Trust...

Our world go beyond the moon,

Our words go into the shadows.

The river sings the endlessness.

We write of our journey through night,

We write in our aloneness,

We want to know the shape of eternity.

~ Enya, The river sings

Tuesday, July 21st, 2009

It was raining again, and Snape waited for her at the front door of the library under his black umbrella, glossy with water.

"So, what do you prefer to do, Miss Granger? Do you want to continue taking your daily drop of poison?" he asked.

Hermione's shoulder lowered in frustration. "That was an unfortunate turn of phrase," she justified herself, abashed. "A terrible example. What I wanted to say..."

Snape smirked. "You are too easy to make uneasy, Miss Granger. I may even consider the possibility of ceasing my efforts to discomfort you, because you offer satisfaction without any effort."

Hermione looked confused for a moment. Is he trifling with me? Was that a joke? The quirk at the corners of Snape's mouth deepened, and she knew she had not offended him.

"I've told you already that there's nothing you can say that would offend me, Miss Granger. I'm used to quite harsher definitions of myself than the ones you could make up. Now come," he said, lifting the umbrella up a little in her direction, "or tell me honestly that you have had enough of this cure and that you prefer to go home by swimming."

"I could always Apparate, you know," she remarked with a slightly petulant inflection as she took her place at Snape's side, under his umbrella.

"That would be rather boring and predictable."

"You almost sound as if you find this task of accompanying me enjoyable, sir. But I've revealed you; I know you are doing this out of duty." Hermione smiled. Snape may know everything about obsessions, but I know everything about duty. And, for what I know of him, Snape knows a lot about it too. There's nothing wrong with acting out of duty; in duty, there is certainty.

Rain was coming down loudly around them, surrounding them with a noisy curtain of water that dripped from the rim of the umbrella. Hermione pulled out her wand and cast a quick water repelling charm in front of them, to prevent them from sliding on the pavement stones.

"You can make yourself useful sometimes, Miss Granger," commented Snape. "I cannot totally complain that you have agreed to oblige this old man's wishes."

"You are not old, Professor," she replied with automatic politeness.

From the deepening edge of Snape's smirk, Hermione understood that she had said exactly what Snape wanted to be told. How vain! She shook her head in indignation. He knows perfectly well that he's not that old. He's only forty-nine, after all. Almost a youngster, by wizarding standards.

But can he still be judged by wizarding standards? He has no more magical powers. Does he still have the life expectancy of a wizard?

A thoughtful expression fell on Hermione's face as she followed her considerations. She clenched her wand more strongly as she continued to repel the water beneath their feet. I shunned the wizarding world for so long, she thought. But I don't know what I would have done if I'd lost my powers. This man has survived through more than I could imagine.

A jolt of fear ran through her as she considered the scenario of living without magic. She quivered, and the involuntary movement made her shoulder contact with Snape's right arm holding the umbrella.

"I don't know how you can do it," she whispered almost imperceptibly, regaining her balance.

"Do what?" he scowled.

"Live without magic," murmured Hermione with a querulous voice, feeling on the verge of crying.

"For Merlin's sake, Granger, spare your tears for when you'll start working for the Ministry," hissed Snape, disgusted.

Hermione snuffled. "I haven't been selected yet."

"Oh, I'm sure they will be happy to wear you like one more war badge, Miss Granger. In fact, I wonder why you aren't the Head of some department yet, like some of your good old friends."

Hermione snored while her lips widened in a nostalgic smile. "They ask me the same thing all the time, you know. Everybody expected me to make an instant career after Hogwarts." I expected that as well, before 1998.

"Instead, you preferred to restore Muggle books."

"I did," Hermione nodded. "Professor McGonagall wasn't pleased that I decided not to pursue my studies in a magical university."

"Minerva wasn't pleased about many things," Snape remarked curtly. Then he added with a silkier tone, "But pray do enlighten me, Miss Granger, as to why a person who showed enough sense to keep herself out of Hogwarts and the Ministry for ten years now wishes to relinquish her well-being for a dog's leash and to exchange freedom for slavery."

"They didn't inform me you cared so much for other people's well-being, Professor."

"It's a most recent habit of mine, Miss Granger. I just developed it."

Hermione repressed a laugh and shook her head one more time. I was right. Snape is joking with me. He wants to put me in a good humour. But he is also evading my question. And I'm just as bad.

