After a few seconds the door swung slowly inward, and he looked into the surprised features of the young woman he had first seen in the bookshop. Her eyes widened slightly as she stared up at him. “Can I help you?”

She had changed her shirt, he realized; now she wore an embellished velvet top of a mossy green that seemed to find an echo in her hazel eyes. Probably the garment was more what Muggles would expect of a psychic, although she’d retained the jeans and flat brown shoes. “I saw the sign in your window,” he began, and pointed toward the object in question. “Do I need an appointment?”

With a smile, she shook her head. “Not at this time of day. Most of my clients come to see me later in the evening. Would you like to come in, Mr. -- ”

“Snape,” he supplied immediately. It wasn’t that uncommon a name in this part of the world; he didn’t see the harm in giving it to her.

“Mr. Snape,” she repeated, then held out her hand. “I’m Celeste Jenkins. Do come in.”

He took the offered hand and shook it, noting that her fingers were bare of rings or polish. Then he stepped into a narrow hallway whose shining wooden floors were overlaid with an old Persian runner. The house smelled faintly of beeswax and something more aromatic. Incense, possibly.

“I do my readings in the back parlor,” she offered, and pointed down the hallway.

In silence Snape followed her through the corridor and on into a smallish room painted a warm terra-cotta color. Low shelves filled with books lined the walls, but the only other furniture was a small round table flanked by a pair of dark wood chairs with well-padded seats of deep green velvet. An embroidered piano scarf trailed down off the tabletop, and in the center of the scarf sat a small crystal ball on an elaborate brass stand that bore the twining shapes of oriental dragons.

Apparently noting the way his gaze paused on the crystal ball, she gave a small laugh and said, “I know it’s a cliché, but it does help me to focus my concentration. Would you please sit?" And she indicated the chair closest to him.

He sat, watching as she took the other seat. Her manner was calm, businesslike, matter-of-fact, quite unlike the air of faraway superiority that Sybill Trelawney and others of her ilk seemed to affect. “How long have you been doing this sort of thing, Miss Jenkins?” he asked.

“Celeste, please,” she replied. “I know it must sound silly, considering what I do for a living, but it really is my real name. The Sixties made an indelible impression on my parents apparently.” The pleasantly neutral expression she wore darkened slightly, but then she went on, “In answer to your question, about seven years.”

“That long? Forgive me, but you must have begun while you were still in school.”

“Just about,” she said. “Even then I knew I wouldn’t be able to do anything else. And after my parents died -- ” Then she broke off abruptly. “Forgive me. You certainly didn’t come here to hear about that sort of thing.”

But I did, Snape thought. Perhaps at that point he should have offered the sort of homily that most people produced in such situations, but he considered such niceties beneath him; he hadn’t known her parents, so why should he commiserate on her loss?

Celeste paused, as if she had expected him to make a comment, then shrugged, a brittle lift of the slender shoulders beneath the rich fabric of her shirt. Her tone sounded too deliberately casual as she said, “Well, that’s ancient history, anyway.” Then she leaned forward over the table, knotting her fingers on top of the embroidered scarf, and inquired, “May I take your hand for a moment? I find it helpful to get a sense of my clients before I do the reading.”

With the slightest of hesitations, Snape placed his hand on the tabletop as she had asked. Physical contact bothered him -- for too many years he’d seen it used as a weapon -- but of course he sensed no malice in the girl who watched him with eyes the deep brownish green of a forest pool.

She laid both her hands on his; they felt cool and soft, the bones light and fragile. For a second she closed her eyes, and then she took in a deep breath. Snape felt a stir of impatience; surely any moment she’d go off in the sort of sham trance he’d seen Sybill Trelawney put on a hundred times.

Instead, Celeste opened her eyes and looked straight at him, but Snape got the sense that she was actually seeing somehow through him. “You’re a teacher,” she said. “Even though you don’t like children very much.”

Well, he certainly couldn’t argue with that. He resisted the impulse to look down at himself, to see if there were some sort of betraying evidence in his dress that would have told her anything about his occupation. But that was ridiculous; if anything, he looked like someone who should have been working in a record shop or an art gallery, with his overlong hair and black clothing.

“Some might say that,” he replied cautiously, resolving not to give anything away.

