A Merciless Affection

Chapter 49: Stay by My Side, Guide Me!

The funeral was on Tuesday. Sarah was glad that Professor Dumbledore had arranged the details. It was difficult enough to stand at her aunt's graveside, even with the support of the headmaster's calming presence.

The delegation from the school was small. Besides Dumbledore, only Professors Snape, McGonagall and Vector had come. McGonagall had only just returned from St. Mungo's on Sunday, and she still leaned rather heavily on her walking stick; Sarah was grateful beyond words that she would make such an effort. Vector, whose presence was altogether unexpected, had apparently known Aunt Portia at school.

Sarah had refused Angelina's valiant offer to attend, although the general sympathy that arose among her dorm mates when the story was reported in the Prophet was more comforting than she could have guessed.

Enduring the pity and reminiscences and effulgent grief of her aunt's friends, however, was more painful than she would ever have supposed. Fortunately, they kept mainly to themselves after their first outpouring of condolence. There were only a handful of people she didn't know--people from the Ministry, she assumed, from the distant and slightly officious stance they took. Aurors? Did they expect her aunt's murderer to show up at the funeral?

Franklin Nott had, to Sarah's agonizing frustration, been cleared of guilt in her aunt's death, although he still languished in Azkaban on a long list of charges stemming from the battle at the Ministry, not least of which was the incriminating presence of the Dark Mark on his left forearm. The wands of everyone in the Nott household had been checked--not strictly with official permission, Sarah gathered--but none of them had been used to cast the Killing Curse. When the Plattus house was searched, Ganna the house-elf had been found dead as well, shut up in a kitchen cupboard, destroying the last hope for a witness. Still no less convinced of the Notts' guilt, Sarah could only fume at Ministry stupidity. Clearly they had overlooked something; it was absurd that they expected to find it here.

It was uncanny to walk through Hogsmeade graveyard, green as it was in the June sunshine. In her mind it had been fixed in blacks and greys, cold and forbidding and very nearly deadly on that night at the cusp of October and November, of her old life and her new one. If not for that night, if not for that stupid Potions field trip, she would not now be standing here at her aunt's open grave. But no, it was not really Severus's fault, as much as she wanted someone else to blame.

Her eyes, wandering in search of she-knew-not-what, lighted on an old man leaning on a spade, out beyond the last of the official observers. It was the same old man, the caretaker, who had been threatened that night. Not his fault, either. It had been one of the Slytherin girls who had screamed, revealing their presence.

Severus was standing as close to her as propriety allowed. Not near enough for comfort. The only thing, in truth, that made her feel any better was the silent but tangible presence of her child. Aunt Portia had not known about that. Would never see her grandnephew. Maybe that was for the best, all things considered. But it hurt.

McGonagall, perhaps noticing Sarah's hand hovering oddly in the air in front of her stomach, took it and clasped it firmly while the minister pronounced the final words.

And so Portia Jane Plattus was laid to rest beside her parents--her father, who had outlived two wives, and whom Sarah remembered only vaguely, and her mother, who had already lain here for some sixty years. Staring at the headstones, Sarah's mind went to another burying place, in Lincolnshire, where both of her own parents' graves lay, only a little separated from each other, beyond the paling.

Where, she wondered, were the Snapes buried? To what fate had she committed her own mortal remains? And how long would one of them lie there without the other?

* * *

"Miss Darkglass, I presume?"

A tall, thin wizard with a rectangular face and iron-grey hair extended his hand.

"John Mycroft."

Of Mycroft and Mycroft, 'specializing in Wizarding and Muggle law.' Or so proclaimed the gold letters on the door. The firm was tucked away on a side street of Hogsmeade. A Muggle-born wizard and his non-magical brother, according to Professor Dumbledore. He had arranged this interview for Wednesday afternoon.

"And Professor Snape?" The man's hand went out again, but his eyebrows cocked quizzically, and he shot a quick look at Sarah's Gryffindor badge.

"Professor Snape will be supervising my apprenticeship next year," Sarah said quickly. The Dark Lord had, as they had hoped, agreed to that. "Professor McGonagall is still recovering from her injuries, and Professor Snape offered to accompany me in her place."

"Ah, I see. Well, do sit down." He retreated behind his large desk. "I wish to express my sympathy to you, Miss Darkglass, on the passing of your aunt. I know this must be particularly difficult for you, since she was your guardian after your parents' deaths."

