Snape's Niece

One

Harry was walking down the hallway. He stopped short, because there was a tall girl in the center of his path. She was very pale, and had the look of someone who had just recieved very bad news. She made a motion with her hand, and a bottle appeared out of midair. Harry was able to read the lable, it was labeled: 'Smirnoff Vodka.' This strange girl chugged the bottle, until it was empty. She fell over, unconsious from the blood alcohol level.

"Emma! Emma, no!" This new, but old voice that Harry knew was Professor Snape. Snape rushed to the girl and knelt, taking her pulse. He looked up and saw all the people staring at the scene. He saw Harry, Hermione, Ron, and Malfoy. "Potter, Granger, Weasley, Malfoy, help me carry her into my office," he snapped, irritably. Instead of his office, Snape had them take her to his room. "Put her down gently, gently now, Weasley. All right, you four, stay here while I go get something to wake her up." After saying that, he swept out of the room in a cloud of billowing black robes.

"Well, this is strange Ron, Harry," Hermione said, ignoring Malfoy. "A strange girl shows up and Snape falls apart like a-" She was cut off by the reappearance of Snape, who had his wand and a vial of some sort of yellow potion.

"Maybe this will revive her; if not I'll have to use the Lastuas," he murmured, for his own benefit. "If the potion doesn't work I'll try both together." He pointed his wand in between the girls' eyes and shouted a spell. "ENNERVATE!" There was a flash of very bright light, and incoherant mumbling from the girl on Snape's bed.

"Mom...Dad...Issac...dead...Crucio...Avada Kedavra...Lord Voldemort...Death Eaters...Lucius Malfoy...Laughing, all of them laughing..." The girl--Emma, Snape had called her--sat up and wiped her eyes. She reached into a old, worn black leather bag that was hanging at her side and pulled out a twelve-inch maple and dragon scale wand. Her fingers trembled as she raised it to her temple and started to whisper something. "Ava-"

"No, Emma!" Snape said snatching away her wand and holding it out of reach. "Just because he killed your family to get to you does not, I repeat does not mean you have to give him what he wants, which is, as you know, your life. I will not allow my only living family member to kill herself, no matter how depressed she is!"

"I thought you didn't have any family? I was under the impression that they were dead?" Malfoy said, slightly puzzled but trying not to show it.

"No, this is my niece, Emma Snape-James. Her mother is--was--my sister. Miri and I were very close. I sent her and her husband and their son, Issac, and Emma, their daughter, to America when... Well, I sent them there about fifteen years ago. Emma was only one." He smiled, and had a faraway look in his eyes. "Only one, and she had wrapped her Uncle Sev around her little finger." He reached over and hugged his niece, who clung to him silently, crying.

After they had finished hugging, Emma reached into her bag and pulled a scroll out. "Mom said if anything ever happened to her and Dad, to find you and give you this. It must be some sort of legal guardianship paper, or something."

Snape unrolled it, and a red envelope fell out, smoking at the edges. He picked it up, cringing.

"SEVERUS SNAPE! WE KNOW THAT YOU ARE A SPY! SHOW YOUR FACE HERE AGAIN AND YOU ARE DEAD! KNOW THIS: YOU AND YOUR NIECE ARE MARKED, ONE DAY YOU WILL MEET A STICKY END, JUST LIKE YOUR SISTER DID!" The letter exploded, but Snape had dropped it before it could hurt him.

"Malfoy, take my niece back to the Slytherin common room. Inform everyone she will be staying for an indefinite period of time. House her in Ms. Parkinson's room; tell Ms. Parkinson she will be sleeping in the sixth year girls' dorm for the rest of the year and possibly next year, too. Go, now, quickly boy! You, Potter, Weasley, Granger, you're dismissed. Off with you now." They left. He waited until he knew they wouldn't be there, then started off for the Headmaster's office.