His reward was a quick smile that revealed a small dimple at the left corner of her mouth. This Celeste was free with her smiles -- he’d give her that. Snape couldn’t remember the last time anyone, let alone a woman, had truly smiled at him.

But then her expression grew serious once more, and she frowned slightly, the long lashes dropping to veil her eyes as she appeared to concentrate. “You teach...chemistry?” The last word was uttered with a definite lift, as if she knew she hadn’t gotten it quite right.

“Close enough.” Of course he couldn’t possibly tell her the actual truth.

The half-dreamy flow of words continued: “North of here...a boarding school. I see a lake, and a...castle?”

Well, that was quite enough. Snape abruptly withdrew his hand from beneath hers, and she gave him a sudden startled look.

“Did I say something wrong?”

No, you were getting far too much right, he thought. He’d deliberately left his thoughts unshielded, since he hadn’t thought the use of Occlumency necessary here, but obviously he had underestimated her.

Apparently unruffled, she calmly folded her hands on the tabletop and gave him a clear-eyed look. “Perhaps you could tell me why you’ve come to see me, Mr. Snape.”

He thought, Because you’re something I can’t quite explain, but remained silent.

For a moment she continued to watch him, until he began to feel somewhat uncomfortable. He wasn’t used to such frank regard -- most of the staff at Hogwarts did their utter best to avoid him, and even very few of the students in his own house would have dared to look at him in such an unflinching manner. A sudden thought crossed his mind -- this woman had no idea who he was, how he was the object of so much hatred and distrust. Certainly she had never heard of Severus Snape, black bat of the Hogwarts dungeons. For some reason he found that realization appealing.

“I get clients for many reasons,” Celeste went on. “Most of the time it’s simple enough -- they want to know ‘does he love me’ or ‘is my wife cheating on me?’ Sometimes it’s heartbreaking, when I take a reading from people and know that the ailing loved one they’ve asked about isn’t going to live. And sometimes it’s wonderful.” Tilting her head to one side, she regarded him thoughtfully. “But somehow I get the feeling that you’re not here for any of those reasons, Mr. Snape.”

“No.” He paused, wondering exactly what he should tell her. Perhaps a small part of the truth -- but not all, no, of course not. “I saw you in the bookstore.”

Her eyebrows lifted at that. Again with that small smile tugging at the corner of her mouth, she asked, “Did you follow me all the way back here to ask me for a date, Mr. Snape?”

“Absolutely not!”

His outburst didn’t seem to bother her at all. Still with her mouth curving in the same half-amused smile, she remarked, “Well, I’m not quite sure whether to be offended or relieved.” Then her expression sobered, and she went on, “So you saw me in the bookstore. And that made you want a psychic reading?”

Flatly, he said, “I saw how you got that book down off the shelf.”

For a second she just sat there looking at him, her face blank and shuttered. Then she said, “Oh.”

“Exactly ‘oh.’ I must admit that the sight of a book sailing off the shelf on its own accord and landing in your hand did take me aback somewhat, Miss Jenkins.”

“So you came here to satisfy your curiosity that your eyes weren’t deceiving you, that I hadn’t put on some sort of cheap parlor trick?” Her tone still sounded level enough, but he could see the sudden narrowing of her eyes.

“Yes.”

“And have I satisfied your curiosity yet? Or would you like to play with a pack of cards for a bit? Two years ago I quite befuddled a researcher from Duke University when I called out forty-four of them in a row. After that he had to nip out across the street for a brandy.” She crossed her arms, then said, “I think you had better leave.”

Apologies did not come easily to him, but Snape knew that he had offended her and should say something to correct the situation. Unfortunately, he was completely unable to summon up the sort of soothing comment that Dumbledore might have been able to produce, or even a half-witty, half-teasing remark of the type that always seemed to work for Sirius Black back when that dodger was trying to charm half the girls at Hogwarts. Snape had very little experience dealing with women, especially Muggle women. Possibly the young woman who faced him now with the daggers in her gaze wasn’t exactly a Muggle, but he didn’t quite know how to think of her.

He said the first thing that came into his mind. “You fascinated me.”