"Mr. Mycroft," Severus said abruptly. "I think this interview will be considerably easier for Miss Darkglass if you omit the meaningless platitudes and get on with business."

John Mycroft cleared his throat, looking to Sarah for direction.

"Please, sir, if you would," she said.

"Very well, then." He picked up a piece of parchment. "This may or may not come as a surprise to you, Miss Darkglass. If it does, I apologize. Your aunt altered her will last winter. She has left no provision in it for you whatsoever."

It was not really a surprise, but it still hurt.

"A few of her personal effects were bequeathed to various friends. The remainder of her estate, including the proceeds from the sale of the house, once that has been effected, will go to the Witches' Protection League."

Sarah felt an ironic smile twitching at the corner of her mouth. She tried to sound flippant. "I daresay she thought I would have need of their services sooner or later." But her voice wobbled.

Mycroft looked at her as if he did not want to know what she meant.

"Your aunt was unable, however, to interfere with the arrangements for your inheritance from your parents. As she was the only remaining trustee, it falls to our firm to complete the terms. Your inheritance will remain in trust until your twenty-fifth birthday. However, you will be granted a generous allowance each year until that time." He named a sum that Sarah thought very reasonable. "That will, I hope, be adequate?"

"Yes, sir." Then, because she remembered having read something of the sort in a novel, she asked, "What if..."

No, perhaps it was not a good idea to ask.

"What is your question?" Mycroft laid the parchment down.

"I was just wondering...what would happen if I were to marry?" Sarah said uneasily.

"Do you mean, would your husband become your trustee?"

"Yes."

Mycroft shook his head, as if he had been asked the question more than once. "No, the Witches' Inheritance Act of 1537 specifies that a woman inherits in her own right--her husband is not entitled to automatic control."

"I see."

Mycroft pulled a scrap of parchment toward him. "Are there any of your own possessions still remaining in your aunt's house that you would like me to retrieve?"

Sarah took a deep breath. She had hardly thought of that. The idea of going back into the house, after it had become a murder scene, was disturbing. And although she had a few summer clothes there, and a few of her old textbooks, everything she truly valued was in her trunk.

"My broom, I suppose," she said finally. "It's a Comet, the newest of the ones in the broom cupboard."

"That's all?" Mycroft had written it down, but he kept his quill poised, his expression unconvinced.

"Yes, that's all."

He put down the quill. "Very well. If you discover, Miss Darkglass, that your expenses exceed your allowance, do contact me. I do not intend to be unreasonable."

"Thank you, Mr. Mycroft," Sarah said, ducking her head.

* * *

"You should not have asked him about marriage," Severus criticized, as they walked back to Hogwarts.

"He would hardly imagine the truth. Any young woman is apt to marry. It was not an unreasonable question."

"It was dangerous, nonetheless."

"Someday we're going to have to reveal the truth," she pointed out, exasperated. "If Professor Dumbledore is right, that will be sooner rather than later."

"Why should you be in such a hurry to reveal," his voice dropped to a fierce whisper, though no one was nearby, "that you're married to me?"

"Why are you so hesitant? Are you ashamed of me?"

"In case it had not occurred to you, most people are capable of simple addition and subtraction!"

"Do you really think that will matter, if we survive this? Surely you've discovered by now that people don't see what they don't want to see."

"Of course I realize that. But there are some--not just among the Dark Lord's servants--who would like to see me fall. I will not tolerate foolish and unnecessary changes in our present arrangement."

"Because you want to be headmaster someday."

He looked at her hard. "Do you disapprove of the ambition?"

"No," Sarah said, surprised that she could do so truthfully. "I just don't want to be sacrificed to it."

"You realize that I have already risked sacrificing it for your sake?" he asked with silken deadliness.

"I did not ask you to do so!"

"You're asking me now!"

"That wasn't what I intended," she protested.

"Stop questioning my judgment! Overriding my plans!"

"That wasn't what I intended either," she said, more quietly. "I just wanted you to know that I'm not ashamed of you."

"The more fool, you," he growled. But his expression softened, hinting that he was mollified. "A broom, of all things?"

"When one doesn't Apparate well, other modes of transportation are desirable. You don't like flying?"

"I'm not overly fond of it as a means of getting from place to place. When it's safe for you to do so, I intend to drill you in Apparition. Your inability is bloody inconvenient."

"What arrangements are we making to get to Knockturn Alley?" she asked, hoping a slight change of subject would improve his mood. They should have talked about it before now, but they had spent very little time together--almost none of it alone--since that fateful night. "The same as at Easter?"

