To Know Who I Am

Acknowledgements: Huge thanks to my beta reader ubiquirk, my Brit-picker saracen77, and my alpha readers bluedolfyn and willow_kat.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything you recognize and I'm not making any money from this. If you think otherwise, there's this nice room in St. Mungo's for you.

Chapter 8

This day was just getting better and better. Except not. Celia had spent the past hour or so playing the impossible customer, haggling with the apothecary clerk over the quality and cost of several of the ingredients she needed. She couldn’t do anything about the accent, so why not take the “ugly American” shtick to its limit? It seemed to fit the Knockturn Alley atmosphere and was nothing like what anyone would expect from a Hogwarts teacher in general or her in particular. Just to break things up a bit, she’d even bickered over a few things that she didn’t need, just so that she could decide not to take them after all. Not that she was taking out her frustrations on the clerk or anything. Not at all.

Now the last two, which should have been the easiest, were not available at all.

“What do you mean out of stock?” she demanded, her irritation now far more sincere than it had been previously. “How can you be out of stock?”

“I’m sorry, but we’re just out,” said the young girl, who looked barely old enough to be out of school. “I can’t just conjure it from nowhere.”

“Let me speak to your boss,” Celia insisted. The girl disappeared through a curtained doorway. When the curtains parted again, a wizened man came into the front of the store.

“What exactly is the problem here?” he grumbled.

“The problem is that I need two very simple, common items, and your clerk tells me you’re out of them. How can you just run out of Wartcap powder and Doxy venom?”

“As it happens, miss, I had a large order for both items just yesterday. Wiped me clean out.”

“Wonderful. Then where would you suggest I go in search of more?”

“You could go find some Doxies and Wartcaps yourself.”

She thought of several anatomically improbable things he could do with that suggestion.

“Do you think I have nothing better to do with my time? I need those ingredients today. Wartcaps have to dry for at least two weeks before they’re any use at all. Who’s your supplier?”

“I don’t give out that sort of information.” The shop owner’s eyes gleamed. “I could, however, point you to the customers who cleaned me out. Maybe they’ll part with some of what they bought.”

Well, that’s deeply unlikely. Anyone who’s buying that stuff in quantity is going to be using it.

Still, maybe it was worth a try. OK, it was more like she didn’t have a real choice if she was going to cast this spell today. She agreed, and the shop owner gave her a scrap of parchment that read WWW – 93 Diagon Alley. As soon as she had paid for her purchases and had them packaged, she left the apothecary.

Just before entering Diagon Alley, she ducked into a small gap between stores and dropped the glamour she had been using. She kept the hood of her cloak pulled low over her face, checked to be sure no one was watching, and exited Knockturn for Diagon. A few stores in, she let the hood fall back and began looking for number 93.

When she located it, she almost turned to storm back to the apothecary.

A joke shop. He sent me to a frickin’ joke shop.

Not that it wasn’t obvious that he was trying to get rid of her, but this was ridiculous.

Then she noticed some of the items advertised in the window. Puking Pastilles? Nosebleed Nougats? Toothache Taffy?

Or maybe they might have some use for sketchy ingredients.

She squared her shoulders and went inside.

Since this time she was looking for a favor rather than normal business, she decided to take a different approach.

“Excuse me, miss,” she said to the woman at the counter, “are you the owner?”

“No,” she replied. “I’m just helping my brothers out.”

“They’re the owners?”

“Yes.”

“May I please speak to one of them?” Celia asked. “I have a … rather odd request.”

“Sure,” said the woman, who then turned and yelled, “Fred! George! Customer wants to see you!”

Don’t worry. I didn’t need these eardrums anyway.

She scrubbed at one of her ears to dispel the ringing.

Two identical redheaded men hurried through the door behind the counter.

“No need to yell, Ginny,” said one.

“We don’t want to frighten the customers away,” said the other.

The woman named Ginny pointed at Celia and said, “This lady wants to ask you something odd.”

“Oh she does, does she?” asked the first man.

“We specialize in odd,” said the second.

“Well,” Celia said, plastering a smile on her face, “It seems you gentlemen bought up the last of some ingredients I need. Urgently. Wartcap powder and Doxy venom? I’m hoping to convince you to sell me a little.”

“Now, what would a lovely American lady like yourself,” began one, leaning his elbows onto the counter.

“Want with the makings of Skiving Snackboxes?” finished the other, copying his twin’s posture.

It took her a few seconds to translate that.

“Skiving …” she crossed her arms over her chest and glared at the two men. “You know what? I really don’t want to know what that is. Nor do I really want to explain why I need this stuff.”

“Sorry, then,” said number one.

“It’s one thing keeping kids from dying of boredom in hideous classes,” continued the other.