Haworth Road appeared in front of them, blurred behind the waterfall of rain, and Hermione, believing nobody would see anything from the windows, let Snape accompany her to the front door.

On Wednesday night, Hermione had just entered into her room and deposited her bag on the floor next to the bed when something knocked at her window. Pic pic, pic pic. She turned and she saw an owl fluttering outside the glass.

"Hedwig II!" She welcomed the bird, opening the window. Harry's owl flew inside and landed on the bed's headboard, where she shook the drops of rain off her feathers. For the third evening in a row, it was raining. Hermione took a biscuit from a pack on her desk and offered it to the bird. Then she proceeded to untie a roll of parchment from the owl's claw.

Dear Hermione,

Harry

No matter how much she had distanced herself from her Hogwarts mates, Harry's birthday was an annual appointment Hermione never missed. It reminded her of better times: when she was brave and strong, strong enough to give Death Eaters the slip in a crowded London night. For the occasion, she could be even willing to meet Ron again. She also looked forward to meeting Harry's children again – James, Albus, and little Lily. They had surely grown.

She picked up a quill and scribbled an answer.

Dear Harry,

Hermione

Hermione tied the parchment to Hedwig II's claw and she stroked the bird's head. "Go and fly back to Godric's Hollow. I will follow soon," she murmured, and she pushed the owl toward the rainy night sky. Then she closed the window behind her, took one of the same biscuits she had offered Hedwig II, and grabbed Harry's letter to flip through it again while she munched her biscuit.

She stopped when she re-read 'the eleven of us – me, Ginny, you, Neville and Hanna, Luna, Ron and the kids.' Me, Harry, Ron, Ginny, Neville, Hanna and Luna make seven, and the three children make ten. Harry had never been a genius in maths, but surely, he knew how to count up to eleven. Had he simply misspelt eleven instead of ten? Or was there going to be another person with them in Godric's Hollow?

On Thursday night, the rain had luckily dwindled into a gentle shower, and Hermione declined Snape's offer to use the umbrella. Instead, she accepted the refreshing, tickling touch of the light drops that rested in her hair like morning dew – but who cared? Her hair had always been impossible, resisting every kind of magical and Muggle brushing, so a little more humidity wasn't certainly going to change her looks that much. After all, she was only going home with Snape – she was not showing off on a catwalk.

The light rain carried the smell of grass and heather, and it was a pleasure to walk among it after staying closed for so long inside the library. Hermione felt crossed by the same feeling of an inebriating summer night she had known in another time, in another place. She felt... well, simply too positive to risk a perilous subject.

"I received a letter yesterday, from Ha– a friend of mine. Concerning Hogwarts." Sensing no objections, she continued, "He tells me they are looking for a new Defence against the Dark Arts teacher. Again."

"The job is jinxed," commented Snape flatly.

"Headmistress McGonagall would like Harry Potter to apply for the post."

"This may be the time a job succeeds where the Dark Lord failed."

"Professor!"

"I may be actually lucky. I earned said title in teaching another subject than DADA, considering the consequences."

"Headmistress McGonagall believes that Harry could break the jinx surrounding the post."

Snape snorted. "Minerva, as many of her fellow Gryffindors, is totally misguided about the matter."

Hermione frowned. "Why, sir? Do you believe you know more about it?"

"As it happens, I do."

"And what is the solution you suggest, sir?" asked Hermione with a shrill voice.

"The job is jinxed because it's founded upon the wrong premises. Hogwarts should not teach only to defend against the Dark Arts... it should teach the Dark Arts, period. The castle senses it."

Hermione's frown deepened and she took a step away from Snape. The rain, which hit her, was suddenly cold and sharp on her skin. "I would not have expected you to still harp on the Dark Arts, Professor," she remarked, seriously.

"The Dark Arts are dark only if you call them such. Label something 'forbidden' and people will be more attracted towards it. Creating taboo only generates fascination, and fascination for the forbidden may be worse than the prohibited object itself. That's what happened in this country, at least." Snape's face was extremely serious, too, and his black eyes, glimmering in the dark pools under his brow, were fixed on some distant point in front of him.

"In Durmstrang they teach the Dark Arts, and Grindelwald came out of it."

"He was expelled from Durmstrang because of his behaviour. And in Bulgaria, people don't wander around killing each other all the time, or was that your impression, Miss Granger? Now that you make me think about it, it seems to me that you met a selection of students from Durmstrang, very long ago, during that disgraced Triwizard Tournament. Did they look like a mass of dangerous criminals to you?"