"I had thought," he said slowly, warily, "that you would remain here after the end of term, while I finish up necessary school business. We had...something of an appointment, did we not?"

Sarah's pace faltered for a moment. The Gryffindor dormitory.

It simply popped out: "She was a Gryffindor, wasn't she?"

His face instantly became a mask of bitterness and anger.

"Do you intend to continually bring up the past?" he snarled.

The injustice of his accusation stung her. "I have never continued to bring up the past. I'm just as happy as you are to let it lie. But occasionally I do trip over it."

"Then you would prefer to cancel our tryst?"

She wanted him, badly. But in all honesty, the idea of enacting a youthful fantasy involving another girl wounded her pride, if nothing else. "I admit, I would prefer that," she said quietly. "But if it's important to you...."

"Not in the least."

His expression belied his words, but Sarah was not prepared to argue the matter further, even though it left her with a nasty kernel of guilt at having genuinely upset him.

"Indeed," he went on, "considering the suspicion that has already been aroused, it may be best for you to return to London on the train with the other students."

"And go to Knockturn Alley on my own?" The idea was composed of equal parts of adventure and horror.

"Hardly. I will meet you at the station, after the other students have departed."

She nodded in silent agreement. She wondered how he was going to manage finishing up his end-of-year business at Hogwarts, but she was not prepared to aggravate him further by asking. Undoubtedly he would manage somehow, without her input on the subject.

They passed through the school gates, which forced the end of their conversation. But despite their silence and the Potions master's typical sour expression, a few curious glances came their way.

At least her dorm mates had been told about the Potions apprenticeship. She hoped that would silence suspicions instead of raising them. Angelina's expression when Sarah had told the others about the apprenticeship had shown how difficult the girl was finding it to keep her privileged information to herself. But she remained silent, whether because of her promise to Sarah or the conversation she must have had with Professor Dumbledore.

"Thank you," Sarah said to the Potions master when they reached the entrance hall, which necessitated their parting. Two safe and simple words, but she meant them--even Sarah Darkglass would have meant them--an expression of sincere gratitude for his support in a difficult time.

"You're quite welcome, Miss Darkglass," he answered, his expression scarcely thawing. Which, here under public eyes, was as it should be.

But how grateful she would be, she thought, as she slowly mounted the stairs, when that was no longer necessary!

* * *

It was hard to believe the term was over, that this was the last time she would be riding the Hogwarts Express as it pulled out of Hogsmeade Station. The sensation it produced was vaguely unreal, and all the seventh years seemed to be affected by it. Most of the girls were in tears; the boys, on the other hand, chatted about jobs and Quidditch, albeit in a slightly subdued fashion.

Unlike most of the others, who were making their way from compartment to compartment, saying their goodbyes, Sarah stayed in her seat, dry-eyed. She was not sorry to see her school career end. She had moved beyond the worries and cares of her classmates months ago. Nor did she really have any close friends whose day-to-day presence she would miss. Her friendship with Angelina had not really even existed until this year, and the tension of their secret had already begun to renew the distance between them.

The other girls wanted to know where she was staying for the summer, since her aunt had, well,.... It was not a comfortable topic for anyone. Sarah reassured them that a family friend was giving her houseroom for the time being, and avoided further questions by hinting that the subject was still too painful for her to discuss. Which was not altogether untrue.

When the train pulled into King's Cross Station, she remained seated in the compartment after everyone else had left. She could not risk what an impulsive last-moment hug from one of her dorm mates might reveal. The anxious look in Angelina's eyes as she bid Sarah a last farewell made her feel unexpectedly lonely as she watched the students being received into the arms of their parents out on the platform.

She had no one anymore. No one who would take her in for the sake of their blood bond alone. Only Severus. And if he should ever choose to abandon her, or if anything happened to him....

A voice startled her out of her reverie.

"Does something ail you?" It was the witch who pushed the snack trolley, her wand (so, she isn't a Squib, Sarah thought) clutched in her hand.

"No," Sarah said. Shaking off her maudlin thoughts, she stood up.

"I have to clean the compartments," the witch said, and began doing so, with a series of murmured words and wand-waving, without even waiting for the girl to leave.

A quick Feather-light Spell allowed Sarah to retrieve her trunk and pull it down the passageway and off the train. Severus was to meet her in the main Muggle part of the station an hour after arrival. At least twenty or thirty minutes of that time had already passed; the platform was nearly deserted. Slowly (since it was difficult for her to do otherwise) she made her way through the barrier and out into the hustle and bustle of the station. .

