Chapter 14: "Monday, you can fall apart."

Circe's nose was still bleeding badly when she almost ran headlong into Dumbledore. She had been trying to make a break for outside to go and sit contemplatively under the banks of a tree and feel sorry for herself, but it now looked like her plan of escape had been thwarted. She swore quietly under her breath.

"My dear, what on earth happened to you?" He asked, looking her bloody attire up and down with alarm. He placed a hand on her shoulder as if stopping her from storming off on her way.

"I… ugh…"

Circe touched a hand to her nose. She didn't want to speak to anyone, only find a quiet corner of the grounds to cry in and clean the blood off her face. Yet when she looked back to Dumbledore, her tenuous grip on keeping herself together unraveled like knitting yarn.

"Headmaster, I think I picked a fight where I shouldn't have…"

She couldn't hold it back any longer. Her bottom lip quivered and the tears sprung up hot and sudden in her eyes.

"Come with me." Dumbledore said simply. "I know how to tend to a broken nose when I see one."

She let herself be led away by the Headmaster. He took her strongly by the arm and up into his office. She was lost in thought as Dumbledore sat her down into the chair opposite his desk and placed a steaming hot cup of tea before her. He hummed absentmindedly to himself as he sat down a plate of sugared almonds beside her teacup. Circe was caught off guard and a small laugh escaped her chest.

"They're my favorites…"

"Are they?" Dumbledore replied, perching on the end of his desk. "We used to have them at Christmas when I was a boy. Please do help yourself. It'll make this experience a whole lot sweeter…"

"What experience?"

"Episkey!"

Circe felt her nose snap and she cried out as pain bloomed in her face. She touched a furtive hand to her nose and felt the still sore but now correctly positioned feature back in place.

"Thank you, Headmaster." She said through gritted teeth, giving her nose an experimental wiggle. "Suppose I should have known better than to think I'd had my share of nasty surprises of recent."

Dumbledore moved to his chair behind his desk and lowered himself slowly into it.

"Yes, I wonder Professor, if you came across something during your research that you wish you hadn't?"

Circe looked at him aghast. She thought for a second of calling his bluff, but as Dumbledore peered at her from over his half-moon spectacles she knew lying to him he would get her nowhere. She tutted and smiled sadly to herself.

"You really must tell me how you do that, Headmaster." She replied jovially, taking an almond."So I suppose you already know about the duel between Severus and I."

"Know? My dear, I heard it all the way from my office. I was just moving to investigate the noise when I bumped into you. I would've thought us as staff have enough on our plates currently without trying to blow each other up too."

"Well I'd have thought you'd know all about Severus's capabilities with regards to 'blowing people up', Headmaster." Circe said cheekily.

Dumbledore went quiet and Circe knew that she had gone too far with her previous comment. She looked around sheepishly, blushing fiercely. The Headmaster peered at her for a long moment and Circe thought that she would surely be dismissed for her insubordinate temper next.

"So what did you find out about him, my dear?" Dumbledore said at last, as gently as a lamb.

She looked up from her tea sharply, surprised at the kindness in his voice. She teared up again and started fiddling with the almond she still held in her fingers.

"The report of his trial at the Ministry." She answered him, the emotion plain in her voice.

"Ah."

"And you still employed him here regardless?"

"He was found not guilty by the jury of his peers, Professor." Dumbledore replied defensively.

Circe scoffed and rose from her chair, pacing about the room.

"You know, I'm not even angry that he didn't say anything because, well, I bloody wouldn't have either if I were him." She walked from one end of the room to the other, thinking aloud as Dumbledore patiently listened. "It's just, as soon as I began to think that I understood him… Knew him in a way that others didn't… Well, it turns out I didn't have the foggiest idea of who he is at all. It actually turns out I don't have the foggiest idea about much of anything, really."

Her feet took her over to Fawkes's perch where the great old phoenix watched the proceedings curiously. Circe extended her hand to him and he nuzzled into it.

What a beautiful animal, she thought. Although he looks like he's at the tail end of his life cycle.

Circe noticed how the bird moved a little stiffly and the feathers at his crest were faded and frayed. She stroked the bird's head as she talked on.

"And all that evidence… The other Death Eaters who spoke out against him . The Dark Mark on his wrist. How could all of that have been dismissed because of one character witness?"

