Chapter 18: "Look at how far we've come. Everything is so clear, Can't believe it's been another year."

"So after all that work… all those hours in the library and down the tunnels… I was beaten by a twelve year old boy and a bird. Everything I did basically counted for nothing."

Circe pushed the trolley that held the Restoration Draft down the central gangway of the Hospital wing. Severus stopped outside Colin Creevey's bed to administer the now completed potion and she pushed the trolley straight into the back of his legs. He grumbled and shot her a look of profound annoyance. She stared back at him with a look of apology, but a mischievous twinkle in her eye. A neat bandage was now stuck over her own injury. It would leave a small scar just near the corner of her left eye, but she was lucky that this was the worst of her consequences.

"Professor, I do believe if I have to hear you whinging about yourself once more, I shall throw you off the top of Ravenclaw tower."

Harry had emerged from the Chamber in Fawkes's talons with Ginny, Ron and Gilderoy in tow, a mere hour after she had released the Phoenix from his cage. When Harry had come to the Hospital for his post-adventure checkup, Circe had leapt from her own bed and beset him with a myriad of questions.

How did you reach the Chamber?

Why did you know where to find it?

Why is Professor Lockhart catatonicaly stupid now?

What was the Chamber like?

How did you defeat the monster?

Poor Madame Pomfrey had been required to move the boy to the other end of the wing to spare him the inquisition.

Severus was still giving her the silent treatment as punishment for her secrecy on the night of Ginny's disappearance. That didn't stop her from talking at Severus however, going through her disappointment that she'd not seen the Chamber for herself before Dumbledore had returned to the school to re-establish order. He'd also been left with a lot of the explaining to do to the Headmaster, as Circe's head injury had left her blabbering and incongruously spouting about how "Fawkes spoke to me…". How exactly she got her head injury, and the mess left behind in the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom Severus had covered with a simple "the monster did it…".

He had completed the Draft that night, by the grace of God, and the two of them were proudly dishing out their hard won achievement to the petrified victims one by one. Hermione and Justin Finch-Fletchley both sat up comfortably in their beds, and Mrs Norriss purred happily in the cat basket by the door. Circe pushed the trolley by Gilderoy's bed and stole a glance through the privacy curtain at him. He caught her eye and waved merrily back to her, in a set of pink striped pyjamas that he previously wouldn't have been seen dead in. She smiled weakly and waved back at him.

"He saved my life, Severus." Circe said in a low voice.

Severus looked to Gilderoy too, humming a tuneless song to himself as he sat in bed.

"Yes, you said. Pulled you out of the rubble." Snape responded flatly. He had been surprised when Circe had first told him how she'd come to be in that trunk…

"Why did he do it? Harry and Ron said he was trying to get away from the castle as quickly as possible to abandon us."

"Perhaps he wanted to redeem himself."

"And risk his own chance of escape?"

"Maybe he wanted to do something to… make up for how he'd treated you before. When you were-"

"Yeah, I get what you mean." She butt in quickly, not wanting to recall the events of Charlotte Ambrose's party. "But it was so unlike him… that might be the first truly heroic thing he's ever done in his life."

"And now he can't even remember it." Snape added coolly. "Quite cruelly ironic, isn't it."

"Not as cruelly ironic as a freaking Ancient Studies Professor being pipped to the post by three children on her own specialism..."

Severus growled and pushed the trolley into her thighs. She yelped as she rubbed her skin and looked to Severus with a pout.

"Stop it, Circe. You can't keep on about this, it's water under the bridge now. The school is safe. The monster is dead. Does it matter how we got there?"

"Easy for you to say. You didn't spend evenings trawling through every cartographic book in this castle, tired to the core, trying not to pass out from exhaustion on your work!"

"Again…" Snape said with a smirk.

"Yeah, again…" Circe replied. She couldn't help a small smile spreading across her lips as she remembered that night. "It's like it didn't even matter that I was here. Everything I did counted for nothing. I was a big fat fucking ball of useless."