“But we’re not selling valuable resources – ”

“—without a good reason.”

“Would one hundred percent profit constitute a good reason?” she tried.

“Maybe,” said number one.

“Long as you convince us you’re not up to no good,” said number two.

She rolled her eyes. “And helping kids skip class doesn’t qualify as ‘up to no good’?”

“Well, now, that all depends – ”

“ – on your point of view.”

Celia had the distinct impression that announcing she was a teacher at Hogwarts was not going to be a useful strategy. Unless … there was something tickling the back of her brain. Her eyes rested on a side display.

Mates get their jollies with jinxes?
Knock ’em back with our Shield Hats!
Bouncing hexes for over eight years!

“You’re those Weasleys,” she murmured. Looking back at the twins, she said, “Right, so would it help if I said it was Hogwarts business?”

The men looked at each other, then at her, and in unison said, “Prove it.”

“Right,” she repeated. “Got a Floo?”

“Of course,” said Ginny, who had been listening with interest in between completing sales with regular customers.

“Then will you please Floo Headmistress McGonagall,” she said, wandlessly casting a quick Muffliato spell on the other customers, “tell her Professor Reese is here to buy the Wartcap powder and Doxy venom you two wiped out of the Knockturn Alley apothecary, and take her word for it when she says you should sell it to me?” She released the muffling spell.

The twins looked at each other, shrugged, resheathed their wands, and went through the door behind the counter.

Celia looked at Ginny questioningly, but the redheaded woman just raised her hands as if to say she was no part of this. She also looked at Celia oddly, as if trying to work out something about her. Celia wasn’t sure why that should bother her, as it made perfect sense that she’d be curious about this weird customer. She shook it off and ordered herself to wait patiently.

In a few minutes, the two men returned, holding a very promising-looking package wrapped in brown paper and looking a little shell-shocked.

“Here you go, then,” said one of them.

“Our compliments,” said the other.

Celia’s eyebrows shot up. “I wasn’t planning to just take them,” she said. “My offer still stands. At least let me reimburse what you paid for them.”

“No need,” said the first.

“Always happy to help,” said the second.

“And this really is what I need?” she asked, suddenly suspicious at the abrupt turnaround. “Or is it something that’s going to blow up in my face and turn the Potions lab fluorescent orange?”

Because it’s not like he’s not acting weird enough today, so it’d be loads of fun to just really piss him off.

“We wouldn’t do that,” they said in unison.

“Not about something that makes McGonagall look that serious,” said one.

The other, for a change, nodded mutely rather than building off his twin’s statement. The woman named Ginny nodded seriously, too, the strange, measuring look still on her face. That did sound consistent with what little she knew of them. How much had Minerva told them?

Who cares? Let me just get out of here, get the damned spell done, and maybe get some actual sleep.

“Well, thank you, then,” she said, accepting the package. She looked around and saw that the store was temporarily empty. “Any objections if I just Portkey straight from here?”

“Not at all,” said twin number two.

Celia smiled, nodded, and pulled her “shopping list” out of a pocket. Making sure she had a secure grip on her packages, she activated the Portkey, mildly annoyed that Severus apparently thought she couldn’t have just made one herself. She made a mental note to add that to the conversation she’d promised him, whenever they finally had it. Immediately, she felt the familiar sensation of a hook grabbing hold behind her navel and pulling her through a swirl of wind toward Hogwarts.

~ ~ ~

When the swirling sensation stopped, Celia landed a bit harder than she might have liked, but kept her feet and did not lose any of her cargo. It was too bad that several of these ingredients didn’t do well if Apparated, but then she'd have had to walk from the Apparition point just outside the grounds. For that matter, if she had made her own Portkey, she’d probably have set it for there, anyway, since she wasn’t sure she could make one that would get her across the boundary enchantments. As it was, she had landed right in the middle of what appeared to be a private Potions lab. There were a few tables containing what were probably potions in progress.

Experiments, maybe?

One table was obviously set up for her use. Beside the empty cauldron were all the ingredients that had been marked off her list. Cabinets lined one wall, which ended with a storage closet. She set down her packages and began to open them.

No sooner had she started than Severus stormed into the room.

“Do you have any idea how lucky you are?” he demanded.

Her heart, which had given a little jump when she first saw him, seemed to stop in the face of his anger. What the hell is he mad about now?

She blinked at him and replied warily, “Why don't you tell me what it is I should feel lucky about before I answer that.”

“If that had been any other shop, you would have compromised yourself by pulling a stunt like that,” he all but shouted.

“If that had been any other store, instead of one owned by two Order of Merlin recipients and former members of the Order of the Phoenix, I never would have ‘pulled a stunt like that,’” she replied, watching intently as he absorbed this.

