Sub Rosa

Chapter 24 – La Rue de la Magi

Severus stared at Kathryn, trying to figure out exactly where the manipulation lay. Her perfectly innocent request to the Headmaster that two of them take a Fieldtrip to New Orleans with some of the students to help out the Interhouse Unity project was obviously a mask for something else, bu’d b’d be damned if he knew what it was.

“New Orleans?” He repeated, feeling somewhat foolish. He at least managed to snarl when he said it, so that the attendant students were hopefully unaware of his mixed feelings. The group consisted of Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, Minuet Ravagienne, another Slytherin girl named Fauna Broomworthy, two Ravenclaws, Regina Flock and Sara Goldblum and two Hufflepuffs, Trevor True and Gentile Frakes. They were huddled together staring at him in horror, well except the the Slytherins, who stood to one side looking bored.

“Professor Snape, this item in our scavenger hunt is clearly only available in New Orleans.” Miss Granger was looking up at him in trepidation, her parchment clutched in her hand, her lip being chewed almost to bleeding.

“While it must have been an error on someone’s part, it’s too late to change it now. Besides, I think the trip could be most instructive.” Kathryn nodded, looking resigned to the trip, as if she was making the best of a bad situation.

She was in her most prim and proper teacher’s persona and, if he hadn’t had a very clear memory of her screaming his name only a few hours before and looking anything but prim and proper, he would have been completely taken in by her act. In fact, she had looked like a Houri beneath him and he had to shake himself free of the image before he could speak.

“If the Headmaster insists.” He said, using his most snarky tone of voice, the one that indicated he would endure the tortures of hell if must be.

“The Headmaster does.” Albus had that little knowing look that always drove Severus up the wall. He was watching Kathryn with an expression of amusement and approval and Severus wasn’t sure why, but he was feeling quite apprehensive. Later, he would blame his acquiescence on his earlier distraction.

Hermione smiled and followed the rest of the group out the door.

“New Orleans is chilly in October, but not as cold as here, we will be in Muggle areas so dress appropriately and be at the Apparation point no later than seven o’clock!” Kathryn called after them and a little chorus of assents drifted back up to them.

“I hope you will give my best regards to your Grandmother, Kathryn.” Albus leaned back in his chair, eyebrow raised.

“I am not planning on seeing her, but should we happen to bump into her, I will of course convey your salutations.” She had that slightly puzzled look that covered a multitude of devious thoughts. He had the urge to kiss her, but restrained himself. She was so twisty at times that he wondered if her ancestry intersected with Tom Riddle’s somewhere in the past.

“What are you up to Kathryn?” He turned her to face him and she smiled up at him with an expression of wry amusement.

“You have gotten to know me surprisingly well, Severus.” She touched his cheek in an affectionate gesture that stilled him. Her voice was a little husky and he was instantly distracted by other thoughts. Perhaps that’s why it took him an hour or so to realize that she hadn’t answered his question.

New Orleans was gray and rainy, filled with color and sound and lots of ironwork, Severus thought. It was a pretty town with broad avenues and an old world elegance that he admired. Kathryn moved through the people with ease, even hindered by the cane. She walked the streets with an easy familiarity, heading across a broad square towards a large storefront with clapboard siding and delicate swirling arches of iron that crawled around the whole building creating two stories of porches.

It had no sign above it, but in the window curious figures and bundles of herbs hung in great profusion. The children, dressed in school uniforms, but without the robes, in muggle mufti, as it were, followed like obedient ducklings after them. Severus opened the door of the shop for Kathryn and waved them in. Potions ingredients of great interest to him were mixed in with absolute rubbish with no rhyme or reason. He raised an eyebrow at Kathryn and she grinned at him.

“Miss Kathryn!” came a screech from the darkest depths of the shop and a tall, ancient woman burst from the shadows and ran at Kathryn.

She was as dark as night with hair gone steel gray and white teeth that seemed to glow. She was dressed in scraps and rags, at least four skirts and two blouses and scarves galore, she reminded him strongly of Dobby, but with less taste. The colors clashed horribly and if it hadn’t been for the bright smile on Kathryn’s face as the woman hugged her he would have given her one of his patented sneers.