That seemed to set her back a bit. For a few seconds she just stared at him, and then she slowly uncrossed her arms, one hand reaching out with an almost unconscious gesture to touch the smooth surface of the crystal ball that stood in the center of the table. Then she said slowly, “This isn’t a game, Mr. Snape. I do all this -- ” She gestured at the crystal, then seemingly toward the room in general -- “to help people. If you don’t need my help, then I’m afraid we have very little to say to one another.”

“But I do.” The words were out of his mouth almost before he knew he was going to say them.

Celeste’s expression was still guarded. “For what? Are you writing a paper on psychic phenomena to amuse yourself over the summer holidays?”

“Let me just say that this has been a period when I possibly could have used some...guidance.” That was nothing more than the simple truth. Certainly the future had never seemed so cloudy as it did now, what with Voldemort risen and dark disturbances rocking the wizarding world. The scar on his forearm had given over to aching almost constantly, and the suspicion he encountered from almost everyone who knew of his past didn’t help any. He hadn’t bothered with trying to explain his actions, or attempting to convince those whose minds were plainly made up that perhaps their suspicions were unjustified. He knew it would be a waste of time.

“All right, then.” Something in her posture seemed to subtly alter, and this time she reached toward the crystal ball with both hands. “Let’s see what we can do about that.”

The second her hands wrapped around the subtly gleaming sphere her body seemed to go rigid, and she shut her eyes. This time Snape let his mind go blank, entering that strange mental state of the Occlumens, where he could sense everything that was going on around him but would let himself form no opinion or thought regarding what he observed. Whatever else she might be, this Celeste Jenkins had strong psychic talents, and he knew he could not allow her to take protected information from his mind.

“There is a...darkness,” she said, and her voice sounded subtly different, some of the northern lilt smoothed away. “Not the sort that can be seen, but it swirls around you, follows you, obscures your way.” A sudden spasm seemed to rock her, and Snape saw her fingers clench on the gleaming surface of the crystal ball, her knuckles showing white. “The man who walks in two worlds, Severus Snape, soon finds he cannot live in either.”

Her words made him sit upright and fasten a burning glare on her pale features. Severus Snape? He had never given her his first name during their introductions. As for the rest -- well, he knew the risks he was taking.

“Go on,” Snape said, after a pause. Since he’d launched her on this ridiculous venture, best to hear everything she had to say.

“The Tower is thrown down, and knowledge laid to waste.” Celeste took a gasping, hitching breath; it sounded as if some enormous pressure were being exerted against her lungs and throat. “In the seventh month he came, and on the hallowed night -- the hallowed night -- ” Her eyes flew open abruptly, and Snape could see a rim of terrified white showing all around her irises. “The power the Dark Lord knows not -- ”

At those words Snape leaned forward suddenly, his own breath strangling in his throat. How was it possible? How could this Muggle woman know that phrase from the prophecy Sybill Trelawney had uttered regarding Harry Potter and Lord Voldemort? He stared at Celeste in consternation, at her bloodless face and staring eyes. Still that convulsive breathing wracked her slender body, and he wondered suddenly whether he should shake her out of this trance, keep it from going any further --

She let out a despairing cry, and clapped one hand to her forehead. Perhaps he was going mad -- perhaps he was merely seeing things -- but for the space of half a breath Snape could have sworn he saw the jagged outline of a lightning-shaped scar raise itself up against the smooth skin of her forehead. Then she sagged forward, her body going limp and lifeless. She would have fallen to the floor if he hadn’t thrust himself out of his seat, the chair flying backward with the violence of his movement as he hastened to catch her, feeling her as dead weight in his arms just a second before she would have crumpled to the faded rug.

Holding her with one arm, he raised the other hand to feel for the pulse in her throat. There -- she lived, but her heart pounded as if she had just run a marathon, and her skin felt clammy and cold. With care he slid his other arm under her and lifted her. There was no place in this small room to lay her down, but he thought he had spotted a larger sitting room as they had come down the hallway earlier.

His memory served him correctly; just two doors down he found a good-sized chamber that obviously served as her main living room. Here was all the paraphernalia of a normal Muggle existence: television set, stereo, computer sitting on the small desk placed up against the far wall. But there was also an old overstuffed couch, and he laid her down there, watching with some concern as her head lolled limply against a shabby needlepoint pillow.

