The Beguiling

It was the last week of April and the month was taking its lamblike leave in a joyous leaping of warmth and sunshine. The Green was dotted with students seated and prone, studying class work or one another. The thawing grounds sloping down to the lake were also populated with black-robed students and crows. Vivian sat, quite alone, beneath a large Scots pine, near the water’s edge. She had her knees drawn up to her chest, her fingers twined into her bare toes. Her sensible school boots and heavy wool socks cast aside. She stared out over the water and let her thoughts drift upon the surface. A sound whispered from behind her and she knew that it would be he, before he even came into her view and settled himself down.

“Headmaster Dumbledore,” she smiled at him.

“I thought I might find you out here. On a beautiful day like today.” He rested his back against the trunk of the tree, feet planted on the ground. His wrists a caesura on his splayed knees and she looked at the elegant, long fingers relaxed, the square tips of them, and the long, smooth nails. She saw that the backs of his hands were dusted with white hairs and let her gaze trace up and over one wrist and peek down into the voluminous sleeve of his robe. The white hair was thick and riotous running up his forearm. She looked up at his face and he was studying her over the tops of his spectacles. She blushed and looked down at her toes, squeezing them tight.

He took off the spectacles and leaned his head back against the tree, closing his eyes. “This is a good tree.”

“Yes.” She laughed softly, “All trees are good trees. This one a particularly good tree, though.”

He opened one eye and smiled at her. “I used to sit under this tree when I was a Seventh Year, myself. Sit, right here, in this exact spot and look out over the water, and think about things.”

She lowered her knees to the ground and turned to face him, her body bent in a feminine curve, her hands trailing through the gathered leaves and bits of moss. “You did?”

He nodded. “I did.

“And here you are sitting under it still.”

“So I am.” He looked out over the water, let his gaze slide across the surface, and follow the water down to the far end where it disappeared into a dark copse of trees just at the edge of the Dark Forest. “It is nearly Beltane. I remember the celebrating, the welcoming of Summertime in years long past. That isn’t done so much anymore, or with such dedicated abandon.”

“I’m certain, Headmaster,” her voice was teasing, “that Hogwarts has never celebrated May Day with any sort of abandon, dedicated or not.” Her eyes shone and she caught some wayward strands of her black hair and palmed them back into place. A slight breeze blew the strands back over her face.

He laughed, very loudly and she joined him. “No, perhaps not. But there were celebrations in the villages.” He was suddenly quiet, watching her watch him. “I celebrated Beltane my last year here as a student. Swam in the small pond there,” he lifted a hand and indicated the far side of the lake, “just inside the forest, under a full moon.”

Her lips parched open, her eyes wide, her face suddenly flushed and he remembered her drinking water from his cupped hands.

Her voice called him back out of the reverie, “The forest was not forbidden to students then?”

“No. No, not then. It wasn’t forbidden at all. I forbade it, when I became headmaster. Put your boots back on, child. You will be late for History and make this old man late for his tea.”

She looked at him from under lowered lashes. “Do you feel like an old man?” she asked softly, pulling on one sock, then the other. She held her boots and looked at him, waiting.

“Do I feel like what I am? Yes I suppose I do. Some days more than others.”

She pushed her feet into the boots and laced them quickly, a flourish of a bow she tucked back down into the tops. She stood and he stood beside her, looking down at her as she looked up at him. A long moment passed between them. He turned and began to walk back up the slope, slowing down so she could keep step with his longer legs. They reached the top of the hill, the school Green stretched out in front of them. He stopped and turned to her.

“Do you know, Vivian, what is meant when one talks of a ‘Greenwood marriage?’” She shook her head. He nodded, put his spectacles back on and the late afternoon sunlight glinted off the glass and hid his eyes. “Go, you will be late.”

~***~

Beltane Eve.

The last night of April, she sat in the Great Hall and turned her huge, dark eyes upon him and something shifted in the way that his eyes caught hers and she was held by his gaze. His head tilted to one side, one long finger tapping at his lips. The world narrowed to the two of them, across the room filled with students and staff, she felt him questioning her with his eyes. He inclined his head and nodded. She stood immediately and fled.

Dumbledore stood and began to leave the Hall. Snape fell into step beside him. They walked quietly, matched strides, out the doors andthe the bottom of the staircase. “It is done,” Albus said and climbed the stairs.

~***~

Under a cloak of darkness, the night falling quickly, her fingers wrapped tightly around the time turner hanging from her neck, she ran into the Forbidden Forest. She found the pool, the green water warm under the waning moonlight. She shed her clothing, long black hair falling past her waist, the necklace her only jewelry and she stepped into the water and turned the hourglass. She sunk beneath the surface and when she rose up again the moon was full and shining brightly and she looked to the shore and he was standing there on the edge, staring at her.

He was tall and lean. His beard cropped close against the sharp planes of his face. His hair was golden brown and wrapped in a leather lace, falling thickly halfway down his back, his shoulders broad, his legs long and muscular. He was naked. She stood in the water, droplets falling from her skin, she pushed back the hair from her face and holding out both arms she beckoned to him with her hands. And he came to her with no hesitation.

She thought she would not ever catch her breath again when he took her into his arms and studied her face. He brought his mouth down to hers and all thought left her and she had the experience of loving him.

On the evening of the second day, she roused, their bed a grassy bower on the edge of the water. She leaned in and kissed his sleeping lips. He turned and pulled her to him, but she whispered nonsense words and lulled him back to sleep. She kissed him once more, then rose and walked out into the water. She turned the hourglass and did not see that he had followed her and was standing on the edge watching her dissolve into the future.

Vivian stepped out of the water, the loss of him so tangible that she thought she might cry out. She found her clothes and dressed quickly. She could not bear to be in that place another moment and she ran, ran back to the castle.

A house-elf found her as she entered the school. Herr drr dripping wet, soaking her robes. He led her to Headmaster Dumbledore’s office and left her standing there alone. Her heart was beating to break and she could not control the tremble of her limbs.

She heard a door click shut and looked up to see him descending the curving staircase behind his desk. He was watching her intently as he drew closer to her. He walked around the desk and came to stand before her and she could not tear her eyes away from his. She held herself steady and breathed but her limbs seemed to jump of their own accord.

“I think I have to sit down, sir,” she whispered and he nodded and she sat.

“Now, you have returned,” his voice was low, but persistent and sad.

She nodded slowly, looking up at him and he came to her then and with a sound of defeated acceptance he crouched before her and laid his head upon her knees. “I searched for you for years, you know. Years.”

“I thought you would think I was a dream.”

“I did not dream of such things before you came.”

“You did not? What then, what did you dream of?”

“I had dreams of light and peace. I dreamed of courage. But after, afterwards, I only dreamt of you.”

She reached out her shaking hands and placed them on his head, the trembling left her and she wound her fingers down through the long, white hair. She bent over him and brought a handful of hair up to her lips.

“How do you think I felt when I saw you, seven years ago? And you were a child?”

She shook her head, silent.

“I knew that my dream had not been a dream. And I watched you grow and wondered if I should stop you from doing this…”

He stood and moved back away from her. She stood and reached for him. He held up one hand and shook his head. “Is this what you want, Vivian? This old man? This aged body?”

She covered her mouth with both hands. Her eyes wide.

“What gave you the right?” he whispered.