Hermione fell silent. No one was more distant from the ideals of a Dark wizard than Viktor. They had actually discussed a lot about that problem, in a past that now seemed a fairytale.

"You can't prevent homicides through a death penalty, Miss Granger. And you can't stop wizards who abuse their powers by keeping them in the ignorance of a substantial part of magic. Instead, you push the most curious of them to seek that knowledge by themselves, unguided, with greater risks for themselves and for the others." Snape's mouth was but a thin line when he stopped talking.

"Until, you mean, they find a guide who is willing to feed their curiosity for his own ends, a guide who is not a respectable teacher of Hogwarts, but someone far more dangerous and untrustworthy," Hermione continued slowly. She raised her eyes to meet Snape's and looked firmly into those shimmering tunnels.

"Exactly, Miss Granger, that is the greater risk," said Snape, returning her gaze. Their pupils reflected into each other for a long moment, and when they broke eye contact, Hermione had the terrifying, exciting impression of having grasped a meaning that dissolved in the next second. It was frightening and irresistible to talk about Voldemort with Snape, as walking on a narrow path encircling a gorge from whence comes an intoxicating perfume.

She wasn't sure she agreed with Snape, possibly not. The Dark Arts were out of question for her. It was a dangerous subject, too dangerous, no matter how Bulgaria and other countries had decided to tackle it. Despite his athletic build, Viktor was kind at heart, but other people were not. However, she could not dismiss the fact that there were many ways of harming a person, without ever resorting to any Dark enchantment. To plunge a knife into another person's breast was not considered Dark – but it was fatal all the same.

She could not say she was pleased to hear Snape suggesting that Hogwarts should teach the Dark Arts, and that a Dark Arts teacher would last longer than a Defence Against the Dark Arts one. It reminded her of her discussion with Harry after their first DADA lesson with Snape, in their sixth year. But she couldn't help but be amazed at the way in which Snape talked about Hogwarts and magic in general. Despite his mild resentment against Minerva (that was only too understandable, at least from his point of view, she considered), Snape managed the topic with an impressive ease – as if he wasn't once powerful wizard deprived of his magic and more or less voluntarily shut out of the magical community. He didn't converse about magic with nostalgia or hatred or bitterness. He seemed... at peace with the whole matter, as if he could be satisfied with his present, non-magical life, as he was with his previous, magic-filled existence. In fact, he seemed even happier now than he was before.

Could living in peace, without fighting in a war that never seemed to end, repay the loss of magic? Did he consider it the right price to pay for a life without Voldemort – or the right punishment for his deeds?

Hermione may not agree with him, but she be damned if she didn't admire – envy, is the word – the apparent state of contentment that Snape had reached during those years in which she had struggled to keep herself just a step above depression through a succession of misfortunes. Snape, somehow – the grey emblem of what a war could ask from a man – had managed to leave the wretchedness behind.

It may not be pleasing to admit, but it was easier to go through the last, lonely hours of work in the reading room, bearing in mind the idea that there was someone waiting for you outside the door, even if that someone was someone like Snape. The library seemed less lonely, less isolated, and the bookshelves were again her dear friends, not some irregular, threatening shapes. Hermione was halfway through restoring Brother Lucretius' third tome, and there were only two more to go before her stage would end.

But concerns about work could wait. It was Friday, and ahead of her, there was a long weekend of peaceful study and chores. She closed The Twelve Patriarkes with a loving caress, put her tools in order, took her bag, switched off all the lights, and walked out of the library. At the front door, as regular as clockwork, was Snape, his usual anthracite shirt buttoned down to his wrists and black trousers. The umbrella, luckily, had been left at home.

Hermione smiled at him, and a certain curve at the corner of Snape's mouth could pass for returning the smile. The man stepped back to let Hermione walk through the door, and as she passed, Hermione heard a tiny noise behind her, as if something had fallen on to the chippings. She turned and she saw Snape bent to collect something from the ground. Before it disappeared from Snape's hand into his pocket, Hermione could recognise a small Moleskine notebook and a pencil.

By the swiftness with which Snape had fastened those objects back in the pocket of his trousers – and above all by the expression with which Snape withered her when he had caught her watching him doing so – Hermione got the impression that she had discovered something that Snape didn't mean for her to know. However, she heard herself asking, "Do you take notes during your night strolls, Professor?"