"Oh for goodness sake…"

He strode over to Hermione's bed and flung back the curtain, revealing the girl looking back at him with a look of shock on her face.

"Granger, tell Professor Smith what you told the Headmaster when he came to ask you about how Potter and Weasley found the Chamber."

"I… I said that I knew the Professor had looked quite a bit at the maps of Hogwarts and had found nothing, so she inspired me to look-"

"At the pipes, yes. But why did the inspiration come?" He asked, shortly.

Circe would have been satisfied enough hearing that she'd "inspired" the girl.

"Well, after that day when we saw the Professor in… in Myrtle's bathroom. I knew there must be something down there, otherwise why would she have been looking there? And on the day I was petrified, and I found the story of the Basilisk, I wrote it down on the book page. In case I didn't make it back to Harry and Ron to tell them…"

"What did you write?" Circe asked, remembering the conversation she had overheard with Harry and Ron from her hidden spot in the tunnels.

"I-I wrote. "It's in the pipes. Why Professor Smith was down the toilet!"." She replied, blushing from ear to ear.

Severus turned to Circe with his inky brow arched in vindication. She turned her back and walked away from Hermione's bed, smiling to herself. Colin was just beginning to wriggle his limbs in his bed and Madame Pomfrey was at his side, gently speaking to him as he woke from his deep sleep. The longer a victim was in a prettified state, the longer it took for the Draft to work. Circe swelled with pride as Severus stood at her back, watching the last of the Basilisk's victims come back to life.

"And so you see, Professor, the three musketeers-of-mischief only knew to go exploring in the pipes because of you. Furthermore,the Draft is just as much an achievement for you as it is for me." He said in a hushed tone.

His voice in her ear set the hairs on her arms on edge again.

"It was rather a collaborative endeavour, after all."

"We made quite the team, didn't we Severus." She said, turning to face him.

"Yes, until you decided to break my trust and sever any hope I had of finding you in the pipes." He said, his hurt plain in his voice.

His eyes involuntarily flicked back to the plaster on her head, a symbol of the decision she'd made that night that had almost ended her life.

"I had to… We needed Dumbledore, and you wouldn't have allowed me to go by myself if I'd said-"

"You didn't have to. You didn't have to lie to me." He said shortly.

"Severus," she said, laying a hand on top of his arm. She felt him tense up beneath her touch and he stared at her in enraptured silence. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have gone down there looking for trouble and leaving you with no means of finding me. And I'm sorry I lied to you… I won't again. I promise. But it's like you said: it's water under the bridge. The school is safe again and the monster's dead. Does it matter how we got there?"

He sighed. Severus could see in her eyes that she hadn't enjoyed deceiving him, and Circe could see in his eyes that he didn't enjoy being angry with her. Most people he liked to be angry with… but not me. The thought made the butterflies wriggle in her stomach.

"You… promise?" He said quietly.

She nodded. "I do."

------

Circe pushed open the large wooden doors to the Great Hall, and from around her emerged the previously petrified victims: all healthy, well and heartily welcomed back by their peers. The students already sat at the house tables gasped and called to them joyously. Circe smiled widely, a small tear in her eye as Hermione ran past her and into the outstretched arms of her friends. She walked into the Great Hall for the feast on the final day of term to take her place at the Staff table. She was starving, having not eaten properly since her head injury. Her appetite properly came back with avengence as she cast her eyes over the delicious food set out on the tables: steak and ale pies decorated with the most beautiful pastry leaves and flowers, buttered leeks, mounds of fluffy mashed potato … her mouth watered. Yet as she reached the table her eyes fell on the only vacant seat beside Severus and her appetite dwindled once more, butterflies squirming in her stomach. The smallest incline of his head invited her to sit, and she moved to oblige him.