"Oh, well there I can help you Professor. That's because the character witness was me."

Fawkes cooed as she stopped dead mid-stroke and turned to face the old man.

"You?"

"Severus…" Dumbledore hesitated, looking deep into Circe's eyes. "… was a double agent during the war."

She gasped, her mouth falling open in shock. "He… He was in the Order?"

"Yes. It's a small wonder that you didn't see him at the headquarters in your younger days when you tried to get into a few of the meetings." He chuckled.

Circe coloured red as she remembered her thwarted efforts to join the resistance. Why did she ever think that just rocking up and lying about how old she was would ever have worked? She cleared her throat and moved on.

"So he…"

"Passed vital information on to us in the Order from within the very inner circles of Voldemort's cohort of followers."

"My God, he lied to the Dark Lord's face?"

"Frequently. And well enough that nothing was ever suspected of him. He is a very talented wizard indeed, Circe. Without him, who knows what state the wizarding world would be in today."

"So why wouldn't he tell everyone? Shout his innocence from the rooftops? Take an ad out in The Prophet, for God sake?"

"Because… He does not wish to have it made public why he chose to betray Voldemort's confidence."

So, regardless of where things had ended, Severus had been an ally of the Dark Lord.

He changed sides later.

She rolled the phrase around her mind, testing how well it sat there. It was still a bitter pill for Circe to swallow, but it was a truth a measure easier to digest now she had the bigger picture. An image of Snape revealing his face by removing the telltale mask of the Death Eater flashed through her mind. Her stomach lurched in that uncomfortable but pleasant way that it did when she thought about him. She quickly tried to bury the image deep within her psyche and move on, filing it away for her to morally grapple with later.

He broke your nose, AND you've just had it confirmed that he was originally a servant of Voldemort and you think that's… sexy?! Fucking hell, Circe. She thought to herself, grimacing outwardly. But becoming a spy… an agent of espionage… having to be surrounded by your enemies every single day and get them to gain your trust. How brave. An outer shell of darkness and malice, but at the core goodness… How very Severus.

She thought of asking Dumbledore why Snape shifted loyalties, but the resolute look in the Headmaster's eye told her that he'd never betray Snape's confidence. She sighed and reluctantly let the issue drop.

"Why are you telling me this, Headmaster?" She asked slowly.

"Because, Professor…" Dumbledore said, rising from his chair to give Fawkes a gentle stroke at Circe's side. He looked her dead in the eye and she waited on bated breath for his next words. "Contrary to what you say, I believe you do understand him and know him in a way most others don't. It has been quite a joy to watch the two of you form your own unique… friendship. And believe me I understand just how difficult it can be to be around Severus, but goodness knows he deserves some happiness. I would hate to see your bond squandered over a grave misunderstanding such as this."

------

It was that weird time in between Christmas and New Year that always felt like a perpetual Sunday. Circe had rather reluctantly been ordered home for the big day at Minerva's behest, Yet she had once again smuggled a few books past her beady eyes. It was a very different Christmas from last year. Even though she was surrounded by family, she somehow felt more lonely than her last Christmas at Hogwarts. Never one to spoil others fun, she'd kept herself to herself as the boys had left Santa milk and a carrot for Rudolph, preferring to claim that she had marking or planning for the next term to do. In the post-Christmas slump, she had been spending the languishing time spread out on her Dad's sofa reading what she brought. Myron dragged her out of her recumbent reading position to do a few gigs in the pubs around Warwick. It was a welcome distraction and whilst she played and sang with her old friend, she almost forgot the terror that stalked Hogwarts halls by night. Myron always managed to put a few beers in her and their musical evenings were full of jokes in good spirits. It was not a bad Christmas, at the end of the day.

Yet underneath it all sat an uneasy bitter feeling of unachievement for Circe.

"I just feel like I've missed something important, My." She said one evening at the bar of The Dirty Duck. "Or I have cast aside something that I didn't look at deeply enough."

They moved outside, their guitar cases swung over their shoulders, and Myron lit a cigarette. The two looked out over the river of Stratford on Avon at the RSC, illuminated still in Christmas lights.

"Didn't you say there was another attack just before the holidays?" he asked, passing her a lit cigarette.

She took it and took a small drag. "Mmm. A Hufflepuff boy and Sir Nicholas."

"A ghost? How do you petrify a ghost?!"

