Chapter 3

Summary: Hermione and Severus help Poppy with patients who don't want to wake up. This is an older story, it was written for the OWL House Cup.

Disclaimer: Nothing you recognise belongs to me, I just play.

A/N: Thank you, Janus, fellow Slytherin, for beta-reading!

---

Fairy Tales: 1. Severus Sleeps

Chapter 3

"Don't say that I didn't warn you," Poppy said and brought an additional warm blanket for Hermione.

Hermione took her wand and spoke. "Rennervate!"

Snape's eyes opened, and for a short moment it looked as if he were awake, but it was an illusion. Hermione swallowed, took his hand and said, "Legilimens!" And once again she entered into Snape's mind. She would try to actively interfere with his dream, but she'd have to find a good opportunity first. She hoped that Snape would once again be trapped in a dream that was based on a well-known fairy tale. He seemed to have been told the same fairy tales as a child as she had. This wasn't really all that surprising since they both had spent their childhood years among Muggles.

---

The Clever Snow Queen

Snape's dream transported Hermione to Hogwarts. She stood in a small room in the Headmaster's tower and looked at a large mirror.

I wonder if this is the Mirror of Erised, she asked herself. She had heard a great deal about that mirror of desires, but never actually seen it. She stepped closer and looked inside, curious what it would show her. At first, the mirror showed her nothing at all, and then it replayed the last part of her own life. It showed her: how she had tried to wake Snape with Rennervate, how she had used Legilimency, how she had entered Snape's mind and how she now stood in front of the mirror to look inside.

---

This was supposed to be the Mirror of Erised? Impossible! Hermione thought. She decided to take a closer look at the mirror, and after some thorough searching, she finally she found an inscription on its back: 'Mirror of Hturt.'

But that one's been broken, Hermione thought, if it ever existed at all... The Mirror of Hturt had been made by a Hogwarts Headmaster, and it helped to find enchanted or magically concealed things or beings. If there had been such a mirror at Hogwarts in the past, Barty Crouch couldn't possibly have posed as Mad-Eye Moody, could he? She looked back into the mirror and it showed her how it broke into a million pieces; then it vanished.

---

Hermione rubbed her nose and wondered about the meaning of what she'd just seen when the room suddenly spun around her in a sickening manner. After a while the world calmed down again, and she found herself in a small, welcoming room where two children played amiably together. The little boy had black hair which was lank and slightly greasy. His nose was very big and hooked, his eyes black and inquisitive. The boy obviously was very poor; his clothes were shabby and he was very thin.

The little girl looked much better. She was very pretty, with red hair and green eyes. Of course Hermione knew immediately that the two children were Snape and Lily Evans.

---

Hermione had watched the playing children for some time when the door opened and an old woman entered the room.

"Gran, tell us a story!" the little girl cried.

"Do you see the white bees in front of the window?" the grandmother asked.

The children hurried to the window and looked outside. It was snowing.

"Are these really bees?" the little boy asked. He looked critically at the snow flurry and then looked back at the grandmother with a frown. "If these are bees, then where is their queen?"

"Look closely, Sev," the woman laughed. "You'll see that among all the snow flakes there is one that is larger than the others. That one is special.

---

"That snowflake will be larger, more beautiful and colder than the others. It's the Snow Queen."

"I don't believe this," Sev said and ran from the room. Lily's eyes followed him; she looked sad.

After a short while, the boy came back into the room; he had a magnifying glass in one hand and had brought a bit of the powdery snow with him.

"Look, Lily, that's what snow really looks like. It consists of crystals. Each snowflake is built like any other, and yet each of them is unique. They are very beautiful before they melt. In any case, they aren't bees."

"I don't want to know this," Lily said unhappily. "I prefer them to be bees." She went to the window and looked outside.

---

"You always want to study and analyse things, Sev," the grandmother said, not very friendly any longer. "One could think that you caught a splinter of the Mirror of Hturt in your eye."

"Even more nonsense," Sev said disdainfully, taking his magnifying glass and going home.

