In Need

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Professor Snape’s office was largely functional and austere. Things were neat and orderly, and the walls were covered with shelves filled with books. Strange diagrams hung on some of his walls, and neat rows of vials lined the shelves along his work table. Since they were underground, there were no windows, and the room was lit by torches. Megan’s sky blue silk robes rustled softly as she sat in the chair he pointed her to.


She waited as he arranged some things on his desk and watched as he stored some of his thoughts in a pensieve, which he then locked in a cabinet. He had made the mistake of leaving his pensieve unsupervised once before, and had been both ragingly furious and painfully embarrassed upon finding Potter snooping into his most private thoughts within it. Snape doubted that Professor Waters would intrude in such a manner, but…he wasn’t about to ever take that chance again.


He dragged another chaver ver near hers so he was sitting in front of her, and he looked at her with his deep black eyes. Hanks of his black hair had fallen forward on his face, and his expression was very serious as he regarded her.


“Occlumency, as I’m sure you know,” he began, “is the art of guarding one’s mind from magical intrusion. When you are working against the dark forces, it is an essential skill to have, for obvious reasons. If you master it, you will protect your own integrity, and therefore will also protect the information - and lives - connected to your thoughts.”


He folded his long hands together gracefully and looked at her intently as he continued to speak. “To train in Occlumency will require intentional invasions of your integrity, which you must resist. That will mean that I will need to purposely attempt to enter your mind through Legilimancy. If I succeed in entering your thoughts, it… could be painful if certain thoughts or memories are exposed. Knowing this, are you willing to continue?”


“I am.”


“Then let us begin.”


Severus focused for a moment to clear his mind, and then began to enter hers. He probed to find an entrance point, like searching over a long row of closed curtains to find the place where they part.


Closer… closer… he slowly moved around the perimeter of her awareness, but after a few moments realized that he was no closer to finding his way in than when he started.


He stopped for a moment and considered her as she sat there before him. She sat comfortably in her chair, looking back at him with her clear blue eyes. Snape was extremely adept at entering the thoughts of others, and the only other wizard to ever keep him entirely at bay in his first attempt at Legilimancy had been Dumbledore, who - even more to his credit - hadn’t even had the advantage of knowing it was coming.


“Very impressive, Professor Waters,” Professor Snape said silkily as he got up from his chair, suddenly feeling somewhat agitated. “I’m not sure that I understand why you wanted this practice.”


“I just want to be ready for whatever comes. There are few peers who challenge these skills in me anymore, and Dumbledore thought that you would be able to. Besides, I hardly think that a session where I am comfortable and prepared to guard against intrusion should really count. This was just to get our bearings - now that we know that I can keep you out, maybe it would be a good idea to practice with something more difficult. I could let you in and then try blocking you out - that has always been more challenging for me than blocking someone initially, because the thoughts get distracting.”


Professor Snape relaxed again and sat back down, now determined to test her abilities without holding back his own at all. He searched her mind for a moment and could feel her hesitation in opening it up - was it fear? But then he found the space and moved into it.


She was picking up a baby bird that had fallen out of its nest and felt it trembling… She was putting a tray of cookies into the oven and felt the heat as she opened the door… She was stuck in traffic and getting irritated and tired… She was hugging her mother and was glad to see her… She was asleep in a hammock, feeling the tickle of butterflies as they landed… She was skiing down a mountain, enjoying the rush of wind and snow… She was kissing a boy and he was unbuttoning her---


Professor Snape was bumped out of her mind with a quick thrust.


They continued with the exercises for several hours - much longer than either of them had originally intended. She found his strength challenging - it awakened the old drive to repeatedly test her vulnerabilities until she learned to overcome them. While she believed that she could probably hold her own with him in a pinch, he was definitely the stronger of the two and by far the more well-read and versatile as far as practical magic.


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They had finally decided to call it a night and Megan was about to leave, when Professor Snape asked, “Professor Waters - do you mind if I ask you a personal question?”


Wondering where this was going, she told him that she didn’t mind.


“Why were you raised with muggles?”


Oh. That.


“My parents were killed by Voldemort when I was about ten y old old. My uncle was active in the fight too, and didn’t believe that it would be safe for me to live with him. So he sent me to live with a muggle couple that he knew - they wanted children, but didn’t have any of their own, and they took me in and took care of me. Even for as scared and mistrustful as I was at first, they were always so patient and nice and really took my quirks in stride. I liked them right away, and over the years, I’ve loved them as true family. They even made sure I had a magical education and managed to keep it all secret.”


“Your uncle sent you to live with muggles?”


“Yes. The death eaters that helped Voldemort corner my parents thought that they had killed me too, so it was better to just take me someplace far away, because it would take them off my trail for good. My muggle family are pretty visible people - well-known on both sides of the family. They are pretty well-protected already, so any other protection that my uncle might have provided would have blended right in with everything else. In a sense, living in the public eye like that was a really effective hiding place - if they ever *had* come looking for me, it would have been the last place they would have thought to look. Or so I like to think,” she finished, getting up.


It explained a lot. Thinking about her reply, Professor Snape stood up to show her to the door. He had been pleasantly surprised this evening. When she had first asked him to train with her, he expected another headache like Potter and had thought of a few choice things to say to Dumbledore for pointing her in his direction. Instead, he had discovered that he was dealing not only with quite a powerful and skilled witch, but also someone who took the training seriously and seemed decent to spend time with. That prompted him to revise their agreement.


“Professor Waters, I have reconsidered my availability. Your skill is quite advanced, and I believe that you are capable of far more than your training has prepared you for so far. I would like to agree to continue to meet as long as it remains valuable, instead of basing the work on a set number of sessions.”


“Thank you!” she exclaimed. “I am so glad that you offered - I feel like tonight really challenged me, and I haven’t felt like that in a long time. I really appreciate your help.”


Megan had offered a refreshing and serious challenge to his skills as well, but he kept that thought to himself. Her looking forward to spending time with him was more appealing than he cared to admit, and he kept that thought to himself too.


“Goodnight,” she said, her blue eyes twinkling at him, and she gave his arm a squeeze as she walked him him and returned to her quarters.


It was quite late already, but it was a long time before he fell asleep that night.

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A/N - ******SOOOOO many thanks to those of you who have reviewed! You are so sweet, and I am really glad that you like the story so far. :-) I love to hear from you - please continue to let me know what you think.******


Best wishes,
R.

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