So, first you think I can’t even manage a Portkey. Now you think I’m stupid enough to just randomly tell people what’s going on here without some clue who they are? I repeat: what the hell?

“Besides,” she continued with forced calm, “all I did was tell them that I'm a teacher here and suggest they confirm with Minerva that it was okay to sell that stuff to me. If something in the past few years had changed so that they were no longer trustworthy, she probably would have just told them I was lying. They’d’ve thrown me out, end of story. No harm done.”

“No harm ...” he trailed off and shook his head. “How did you know so much about them?”

She shrugged, hoping she looked more nonchalant than she felt. “I did my homework before I came here. One of the bonuses of the Rosenberg speed-reading method is you don't miss the footnotes. Though if I hadn't seen some of their defensive merchandise being sold as gag items, I probably wouldn't have put it together.”

“How did you end up there in the first place?”

“They’d bought up all the Wartcap powder and Doxy venom from the apothecary. Apparently I annoyed the apothecary's owner enough that he sicced me on them.”

Severus pinched the bridge of his nose. It was kind of endearing, except that it reminded her of Giles a little and that was just weird. Besides, he wasn’t allowed to do things that were endearing while pissing her off. She gritted her teeth.

“Do I want to know why Messrs Weasley were buying large quantities of Wartcap powder and Doxy venom?”

“Probably not. It sounds like it involves students skipping classes.”

He muttered something about things not changing. Looking at the way Celia had begun arranging things on the stone table, he asked, “Do you have everything you need, then?”

“All but the flasks,” she replied.

So that’s it? He’s over it? Not now. Stuff to do. But seriously, what is his problem?

“You will find a selection in the leftmost cabinet,” he said.

“Thank you.” She resumed unwrapping and organizing her supplies, taking deliberately slow breaths to calm herself. After looking around briefly for a waste bin, she remembered herself and vanished the paper wrappers. When she had everything as she wanted it around the cauldron, she looked up to see Severus watching her. “Are you planning to stay for this? Much as I wish teamwork would speed things up, it's just a long, slow process.”

“No,” he said. “I thought perhaps, before you begin, we could speak.”

She raised her eyebrows. “Now? All right then.” She stepped away from the worktable but did not move closer to him. This didn’t sound promising, at least not in a good way.

“What occurred between us earlier cannot happen again,” he said, and the bottom dropped out of her stomach.

“I'm sorry, what?” she asked.

“I believe you heard me,” he sneered.

So, not over it, then. Or moving on to a whole different “it,” which is … over? Already?

“I heard what you said, I'm just ... surprised,” she replied, glad that the jar she was gripping had an Unbreakable Charm on it. “Um, why?”

“I should have thought it would be obvious. Clearly we were both experiencing the strain of the night's events and were too exhausted to exercise better judgment. Obviously you realize this, as you immediately tried to obfuscate the reason for my presence in your quarters.”

“I told you I wasn’t ashamed of what we'd done,” she said softly, firmly. “I'm still not. I still don't regret it, either, but apparently I'm alone in that.”

Starting to regret it now though!

“Apparently.”

Both were silent, as that little voice in Celia's head began chanting several versions of I told you so. It was always the same. She shouldn’t be surprised. It just usually took a little longer than this.

“I should have seen this coming,” she said at last. “I reminded you of what I am before things had gone too far. If you were going to pull the typical ‘I don't want to deal with a Slayer’ bullshit, that would have been the time to back out.”

“I believe I have already pointed out the lack of judgment being exercised.”

She scowled at him, then looked away. “I really thought you'd be different.”

“Why?” he snapped. “Did you think me so desperate that I would be unable to resist the lure of being your dirty little secret?”

“What?” she demanded, whipping her head back around to face him. “No, damnit. I thought the fact that you're so powerful might mean you wouldn't pull the usual freak-out. Obviously I was wrong!”

“Clearly.”

She seethed in silence for a moment.

This is just so typical, and yet not making any of the usual sense. He doesn’t get out of it that easily. No way.

“What I don't understand is how you're rationalizing this.”

“What do you mean?”

“I'll agree that things got a little ... accelerated last night ... this morning ... whatever. But as far as I can tell, things were heading in that direction anyway. And whatever that magic was ... that had to mean something.”

“It appears someone has a very high opinion of herself.”

“That's not what I mean, and you know it!” she retorted.

“And how would I know that?”

“You could try listening to what I'm actually saying,” she said. “Or ... you could look.” Oh, brilliant! Get all emotional and then invite him in. Have I completely lost what's left of my mind?

“What?”

“I said you could look,” she repeated, stepping closer and looking very deliberately into his eyes. For a moment, he appeared to wrestle with the idea, and then she felt his presence abruptly in her mind.