Hermione followed Sev into the neighbouring building. The children lived in two houses that were only separated by a rain pipe. They had large flower boxes in front of their windows, with herbs and flowers in them, among them two beautiful rosebushes, which were Sev's favourite flowers. During the summer months, the children could visit each other by stepping out of their windows and crossing over the boxes into the neighbouring house.

---

Hermione now knew which fairy tale this was. They were still at the beginning. The Mirror of Hturt had been a wondrous thing, and according to rumour it had been broken into many pieces. There was a legend in the wizarding world that said that anybody who got a splinter of the mirror into their eye would be able to uncover every secret and would want to learn everything there was to learn. Hermione thought that this was a very good thing.

She had heard the fairy tale in its Muggle version as well. There, as usual, everything was twisted and turned upside down. The mirror in the Muggle tale was one that distorted everything that was beautiful and presented it as being ugly instead. Ugly things were shown as being beautiful. That whole idea was, of course, complete and utter rubbish.

---

Hermione had never liked that tale, but when she looked at Sev and Lily she understood why Snape was trapped in this particular fairy tale.

After thinking things through for a bit, Hermione smiled. She had an idea how she could change the outcome of the tale.

In the meantime, Sev got ready for bed and now stood at the window in his faded grey nightshirt. He looked outside and seemed to wonder if there was some truth behind the tale of the Snow Queen.

All the snowflakes were dancing wildly in the wind, but there was one, a large one, that glittered like a diamond in the moonlight.

---

That snowflake didn't whirl through the air like all the others, it landed on the flower box in front of Sev's window.

The snowflake grew and grew until, at last, it transformed into a woman. She was dressed in garments of white gauze, which looked like millions of starry snowflakes linked together. She was fair and beautiful, but looked as if made of ice...shining and glittering ice. Still she was alive, and her eyes sparkled like bright stars, and her hair stuck out of her head in wild bushy locks. She nodded towards the window, smiled and waved at Sev.

---

The little boy became frightened and ran away from the window. When he hesitantly looked back, the woman was gone.

The next day, Sev came into Lily's house with a pair of thick gloves and his sledge on his back.

"I'm allowed to go into the great square, where the other boys play. You had better stay at home, that's only something for men." And away he went.

In the great square, the boldest among the boys would often tie their sledges to the country people's carts and go with them a good way. This was capital. But while they were all amusing themselves, and Sev with them, a great sledge came by; it was painted white, and in it sat someone wrapped in a rough white fur and wearing a white cap.

---

The sledge drove twice round the square, and Sev fastened his own little sledge to it, so that when it went away, he followed with it. It went faster and faster right through the next street, until they drove out through the town gate. Then the snow began to fall so heavily that the little boy could not see a hand's breadth before him, but still they drove on. When Sev had enough, he tried to loosen the cord so that the large sled would go on without him, but he couldn't free his little sledge, and away they went like the wind. Then he called out loudly, but nobody heard him, while the snow beat upon him, and the sledge flew onwards.

---

The snowflakes became larger and larger, till they appeared like great white chickens. All at once the horses sprang to the side of the road, the great sledge stopped, and the person who had driven it rose up. The fur and the cap, which were made entirely of snow, fell off, and he saw a lady, tall and white with wild hair. It was the Snow Queen.

"We have driven well," said she, "but why do you tremble? Here, creep into my warm fur." Then she seated him beside her in the sledge, and as she wrapped the fur round him he felt as if he were sinking into a snowdrift.

"Are you still cold?" she asked, as she hugged him slightly.

---

Sev felt so cold that he felt as if he were going to die, but only for a moment; he soon seemed quite well again, and did not notice the cold around him. It seemed to him as if the snow Queen understood him as no one ever had before.

Sev wasn't at all afraid of the Snow Queen. He told her that he could levitate a feather and already brew some potions. She smiled to everything he said and they flew away. They flew high, up to the black clouds, and the storm blew and howled as if it were singing old songs. They flew over woods and lakes, sea and land.