When she finally reached the benches that were their agreed-upon meeting place, she sat gratefully, panting quietly. A few odd glances came her way from Muggle passersby--she had kept on her school robes, not eager to show the suggestive outfit underneath--but she was too weary and heartsick to care. Severian was restless, after all the moving about, and she closed her eyes and concentrated on him, absorbed for long minutes in trying to discern which jab was an elbow and which was a foot.

"Sarah?" called an astonished but familiar voice, jolting her out of the half-sleep into which she had unintentionally fallen. Her eyes popped up, searching the crowd for the person who had spoken.

It was Michael.

Her obvious recognition brought him over to her at a jog.

"What are you doing here?" Sarah gasped.

"Coming up to stay with my cousin Geoff for the weekend. Got home yesterday, but I have an interview early Monday." He grinned. "You're the last person I expected to run into."

"Likewise." Sarah was flabbergasted.

"You waiting for someone to pick you up?" His smile faded. "I...uh...I heard about your aunt. My mum told me last night."

What, Sarah wondered desperately, would the Muggle neighbors have heard?

"I'm awfully sorry," he went on. "You're not going to stay in the house alone, are you?"

"No, the house is to be sold," Sarah replied. "I'm staying with...um...friends. Here in London."

Michael nodded. "You going to work here in the city now?"

"I...uh...I hope I won't have to work. Over the summer anyway."

"Oh, um, I suppose you're still quite upset," he said, with embarrassed sympathy. "Sorry. I just...well, I got the impression that you'd quarreled with your aunt over Christmas. You just up and left, you know? And your aunt refused to say anything about where you'd gone or why. She wouldn't send on a message. She wouldn't even give me an address to write to you."

He must have been worried, Sarah thought, if he had asked to write to her. From their first year at school, she had put him off the idea by saying that the post up at Hogwarts was notoriously unreliable.

"Do you know," he said, "your school isn't in any directories?"

Sarah blanched. "It is awfully old and exclusive."

"Must be." He grinned again, taking in her school robes. "But I can have your London address, right? I'd hate to lose touch with you, now that you're leaving the village for good."

What she would have said in reply to that awkward request, she never found out. At that moment, someone else--someone more familiar yet--called her name.

"Sarah?" Severus strode up. He studied the red-haired youth speaking to his wife as he would have a substandard dried flobberworm. "What is the meaning of this?"

Feeling too much at a disadvantage, Sarah pushed herself to her feet.

"This is, um, Michael Everett. An old friend of mine."

The expression on his face changed subtly as he realized just which friend this must be.

"Michael," she said hurriedly, hoping that an introduction might take some of the edge off the situation. "This is Professor Severus Snape, a teacher from my school."

"Pleased to meet you," Michael said automatically. He seemed about to extend his hand, but apparently thought better of it. "I suppose you're helping Sarah get to her friends'?"

"Yes," Severus answered sharply. Then, to both of them, "As touching as I'm sure this little reunion is, I have no more time to waste."

"I...um...I really could use a trolley for my trunk," Sarah said, anxious to have a moment more to speak to Michael. She had run off without a word at Christmas, and it would be rotten of her to do so again.

Severus's expression soured as he understood the hint, and she was afraid he would refuse to take it. But he said, "I shall get you one." He stalked off, the billowing of his robes drawing further attention to his unconventional mode of dress.

"Whew, he's not very nice!" Michael whispered. "I expect you'll be glad to be quit of him."

Sarah opened her mouth...and then shut it, not sure what she wanted to say. Her glance went after Severus almost involuntarily.

"Sarah?" Michael said. Her face must have given something away, because he sounded troubled.

She blinked, trying to paste on a casual expression. "No, I suppose he's not very nice."

It took her an instant to realize her mistake in her choice of words--the same ones she had used to describe her boyfriend to Michael at Christmas--although she had only meant them to be an echo of his last comment. His eyebrows furrowed quizzically, and her own dismay, now unavoidably evident, made matters worse, triggering an exchange of unspoken reactions that erased all doubt. The youth's face went pale under his red hair.

"You.... Not him?" He sounded genuinely shocked. "A teacher?"

"Look," Sarah said. "I'll write to you. I can't give you my address just now."

"Are you staying with him?" Michael hissed low, in utter disbelief.

Severus was coming back now, pushing the trolley fast enough that it wobbled furiously.