If he had been back at Hogwarts, he could have quickly mixed her a revivifying potion, but he doubted she would have a tenth of the ingredients he needed on hand, so instead he pushed a stack of magazines to one side, sat down on the coffee table that fronted the couch, and stared at her in some consternation. Yes, she breathed, but she seemed to be in shock. Looking around, he noticed a knitted throw draped over the back of a wing chair and went to fetch it, then spread it carefully over her inert form.

Once he was done with that, he had nothing left to do but watch her and wrestle with the wild thoughts that came and went in his mind. How could she have possibly known any of that? To repeat a phrase from the prophecy nearly word for word? To know of the Dark Lord -- to know that that wretched Potter boy had been born in July and vanquished Voldemort on Halloween? For Snape was sure that was what Celeste had meant by the term “hallowed night.”

Who are you? he thought. How could someone with your powers have hidden in the Muggle world for so long? If what he had just seen were any indication, she would have made a far better Divination professor than Sybill Trelawney ever had.

What made Snape even more uncomfortable was the fact that somehow he could still feel the weight of her in his arms, the way her long unbound hair had brushed against his hands as he laid her down on the couch. Something that had lain dormant for too many years seemed to suddenly stir inside him, and he scowled, digging his fingers into the flesh of his thighs as he stared at the unconscious woman. It was easy to ignore women when there were no interesting ones around, but --

But nothing, he rebuked himself. How could he possibly let himself be distracted by whatever questionable charms this Muggle girl might possess, when it was her abilities that were the real issue?

He hated to admit it, but he was out of his depth here. This was a matter he needed to discuss with Albus Dumbledore. Surely the Headmaster would know if there were any precedent for a being such as Celeste Jenkins.

She stirred then, opening her eyes slowly and gazing at Snape in some confusion. “What happened?” Her voice sounded raw, as if she had spent all afternoon shouting at a Quidditch match.

“You fainted,” he said shortly.

“I did?” Frowning a little, she lifted a visibly shaking hand to her forehead, to the exact spot where the mirror of Harry Potter’s scar had appeared. Of course there was nothing to be seen or felt there now -- the skin was as smooth and unblemished as ever.

“Does this happen often?” Snape asked, making sure his tone remained cold and clinical.

“No -- never,” she replied, after a faint pause. “At least, not for a long time. I think once, when I was eleven -- " A faint head shake, and then she said ruefully, “I hope I didn’t frighten you too much, Mr. Snape.”

“Hardly,” he said. “But I think I should go -- now that I see you’re all right.”

For a moment she remained silent, a small frown puckering her forehead. “I’m getting bits and pieces -- a Tower...something about Halloween....”

Snape froze. He had hoped that her fainting spell or whatever fit had overtaken her would have served to wipe away her memory of what had just transpired. But apparently some of it was beginning to come back to her. That could be a problem -- for her and for the wizarding world in general. For if Celeste Jenkins ever spoke to anyone of what she had seen -- if word got out to the wrong people --

Although it was not easy to carry a wand in Muggle street clothing, Snape managed it by having a hidden pocket built into the outer seam of his left pant leg. Using the pretense of bending over to brush at a piece of nonexistent grime on his shoe, he leaned down and retrieved the wand. He knew what he had to do.

But as he straightened and looked down at the pale oval of her face, the dark crescents her lashes made against her cheeks as she shut her eyes once more, something made him wish that he didn’t have to do this. Somehow he didn’t want to remove every trace of his existence from her mind. Perhaps he could simply erase the memories of what had come after she laid her hands on the crystal ball and conjured up those frightening images of destruction and despair.

She was looking up at him now, her wide eyes almost the same mossy green as the velvet top she wore. “Mr. Snape -- is something the matter? Did I say something to upset you?”

“No,” he replied. “Just rest, and I’ll let myself out.” And that will be the end of it, he thought. I’ll go back to Hogwarts, and no doubt Dumbledore will tell me I’ve been making dragons out of Blast-Ended Skrewts. That inner voice sounded far more convinced than Snape knew he actually was; he couldn’t hazard to think what Dumbledore would make of all this.


For now, he had only one thing left to do. Perhaps this task was something that should have been handed over to the Ministry of Magic, but these days Snape wouldn’t trust any of them to black his boots.

So he looked down at Celeste Jenkins’ puzzled, pretty face, raised his wand, and said softly, “Obliviate!”