A/N: Snape is a bit out of character again. Sorry.

Chapter 9: The Silence Is Broken...Sort Of

It was an odd feeling, bubbling up inside of him even though his face was as stern and bitter as always. Still, when he encountered that insufferable James Potter’s even-worse son Harry in the corridor on the way over to Geillis’ rooms, he only took ten points away from Gryffindor, as opposed to his usual twenty or thirty.

He didn’t even know why he felt this way. It was too soon; he had told himself over and over that he wasn’t attracted to Geillis. But somehow, on this day, he was unable to hide it from himself any longer. When he had asked if he might accompany her to the banquet and she had said yes, he had had to mentally force himself not to attempt to turn a cartwheel. He hadn’t realized that it would mean this much to him.

You’re being an idiot, he told himself.

He was amazed at how much he didn’t care.

Inside one of the many pockets in his robe, he carried a small box containing her Christmas present. He hoped that she would like it.

It was an odd feeling, all right, and if anybody knew, save for her (and perhaps Dumbledore), they would probably commit him to the nearest mental institution, and all the better if it were a Muggle one.

The feeling was so totally alien to him that he had almost forgotten the word, but for the first time in many years, Severus Snape was actually happy.

***

“Cope sent a message frae Dunbar
Sayin’ Charlie meet me, an’ ye daur,
An’ I’ll learn ye the art of war
If ye’ll meet me in the mornin’.”

Geillis sat in her sitting room, ostensibly looking at an old Scottish song in the book that Dumbledore had given her. In truth, she was pondering her recent conversation with the old wizard. He had certainly shed some light on the subject of her friend, though she was not entirely sure that she wanted to know what Dumbledore had insisted she ask Severus about. It sounded bad; it sounded very bad indeed.

Especially as he had felt it necessary to tell her that in spite of it, he trusted Severus; the implication was that she should, too.

Well, why would she not? True, they hadn’t gotten along very well in her first month or so at Hogwarts, but that had changed. They were friends now, or at least something close to it. She had trusted him with her life after the explosion, and he had not let her down.

And then, there was what Dumbledore had said at the end of their interview. That bit about her “understanding” with Severus, and then that remark about cats—perhaps The Headmaster had meant nothing by it. However, he rarely—if ever—said anything that he did not mean, or at least intend to have a meaning. Not when he took that conciliatory tone of voice, at least.

The problem was that she had not been totally honest with Dumbledore, and she suspected that he knew it. She did in fact have some fairly confusing feelings for her most unlikely friend, but damned if she would ever admit it—yet, anyway. Besides, what manner of woman would fall in love with another man less than three years after her husband’s death? Nathan had been her love, her life, her best of friends. When he had died, she had wished that she could, too.

The point was, Geillis was beginning to get nervous. She knew that any moment now he would be arriving, and they would go to the banquet together. And then what?

She had no time to answer her own nervous question, for there was a knock on her harp-door. She cast her divination spell again, coloured slightly, and said, “Come in.” She rose, went to the door, and greeted the person on the other side.

As the door slid open to reveal a slightly smiling Severus Snape, all traces of nervousness left her. Happy Christmas,” he said, and she gave him a short, somewhat friendly hug. He hesitated for a moment, and then his arms came up around her as well.

This knocked her slightly off-balance as she hadn't expected any reaction, but she managed to hide it fairly well. "Happy Christmas, Severus,” she smiled. “However, a smiling Snape is a scary sight, to say the least—it usually means that somebody’s in trouble, or at least about to be. What in the world can you be so happy about?” she teased him.

"Ah...why don’t we talk about that later?” he asked. “If we don’t leave now, we’ll probably be late.”

“Right as usual,” she said wryly. “Shall we go, then?”

He made no reply, but offered an arm to her, and she slipped hers around it. They made their way to the Great Hall in relative silence, drawing stares from all who passed. He’s acting very oddly tonight, she thought. His actions were normally somewhat out of character where she was concerned, but then, he didn't normally tend to give the impression of a man who cared for a great deal but strangely-coloured liquids in glass bottles. The very fact that he had pursued a friendship with her was strange enough in itself.