"Yes, about the indiscretion of women," he barked.

Hermione scowled, but she held her tongue. She simply turned on her heels and proceeded toward the library's gates. A moment later, she heard the cracking of Snape's steps behind her.

They walked silently up to the bridge. There, as they passed under the first lamppost, and Snape spat, "All right, Miss Granger. You had already asked it, and you would manage to discover it in any case, sooner or later. Yes, I do write."

"I had not asked," she said.

"You insisted on learning what I do for a living, and now I repeat: I write."

"About potions?"

"Oh, no; no more of that. It grew tiresome. Now I like to waste my time on trifles."

Hermione blinked. "Do you mean novels? And what kind of novels do you write?" she asked, bewildered.

"Spy stories, of course," replied Snape, and finally the now familiar smirk came back to its place.

"Nobody ever told me, and I would have never discovered that by myself," she said, as a wave of enthusiasm rose in her.

"That's the meagre utility of using a nom de plume."

Which is? Which is? "I thought you received a war pension from the Ministry, actually."

"They offered me one, and I was not decent enough to decline their cheques, to tell the truth," Snape smugly said. "Writing is not an activity one does for the money."

"But you are published, aren't you?"

"Yes; they published the first two volumes of a series. I'm writing the third now"

Which are their titles? "So, the manuscript you consulted at the library..."

"Was for reference, yes, Miss Granger."

"Medieval warfare?"

"My series is set at the end of the Middle Ages."

"And I was the one fixed in the past." There was an exquisite delight in mocking a sarcastic man, especially when she knew that her remarks would be accepted in the same spirit.

"Not past enough." Snape slowed his pace and turned to peer at her. He searched Hermione's face with an intense stare, until she felt uncomfortable. Stop staring at me and tell me more about your books, she thought. Eventually, Snape asked with a velvety inflection, "Have you already been to Jorvik Centre?"

"Eh? No, I haven't," Hermione replied.

"Mr. and Mrs. Boddington helped to create a few of the rooms of the exhibition." In response to Hermione's blank expression, Snape explained, "The Boddingtons are the other wizards living in town, Miss Granger."

"Ah, right. You mentioned them in your note."

"Uh-uhm. They are usually in the Centre on Sundays. You might enjoy a visit there, perhaps."

"Are you inviting me there?"

"Why, do you want me to accompany you?

"No! I mean... why not? If you like the place..."

"To say that I 'like' the place sounds rather bombastic; it's a caravan with too many people in it, both in flesh and bones and in wax. But for you it could be instructive."

"Are we going there on Sunday? Morning or afternoon?"

"Afternoon, for heaven's sake... But I've already visited it."

"If you don't come, how am I supposed to be introduced to Mr. and Mrs. Boddington?"

"You could always ask, Miss Granger. And, unfortunately, neither I nor you need to be introduced to any wizard in Britain."

"You could always ask, Miss Granger." Gnah gnah. Your velvet tone can be really obnoxious at times. Would you have replied had I asked you the title of your books? You were trying so hard to hide that notebook from me. But I will discover their titles.

As soon as she reached her room, Hermione opened her laptop, ready to give up her night's sleep to find those damned novels on the web, if that were the case. She knew the internet would only provide her with information about books sold to Muggles, but somehow she sensed that she would not find Snape's novels in Flourish and Blotts.

At one o' clock, she was in the same blindness as before. She had surfed through amazon.com and other bookselling sites, but it was impossible to find something with such a general subject as 'spy story' and 'medieval'. Stories of Brother Cadfael tumbled upon her at each query. She tried sites specialized in detective fiction and was at a loss at the sheer quantity of titles, enlisted under subcategories and subcategories of subcategories. Nothing had offered her a clue.

At two o' clock in the morning, she gave up. I have lost three hours of sleep for you, Severus Snape. One day you'll repay me them.

Saturday was for shopping and doing the washing and home chores. Hermione could easily dust her room with a flick of her wand, but she preferred to have real water poured through her clothes, and the washing machine was downstairs, in Mrs. Neill's bathroom. She wasn't allowed to use it when she came back from the library, for it would have awakened Mrs. Neill.

Of all these household activities, going shopping was by far her favourite. She loved supermarkets; she loved them since her childhood, when she would sit in the trolley's baby seat and get pushed around by her mother. She was no great cook; neither did she like to spend more time than needed in Mrs. Neill's kitchen. Therefore, her home-prepared meals consisted mainly of heated-up vegetables, soups, smashed potatoes and the like. She blessed every day the inventor of the microwave.