---

Below them roared the wild wind; the wolves howled and the snow crackled; over them flew the black, screaming crows, and above all shone the moon, clear and bright. Sev looked up to the moon, through the long, long winter's night, and by day he slept at the feet of the Snow Queen.

***

When little Sev didn't return from sledging, Lily was very sad and cried bitterly. No one knew where Sev went; there wasn't a trace of him to be found, and everyone believed that he had fallen into the river and drowned. Lily didn't want to believe that.

---

When Spring came, Lily missed her best friend even more. After she cried a bit more, she decided to leave her home and search for Sev.

She put on her new red shoes and went down to the river, asking if it had swallowed Sev. When the river didn't answer, she jumped into a small boat and drifted down the river until she saw a pretty cottage in the midst of a lovely garden. The river seemed to think that she should interrupt her journey there, as it carried the boat to the shore.

"Hello, hello, is anybody home?" Lily cried.

---

An old woman who leaned on crutches came out of the house. She was wearing a large hat that was painted with flowers.

The old woman secured Lily's boat and invited her to come into the house with her. Lily told her why she was travelling on the river.

When Lily asked if the old woman had seen Sev passing by, the woman [replied that he hadn't come yet, but surely would arrive there later. She kept feeding cake and sweets to Lily.

The old woman had taken a liking to the girl and would have liked to keep the girl with her. That's why she went around her home, hiding and concealing everything she could find that could have reminded Lily of Sev – books and roses first of all.

---

Lily loved the old woman's garden and soon she forgot completely why she had left home.

One day, however, quite by coincidence, she became aware of the roses on the old woman's hat. The crone had forgotten to hide the roses on her hat, and the beautiful flowers reminded Lily of Sev. When Lily ran out into the garden, suddenly all the rose bushes reappeared.

"Oh, how long have I been here, whiling my days away with the old woman?" Lily moaned. "I wanted to look for Sev! Don't you know where he is?" She asked the roses. "Do you think that he is dead and gone?"

---

"He isn't dead," the roses said. "We've been hidden below ground, where all the dead things are; we would have seen him. Sev wasn't there!"

"Thank Merlin!" said little Lily and went to the other flowers, looked into their calyxes and asked, "Don't you know where little Sev is?"

The flowers, however, were only interested in their own stories and none of them knew where Sev was. And so Lily decided that she would have to leave to continue her search.

"Merlin, how much time I've wasted? Unbelievable!" She exclaimed as she left the garden and noticed that autumn had come already.

---

"I shan't dawdle," Lily cried and started to run.

After a while she got very tired; she was only a child, after all, and her little feet were hurting. She was feeling very cold; the first snow had already fallen.

When she took a short break, a crow was hopping around in the snow, just in front of her.

"Have you seen Sev?" Lily asked.

The crow nodded thoughtfully and said, "Possibly, quite possibly."

"What? Do you think you have?" the little girl cried and kissed the crow with such might that she almost squeezed the poor bird to death.

---

The crow told Lily that in the kingdom where they now were, a beautiful and very clever princess had been searching for an equally beautiful and very clever groom. Many men had tried to solve her puzzles and pass her tests, but none had succeeded except for one. That boy had solved all the puzzles and had married the princess just a few days ago.

"That's got to be Sev," Lily said. "He's always been so very clever. He always wanted to read and learn new things. I always had to tear him away from his books when I wanted to play with him. Oh, how I miss him! It's so dull without him."

---

The crow didn't think that Lily would easily gain admission to the castle where the princess lived, poor and ragged as she looked. But they conceived of a plan to get Lily into the castle and then into the prince's chambers.

They succeeded with the help of a tame crow in the castle who was the fiancée of Lily's crow friend.

Lily had planned to sneak up to the boy and look at him to find out if it really was Sev, but the prince woke; he wasn't Sev. Instead of black, he had blond hair, just as his princess had, whose name was Narcissa. They insisted that Lily tell them Sev's story, and they were both very impressed by how clever Sev was.