Champagne was the staff treat for today, and Circe poured herself a tall fizzing flute and popped a in a single raspberry. It was only on very rare occasions that Circe felt put-off food. She loved it. Had always loved eating. But she did recall previously in her life when she'd felt moved enough to be off her food... When she'd felt ill but not ill. Restless but calm. Pleasantly aching. She sipped her flute, the liquid tart and crisp on her tongue, and tried to push through the conclusion she didn't want to come to… just yet. Circe began hungrily dishing herself out a portion of pie, giving herself an extra scoop of filling to try and convince herself that she was fine. She offered the potatoes to Severus and he waved them politely away. He had a general rule of avoiding eating, as much as he could, in the company of students or other staff. Instead, he picked at the pie and knocked back a few glasses of champagne, the fizzy feeling filling his gut with the liquid courage he needed.

"So, you'll go back to your Father's for the summer?"

"Oof this is déjà-vu from this time last year isn't it, Severus." She laughed haughtily.

Severus went quiet, unsure how he'd garnered such a brusque reply from her. She sensed his deflation and decided to drop her attempt at trying to play cool.

"Yes, I am." she answered earnestly. "And you to Spinner's End?"

"Well, at least you got it right this year."

They both laughed.

"Well, cheers to another year of not tearing each other's throats out, Severus." She said and they clinked glasses.

"Yes, well… I thought you might quite like to… continue the trend of… not tearing each other's throats out into the Summer?" He said, his heart dipping and weaving in his chest.

Circe looked to him, his face hidden as he stared down at his small plate of food. He prodded at a piece of pastry with his fork, not daring to look up and see the look of disgust that he assumed would be plastered on her face.

"Write to one another?" She asked tentatively.

He shrugged his shoulders in affirmation, still doggedly refusing to look at her.

Just like you promised you would last year? She thought bitterly.

He sensed her hesitation and scrabbled around in his own mind desperately for something that might assuage her.

"I know I was not particularly forthcoming with my end of that arrangement last year-"

"You didn't write to me once, Severus." She added, feeling the old wound open.

How do I know you won't start a million letters again and never get around to sending them?

She wanted to tell him she'd found his letters on that day he'd come storming into her classroom in a tantrum. How each of his starts had pulled at her heart for one reason or another. Yet the fact remained that he had still chosen not to post them. He had still chosen to ignore her once she was out of his sights, and what use was a confrontation when it came down to it? Circe had thought they'd grown close this year, but she had thought that by last summer too. Perhaps Severus was one of those people that just had a different life outside of work. Never mixed business and pleasure. Perhaps that was a rule she needed to stick more too as well considering how the shift of Severus's fingers or a correctly placed look from him could keep her up late into the night.

"Then I shall raise the stakes." Severus said achingly slowly. "More than just letters."

"What do you mean?"

"Meet me."

She blinked in disbelief. "I- what?"

"You must get as catatonically bored over the summer as I do…." He finally raised his eyes from his plate.

It was a cry for friendship and companionship over legions of time in solitude. He felt as if he were stranded out in no man's land. In unfamiliar, hostile territory with none of his armour of coldness and distance to protect him.

All thoughts of why or where came into her head and left as swiftly as they arrived. She cleared her throat and tried to play at being cool again.

"I will await your instructions then, Professor." She said with a grin, touching the flute to her lips.

Flitwick tapped her on the shoulder, severing the penetrating look between them to ask her for the gravy. Circe's attention was called away elsewhere, and Severus took the opportunity to down another glass of champagne and wipe the beads of sweat that had gathered at his temple. He fought hard to smother the wide smile that pulled at the corners of his mouth.