That Saturday, Hermione didn't go to the usual supermarket around the corner. Instead, she crossed the bridge to go to the big Sainsbury downtown that casually obliged her to pass by a Waterstone's. By chance, she decided to make a detour into the bookstore, and by anything but mere chance, she found herself in the section of detective fiction. Every title there was new to her, apart from the Agatha Christie ones she had read when she was twelve. The covers ranged from brutal depictions of gore to elegant, old-fashioned vignettes. All those books had only two things in common: they were too many, and none of them had been written by Snape.

Until she saw it. On a lower shelf. Thin. Less than two hundred pages, at a rough guess. A watercolour-painted wall on the jacket. Title: Against a Brick Wall. Author: Leslie Prince. She read Prince and she knew that had to be him. Cursing mentally the system of cataloguing, which had placed the book with historical novels and not with spy stories, Hermione picked up Against a Brick Wall and read the description.

"A spy has only one enemy: his heart, if he has one." Jacob Norton – code name: Funnel – returns in this breathless adventure, that continues unravelling the web of court intrigue and political manoeuvres we had experienced in Smoke From the Chimneys. The battle of Stoke Fields put an end to Lambert Simnel's claim to the English throne. Francis Lovell is missing. Funnel returns to Burgundy only to discover that Maximilian of Habsburg has been taken prisoner. What would Funnel do to save the son-in-law of his patroness, the dowager duchess Margaret? And which will be his role when a new pretender to the English crown appears under the name of Perkin Warbeck?

Suspense will make your hair rise as you follow the turn of events that lead Funnel through his fight against his enemies – and his friends as well – in this gripping tale masterly told by Leslie Prince.

Well, it seemed historical enough to be placed under the historical fiction section, after all. It was published by a little publishing house – Hermione had never heard of it – probably local, and this could account for her difficulties in finding it on the net. She searched the shelves, but Smoke From the Chimneys – the first book in the series, it seemed – was nowhere to be found. She asked a shop assistant and was told that the book would need to be ordered. She let that go and proceeded to pay for Against a Brick Wall.

She did her shopping in a rush and returned home, almost running. She shoved the milk bottle and the lettuce in the fridge and fled upstairs. She sprawled on her bed and sank into the book.

It was not a masterpiece of literature, that was sure. But the prose was carefully crafted and abounded in wit. An undercurrent line of ironical scepticism invested both characters and actions, and it smacked foully of Snape. In truth, it was a refreshing change from the usually pompous phrasing of historical novels set in the Middle Ages. Hermione might not sport a significant knowledge of detective fiction, but she was quite acquainted with historical reconstructions. In general, her favourites involved libraries, typographers and the like and were set in the Netherlands. Flanders was a close choice.

A memory came back from a very distant region of her mind – of when she was a young girl, all determination and bravery, and she had spent the summer leading to her thirteenth birthday reading of Gilderoy Lockhart's adventures with banshees and yetis. She sighed. The man was a fraud, and she had been almost as foolish in falling in love with his blatant inventions. Yet she could not dismiss the memory of that sentiment altogether; the object of her affection had been despicable, however, the feeling itself, of being in love, had been cheerful and exciting and could still bring warmth to her chest. She tenderly smiled at her younger and brasher self.

People say that adolescence is a difficult age. Hermione would gladly give all of the years after her eighteenth birthday to live again one day as a thirteen or fourteen years old – to hold again the spark of recklessness, the untainted joy of living, the not-rationalized sensation of being alive. She cherished the memory of a time in which she hadn't feared her own mind, hadn't experienced – yet – the frailty of the one thing she valued above all the rest: her thought. No matter how much Voldemort had put her and her friends in peril, peril was recognized as such only when it became internal. The real enemy was not aggression it was cancer.

Hermione observed the orderly, moss-covered bricks painted on the jacket. Against a Brick Wall. That's where she was, wasn't she? Hermione Granger, once a promising prodigy, now almost thirty, without a paid job, without a boyfriend, a promising expert in self-deprecation. To all appearances, so little had changed. Seventeen years after that summer, she could still be found reading her professors' books, and thinking higher of them because of that. She couldn't help but grow a little reverence for the people whose prose she valued. Maybe she shouldn't be in a mood for self-complaint after all. Jacob 'Funnel' Norton wouldn't approve.