---

The prince and the princess treated Lily very well and invited her to stay with them, but Lily wanted to go on with her search for Sev. The royal couple gave her magnificent warm clothes and a richly decorated coach complete with horses. They gave her cakes and other sweets so she wouldn't have to be hungry, and then she was on her way again.

They were going through a dark deep forest, but the carriage was glittering and glistening and could be seen from afar. It dazzled the eyes of some robbers, who could not bear to let it pass unmolested. They took away everything Lily possessed, except for the clothes she wore.

The robbers had planned to eat Lily for dinner, but a little robber-boy stopped them. He was strong-willed and obstinate, and took everything he wanted for himself. He always got his way with the other robbers.

---

The name of the little robber-boy was James.

"I want her to play with me," said James. "I want everything she has, and then she shall sleep beside me in my bed."

Lily didn't think that the little robber-boy was very nice, but after he had threatened to eat her for dinner, she told him about Sev and how dearly she loved Sev.

"You're supposed to love only me," James complained, "and that's why you will sleep with my animals tonight." He led Lily to a cave, where straw and blankets were stacked in one corner. Above them, on laths and perches, sat more than a hundred pigeons, and there was a reindeer in the cave.

---

"These all belong to me," James said proudly. He shook the reindeer by its horn and tormented the poor animal with his long knife

"Will you have that knife with you while you are asleep?" asked Lily, looking at James slightly afraid.

"I always sleep with the knife by me," said the boy and held the knife in front of Lily's face while he drew her against him with his other arm. "No one knows what may happen."

Lily thought that she could quite like James if only he weren't so rough all the time. That night she didn't sleep well at all, and that's why she heard the pigeons talk with each other.

---

The pigeons were telling each other how they had seen little Sev sitting in the Snow Queen's sledge and flying straight away to her castle.

Lily grew very excited. She asked the pigeons for details, and inquired again and again where the Snow Queen could have gone.

"Most likely she went to Lapland; there is always snow and ice there. Just ask the reindeer that's tethered down over there," one of the pigeons replied.

"There's ice and snow there; it is a blessed, magnificent country," the reindeer declared. "One jumps about freely there, in large glittering valleys. There the Snow Queen has her summer tent, but her castle is close to the North Pole, on an island called Spitsbergen.

---

"Oh, Sev, dear Sev!" Lily sighed.

"You must lie still now," the robber-boy said. "Else I push the knife into your belly."

In the morning, Lily told James everything she had learned from the wood pigeons, and the little robber-boy nodded earnestly and asked the reindeer, "Do you know where Lapland is?"

"Who should know that better than I?" said the reindeer with shining eyes. "I was born there. I grew up there and I romped about on the snow fields there."

"I would rather keep you here, but if you have to look for your Sev, then take the reindeer; it will show you the way to Lapland."

---

"Come back to me after you've freed your Sev."

"I'll gladly do that," Lily replied, finding the robber-boy quite interesting now. She liked that he was more interested in playing with her than in reading books.

When the reindeer was set free, it jumped high into the air with joy. The robber-boy helped Lily onto the reindeer's back, carefully fastened her to the beast and even gave her a cushion to sit on. He returned her warm clothes to her and gave her a pair of thick fur gloves.

Lily wept with joy.

"You are prettier when you smile," the robber-boy said. "Here, have two loaves of bread and a ham, so you won't have to go hungry."

---

The food was tied onto the reindeer's back. James opened the door, and Lily and the reindeer hurried away.

The reindeer ran north without pausing or tiring until they arrived at a small house, where they stopped. The owner of the house invited Lily and the reindeer inside; they were given a good meal and permitted to warm themselves up.

While Lily drank a cup of warm tea, the reindeer told Lily's story to the woman who lived in the house.

"You poor things!" the woman exclaimed. "You have a long way ahead of you still." She gave them a message for an acquaintance of hers and showed them the way. Even though it was dark already, they hurried on. The most beautiful Northern Lights were weaving and swirling in brilliant colours in the sky.

