like?"

"I thought that to start, I'd try a half of this supposedly special chicken salad sandwich," Helena said.

Severus handed her a wrapped sandwich, and when she'd taken half, he said, "Do you mind?"

"No, go ahead, have the other half. I think there's another there if we want it."

Severus bit into the sandwich. It was on a soft potato bread that was a pleasant backdrop for the curried chicken salad. Not bad. It had nuts and halved grapes in it. He supposed that was what made Puddifoot claim it was special.

"It's all right," Helena said. "It could do with a bit more bite to it, though. D'you have the coffee over there? I could use a hot drink."

As they ate their picnic lunch, Severus finishing his chicken sandwich and moving on to the roast beef, he thought that it was a good and peaceful day, and he felt well, despite all that had gone wrong in his life lately, everything from the fiasco with Hermione the other evening, to still having moved no further with Poppy, to having had to inform Draco that his father had been the victim in the most recent attack on former Death Eaters. Draco had looked more stunned than Severus had anticipated, but once he had been reassured that his mother had been at work at the time, he had only wanted to know where she was and how he could reach her. He hadn't seemed to care that Lucius was a patient in St. Mungo's. The Headmistress had made arrangements for him to visit his mother over the weekend, and he wouldn't be back until Monday morning. Severus wondered if he would visit his father, as well.

As if she were reading his thoughts, Helena asked, "So, the Death Eater who was burned out the other day, was he a friend of yours?"

Severus raised an eyebrow.

"I just meant..."

"No. I knew him. I wish him no ill, but he was . . . No. He is not a friend."

"I didn't mean any offence. I was just curious. And if he had been a friend, I would have offered you my sympathy."

Severus sighed. "It is complicated. I have known him for a long time. At one point, I did believe he was a friend. But I have him to thank for making it so easy for me to join . . . to join Riddle's group."

"To blame, you mean."

Severus shook his head. "No. I'm the only one to blame for that. However easy he made it, with introductions, recommendations, making me feel valued, or however easy others made it for me by . . . by taking up against me, I only have myself to blame."

"Taking up against you?" Helena looked puzzled.

He shrugged. "That's the way it felt to me. I was never the golden-haired boy at school, you know. But L–, the wizard in question is not a friend. An acquaintance of long-standing, yes. And he did do me a good turn occasionally, though I always paid double for it."

"The Prophet said you were young when you joined, just out of school," Helena said questioningly.

"Yes. The week after the Leaving Feast." The week after the Leaving Feast, he was at a party in his honour, surrounded by powerful wizards and witches who welcomed him into their ranks, and they topped off the party with some Muggle-baiting and some imaginative vandalism at Diagon Alley's owl shop and the Owl Post Office. He'd been sick the next day, and less from drink too much taken than from the memory of bits of owls scattered over the street and pavement. Most of the owls had escaped through the broken windows or the hole in the Post Office roof, but some had not. It had tempted him to drink more, but he had simply spent the day practising Occlusion exercises. By bedtime, the memory was distant, emotionless, and unreal. He became very good at Occluding, hiding his memories and his feelings even from himself.

Severus set down his mug of coffee and rolled over onto his back. He didn't Occlude, but he focussed on the strips of clouds grazing the hills and tried not to think at all.

"Sorry, Severus. You probably don't want to talk about it."

"No, I don't," he said, his voice a rough whisper. One of the clouds reminded him of Poppy's silhouette as she lay beside him in bed. Poppy . . . she had only the slightest inkling of what he was, what he had done. He swallowed.

"I am sorry." Helena's voice was soft, but closer. She had moved to sit beside his head. "I can imagine it's something you prefer not to think about. But sometimes . . . sometimes I feel as though it's the big purple elephant in the middle of the room, you know? Except that everyone else in the room has gotten used to it. They know how to step around it, through its legs, avoid its trunk, and they don't even really see it anymore. I'm the new girl. I still keep seeing it. Not all of the time; most of the time, I just see you, but sometimes I remember and I'm curious. The Prophet articles have only confused me and raised more questions than they answered."

"I'll give you the short version of the story, then. With a little more than the Prophet has been officially given by any of us, but if I find it in their next issue..."

"No, don't say anything, then. I wouldn't want you ever to think I'd told anyone. Best way to keep that from happening is for me not to know. I'm not a cat; I won't die of curiosity."

Severus shifted his gaze from the clouds to Helena's face. "You're certain."

"Yes. As far as I'm concerned, anyway, you're the friend who let me cry on his shoulder when I needed it. Anything else . . ." She shrugged. "It would be interesting to me, but not vital to me or to our friendship."

Severus nodded, looking up at her. She really was truly beautiful. It was not simply that her features were in near-perfect proportion, her blue eyes so very bright set against her darker skin, her straight black hair so glossy and lovely, but that she emanated warmth and life. He gave her a slight smile. "So if you're not a cat, what are you?"

"What?"

"Hermione Granger tells me that she's doing Animagus exercises with you. What animal are you?"

Helena laughed. "I see...can you guess? Probably not!"

"Hmm, something sharp and quick," Severus said. "A fox?"

Helena laughed again. "No, not a fox."

Severus tried to think of swift-moving North American animals. "A coyote?"

"Nope. Nothing canine."

"A squirrel?"

She shook her head.

"An eagle?"

"You're getting a bit warmer," she said.

"A flying creature of some kind, then," Severus said.