Next morning – Sunday, July 26th – when Hermione went downstairs to prepare her breakfast, Mrs Neill waved an envelope under her nose. "This was in the mailbox for you, Hermione," she said. Inside it there was only a small note scribbled on a pale green card:

Sunday afternoon Jorvik Viking Centre three p.m. Coppergate. S. S.

"There isn't a stamp on the envelope; someone must have dropped it personally in the mailbox during the night," added Mrs. Neill, giving Hermione a piercing look, as if she knew perfectly well who that someone was – and disapproved of him completely.

"It's possible," replied Hermione, and she addressed a malevolent smile to Mrs. Neill when the older woman turned her back. I wish that next time Snape would send me an owl, and that it would land directly on the kitchen table just to make an impression on Mrs. Neill.

She didn't spot him immediately. The city centre was crowded with inhabitants and tourists enjoying a Sunday walk. For once, the day was sunny and hot, and people flowed in the streets holding ice creams and beverages. Hermione reached the entrance to Jorvik Viking Centre and peeped inside, worrying at the sight of the long queue waiting at the ticket office. When she turned toward the street, Snape was right behind her.

"Miss Granger," he said with a nod of his head.

"Professor," she greeted him. Instead of his usual gray, black or green, Snape was wearing a dark blue shirt. Blue and shirt were a combination Hermione couldn't proclaim herself indifferent to. The article fits even Snape. A magic out of the blue.

"No 'Professors' here, Miss Granger. No one in town knows me under that title. You can call me 'sir' or 'Mr. Snape' or as you wish."

"Maybe... Leslie Prince?"

A concerned look erred for a moment through Snape's eyes and was gone before Hermione could blink. If she hadn't known the man, Hermione would call that fear.

"If you wish," said Snape silkily, and Hermione decided it was better to avoid the matter for a while.

Jorvik Centre was a caravan, as Snape had said. He had insisted on paying for her ticket, however, and had made only mild remarks on the boorishness of the place. As for Hermione, she had enjoyed it immensely. They had been asked to take seat on a 'time machine' – which, by all means, looked like a roller coaster car – and had been carried on a ride through a reconstruction of the old Viking York populated with wax figures. Hermione happily submitted to the idea of a time machine that could turn you back in time at the mere sound of a registered voice on a screen. It made Time-Turners sound so complicated. It was very ironic when you considered, as Snape said, that two wizards, Mr. and Mrs. Boddington, contributed to the concept of the building. But the lulling voice of the speaker seemed indeed able to cast a spell on the visitors, and Hermione abandoned herself to the suspension of disbelief.

The one element of reality Hermione could not forget was Snape sitting at her side in the car. God, a dark blue shirt could have an effect on her, even when it was worn by an ugly man. Black made him look too pale, and rifle green only emphasized his sallow complexion. Blue, on the other hand, made an interesting contrast with his black hair. The glossy quality of the fabric – Egyptian cotton? – would surely make it smooth to the touch. It surely depended only on the colour combination, but she could almost feel a heat, surging from her and directed toward the shirt...

The content of our thoughts is not subject to moral judgement.

At the end of their tour through the galleries, Hermione headed to the toilets. When she emerged, Snape was in the gift shop, talking with two middle-aged people.

"Hermione, these are the Boddingtons, Adele and Eustace."

"Ooh! The famous Miss Granger! Can we call you Hermione too, please? We are honoured to meet you, finally!" Eustace Boddington shook her hand enthusiastically and Adele beamed at her.

Hermione smiled faintly and glanced at Snape. He looked supremely serious, which only meant he was keeping his sarcasm for himself. "I'm pleased to meet you too, sir, madam," she said.

"Ahah! Well, it's a pleasure for us to have you in town, and we are glad that Severus decided to show you our humble Jorvik Centre."

"Please honour us with your company. Come to lunch one of these days. Our house is right in front of Jorvik."

"Ehm, Adele, dear, I don't know if we deserve to have Miss Granger as a guest."

"Why so?" asked Hermione, puzzled.

"You see, Hermione, we are not of the brave kind. When You-Know-Who came back to power, twelve years ago, we fled to France."

"We left the war to heroes like you and our Severus here. We have been selfish... and cowardly."

"We are so grateful that Severus bestowed us with his friendship when he came to live here. Ah, but we imagine he would feel more at ease with someone like you."