When they reached the table, he politely pulled out her usual chair for her, and she smiled and thanked him as she sat down. Their eyes met, and a strange feeling of happiness washed over her. She decided not to worry anymore tonight, and just enjoy herself. There would be plenty of time for worry in the morning.

***

Albus Dumbledore watched the two with an approving twinkle in his eyes. “Oh, do stop it, Albus,” said Minerva McGonagall, irritably. “I’m sure there’s a perfectly rational explanation for this.”

Dumbledore only smiled.

"And don't give me that cryptic smile, either!" she said, exasperated.

***

Codanna skulked in the halls of Hogwarts, watching for her foe. There had to be some proof of weakness in Sashara’s movements, damn it! Unfortunately, Codanna could not see any. The password to Sashara’s chambers was changed a minimum of once daily, and often it was even changed twice. She always did a thorough check of her classroom every day, and of course Codanna could not simply use the killing curse.

Just as she was about to give up on her search for useful information, she heard a man’s footsteps in the corridor. An ugly man dressed in black, with longish, greasy black hair, walked past her in the direction of the whore’s rooms. A few minutes later, he walked by again, with Sashara herself on his arm. Codanna sneered. Sashara’s taste in men had clearly deteriorated. But then, it had been nearly three years—and who could possibly compare with Nathan Bonosares?

How, having had Bonosares, could Sashara ever settle for somebody else? Codanna’s main motive for killing her own beloved had been to make Sashara pay. But though it had been only a couple of years, it didn’t look as though she was paying very much at all.

Damn it, she had to think! She shimmered into the familiar form of the large raven, and flew back to Malfoy Manor. Lucius was expecting her, anyway.

***

After the banquet, Severus and Geillis wandered back to her rooms; he had never really been much for the overdone gaiety of a Hogwarts Christmas banquet, so they had excused themselves early. Besides, Snape had not yet given her his gift, and she had forgotten her gift to him in her rooms. Being as stubborn as she was, she would not accept his gift until she was able to give him hers.

The sat comfortably on her couch, and Snape unwrapped Geillis’ present first. He smiled. “How did you know that I needed a new cauldron?” he asked, surprised. One of Neville Longbottom's recent disasters had not only destroyed his own cauldron, but Snape's as well. Severus was still trying to figure out how he'd managed it.

Her smile was full of mischief. “A little bird told me.”

He pretended to ignore that. Ha. More likely it was a cat named Minerva.

But Geillis was speaking again. “Look inside,” she told him.

He did, and lifted out a long black Winter cloak. He was amazed; it had obviously been handmade, and very well at that. “Did you do this?” he asked.

“Yes,” she replied.

“How on Earth did you ever find the time?”

“Oh, you know. A little bit of time here, a little there—it all adds up after awhile.”

“He quietly handed her the small box he had been carrying all evening, so close to his heart. She opened it.

Inside lay a beautiful silver pendant with an amethyst rose set in the centre. She gave him a glowing smile. “Severus, it’s beautiful,” she said. “Thank you.”

“Put it on,” he urged her.

“Will you, please?” she asked, unsure why it was so important to her.

Wordlessly, he took the pendant from her hand and unclasped the delicate silver chain. He gently eased her hair away from her neck so that it would not get caught in the clasp. If he leaned forward just a little, their lips would be touching. He briefly contemplated it, but shrank away from the thought. When the chain was fastened, he let his hands drop gently to his sides, though his right hand lingered on her cheek for a second. Her cheeks turned slightly pinker.

“Thank you,” she said, unable to say anything else.

A long moment passed as they gazed into each other’s eyes. They both wondered, long after, if things might have been different over the next few months had they not lingered in the moment for so long. But when it was over, Severus knew he had to tell her something that had been unsaid for far too long. He took her hands in his own and held them astonishingly tightly.