---

Finally, they arrived at the house of the woman's acquaintance.

Her house was so warm that Lily had to take off her warm clothes and the reindeer had to wear a chunk of ice on its head to be able to bear the heat.

The reindeer was flattering the woman, because it wanted her to help Lily.

"You are very clever and powerful," said the reindeer. "I know that you can tie all the winds of the world together with merely a thread. When a mariner unties one knot, he'll have good winds, if he unties another, there'll be a sharp breeze, and if he unties the third and fourth, there'll be storms so violent that the trees get uprooted.

---

"Why don't you give one of your potions to the little girl, to give her the strength of twelve men so she can defeat the Snow Queen?"

"The strength of twelve men!" exclaimed the woman. "That wouldn't be enough by far!" She turned away and started to read in a spell book.

The reindeer, however, didn't give up and begged and pleaded until the woman gave in.

"Little Sev really is staying with the Snow Queen. He finds everything there exactly to his liking; he feels very comfortable and is convinced that he is the luckiest boy in the world. He has a splinter of the Mirror of Hturt in his eye and strives to learn and become cleverer every day."

---

"The Snow Queen is the cleverest witch of her age and she never stops learning. The two get along famously."

"But can't you give anything to little Lily which would give her power over the situation?"

"I can't give her greater power than she holds already. Don't you see how powerful she already is? Don't you see how men and beasts strive to serve her? Her power is rooted deep in her heart and comes from her beauty and kindness. If she can't enter the Snow Queen's realm through her own means and free little Sev from the splinter in his eye so that he wants to stop reading and learning, then there is nothing we can do to help her."

---

The woman helped Lily onto the back of the reindeer and showed them the way.

"When you have delivered Lily to her destination, come back here quickly," she told the reindeer.

"My boots! My gloves!" cried little Lily, who felt the bitter cold. But the reindeer didn't dare to stop and turn around; it ran without pause until it came to the place the woman had described. There it put Lily down, said good-bye and ran back as fast as it could.

Poor Lily, who had neither shoes nor gloves, ran on as fast as she could. Suddenly an entire army of snowflakes appeared.

---

These snowflakes, however, didn't fall from the sky. The sky was clear and glittered with the northern lights. The snowflakes flew parallel to the ground and gained size the closer they came. Lily remembered how beautiful and delicate they had looked under the magnifying glass. Each snowflake consisted of ice crystals, Sev had told her.

These flakes, though, weren't ice crystals. They were living beings and the Snow Queen's vanguard. Some looked like snakes, others like badgers, some like eagles and lions were among them, too. The biggest and most powerful beings, however, were dragons and they didn't look sleepy at all.

---

Lily was scared when she saw these beings, but she remembered that she was a Gryffindor back at school, and that meant she had to be brave. Her courage reminded her that she had learned to cast a few spells, even though she was only a first year. Thus she could cast a warming spell over her feet. Lily berated herself because she hadn't thought about this earlier. She shook herself and resolutely walked towards the castle.

Little Sev, naturally, didn't know anything about this. He was sitting in the castle's library and reading as long as he could keep his eyes open.

---

It would take years for him to read all the books in here. The Snow Queen was nice to him; the servants were efficient and discreet; life in the Snow Queen's castle was good.

"Now I must hasten away to warmer countries," said the Snow Queen. "I will go and look into the black craters of the tops of the burning mountains – Etna and Vesuvius, as they are called; I shall make them look white, which will be good for them, and for the lemons and the grapes." And away flew the Snow Queen, leaving little Sev quite alone in the great hall, which was so many miles in length. He sat and looked at his pieces of ice, and was thinking so deeply, that his thoughts crackled inside of him.

---

He sat so stiff and still that any one might have supposed he was frozen. In truth, he wished that he could have gone with the Snow Queen. She always could explain things so beautifully, and he found the things she did fascinating.

As the Snow Queen left her castle through a window of the highest room in the highest tower, little Lily entered the castle through the large gate.