"I'm very happy, Michael. I really am." Quickly and quietly, she pleaded, "Please don't think badly of me."

"Of course not." Michael gaped. "I'm just...."

The trolley thumped into the bench. Glaring, Severus loaded Sarah's trunk onto it.

"I do have to go now," Sarah said. "Good luck to you, Michael, in your interview."

"I hope we'll run into each other again." The comment earned him a nasty glance from Sarah's professor. "Take care of yourself, Sarah."

"Good-bye!" she called.

* * *

"No one would have ever believed your child was his. Not with such hair," Severus muttered under his breath, as he pushed the cart toward a way out.

Sarah thought about defending her erstwhile preparations, but it was too much effort. Nor did it matter anymore. Things had changed since she had devised those plans. Everything had changed.

When she did not respond, Severus added snidely, "Was that arranged?"

"What?"

"Your little tryst."

She stopped in her tracks.

"It was a chance meeting!" She was appalled at what he seemed to be suggesting. "I've never written to Michael from school. How could I? He's a Muggle."

Severus had halted, but now--as if to make up for that minor yielding--he stiffened coldly to his full height. "You will not contact him again."

It took Sarah a moment to recover her wits. How dare he! "You will not tell me who I can and can't associate with!"

"You cannot afford to associate," he twisted the word nastily, "with Muggles at present."

"I'm hardly going to introduce him to...to certain people."

Severus resumed pushing the cart, his expression disdainful.

"Michael is one of my oldest and dearest friends," Sarah went on, struggling to keep up with him. Then, when he gave no hint of a reaction, she added, "He even gave me my first kiss."

That did it. His mouth bent into a snarl and he hissed, "Are you deliberately trying to provoke me, Sarah?"

"Well, you're trying so hard to be provoked, it seemed a shame to disappoint you. What cause have you to be so jealous?"

He rounded on her. "What cause have I? When I find you speaking companionably with a boy of your own age, a boy in whom you have admitted a past interest? A boy far more suited to...."

"I would never...I'm married to you!" Sarah protested, glancing around nervously as she tried to keep her voice down. Their argument had garnered a few curious looks, but perhaps it wasn't unusual for Muggles to argue in public places: at least no one was paying particular attention.

"Even being married does not prevent some people from--"

"Are you trying to put me in the same class as Bellatrix?"

His red face blanched, and some of the anger drained out of his eyes. "Of course not. But nevertheless--"

"Let me tell you something," Sarah said earnestly. "Before I ever had a magical reason not to, I thought about that--about sleeping with someone else...even with him." She pointed vaguely in the direction in which Michael had departed. "And I couldn't. I couldn't bear the thought of being with anyone but you."

His expression of disbelief softened slightly; as if to cover that fact, he pushed the trolley forward sharply again. "I fail to comprehend why. Unless your mother's interventions were even more powerful than we've chosen to suppose."

The possibility made her heart lodge in her throat, but she stubbornly swallowed it away. "Can you simply not accept that I was yours--of my own free will--long before you ever thought to force me to be?"

Almost without realizing it, they had reached the way out. Severus brought the trolley to an abrupt stop and heaved her still-Lightened trunk onto the floor. He said nothing in reply, but his unwillingness to look at her said more about his regret over his behavior than he would ever have verbally admitted.

"I didn't want to quarrel with you today," Sarah murmured.

"Then we shall not do so any further," he said bluntly. "Give me your school robes."

She felt more than a little chagrin about shedding her outer clothes in public, revealing her whore costume--the waistline having been considerable altered by McGonagall--with the illusion belt hidden underneath. But the Muggles took little notice: a glare from Severus was enough to suggest to any passing bloke that his appreciative eyes had better wander elsewhere. Severus popped open her trunk just long enough to tuck her robes inside, then began dragging it along behind him towards the pavement outside. It suddenly occurred to her to wonder where he meant to go.

"How are we getting to Diagon Alley? I thought we were taking the Muggle Underground?" She glanced anxiously back into the station. The thought of walking across the city--even with him managing the trunk--made her feet and back hurt more than they already did.

Severus grimaced. "Professor Dumbledore thought another solution might be easier for you. He made...arrangements."

As they stepped out into the early evening light, a young woman unexpectedly approached them. Sarah would have sworn at first glance she was a Muggle--her pink hair and her emblazoned purple t-shirt were certainly less out-of-place here at the station than their robes.

"Wotcher, Snape," she said.