“Geillis, there is something very particular which I would like to tell you.”

“What is it, Severus?” Her silvery eyes were full of questions.

His heart constricted as he took a deep breath. “Geillis, you know that I have not led the best of lives. I’ve made mistakes, and I’m still paying for most of them.” He let go of one of her hands and pushed up his left sleeve, where the Dark Mark lay inscribed in his flesh. It wasn’t clear—it hadn’t been in years—but it was there, indelible. “Especially this one.”

She gasped. Her head was reeling. He was a Death Eater! Merlin’s beard! What was she doing?

Remember that I trust him.

Dumbledore trusted him. But was it at his peril, and that of Hogwarts itself?

She could not speak. She could not trust herself to. Snape saw this and continued.

“I was very young and foolish, Geillis. And though I was an excellent student, if I do say so myself, I was nearly powerless against my fellow students; they loved to play pranks on me, particularly a foursome known as the Marauders—they were Peter Pettigrew, Remus Lupin, Sirius Black, and James Potter.”

“I remember them.” She didn’t think that this would be the best time to tell him that she and Lupin had been something at least resembling friends.

Snape grimaced. “Well, one of these pranks nearly ended in my death, and I have never been able to forgive them for it. Then one day, the Dark Lord came to me and offered me power and the chance for revenge. I leapt at the chance, as he almost certainly knew I would. I do not care to think of the atrocities which I committed in the years after; one day, I simply became sick of the killing, the torture, and the mutilation which were part of being in the Dark Lord’s service.” He sighed. “They still haunt me in my worst of nightmares. Many times I have had to take a Dreamless Sleep potion simply to be able to rest through the night. Eventually, I turned back to the Light. Dumbledore was the only one who trusted me after all that I had done. He gave me a job teaching Potions here, and I spied on the Dark Lord for him. I was never caught at it,” he said with pride. Then, he grew sombre once again. “But I was not able to prevent the Potters’ deaths. Now I’m stuck with this bloody life-debt which I owe to James, who I couldn’t stand, an irremovable mark on my left arm, and a million regrets which cut into me at almost every moment of my life.”

Geillis was still silent.

He looked at her, his dark eyes pleading. “Geillis, please tell me that you can forgive me for this. Please tell me that you still trust me, knowing this.”

Her voice trembled as she finally spoke. “I think that the Headmaster knew that you were going to tell me this today, Severus. He told me to remember that he trusts you.” She drew a deep breath. “But I think that even if he hadn’t told me this, I would still trust you. I cannot forgive you; it is not me who you have wronged. That power is denied me, though I wish for all the world that I had it. But at least I can tell you that I still trust you.”

Severus looked at her, relieved. “Thank you,” he whispered. “This is a cliché, but you can never know how much this means to me.”

She looked straight into his eyes. He had the strange feeling that she was reading his soul. But that was ridiculous—although it was possible, he had put up so many wards against this sort of thing that it was damn’ near impossible to break through them. He was a master of occlumency, for Merlin’s sake—that was how he had survived so many Death Eater gatherings after he’d turned!

And then, he remembered. Trust could break through all the wards which he had set up; he had wanted Dumbledore to be able to read him, even when others could not. He trusted the Headmaster.

He also trusted Geillis.

He looked her straight in the eye again, forcing his voice not to tremble as he spoke. “Geillis—there is something else I would like to tell you,” he said. His hands tightened around hers, and he leaned slightly forward.

“Severus?”

He took a deep breath, trying to steady himself. Once he was finally certain that his voice would not tremble, he spoke. “This isn’t going to be easy for me. Telling you that I was once a Death Eater was easier. However, I cannot keep silent any longer. Geillis, I—”

KNOCK! KNOCK! KNOCK!

Both of them started at the noise. Severus swore. “Who would go around pounding on doors at this time of night?” he grumbled.

Geillis sang her divination spell. “It’s Argus Filch,” she said. “It sounds important.”