When she came into the great entrance hall, she saw Sev, recognised him, hurled herself at him and hugged him fiercely. She cried, "Sev, sweet darling Sev, finally I've found you!"

---

Little Sev raised an eyebrow and looked at her sharply. "I'm no darling, and in no bloody way am I sweet. What do you want from me?"

Little Lily hugged him and wept. Sev, however, finally recognised her and saw the truth; he carried a splinter of the Mirror of Hturt inside of him, after all. He gently stroked her hair.

"There's no use crying, Lily. I'm so much happier here than I ever was at home. Why don't you stay here as well?"

Lily continued crying and couldn't believe what he said. "Everyone always did what I wanted while I was searching for you and now you don't want to go home with me, Sev? What in the world has happened to you?"

---

"Nothing has happened," said the Snow Queen who had returned and took Sev's hand. "He has found out what is important for him. You can't always hold on to childhood dreams, Lily. When children grow up, they must learn to make decisions and take up responsibility for the world around them. Sev wants to do that. He doesn't want to be dependent on other people any longer; he wants to help himself. This is what he can learn here. When he has learned enough, I shall show him the Mirror of Tiw Revelc, which is the grandest and best of the big magical mirrors.

---

"Afterwards, he can either help me with my work and be my equal, or he can look for a different occupation. The ruler of the Waters is looking for an apprentice; that would be something that would suit Sev as well.

Little Lily stared round-eyed at the Snow Queen, shook her head and wept some more. "I want Sev! I want Sev!" she cried.

Sev rolled his eyes; he found all that crying quite embarrassing. As much as he liked Lily, he preferred to live his own life.

"Why don't you stay here as well?" the Snow Queen asked kindly. "You are a dear and clever girl; you could learn many things here."

---

"I don't need this," Lily wailed. "People love me anyway. Sev loves me, too, don't you, Sev?"

"Always," said Sev and kissed her forehead. "But I'll stay here nonetheless. The two of us wouldn't be happy together, you know."

"But who will be my best friend, then?" asked Lily, hiccoughing loudly.

"I shall always be your friend," said Sev, who felt a bit guilty. Lily had come such a long way to find him; she had gone through so much trouble for him, after all.

"But I don't want to be without you!" she yelled, but Sev shook his head.

---

"Didn't you meet anyone that you liked on your journey, Lily?" The Snow Queen asked agreeably.

Lily shook her head, but stopped crying. "I don't know... perhaps. Yes, I believe I did. There were the princess and her prince... and there was the little robber-boy."

The Snow Queen clapped her hands, and suddenly the reindeer cantered into the hall. James, the robber-boy, proudly rode on its back.

"It's so boring without you, Lily," said James. "Can't I stay with you? I'll never play with my knife again if you let me; I promise."

Lily looked from Sev to James and back to Sev.

---

"Would you go home with me?" she asked James.

"I'll go with you wherever you want to go," he replied. I'm rich; we can go everywhere. I've inherited the robbers' treasure."

Lily looked back at Sev, but he looked at the Snow Queen. Lily sighed and finally admitted to herself that she had liked James better than Sev for quite some time now.

"Very well, then," she said to the robber-boy. "But you must do what I want." She waved at Sev and the Snow Queen, then she jumped onto the reindeer's back, and it carried Lily and James away.

---

"I promise you that you won't regret it, Sev," said the Snow Queen and hugged Sev tightly. "You're grown up now, and can keep your childhood love in your memories, where it belongs. Now you are free to live your own life."

"Thank you," said Sev. The Snow Queen looked at him affectionately before she fainted.

---

"Hermione!" Poppy cried, slapping her cheeks slightly. "Oh, Merlin, Hermione!" Hermione was lying in a heap on Snape's bed.

"If I had known what a commotion you make here, I wouldn't have woken up, Poppy."

"Severus! Oh, thank Merlin! You're back with us. But now Hermione won't wake up. Perhaps I should just let her sleep?"