Quickly, she pushed forward a series of images: her reaction to his letter in the Potions journal ... meeting him on the first day of school ... feelings of friendship when he expressed interest in her work, increasing when they moved into open collaboration ... dancing with him at Christmas ... dancing with him last night ... the secure feeling of having an experienced fighter at her back after she’d dusted that vamp ... kissing him ... arguing with herself about him ... the surge of anger when she saw the scars on his body … that twin surge of magical energies that had crashed through each of them and then flowed into one another ... the certainty that meant something significant ... her realization she was probably falling in love ...

The memories she'd chosen to share reached an end, and still he was in her mind. She was a little unsure she should have let that last bit through. Was that why he hadn’t left yet? She left her mind blank as a signal that she was done, and still he remained. A twinge of doubt flitted through her mind, quickly suppressed, but not quickly enough.

“Since your prior experiences,” he made the word sound filthy, “were all with Muggles, you should not assume that a surge of magical energy is anything unusual when you are having sex with a wizard. Nor should you impose some great meaning on a single encounter.”

She glared at him. She wanted to order him to leave, except for the slight problem that this was his lab. She couldn't storm out either; she had work to do. Seething, she finally said only, “Maybe.”

“Then we understand one another,” he said flatly, eyes narrowed.

“I wouldn't go that far,” she snapped. “But you've made your position pretty clear. Now, may I please get to work?”

“Of course,” he replied and left, closing the door none too gently on his way out.

She spent several minutes disciplining her mind into calmness before she started a wand-lit flame under the cauldron and began to work.

The mission comes first. I can think up creative ways to deal with him later. Right now, I’m all about keeping the vampires out. Too bad the students who think he’s a vamp are wrong.

~ ~ ~

As he slammed back into his office, Severus nearly growled out loud. That arrogant … who did she think she was? Did she honestly think that … that … display of emotion would convince him she had some sort of real feelings for him? So she became upset at the sight of his injuries. That sort of thing was probably hard-wired into Slayers, part of what made them tick. As for the rest, he’d already known she had enjoyed herself. That meant nothing. He’d had to be good, with his looks, or he’d never have got laid by anyone other than whores. But there was a world of difference between the sort of casual encounters he usually enjoyed and some sordid clandestine affair with a colleague. The one “relationship” he’d attempted in recent years had not gone well and was clearly irrelevant. Or perhaps not. That had also been with a much younger witch. Clearly that was a formula for disaster. Even if Reese hadn’t been too embarrassed to admit what had happened between them, it would have been a bad idea to allow this to continue.

He wasn’t sure why he cared about that. It wasn’t as though he suddenly wanted to maul her at the staff table in front of everyone, though that proved a momentarily distracting thought. She was right that such things were private. Something about the way she had not even deflected but somehow just dismissed her Watcher’s innuendo, however, had chilled him to the bone.

And then there was everything else that had happened since. Her revelations at the staff meeting might have stunned some of the others, but they had shaken him profoundly. If he understood her correctly, her head was half-filled with some other witch’s memories, at least some of which included work in the Dark Arts. Then she’d run off to Knockturn Alley, and she’d been going to leave without a bloody Portkey. What was she going to do, walk back? She had to know some of those ingredients would not survive Apparition. So he’d charmed the parchment and scrawled instructions on how to activate it, and when their hands had brushed as he’d handed it to her, for a moment he’d thought perhaps there really was something there that could grow between them.

But then, not one hour later, Fred and George Weasley’s heads had appeared in Minerva’s fireplace while he had been sitting there, talking with her, and they were saying there was a Professor Reese there, and was she really a Hogwarts professor, and should they really sell her the some of the Wartcap powder and Doxy venom they’d bought up from the Knockturn Alley apothecary? And was that truly less than half an hour ago? He’d been furious at her lack of discretion. What if the store to which she’d been sent had been … well, had been someone with a grudge against Hogwarts. He supposed nobody here would have actually known her or had any reason to wish her harm personally. Still, with all she undoubtedly had in her head, and considering the fact that she was a Slayer, she ought to have the sense to be far more careful. Anything could have happened. Of course, she had said that the only reason she’d spoken up was that she’d realized who the twins were. Now that he thought about it, they really hadn’t appeared to know anything more than exactly what they had asked, and that had not been much. Perhaps he shouldn’t have blown up at them quite so severely. Then again, would they have expected any less from him?

That was not the point. She was infuriating, rash as any Gryffindor, and again, clearly ashamed of what they’d done, regardless of what she had said. Taken all together, it was clear that their liaison had been a mistake, and he’d had to nip this thing in the bud before he let her get any further inside his defenses. And, no, he was not going to suddenly begin making Herbological metaphors of things. That wisp of doubt he’d caught, when she’d thought, What if it was just because he’s not a Muggle, had been the perfect weapon to sever any lingering attachment. It wasn’t true of course. He’d been with plenty of witches and had never experienced anything remotely like that swirling crash of energies. Whatever it was, he could still feel it, and he hoped it would wear off soon, as it was very distracting. So, yes, something had been unique about that experience, but it didn’t have to have some sort of profound significance just because a naïve twenty-four year-old witch thought so.