"Beats me. Moving a petrified ghost is even harder by the way…"

Myron laughed, his breath clouding in front of him in the cold night air. He sighed and drew his brown teddy bear coat around his thin body. He was one of those musicians who seems to live off lager and cigarettes. Always with a generous smudge of eyeliner under his eyes and his hair at odd angles.

"Cee…" he said, grasping his pint. "Every time I see you, you talk about nothin' else. You're obsessed with this."

"How can I not be? My kids are being attacked, Myron."

"No, I know. I'm just saying with you being you… When you want somethin', you don't let up till you've got it."

"Meaning?"

"Meanin' , the kids will be fine if you're on the case. You're this far away." He held up his black painted fingers an inch apart. "I can feel it."

She sighed and took another drag on the cigarette watching the ducks paddling merrily on the water. Myron watched his old friend slip back into thought, away from him. Circe had always been like a bulldog with a bone when she was working at something hard. When they'd been in school together, he'd made it his mission to make sure she lightened up every now and again. She always worked so hard, and it made Myron feel tired just looking at her study sometimes. It turned out Circe knew how to be silly and spontaneous too when needed (or plied with enough butter beer) and what had started off as an unlikely friendship matured into an odd but still complimentary pairing. Like cheese and… yoghurt. Music had come to them both naturally, Myron being the face, the performer, and Circe being the craft and the soul. Yet, when her head was elsewhere she was like a far away ghost. Ever since she's gone back to Hogwarts in September, Myron could tell he only really ever had 80% of her with him at rehearsals or gigs.

"Jesus, Cee. We need to get you laid."

Circe was roused from her far off thoughts and looked at her friend with contempt.

"What? Oh fuck off."

He laughed crassly, and paused as she handed back his cigarette. "You don't like being away from Hogwarts now, do you?"

"What?" She asked. "How'd you get to that?"

"When we finish up a gig normally, you're always apparating away before I can say 'beer or wine?'"

"Well you know why. It's because of this-"

"Nah, it's not just that. I've known you for over ten years now, Cee. You have that look of someone who's homesick or… Well I don't know… Like when you drag your lovesick mate away from their girlfriend for the first time for a drink down the pub."

"You must miss it too."

"Hogwarts? Yeah of course. I've spent my adult years tryin' to recapture the magic me and you and the others had there with our music. But I'd put money on something else going on there, apart from your little murder mystery."

"It's not a murder mystery, Myron. No one's die-"

"Something with a bloke maybe. Eh, does Slughorn still work there?!"

She playfully hit him on the arm and scoffed. "Give us a fag." She said, evasively.

Circe only ever smoked when she was with Myron. But it was a taste she'd come to associate with him, and pubs, and gigging, and drinking.

"Cee," Myron said contemplatively, handing her a lighter and a fresh cigarette. "If you want to go back, then forget about our New Year's Eve gig. I'll cancel it. In fact, let's cancel all the other gigs we've got comin' up until you've solved it... Go and catch this prick. Tear down every wall and rip up every pipe, if need be. Make Hogwarts a home for those kids again."

"You sure, Myron?" She asked, wide-eyed.

"Yeah. I'd feel bad knowing I've kept you from a breakthrough… Wouldn't sing right, you know?"

"Oh, Myron…" she leaned forward and kissed him on the head.

She leaned back in her chair grinning from ear to ear. Then, suddenly a piece of the puzzle shifted in her head and would not slot back comfortably into place. Her brow furrowed and she stared off into space.

"Myron...What did you say just then?"

"What? About catching whoever's doing this to Hogwarts?"

"No, what did you say after that?"

"Tear down the walls and rip up the piping to catch them, if you have to…"

"The fucking plumbing! I knew I'd dismissed something too soon!"

She downed her beer and picked up her guitar.

"You're going right now?"

"Ring Dad for me and tell him I won't be home tonight. Tell him I had to go back to Hogwarts urgently. I'll be back for my suitcase later."

"Fine, fine…" Myron waved his hand nonchalantly, chuckling as he watched his friend trot away towards the river bank. "Good luck, Cee!" He shouted after her.

"Thanks, My!" She called back over her shoulder.

She ran down to a secluded spot just under the eaves of the currently empty RSC theatre. Fumbling in her pocket, she pulled out her wand and thought of a spot as close to the Hogwarts grounds as she dared, without picturing a no-apparitions location. Settling on the Shrieking Shack, she cast the spell and went flying off into the night air with a pop.

