Chapter 23
The moment Lucius was gone, Severus smiled, cut his finger, and drew a small diamond-shaped pattern on his palm.
"I thought that would be harder," he said, licking the blood from his fingertip. He glanced at Nagini, whose head was resting in his lap, eyes drifting closed. "Thank you. I doubt I could have pulled it off without you." She muttered something. "I honestly did not catch that, but no matter."
August 29, 1976.
Without Severus quite noticing, the time to return to Hogwarts had crept close. Diagon Alley was filling up: parents and children hunting for school supplies, shops that had been dark for weeks opening one by one. The beginning of term was a more significant celebration for shopkeepers than it ever would be for students, and the street knew it.
Severus was not staying home either. He was genuinely looking forward to returning to Hogwarts, finally ready to hunt the basilisk. Like everyone else, he was walking the crowded, winding street with Nagini tucked under his shirt, shrunk down to a size that would not turn heads. Shop windows glittered. Signs seemed to catch the light in ways that were probably intentional. The vendors' faces were cheerful, and the whole stretch had the quality of a painted backdrop, as though the war had simply agreed not to exist here, at least for today. Compared to a month ago, Diagon Alley felt alive again, temporarily and somewhat artificially, but alive, and the people moving through it seemed genuinely glad to have the feeling.
"There." Nagini poked her tail in the direction of a small studio.
"I see it. You have been going on about this for days." Severus headed toward it, glancing sideways as he passed a pair of wizards in dark formal suits scanning the street with the particular focus of people who are trying not to look like they are scanning. "That is the fifth patrol. Trying to show that nobody is afraid of any Dark Lord, that everything is under control. What a waste. They could at least dress the Aurors in ordinary clothes."
The moment he stepped into the studio, a short woman in purple came briskly toward him.
"Welcome! I would be delighted to help you choose a robe. Let me take your measurements."
"Thank you. I also need two pairs of dark trousers and two shirts."
"Trousers?" She blinked. "Students do not usually ask for trousers."
"You do not carry them?"
"No, no, we certainly do. I was only surprised. Forgive me, I am talking too much." A tape measure flew off the table and began moving around his waist. A sheet of paper and a quill drifted toward her hand. "Let us get started."
Half an hour later, Severus left with new clothes and a second order placed that would be ready the following afternoon.
After that: the shoe shop, where he bought high boots with metal inserts and a pair of light shoes. Then the Magical Menagerie, where he finally got around to buying a postal owl he had been meaning to purchase for weeks. There had been no particular urgency before: Lucius sent his own owl, as did the Macmillans, and Severus simply replied using theirs.
Then the bookshop for his sixth-year textbooks. Eileen's old ones were still sitting in the wardrobe, but they were badly out of date.
Closer to two in the afternoon he stopped at the last ingredient shop on his list and left roughly fifteen hundred Galleons lighter.
"Were there goblins somewhere in your family tree?" Nagini asked, in a tone so thoughtful it nearly made him trip.
"Who knows with the Prince line. Possibly. Why?"
"Your relationship with gold is a little frightening. You already have nearly twenty thousand Galleons in that bag, and you are planning to sell Malfoy his next lot of potion for six times what it cost you to make."
"What can I do? He comes back himself, willingly. I am not making him buy anything, and I did not name the price first." Severus shrugged, and Nagini slid back under his shirt. "And do you really think he is buying them for himself? I would think about which of us is actually the goblin here. He is absolutely selling them on at ten times what he pays me."
"Both of you, then."
"Hard to argue." He paused as warmth spread across one of the diamonds etched in his palm. "Stay under there. Whatever happens next, do not come out."
"What?"
Thin arms shot out of a dark alley and pulled him in hard.
"Did you think you could hide from me by changing your face?!" Bella had him against the wall, one hand pinning him there, her wand in the other with the tip pressed a millimetre from his throat.
"Bella. I have missed you. Particularly those lips."
"Shut up." She jabbed the wand harder. "Say another word and—"
"The strawberry flavour was especially memorable." He held her gaze, expression completely calm. "Though if you would rather not discuss it, I will stop. But I would not say no to a reminder. Interested?"
"In the next world. Avada—"
"I would not. Voldemort would be disappointed to hear I had died."
A pause. The certainty in her face shifted by a degree, not much, but enough.
"What are you talking about? Why would our master care about the death of some pathetic half-breed?" She watched the smile on his face and the certainty eroded a little more. "Answer me."
"I do not particularly want to."
"Answer!" The wand pressed harder. The confidence behind it was no longer quite what it had been.
"No."
"Then I kill you."
"Kill me, and let us see how you explain it to him afterward."
"YOU—" Her hand was shaking. "What do you want?!"
"You already know," Severus said. He looked into her black eyes, raised his hand, and touched her chin.
The struggle on her face was almost enjoyable. Through the mark he could feel that particular current in her: the homicidal intent, enormous and very real, held back by the single thought that killing him might ruin her master's plans.
"It is only a kiss. I am not asking for anything more." He raised his other hand, pushed her wand gently to the side, and pressed his lips to hers. This time he held back and did not use his tongue. He did not feel like being bitten again. "You could try to look slightly less like a statue." He sighed, let her go with a faint note of disappointment, and turned away. The vial of potion he tossed over his shoulder into the alley. He walked toward the street. "Last time was considerably more interesting. This was like kissing a very angry doll."
Bella stood exactly where he had left her, staring at his retreating back. She recognised the potion the moment she heard it hit the ground, which was precisely why she had not moved.
And what was that expression on my face? she thought, her fingers drifting toward her lips before she caught them.
"If you want to increase the quantity Malfoy usually buys from me," Severus called from the mouth of the alley, "I want you to come and collect them yourself. With payment, naturally. And a small bonus."
His laughter reached her long after he had gone.
"You absolute bastard." She grabbed the vial and threw it against the wall with everything she had. It shattered. "One day. I swear. I WILL KILL YOU."
Severus walked home. Everything he needed was bought. All that remained was to wait for the first of September.
"What was all that?" Nagini's voice was flat, with something underneath it she was not quite managing to hide.
"Cat and mouse," Severus said, and scratched her head as she slid out from under his shirt. "Do not give it another thought. You are the only one who matters, and nobody could replace you. Besides." He added a wink. "We need to think about the family line."
"Pfft. Get a grip. I am a snake."
"That is a temporary problem. I am already working on a potion that should help you control your animal side."
Nagini went silent.
"Thank you," she said finally, in a voice she was trying to make smaller than it was. She turned her head away.
"Why are you crying?"
"I am not crying. I got something in my eye."
"Then why is my shirt wet?"
"Don't. I will bite you."
"All right. Changing the subject: will you come to Hogwarts with me?"
She lifted her head.
"What if they notice?"
"We tell the truth. I am trying to develop a potion to restore your human form, and in the meantime you are my pet. Hogwarts allows pets."
"Then I will come. I do not want to be alone again."
"Good."
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