Then Mrs. Boddington prayed them to excuse her and went to speak quietly with the shop assistant. When she rejoined them, she invited Hermione to take whatever she wished from the shop.

"Let us give you a gift, dear. We made Severus confess that he did pay – pay! – for the entrance ticket, and that's absurd. He could ask us free tickets every time."

"I don't want to bother you, Adele."

"Nonsense. People like you and Miss Granger saved this country. We owe you more than an entrance ticket."

They insisted so much that she should choose something from the gift shop that eventually she resigned.

"I was sure you would choose a book."

"It was more expensive."

"Humph. It's as well you liked the Jorvik circus so much to have a mug with their logo."

"You said I would find it instructive."

"I meant that meeting the Boddingtons would be instructive."

"It was instructive to watch you keep your tongue while they greeted the 'famous Miss Granger.'"

"I forgive them because they did that for themselves, not for your sake. They seek our absolution. Do you know they are purebloods? Mrs. Foxcroft – Adele's grandmother – would host my mother in her manor during summer holidays. She considered herself – ah – a philanthropist."

"So, you have known Mrs. Boddington since you were a child."

"We visited the Foxcrofts only in summer, when we came back to Yorkshire. Adele is ten years older than me, so we would likely ignore each other when we were young."

"I'm surprised to learn that you are friends with people who call themselves cowards and declare you a hero."

"Do you?"

"I meant... Oh, never mind. Why do you find the Boddingtons instructive?"

"They live on the Muggle side, as you can see. They work with and for Muggles and limit their use of magic to silly charms like enhancing the appeal of the speaker's voice."

"So it was charmed, then."

"Absolutely. The whole place is charmed to please visitors. Pity that the Entrancing Enchantment is badly cast, so that visitors also end up finding each other attractive."

"Ah." Hermione paused. "In any case, I approve of two purebloods willing to work in a Muggle environment."

Snape sneered. "They do that out of guilt. When they came back to England at the end of the war, unscathed, they believed themselves unworthy of using magic again. They craved their share in the general suffering, and they gave up their magically pampered life – except for idiocies, of course. Jorvik – that's the pureblood survivor's guilt."

"You are actually fond of them."

"Adele is a great cook, and Eustace can play a decent match of Gobstones. You have to go there for a lunch, one day."

Snape bid Hermione goodbye at Monk Bar Court, telling her he was busy, and walked away depriving her of the sight of his blue shirt. She took her time before going home, pacing slowly and bathing in the yellow light that was what she liked the best in summer afternoons.

She could see the relation between herself, Snape, and the Boddingtons. Their reactions were a variation on the same theme. She had left Hogwarts in fear, crushed by the images of what magic could lead to. She had chosen a Muggle university and possibly a Muggle job to escape from a world that no longer seemed as dreamlike as she had believed for so long. The Boddingtons, as far as she could deduce, were ashamed by their magic and their pureblood birth. They lived among Muggles as a penitence. As for Severus, he had not relinquished his magic willingly, but he had apparently reached this mysterious contentment with his condition that Hermione found so admirable. He wrote for Muggles about Muggle history and his demeanour seemed devoid of regret.

Did I call him Severus? Did I think his composure admirable? To be badly cast, this Entrancing Enchantment is quite strong.

But she was well out of Jorvik now, and she did know there wasn't any Enchantment at work. That had simply been the first time she had met Snape in a public space, outside of their night strolls and the library. Among the unknown and unnamed York crowd, he was the only one she knew. There wasn't anything notable in the fact that she felt a stronger connection with him than with those strangers. And it was only fair to say that Snape had played a big role in her life.

What she was more grateful for in that glorious summer afternoon was that the Snape she could say she knew was no more a trembling form on a dusty floor, spilling blood from his slashed neck. That foul image had thankfully been replaced with a new one. In the future, when she would think of Snape, she will not remember that night at the Shrieking Shack, but the low murmur of the Foss as he accompanied her home.

A/N: This chapter was a savage beast, and I'm grateful to the people who aided me in taming it. Pink Raccoon brainstormed it with me and helped me invent the titles of Snape's novels. Valady and RobisonRocket kindly betaed it. Thank them for my sake. Thanks also to W., with whom I visited Jorvik in June, 2008.

Snape writing thrillers bears reference to the present job of Italian (ex) terrorist Cesare Battisti.