-----

Circe walked up and down the Hogwarts corridors with 'A Complete and Detailed History of the Plumbing and Piping of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry' in her hands. The first place she had run to upon being back at the castle was the library, where she had hastily tugged from the bookshelves the book she had so unceremoniously thrown aside before. To any who might have seen her, she may have appeared like a mad woman: muttering to herself, flicking from page to page, stroking the walls and running her eyes from floor to ceiling. She felt alive, buzzing with an energy that had evaded her for a long while. The pages in front of her were headache-inducingly complex. The pipes seemed to wind and snake under the floors and over the ceilings, invisible to her behind the walls and carpets.

"My God, they're massive." She whispered, looking at the scale of the map she inspected.

She paused for a while, measuring the diagram with her fingers next to the index beside it.

"Big enough for someone to walk through easily…"

Her feet guided her from floor to floor as she walked the length of each pipe for as long as she could before it branched off to a place that she couldn't follow. What she searched for was an opening. Somewhere where she herself could step inside and go exploring. She found a few tiny air grates close to the ground, large enough for a child to crawl through perhaps, but not her. Her frustration was beginning to peek again when she found herself at the entrance of the green houses.

The site of the ancient Slytherin dormitories… she thought. She looked back to the pages of her book and saw a number of pipes seemingly ending in this area. Perhaps if I look around a bit… Move a few flagstones about…

She shut her book and moved wordlessly inside, closing the dragon-shaped handle of the glass door behind her. The inside was flooded with the comforting smell of earth and a sweet bouquet of an array of different flowers in bloom. The outside light was long gone, creating a thick, impenetrable black curtain around the greenery before Circe. She walked around the busy tables a few times, running a hand over the half filled pots and spilled soil from Pomona's lessons. Plants and greenery always had a way of relaxing Circe, which is why she loved being outdoors as well as her and Minerva's little conservatory so much. The greenhouses too had a strange soporific effect on her previously frantic mood. She stroked the waxy green leaf of a ginseng plant, the weird roots of the thing looking like it would get up and walk away from her at any moment. She laughed to herself, thinking on how she would never have had a thought like this had she still been living in her flat in Edinburgh. The wizarding world had rather conditioned her to expect everything to be either charmed or alive in some way… Out of the corner of her eye she saw an odd protruding ridge in the flooring. She crouched to the ground, inspecting the hump in the tiles she had spotted. She followed the ridge, easily four feet wide, marveling at how well it was hidden under all the gardening equipment and flower beds around her.

A pipe!

Her heartbeat quickened again as she followed the ridge from one greenhouse to another. She halted as she came to a small annexed-off section of the very last of the greenhouses, shut tight away from everyone by a heavy hinged door. Perhaps this was Pomona's little private greenhouse, or maybe it served as a storage room not unlike the one Severus had in the potions department. It was dark inside the small room, but Circe could just about see a few seemingly ordinary plants sitting in small pots along the surface of the table inside, and on the floor there was what looked to be a huge drainage hole covered with an iron grate.

The entrance! And it looks at least six foot wide.

She bristled with excitement. Circe smiled and moved to grab at the ante-room's door handle when she spied a series of earmuffs hanging on the wall by the door.

Weird… she thought to herself, until her eyes fell on something even more surprising...

Through the glass door, on the table just on the other side of it sat her old Walkman.

It took her completely by surprise, so out of place in a setting such as this. Without a thought she tugged open the glass door and strode into the small ante-room. She picked up her Walkman, noting that it sat on top of a number of muggle CDs that weren't hers. To her knowledge, no one else in the castle had these things and she stared at them in astonishment. She picked up a few, inspecting them closely: Bowie, The Rolling Stones, The Clash...

These… these must be… Realisaion hit her like a train as she recalled who she had lent her Walkman to at the very end of last year.

"Severus's!" She almost shouted.

She startled as the plant beside her shivered and cooed, roused by her noise. She dropped the CD's she held and they crashed on top of one another sending a disturbed ripple of movement through the other plants in the room. Tentatively, she moved her head a fraction to peer inside the pot at whatever leafy creature was sitting within it. Dawning horror made her heart thunder in her ears as she saw the ugly, baby-like face of a mandrake… There was silence for a second as the creature peered at Circe. She too was staring back at it, holding her breath.