Determined to waste no further thought on the matter, he grabbed a pile of essays and began to mark them viciously.

~ ~ ~

By the time she had finished the potion, reduced it to a powder, and divided it into five equal flasks, it was late afternoon. She healed the cut she had made across the palm of her left hand, cleaned the cauldron and table meticulously, and returned the ingredients to the storeroom. After a moment of looking at the careful ordering of the shelves, she decided to leave the newly purchased items on the worktable so that Snape could decide whether and where to put them. Using a slicing charm on her cloak, she removed a large piece which she transfigured into a sectioned carrying bag for the flasks. With one last look about the lab to ensure she hadn’t left anything else for him to fly off the handle about, she exited the room and headed toward Minerva’s office.

When she arrived, the Headmistress appeared surprised to see her.

“You’re done already?” she asked.

“Only with the potion-making,” Celia replied. “I thought I should touch base with you before I go out to actually do the spell. Also, I should probably apologize if my handling of the situation with the Weasleys was inappropriate.”

“I admit I was surprised to hear from them. However, from the way in which they inquired, clearly you had not told them anything about your reason for seeking the items in question. Severus appeared rather more concerned.”

“‘Livid’ might cover it a bit better.” Celia made an effort not to roll her eyes. She hoped Minerva didn’t have any more to say about him. That would really mess with her plan to not think about him at all, at least not until this was done.

“Indeed.” The Headmistress gave her an odd look, but said no more on the subject. “So then, the spell. I have spoken with Filius at some length about the problem of finding any vampires that may be hiding in the Forbidden Forest and the concerns Severus said you raised about how this spell might interact with the existing Charms warding the grounds. Filius feels, and I agree, that the best approach would be to define the boundary as you see here.” She pointed to a small map of the grounds on which a red line had been drawn, outlining the boundary she was to use.

Celia’s eyes widened in surprise. She’d completely forgotten to raise that issue earlier and was surprised that Severus had done so, all things considered. The scrolls she’d conjured had simply made the assumption that the spell’s boundaries would be slightly outside those of Hogwarts. She was even more surprised by the solution they’d decided upon. She decided to focus on that part. Much safer … and also what she really should be focusing on.

Severus who?

“You want me to work on the inside of the enchantments then, and keep the Forbidden Forest outside the bounds of this spell?”

“That would seem to solve the problem of any vampires that may already be hiding in the Forest, and Filius is certain there will be no difficulties with your spell being cast within the protective charms already in place.”

Celia nodded. “That should actually make it a little bit easier.”

“How long will it take you?”

“About an hour, maybe a little more,” she replied. “Once I’m done, I’ll be wiped out though. I’d like to go straight to my quarters and sleep a few hours before patrolling tonight. Could you show me how to communicate by Patronus, the way you did to Hagrid and me earlier? That way I can let you know when it’s done without having to come back into the castle.”

“It is actually quite simple,” said Minerva. “When you form the Patronus, you think very clearly of the person to whom the message is to be directed and what you want to say. It is best if you keep the message brief.”

“Sounds simple enough,” Celia agreed. “May I run a quick test?”

“By all means.”

Celia summoned the memory she had always used to fuel the Patronus Charm: the day her foster-mother had taken her to buy a gown for her junior prom. She had made such a big deal of it, saying how she had once thought she would never be able to enjoy such clichéd mother-daughter moments, and thanked Celia for being that daughter. They had hugged and cried, and while it was only one happy memory among many, it had always stood out to Celia as one that defined the bond between them. With the memory firmly in mind, she focused and thought Tell Minerva testing 1-2-3 and silently cast, Expecto Patronum!

A silvery mist flowed from her wand and coalesced into the shape of a ball python, slithered across the Headmistress’ desk, and raised its head expectantly before her. Hesitantly, Minerva touched its head, and the form dissolved.

“Testing 1-2-3?” she asked.

“It’s all I could think of,” Celia said with an embarrassed smile.

“And your Patronus is a snake?”

“Yeah. I used to raise little corn snakes when I was a teenager, so I suppose it makes a kind of sense. I’d always wanted one that was a little bigger, but my foster parents seemed to think I’d pushed my luck far enough. So now I have a nice big silvery one, and I don’t even have to clean up after it.”

“I see.” Another odd look. She was collecting a lot of those today. “Well, it seems you have the technique, so I will await your message that the spell has been completed. You may use the Patronus to send an alert to the castle, as well, if you encounter anything on your patrol.”