-----

Circe had gone with most of the staff down to the Three Broomsticks to welcome back Hagrid from Azkaban with open arms. The castle was empty now all of the students had once again dispersed for the Summer, and Snape watched the merry band of his colleagues walk down to the village from his spot in the clock tower solemnly. Circe walked arm in arm with Minerva, carrying the last of her suitcases to depart after the last drink of the term. He mused over how easy laughter and conversation seemed to come to her; she was able to slip into any group of people, become a bright star in any room she was in, be a person people enjoyed to be around... and the exact opposite was true for him. Severus had considered joining them down in Hogsmeade, but decided that he was not the kind of 'let's grab a quick drink' colleague. He would have to get used to being lonely again over the long summer months at Spinner's End, he might as well start acclimatising himself to the feeling now. Still, at least he had their meeting to look forward to…

Circe pulled away from Minerva and stood quite alone in the Hogwarts courtyard whilst her other colleagues walked on. Severus watched her as she turned back to Hogwarts and cast a long look over the many towers and trellises before her. He felt rather voyeuristic watching her in this moment of private introspection and moved to back away from the window when she locked eyes with him, spotting him gazing down at her from the very top of the tower. He drew in his breath sharply and froze.

Whatever will she think of you, staring down at her like some hideous creepy gargoyle on the roof? He thought bleakly.

Circe smiled and waved her spare hand up to him as a last goodbye. He was taken slightly aback that she wasn't annoyed or unsettled by him watching over her. He shyly raised his own hand and gave her a small wave back. And with that, she grinned broadly up at Severus one last time, and turned from him to leave.

Once his heartbeat had settled down, Severus began the long descent from the top of the tower. It had not just been his reluctance to socialise that had kept him from joining Hagrid's "welcome back" pub session, the Headmaster had called to see him before he left for the holidays. He came to the Headmaster's office door and knocked reluctantly. For Dumbledore to have asked to see him at this point in the year, it must be important.

"Come in, Severus…" came the old man's voice on the other side, and Snape pushed the door open, stepping inside.

"Headmaster, you wished to see…" Severus began, but halted as he saw the item on Dumbledore's desk.

The old Headmaster looked pale and haggard as he too stared at the book before him. The pages were torn and crinkled, and a huge hole now sat squarely at the center where the Basilisk's fang had plunged into it. Severus approached it cautiously, judging by the grave look on Dumbledore's face that this was an item of immense magical power. He hovered over the deep black cover and saw the gold embossed letters on the front, some smothered with ink and blood, but still chillingly readable:

"Tom Marvolo Riddle…. this… this can't be-" Severus said shakily, recognizing the name in an instant.

"It is. From his own time as a student at Hogwarts."

"But… how did-"

"Harry found it within The Chamber. He said that the "memory" of Riddle was controlling the Weasley girl and so to lift the curse, he destroyed the thing with a Basilisk tooth." The Headmaster held up a fang that had been placed at the side of the diary in demonstration.

"A "memory"?" Severus repeated, confusion tainting his voice. He lost himself in the black, puckered leather of the diary, his head swimming with questions. "What do you think the boy meant by that?"

"I'm afraid what I suspected last year is true, Severus." Dumbledore said slowly, leaning in close to Snape. "Voldemort will be back. From the power this seemingly ordinary object exercised over Ginny Weasley, and the visions of Riddle it showed to Harry in the Chamber…" he sucked in his breath, as if mentally steeling himself for the conclusion he was leading to. "The diary Harry destroyed can only be… a horcrux."

"No…" Severus breathed, the air around him turning cold and heavy. "The diary wasn't a "memory" it was-"

"A part of Voldemort's soul."

The two men went quiet, both lost in terrible thoughts as they stared at the book. Even though Dumbledore had told him the horcrux was now destroyed, the diary still had a sinister, evil feel to it. The Dark Mark on Severus's arm prickled almost on cue and he flinched, grasping his wrist with a jump.

"The questions raised last year when Quirrell was killed have, I'm afraid, been horribly, frightfully answered."

"There will be more." Severus said flatly as he traced a finger over the golden letters. "Who knows how many. He certainly killed enough people to make a small legion of them."

Dumbledore sighed heavily, having reached the same conclusion as Snape.

"I'm afraid, Severus, that that is not the sum of why I called you here today." He spoke levelly, fixing him with a long, sombre look.

"What?"

"Harry also told me how he came by the book…" Dumbledore halted, not wanting to tell Severus what he had to say.

"How?" Severus prompted him. He could sense the pain that pulled at Dumbledore, preventing him from speaking.