Then. It screamed.

She clasped her hands to her ears as a pain unlike anything she'd ever felt rattled through her skull. The other mandrakes joined in the chorus of howling and shrieking. She stumbled backwards in alarm, and in her clumsy footing, she backed into the room's door, shutting her inside with the screaming mandrakes.

Oh fuck fuck fuck fuck… she thought, already feeling the dizzying effect of the plant's noises on her.

She moved to face the door and reluctantly took her hands away from her ears to try the handle. The pain in her head soared as the handle stiffly refused to budge, jammed and refusing to open for her. She reeled from the cries as the effects of the mandrake's screams threatened to make her pass out. She snapped her hands back over her ears, doing little to drown out their noise or ease the excruciating pain in her head. The ear muffs sat on the other side of the glass, tantalizingly out of her grasp.

She staggered about the room, desperately searching for something to help her, trying to stay conscious with every ounce of her concentration. If she passed out, she'd die. That she knew for certain. She fell to her knees, her head swimming as if she were drunk. Circe looked back to the Walkman that sat on the tabletop and made one last attempt to grab it. The shrieks of the plants filled her ears as she removed her hands again, and she fell to the floor, the CD player in her hands. Circe desperately stuffed the earbuds into her ears with the last of her strength, and with fumbling fingers she mashed away at the buttons, praying that the thing still had battery power.

She was on the very edge of consciousness, lying prostrate on the floor, waiting for noise to fill her ears. Nothing came.

It's dead.

I'm dead.

Ahh, fuck….

Darkness clouded over her eyes...

She let the pain consume her….

And then, noise.

Blissful, blissful music filled her ears. It drowned out the mandrake screams instantly and Circe felt herself crawling back into the land of the living. Her eyes opened and she stared up at the glasshouse's ceiling, breathing deeply as the pain in her head slipped away into nothing. She laughed, sheer elation washing over her as tears of relief sprung up in her eyes. She paused for a moment, listening to the song that had just saved her life.

"I don't care if Monday's blue

Tuesday's grey and Wednesday too

Thursday, I don't care about you

It's Friday, I'm in love."

She laughed harder. "The Cure! He likes The Cure!" She shouted, barely able to hear herself over the song in her ears. "The maudlin bugger! Of course he likes The Cure!"

"Monday you can fall apart

Tuesday, Wednesday break my heart

Oh, Thursday doesn't even start

It's Friday, I'm in love"

She rose to her feet, pure joy and euphoria taking hold of her. Circe began to dance and sing to the music, waltzing about the ante-room like a woman possessed. She sang to the still screaming mandrakes, pointing at them and performing to the ugly little things as if they were an adoring crowd of fans. She didn't know how long she danced and sang for, starting the song again every time she heard it winding down. But it was in that state of pure buffoonery and jubilation that Severus found her.

He had heard the screams of the startled mandrakes from far away, running through the corridors of Hogwarts towards the alarming noise. Whatever he had expected to find… it certainly wasn't Circe dancing with gay abandon in the mandrake greenhouse, the Walkman in her ears, singing at the top of her lungs to 'Friday I'm in Love'. He stood on the other side of the glass, mouth agape. She was in a world of her own, not even seeing him when he reached up to take a pair of earmuffs from the wall and place them over his own ears. He opened the ante-room's door with a forceful tug and it swung open for him.

"Circe… Circe!" He shouted to her back.

Yet she still couldn't hear him. He rolled his eyes and grabbed her wrist, making her almost jump out of her skin.

"Severus!" She shouted back to him, beaming from ear to ear. "You've developed some good taste!"

"Oh for God's sake, come on…!"

He tugged her forcefully from the room and they both fell through the glass door, sprawling out onto the floor together. Severus's earmuffs fell from his head and he cried out in pain, clutching at his ears. Circe kicked at the door and it slammed shut, sealing in the excruciating mandrake screams for good.

Circe sighed and finally took the earbuds out of her own ears, looking at Severus with a broad grin still etched on her face. Severus did not share in her expression, his face like thunder.

"What the bloody hell are you doing here?" He asked sharply. "I thought you were away for the holidays."