“I don’t expect to, but if I do, and it’s, say, one in the morning, will the Patronus wake you automatically? Or do I need to include that intent as well?”

“Include that with your message. And if it is something that urgent, send one to me and one to Severus, as he will most likely be patrolling within the castle and able to respond more quickly.” The Headmistress paused, then added, “One more thing, Celia. There will be another pre-breakfast staff meeting tomorrow. If, as I suspect, there will be little to report other than the casting of this protective spell, you will most likely face quite a few questions from your peers.”

“How far would you like me to go in answering them?”

“I would like you to be completely honest about anything to do with your purpose in being here and your plans for how to train the new Slayer-witch. In fact, you might provide copies of the curriculum you plan to cover with her. That would satisfy many of the curious questions I have overheard from the staff today.”

“And the rest?”

“I think you will find that most have already accepted your … unusual background.”

“I hope you’re right.”

“I will await your message in approximately one hour then.”

Celia nodded in acceptance of this dismissal and left, completely focused on the task at hand. Had she looked back over her shoulder, she might have noticed one of the usually slumbering portraits on the wall watching her keenly as she departed.

~ ~ ~

The gates to the grounds were the perfect starting point, and Celia stopped just inside them, knelt in the snow, and cast a quick Melting Charm so that she could reach the ground. Once a largish patch of ground was clear, she used another charm to dig a small hole in the frozen earth, poured in the contents of one of the flasks, and covered it back up. She drew energy from the land into herself and channeled it into the spell as she spoke the incantation aloud.

“No undead creatures here may roam,
Lest I invite, as to my home.”

Walking quickly but unhurriedly, she traced out the inner boundary of the grounds, moving toward her next stop just this side of the Forbidden Forest. She repeated the melting and digging charms, buried the contents of the second flask, drew up more energy from the land, channeled it into the spell, and repeated the incantation.

Three more times she repeated the pattern, but when she came to the fifth point, by the lake, there was something different. The power she drew up from the land seemed to flow from the bottom of the lake itself, and it had a darker quality to it. She made a mental note to ask Minerva later what that was about, but didn’t interrupt the spell.

Finally, she traced out the last leg of the boundary of her spell, returning to the spot just inside the main gates. Closing her eyes, she visualized the continuous line she had walked and the protective powder containing her blood that she had planted at five key, equidistant points to act as sentries. Tapping this time into her own energy, into the essence of what made her a Slayer, she projected that energy to all of the sentry points simultaneously, lighting up the irregularly shaped boundary with bright golden light, repeating the incantation one last time,

“No undead creatures here may roam,
Lest I invite, as to my home!”

She felt the unmistakable SNAP of the protection locking into place and staggered a few steps backwards as she disconnected herself from it. She hoped briefly that none of the students had happened to look out the window just then.

Oh well, how weird is it, really, to see a teacher obviously doing some sort of protective thing out here? They don’t need to know details. Plus, if Minerva does leak it, maybe it’d even be good that they saw me.

Still reeling slightly from the massive expenditure of energy, she summoned the memory of that day with her foster-mother, thought Go tell Minerva it’s done, and cast the Patronus Charm. She watched for a moment as the silvery snake made its way across the snow, until it dazzled her eyes as the late afternoon sun caught both snow and snake, then walked slowly and a bit unsteadily toward the greenhouses and her cottage.

Once she arrived, she wanted nothing more than to tumble into bed, but she couldn’t let herself do that until she had cleaned the flasks. It was never a good idea to leave spell residue lying around, after all. She washed them thoroughly and set them to dry. She considered repairing her cloak but decided that could wait. Carrying the flasks to return them would be easier if she kept the chambered bag a little longer.

Bleary-eyed, she stumbled into her room, ripped off her boots, and climbed under the covers fully clothed. She set the alarm for an hour after sunset, and as soon as her head touched the pillow, she was fast asleep.

~ ~ ~

“Professor Snape,” Hagrid said around a mouthful of mutton, “d’ye know if Celia’s back yet? This is the second meal she’s missed.”

“She returned several hours ago,” he replied across the empty seat separating them. “As it is nearly sunset, no doubt she is preparing to patrol the grounds.”

“On an empty stomach? Tha’s not a good idea.”

“Perhaps she’s had the elves bring her something. She certainly knows how to contact them if she needs anything.” Manages to keep track of what sandwiches and biscuits her guests like, too. Which is not important. He scowled at his plate.

“Di’ she cast tha’ … you know?” Hagrid winked in what was clearly supposed to be a subtle and conspiratorial manner, and Snape wondered at Minerva entrusting him with any secret more sensitive than the next Hogsmeade weekend’s date.