“Madame Roxanne.” Kathryn replied, all gentile and lady-like, with a slight drawl to her voice that wasn’t there ten minutes ago. She hugged the old lady again and then turned to Severus and the kids. “I would like to introduce you to Severus Snape, an English Potions Master, and some of our students.” Madame Roxanne eyed him up and down and snorted.

“Potions Master, eh?” Her voice was dubious and Severus was tempted to lash her with his tongue, but Kathryn shot him a look over the old lady’s head and he shut his mouth on a sharp retort. Instead he whipped out the parchment he had written up before coming and handed it to the old woman.

“This is a list of some of the ingredients I require. I hope your store is well stocked.” He let his eyes drift disdainfully over some of the more lurid items and sniffed. Her eyes flashed at his challenge and she frowned at him.

“This is tourist stuff, the real stock is in the back.” She gave him the evil eye and then glared at the kids who were giggling over an Ouiji board. “What is safe for tourists to play at can be cursed for you to touch.” She snapped at them and they withdrew their hands watching her with a touch of fear.

The old woman cast a benevolent smile at Kathryn and then vanished into the back room.

“I apologize for Madame, she doesn’t like strangers.” Kathryn smiled at him and he nodded.

“She has a good act there, I am sure she has the locals quite petrified.” Severus was in the mood to be generous, but he had an audience of watching students to consider, so he made sure to look unpleasant and snarky.

“Kathryn?” A masculine voice questioned from the street entrance to the shop.

“Gabriel!” Kathryn flung herself into the arms of a stunningly handsome man with dark hair and eyes. Her voice was surprised and happy and he embraced her with long familiarity. Severus felt something stab him in the heart and he cursed himself soundly. Here was a Prince Charming fit for Kathryn, not the Beast that he was. “I didn’t expect you to be here! Are you visiting Grand-mére’s house?”

“Actually most of us are home for All Hollow’s, Its Cassandra’s tenth year.” The man had a smooth voice with the drawl more exaggerated than Kathryn’s.

“Severus, may I introduce you to Gabriel Leblanc, my youngest brother.” His heart filled at her words and he was hard pressed not to smile openly at the man. “Gabriel, this is Severus Snape, he’s the Potion’s Master at Hogwarts.” Gabriel smiled at him and shook his hand firmly.

“A pleasure, Professor Snape, Kathryn speaks highly of you.” Severus’s eyebrow rose and Kathryn ducked her head to avoid his eyes. What had she been telling her family?

“Indeed, yet she has managed to completely omit you from our conversations.” He chided her and Gabriel grinned broadly.

“I take it she hasn’t mentioned that she is the middle daughter in a family of eight?” Gabriel chuckled.

“Eight?” Harry burst out, looking at Kathryn with a smile of his own.

“Auror Intrepidus Gabriel Leblanc meet Harry Potter.” Kathryn rolled her eyes at the Auror and the boy-who-lived.
It was hard to tell which was more impressed by the other. Auror Intrepidus was one rank above Auror here and was only granted to Aurors who had shown extreme courage under fire and leadership abilities. The two men, well boys really, despite Gabriel’s rank, were shaking hands with vigor and grinning like loons.

Kathryn introduced the other students and Severus was amused by how quickly the females surrounded Gabriel. The boys pelted him with questions, but the girls were gazing at him with a completely different interest. Kathryn, however, slipped her arm into Severus’ and her little sigh of contentment went far to calm his earlier distress.

Half an hour later, the group had all of Severus’ ingredients and the small corn dolly that the team needed for the scavenger hunt. Madame Roxanne drove them from the store with sharp comments and scathing insults that Severus stored away for future use.

Gabriel invited them to join him at a café in the nearby Wizarding district and they accepted happily.

Turning down an alleyway, they stepped through an elegant wrought iron fence and found themselves on a wide boulevard with cobbled streets and sparkling storefronts. Wizards and witches strolled by and several called out to both Kathryn and Gabriel. Hermione began asking questions at a rapid fire pace and Gabriel smilingly answered her, filled with an apparently endless supply of historical facts.

Unlike Diagon Alley, this place oozed sophistication and wealth. The stores were fronted with huge sparkling panes of glass and the interiors were crammed full of merchandise that tempted the children, who ran back and forth between each new sight and distraction.

“Welcome to La Rue de la Magi.” Kathryn smiled up at him, apparently content to let her brother lead.