"I was, but-"

"And why were you picking a fight with a full crop of fully matured mandrakes, you stupid girl? Where are your earmuffs? You could have died if you'd listened to them for too long."

"I think I almost did." She laughed, wiping her eyes. She rose to her feet, extending a handout to Snape and helping him up. "Did… did you say they're fully matured now?"

"Yes, I have been preparing them for brewing. I should be able to start the Restoration Draft tomorrow."

"Oh Severus, that's brilliant! But didn't you say it takes constant supervision to make sure it doesn't go stale?"

"Yes…"

"Then we'll both monitor it. Together. I'll talk to Dumbledore, get him to cover some of my lesson time. I'm sure he'll oblige me if I tell him I'm helping you out."

She smiled, feeling her face flush with the memory of her and the Headmaster's last conversation. Severus's heart soared at the thought of having them working side by side once more.

"I… bu-... Don't avoid the question! What are you doing here?!" He asked her again, all a-flutter.

"Severus, I think I found something useful…"

She walked back over to the glass door, and Severus rushed to her side thinking she was about to go into the mandrake room again.

"You see that grate?" She asked, pointing at the iron lattice on the floor.

Severus sighed and looked to where she pointed. "I do."

"It's a pipe."

"A pipe?"

"Yes, part of the plumbing system of the castle."

"I'm not following you, Professor." Snape said coldly.

"The Chamber isn't on any recorded maps or sketches of the castle. But I'd be willing to bet my bottom dollar that the plumbing network is linked to it. And look…" she peered around the greenhouse, looking for where she'd discarded 'A Complete and Detailed History of the Plumbing and Piping of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry'. She thumbed through it and settled on a particularly complex-looking map of interwoven lines. "These pipes, underneath the greenhouses, are some of the oldest in the school. And look…" she flicked to another page. "... they go to the subterranean floors and quite a few of them mysteriously stop here."

Her finger settled on an oddly blank space on the diagram of Hogwarts's underground floors. Snape frowned and pulled Circe's book closer to him.

"Where is that?" He asked, bemused.

"I don't know. According to all the maps I've seen this year, there's nothing there."

"Professor, it could just be an underground drainage lake."

"Or it could be The Chamber, Severus!"

Her face was lit up like a child at Christmas. He looked down at her, caught off guard by the spark of passion in her eyes. The ferocity of her excitement radiated from her. He hadn't seen her like this for a long time and it warmed something small within him too; she shone, from her core to her brilliant green eyes and he marveled at the palpable felicity in her every glance.

"You weren't going to go crawling inside that thing, were you?" He asked sardonically. "Without telling anyone where you were going?"

She looked to her feet sheepishly, realizing just how carried away with her discovery she'd been.

"For the love of Merlin, what if you'd run into the monster!"

"I… well…"

"Do you have a death wish, Professor?" He asked incredulously.

"Alright, fine. Not my cleverest moment."

"Indeed."

"But… when I've planned something, and prepared… you'll come with me, Severus?" She asked, looking up at him with her best long-lashed puppy eyes.

Something about the cadence in her voice, so pleading and in want of him, sparked a stir of desire within him. He felt himself stiffen and he had to shift in his feet awkwardly to hide himself.

Oh Merlin, not this again...

"Yes… yes of course." He replied quickly, turning from her.

She smiled and bunched up the Walkman's headphones in her hand. Her heart had slowed to a regular pace, now all of the adrenaline had left her body and she was suddenly overcome with fatigue.

God I wish I had another one of Myron's cigarettes, she thought to herself. Coffee will have to do.

She strode over to Severus and placed the Walkman back in his hands before continuing her path to the Staff Room.

"This is yours." He replied rather awkwardly. "I should have returned it to you much sooner."

"Keep it." She replied, pausing at the exit of the greenhouse. "It sounds like you've been using it more than I would be."

Circe smiled and Severus coloured red in embarrassment, realizing that she must have seen the small selection of his now sizeable CD collection that he'd left in the mandrake room. He liked to listen as he worked away on the creatures, testing their sap potency and measuring their growth. It was something he'd taken great pains to hide from staff and students alike, and he thought his newly acquired muggle habit was safe from prying eyes during the holidays. And now he was exposed, feeling like his very soul had been laid bare before Circe.

"I told you that you just hadn't found the right music, Severus." Circe added with a wink, before leaving him speechless and red from his ears to his feet.