“Yes, of course,” he replied with a narrowed gaze meant to warn the man off further discussion.

“Then why would she need to patrol? Won’ be nothin’ to find, righ’?”

“Perhaps you should ask her yourself, if you run into her.”

“Hmph.” The half-giant tucked back into his dinner, clearly not satisfied, but at least not pressing the matter further.

It was a good question, though. He supposed she might plan to catch the person who had invited that other vampire onto the grounds, but as they had not yet leaked anything about the new protective spell, much less that she was the only one to whom it was keyed, it was rather unlikely unless she just stumbled into them. There was that dream, too. She didn’t mention it at this morning’s meeting after all. She also didn’t say whether those other vampires, Turok-Han, are subject to the same constraints as regular vampires. Will the spell work against them? Surely she would have said something if not.

Suddenly, dinner was over, and he had to escort the Slytherins back to their Common Room and start his own patrols of the castle. It promised to be another long night.

~ ~ ~

It was. And in the morning, he was glad he had spent a portion of the pre-dawn hours brewing another batch of Invigoration Draught. Not everyone needed it today, but he was going to need several doses to get through his classes. From the look of Celia as she dragged in the door, so was she. Minerva, at least, seemed to have got some rest. Phials of the potion were set beside both women’s cups, as well as Potter’s. He had already taken a dose before he arrived.

He was surprised when the Slayer came down to his end of the table and presented him with a sectioned carrier bag containing the flasks she’d taken from his lab.

“I only needed them to divide the mixture evenly and transport it,” she explained.

He grunted and removed the flasks to examine them. They did appear thoroughly cleaned. He shrunk them and placed them in his pocket with a nod. She merely pressed her mouth into a firm line and went to her usual seat.

The actual news portion of the meeting was unsurprisingly short. No one had, after all, encountered any vampires or really much of anything last night. Precautions were remaining in force for today, including staff escorts between classes, with an announcement to be made at dinner that the defenses on the grounds had been enhanced. As a result, only Celia would need to continue the extended patrols tonight. On Tuesday, tomorrow, they would allow a couple of gossipy students to overhear a conversation revealing that these new defenses were keyed to a single person and that the newest professor had been chosen as the least obvious option. Then perhaps they would get to the bottom of this.

Celia spoke up and mentioned her dream, saying she had now had it twice. She slept? Doesn’t look it.

“Since we were already taking precautions against any more vampire activity, I didn’t mention it the first time,” she said. “Now I’m concerned that it showed up again after the protective spell was cast. I’ve tested the perimeter, and it’s active: no vampire of any sort can get through it without my express invitation, which I obviously won’t be giving. So maybe it’s more metaphoric.”

Everyone turned to look at Sybill, but she predictably had nothing useful to offer on the subject of dreams featuring Turok-Hans and giant snakes.

“Harry,” Celia continued, “if you have a Pensieve, can I ask you to have a look at the dream later? I doubt the snake said anything useful, but just in case, would you please translate?”

“Yeah, sure,” he replied drowsily.

The idiot hasn’t taken any of the Invigoration Draught at all.

Just as Severus was about to ask if they could now adjourn the bloody useless meeting, Filius piped up with a completely irrelevant question regarding what Celia planned to teach the new Slayer once she was identified. Worse, it appeared that Celia had expected the question, as she had little scrolls of parchment for all of them with a list of the topics above and beyond the Hogwarts curriculum she would be covering with the young lady. She was saying something about adjusting as necessary based on the girl’s aptitudes, but he focused instead on the list.

The first several items were obvious. They did not teach physical forms of self defense at all, so obviously she would need to cover that. Some of the potions that were not in even the N.E.W.T. curriculum seemed reasonable enough until he saw “contraceptive potions, minimum two variants.”

“Excuse me,” he drawled, “but why in the world would you teach the girl to brew contraceptive potions? Surely you realize we do not encourage the sort of behavior among the students that would render such a thing necessary?”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “Don’t worry. I have no intention of imposing some sort of stereotypically loose American morals on a proper British young lady,” she said, her voice dripping with sarcasm. “However, rape is a very real job hazard for a Slayer, and she will be protected against any additional consequences if it should happen.”

Severus felt as though she had physically slapped him. He had not thought of that possibility. It had seemed odd that she would be taking such a potion herself while claiming to be “out of practice,” but he had not given it much thought. Was that truly such a danger?

Potter finally seemed to wake up. “What? I’d think a Slayer, especially one who’s a witch, would be at less risk for that, not more.”

“You’d think,” she replied. “But we’re not invulnerable. We can still be stunned, drugged, or just plain knocked out. It shouldn’t happen, but it can, and we’re far more often in situations where any of the above could happen than the average woman. Besides, human men aren’t the only, nor even the primary, concern.”