Severus was happy, he realized. He had a beautiful woman on his arm, he was free from the call of the Dark Lord, having informed Narcissa that Dumbledore was claiming his time this evening, and he was somewhere glittering and lovely. Gas lamps lit the night and owls winged overhead, it was wonderful.

Voices broke over him and suddenly laughing people surrounded him. Resemblances to Kathryn were there in varying degrees and he was being introduced to a large group of people in rapid succession, while Kathryn laughed and was hugged by each member of the mob in turn. They were dragged into the café and tables were shoved together, the kids were pelted with questions and everyone spoke in a mixture of French patois and English, moving back and forth with ease.

Severus found himself seated beside Kathryn and being dragged into a conversation about Potion’s research. He was quickly lost in the conversation arguing happily with a tiny elderly woman with bright black eyes and a café au lait complexion.

“Non, non, Professeur, C’est n’pas vrai. The potion must be decanted quickly, to let it linger will ruin its potency!” She chided him with a smile.

“Madame, trust me, I have brewed it countless times and a quick suspension charm has never harmed it.” He replied politely.

“Bah, I hate to use a wand in the laboratory, it is so unnecessary!” She waved a hand in dismissal, but the smile was still there in her eyes and he knew she was enjoying the conversation.

“I too feel that foolish wand waving is usually unnecessary in the lab, but the demands on my time have forced me to adopt certain expediencies.” His mouth twisted, but the old woman merely nodded in sympathy.

Kathryn was mediating a conversation between Hermione and several young women one of whom Severus vaguely recalled having been introduced as her niece. She sparkled in the gaslight. She shone with the love of her family and the pleasure of good company.

She was not as beautiful as some of the members of her family, sisters and cousins of jewel-like loveliness surrounded him, but she was all he saw. Her mind was sharp and her vision clear and he realized that he could very easily fall in love with her.

“My granddaughter has always been overshadowed by the prettier girls in our family.” The elderly woman said with a soft voice. Severus realized that this tiny woman must be the formidable Grand-mére Marie that Kathryn had spoken of.

“There are no girls prettier than Kathryn.” He answered her absently, still watching his lover talk with the girls across the table. Marie Laveau chuckled at him and patted his hand.

“You are just what I have wanted for her.” Marie smirked at him and he was quite startled. Him? He was what she wanted for Kathryn? He was the beast, the monster to frighten children in the night and he still bore the Dark Mark to prove it.

“I think you mistake me for someone else, Madame.” There was a wistful undertone to his voice that he didn’t hear, but Marie heard it and Marie understood it.

“Non, mon enfant, non, you are wrong.” She looked into his eyes and, like with Albus, he had the feeling that he was truly seen, that no part of his soul was left unnoticed and also, as it was with Albus, he felt accepted for all that he was, both the light and the darkness. “I am like you, enfant, one foot in shadow and one in light. Kathryn is this way too, she is like us.” Severus leaned in closer to soak up the gentle words. “She can never be wholly of one thing or the other it would tear her apart. I have looked for a man who has seen the dark, who is part of it, yet not owned by it.” Severus shook his head, trying to deny what she said, her hand took his chin and she looked into his soul again. “C’est vraiment, mon enfant, you have a soul that shines.”

Severus sat with Marie Laveau long into the afternoon, talking with her and arguing potions and being healed by her gentle words and when at last it was time to go, the children yawning from the time difference, the pastries eaten, the coffee and tea drunk, he rose from the table with a feeling of contentment he hadn’t had in many years.

Kathryn hugged her grandmother close and Severus saw Marie slip a small package in her pocket before they parted. He knew that whatever she had received was the real reason they had come to New Orleans. He bent over the tiny woman’s hand and saluted it, with all the respect he would have given a queen. She smiled up at him with light in her eyes.

“Albus wanted us to pay our respects to you.” He whispered to her. Marie threw back her head and laughed with the silver pealing of bells.

“Tell him my offer still stands.” She whispered back, mischief in her eyes, and he saw the resemblance to Kathryn then. Not in face or voice, but in attitude and personality. Marie was Kathryn in fifty years time, all that dynamism and energy mellowed to gentle laughter and endless wisdom. He wanted more than anything to be there to see the changes as they came. He wanted, for the first time, to survive this war.

“Madame, I will.” He answered her and there were layers to his answer that only they could hear.