"Yes, and I really doubt you'll get it," Helena said. "I'll show you."

She rolled up onto her knees, and when she transformed, she seemed to curl into herself and almost disappear. Severus gaped. Then he blinked. Helena rose straight up, then flew forward with a great buzzing of wings. Had he not been so close, he might have thought her to be a large insect of some kind, but she was a bird. A hummingbird. A brilliantly coloured, swift-moving, utterly amazing hummingbird. He laughed, delighted. He'd never seen one before.

"That's marvellous!"

Helena flew around him as Severus sat up, newly energised by his wonder at her form. He watched her incredulously as she zipped about, up and down, circling his head, and then just hovering in front of him.

Severus laughed again. "I thought you were amazing on a broomstick, but that was nothing!"

Helena rose up, then with a pop, smoothly transformed back to her ordinary form. She grinned at him as she folded her legs under her. "Liked it, eh?"

"Very much."

"You're not an Animagus?"

Severus shook his head. "No. I doubt I have the aptitude, and even if I had, I never had the time for it. I certainly couldn't have found a form without training, and at the time in my life when I might have had interest in it, there was no one who could train me. It's not a common skill here."

"What's your Patronus? A person's Patronus is often an indicator of what their Animagus form might be, although they're not always identical."

Severus remembered Poppy smiling at him, her head resting beside his on his pillow, flushed and happy from making love with him. He drew his wand from his inner jacket pocket and quickly cast a Patronus. He surprised himself as it flew, almost fully material, from the end of his wand. He had never been able to cast a nonverbal Patronus before, and he had done it without even thinking about it.

"Oh, it's wonderful! A panther of some kind, yes?" Helena said, watching the large feline as Severus directed it around them, until finally, he let it fly away into the clouds and disappear.

"Indeed. It was not always that, however. I used to cast a deer. A doe, actually."

"Huh. That's interesting...did it change when you became an adult? Deer as a teen, panther when you grew up?"

"No, much later than that. I didn't learn to cast a Patronus until I was twenty-one."

"So it wasn't when you joined the Order of the Phoenix, either," Helena said thoughtfully.

"No. It was recent."

"After the war, then?"

"No, during the final year of it."

"Interesting . . . If you were an Animagus, then, you might be some kind of cat."

Severus nodded. "I suppose that's likely. There are worse forms, more inconvenient ones, certainly. I've always thought it would be particularly nasty to go to all the work of becoming an Animagus only to discover you were a fish. I wouldn't like that at all."

"Oh, it could be fun, but I see how it could be limiting. And dangerous." Helena opened the box and pulled out a biscuit. "Cookie, Severus?"

"Hmm? Yes, perhaps I'll have one." He waved his hand and warmed up his coffee. One good thing about the duelling practice with Filius: his wandless magic was becoming much more precise...when he wasn't distracted holding a naked witch in his arms, anyway, Severus thought, remembering Poppy's broken door. He helped himself to a chocolate biscuit with a rich, creamy vanilla filling. It was sweeter than he normally liked, but nice with the black coffee.

Helena licked some cream from her fingertips. "My Great-uncle Leon is what you might call a Multianimorphmagus in this country, or a shapeshifter. He has more than one form he can take."

"Really? I've heard of that, but I didn't know there was actually anyone alive who could do it."

"There aren't many. It's more of a natural talent than a learned skill, although he worked at it to expand the number of different creatures he can manifest. He can even change his human form, within limits, a bit like a Metamorphmagus."

"That could be convenient," Severus said, thinking of the situations he could have extricated himself from if he'd had such skills.

Helena shrugged. "It's kind of a parlour trick for him, you know? But as you say, it can be convenient."

"He could have been useful during the war," Severus said.

"Uncle Leon probably would have helped if he'd been asked, but it took your Ministry a very long time to recognise the danger, and we really didn't know anything about the Order of the Phoenix back home. Just as well; I think Aunt Evie, his wife, wouldn't have been very pleased."

"Just as well, as you say," Severus agreed.

"So, are you ready for your one-witch broomstick rodeo, or do you have to get back to Hogwarts?" Helena asked.

"I don't need to get back till later this afternoon. I'd enjoy seeing the Thunderbolt ridden by someone who really knows what she's doing," Severus said. She was good and she knew it, so there was no point in pretending that he didn't appreciate her skill.

Helena grinned. "Okay, then! I'll wait to have any more of these cookies...flying doesn't usually give me indigestion, but it's not as much fun doing backward loops on a full stomach!" She stood up and held out her hand; the Thunderbolt leapt into her grasp. "You might want to take the other broom and fly up over there somewhere to watch," she said, pointing to the hillside across from them. "I think you'd have a better view from there."

Severus nodded and Summoned the other broom.

"Don't let anyone know I let you ride the Victory," Helena said. "Technically, I'm the only one who's supposed to ride it during this testing phase."

"Right. My lips are sealed."

"Ready? I'll just warm up a bit now, then when I see you're settled, I'll do a few little tricks for you."

Helena shot almost straight up into the air, and Severus took off for the hillside at a more leisurely speed, looking for a spot from which he could watch his private broomstick rodeo show.

NEXT

Chapter Sixty-Six: Broomstick Rodeo

Sunday, 21 March 1999

Severus gets a one-woman broomstick rodeo show.

Rated T.

Characters: Severus Snape, Helena Benetti, Gareth McGonagall