KNOCK! KNOCK! KNOCK!

She sighed. “I guess I’d better answer it before he damages that harp for good.” She knew that whatever Severus had been about to say would not be said now. The mood, interrupted so, had been shattered beyond repair. “Come in, Argus,” she said as she stepped into her office.

“I need to see Professor Snape right now,” he said.

There was no point in asking how Filch knew that Snape was there. His cat, Mrs Norris, told him absolutely everything. “He’s in my sitting room,” she told him. “Just wait a sec—I’ll get him.”

“That won’t be necessary, Geillis,” said Snape, now wearing his customary sneer. “What is it, Filch? And it had better be important.”

“There’s someone in the restricted section of the library. They may be looking for some information about…it. Thought I should tell you. Hope I wasn’t interrupting anything,” he leered.

“That’s enough,” Severus snapped. He turned to Geillis. “I’m sorry. I have to go. Can we talk about this in the morning?”

“I guess we’ll have to.” She sighed again. “Go. I’ll see you at breakfast.”

***

A/N: Once again, I’m sorry that Snape went out of character again (actually, it’s even beginning to get on my nerves), though I hope I managed to get him almost back to normal at the end of the chapter.

Anyway, part of the chapter title is the name of a song by Damn Yankees. (Oops, that didn’t come out quite the way I had planned. Oh, well.)

I don’t know why, but I figure that Snape is the type to have a lot of pockets in his robes, even if he doesn’t actually use most of them. You know, just in case he needs them for Potions ingredients or something.

The song that Geillis is looking at the first time we see her in this chapter is called “Johnny Cope”. It was written by a Scottish farmer in honour of the Scottish victory at the Battle of Prestonpans. It’s one of my favourite songs, and I’ve actually written a parody of it. It's not too bad, I guess, so I think I may post it on Lumos (it's about Lockhart).

The pendant is set with an amethyst rose mostly because I wanted Snape to give Geillis something pretty, but also something that was unusual.

About Geillis being friends with Lupin—yes, I realize that this could be a form of Mary Sue, but I rather figured that both Geillis and Lupin would be the sort to spend a lot of time in libraries, so it wouldn’t be too surprising if they happened to meet during a study session or something. In my experience, bookworms tend to get along quite well. (I am not without experience with this sort of thing, being a bookworm myself. Some of my best school-related friendships have begun in libraries.)

I’m not entirely sure from what I’ve read in the books whether the Dark Mark would still be visible at this time, so I decided to work on the assumption that it could still be visible, even if it isn’t all that clear. Since it was such a well-known and feared symbol during Voldemort’s reign of terror, I figured that Geillis would be able to recognize it even just from a hint.

Geillis isn’t really reading Snape’s soul, by the way. I want it to be perfectly clear that although I wrote that “Incident With Peeves” and although I gave Geillis an absolutely ridiculous “original” name, I have done what I could to avoid the idiocy of Mary Sue. Therefore, she has little skill with occlumency or legilimency, though she can recognize them when she sees them. My explanation for that line is--well, have you ever looked right into someone else’s eyes and felt as if they could read everything about you in your own? I certainly have, and that’s the feeling that I wanted to convey in this scene.



Finally, I know that Geillis is being a bit dense in regards to what Snape was probably going to say, especially given that moment when he was putting the pendant around her neck. However, this is for a particular reason. She’s a widow, and though it’s been quite some time since her husband died, she still misses him terribly. Even though she’s attracted to Snape, she doesn’t want to admit it, even to herself; at this stage, she sees it as a form of disloyalty to Nathan. Notice that after all this time, she still dresses almost exclusively in black; before she was widowed, most of her clothes were blue, green, purple, grey or reddish-brown, though she did have a rather cheerful yellow sweater of which she was quite fond. Clearly she has to work through a few things in regards to her husband’s death before she can be completely honest with herself again.



Oh, and sorry about the “Severus snapped”. That’s the sort of bad pun to which I am far too prone.