"He said… Professor Smith dropped it the day she… crawled out of the toilet." The Headmaster cringed as he lingered over his last words.

"Circe had it?!"

"Yes. Which I'm afraid leaves us with two possible, but equally worrisome scenarios."

"Which are?" Severus asked, rubbing his eyes exasperatedly. Right at this moment, he was not appreciating the Headmaster's ambling, poetical cadences.

"Either Circe has, from the very beginning, been allied with those who ensured the diary was smuggled into the castle, bringing it directly to Harry when the Weasley girl tried to get rid of-"

"No!" Severus said sharply. "I don't believe it."

"Don't believe it because you know differently? Or don't believe it because you don't want to, Severus?" Dumbledore asked, his brow raised daringly.

"She is not an ally of the Dark Lord!" He shouted, standing to his feet. "I… I trust her, I will vouch for her."

"Severus, sit down." Dumbledore said calmly. "I also agree this scenario is unlikely… especially after how upset she appeared when she discovered your arrest as a Death Eater."

"She… she knows I was a Death Eater?" Severus asked, the emotion plain in his voice.

"She does, and she was also informed to the contrary after your Duel."

Oh God, that explains her comment after she broke her nose during the fight. Why she was so cold to me beforehand.

"What did you tell her?" Severus asked, clenching his jaw and fixing Dumbledore with a vicious stare.

"I did not tell her about Lily if that's what you're insinuating, Severus." Dumbledore replied defensively.

Severus let go of the knuckle-whitening grip he had held on the arms of his chair. He acknowledged that his attraction to Circe that year had grown from a juvenile feeling of puppy-love, as it had been previously, to something much more adult and downright sinful. Before, he took solace in dismissing his feelings as the twinge of someone still desperately grieving the love of his life, but still ultimately human. Now was another matter. Circe had stolen herself into his thoughts more and more. Into his libidinous hands… Yet it was still Lily's face who haunted his dreams at night, her eternal memory that drove him on. Anybody knowing of his love for Lily, especially Circe, would destroy him. Yet he had lay in bed at night many times that year wondering why crippling guilt and alarm seized him bodily any time he consciously thought of any face but Lily's in his private moments. He still clung to her memory like an old comfort blanket, the pain and regret that came with it all included in what he had grown used to living with. But as the year had marched on, he realised that his guilt had begun to dwindle. His self-punishing thoughts any time he left Circe's presence had become less severe. Somewhere within him, unconsciously, at some point in the year because of Circe, he had begun to flirt with the idea that he could be less miserable... Let ghosts lie...

Perhaps even enjoy being alive from time to time.

"I'm afraid the second possible scenario for Professor Smith doesn't offer much more solace for us." Dumbledore added quickly before Severus could ask him any questions about his and Circe's conversation.

"Why?" Severus queried, sinking exhaustedly back into the chair.

"Circe was clearly in possession of the diary for a time. And for a magical item that held a part of Voldemort's soul, something as potent and evil as a horcrux… Voldemort may be aware of her now."

"Just from holding it? Picking it up? Do you know if she even opened it?" He asked shortly.

"I don't. However, that might not matter, Severus." Dumbledore said with a shrug.

Severus closed his eyes and sighed. Circe had told him of how she'd always wanted to be a part of the wizarding war. How her age had gotten in her way. How guilty she felt that her friends in the older years had fought for her whilst she'd been powerless to do anything. She very soon would have everything her teenage self would have wanted: to be at the very center of the fight against Dark Lord's uprising, but for a very different reason. Dumbledore was right. Circe was a possible target for Voldemort to concentrate his energies on. All because she'd picked up that blasted book in the tunnels.

She didn't mention anything to me about opening it… but then again why would she? The name Tom Marvolo Riddle will mean nothing to her. Some of Voldemort's closest followers didn't know his birth name.

Dumbledore folded his hands together and fixed the Potions Master with a serious look. "But what I do know is that Professor Smith might be in more danger now than she ever has been before."