Potter looked a bit green at that. So, for that matter, did several of the other teachers. Minerva, however, clearly already knew about all of this, damn her.

“I see you have some idea what is involved in a demon-human pregnancy,” she continued. “Even trying to terminate one can be fatal, and trust me, it’s a horrible way to die.” The look on her face suggested she had witnessed just such a death. “Obviously that risk is not to Slayers alone, but as I said, we’re just more often in situations that make it possible, so she will be protected. If she doesn’t have the aptitude to learn to make it herself, then I’ll make it for her for as long as she is in my care, and someone else will take over after that. Obviously, it’s preferable that she not be dependent on others for that, or the healing potions that are listed for that matter, so if she’s one of those students that melts cauldrons in every class, I’ll be making every effort to forcibly drag her up to par.”

Silence fell over the table, and several eyes were now on him. Since he had raised the question, after all, he merely nodded and made it obvious that he was moving on to read the rest of the list.

“Resistance to torture?” Potter sputtered. “Minerva, you can’t seriously tell me you’re going to sit back while someone casts the Cruciatus on a student!”

Minerva, however, merely gestured to Celia, who responded. “I have no intention of casting the Cruciatus on her, Harry. Not planning to allow anyone else to, either. In fact, you’ll notice there is a mark next to that one, showing that I’m not the one who will be teaching her to resist torture. One of the older Slayers has developed a program on coping with non-magical forms of torture.”

“You run into lots of demons that are into torture, then?”

“Demons, vampires, hell-gods, whatever. Yes. Sometimes they aren’t just on a killing spree. Sometimes they want something. And if they even think it’s something she could give them, yes, they’ll probably try to torture her. So she needs to be prepared for that possibility, as best as can be. That’s why she also needs to learn Occlumency. Legilimency will be useful for her, too, if she has the aptitude, but she absolutely has to try to learn at least basic Occlumency.”

“And next I see you’re planning to teach her to cast the Killing Curse?” Potter continued, obviously incredulous.

Celia had clearly had enough. “Harry, what part of the word ‘Slayer’ do you not understand? Of course I have to teach her to kill, preferably while keeping herself alive. And, okay, there’s a whole boatload of demons the Killing Curse won’t kill, especially things like vampires that are already walking cadavers, but there are many more that it will. So, yes, she has to be proficient with it.”

“Who the hell are you going to use for practice?” he demanded.

“Animals that are either fatally injured or terminally ill,” she replied impatiently. “Obviously that means field trips to a couple of veterinarians we work with.”

“So you’re going to teach her to kill little defenseless animals?”

“No, I’m going to teach her to use a tool that, among other things, can end the suffering of little defenseless animals. And when she’s learned to manage doing that, even while being as sad as I expect her to be about it, then maybe she’ll be able to cast it when faced with some giant demon with too many heads and teeth, rather than freezing in terror or trying to close in on it with a blade when she doesn’t have to endanger herself like that. I’ll also remind you that obviously using it on an animal or a hostile demon is not considered ‘unforgivable.’”

Severus watched this exchange with interest. It wasn’t often that anyone else put Potter in his place, and it was rather enjoyable to watch in spite of everything.

“Are there any other questions?” Minerva asked. When no one replied, she continued, “If not, then I’d like to focus on the business at hand. When the young lady is activated, we will certainly need to discuss her schooling, particularly if she needs remedial work in any key areas. For now, however, I’d rather that you all focus your energies on dealing with whomever brought that vampire onto the grounds, and that starts with getting the students in to breakfast.”

With that, the meeting was finally adjourned, and Severus returned to Slytherin House to escort his students to the Great Hall. On his way there, he stopped into his lab to retrieve two more doses of Invigoration Draught.

~ ~ ~

He noticed that Celia was unusually silent at breakfast. It was not surprising that she was not speaking to him, but she’d barely said two words to Hagrid either, and that was unusual. She must be truly exhausted. That was only important because of the possibility her classes would suffer, of course.

Since they had the only classes currently being held out of doors, Hagrid and Celia would be the first to escort their students out of the Great Hall. When Hagrid rose and called for the fourth year Gryffindors and Slytherins to follow him, Severus pulled the phials of Invigoration Draught out of his pocket and placed them on the table next to her. She looked at them, then looked at him questioningly.

“We can’t have you falling asleep in class,” he said and watched her reactions as she processed this. No change of expression crossed her face.

“Thank you,” she said quietly and pocketed the phials before rising, pointing her wand to her throat and calling out, “Third year Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw, please proceed to the Entrance Hall.”

Once she had left, following her pack of students, he rose and summoned the first year Slytherins and Gryffindors to proceed to the dungeons. As if having first years for first period on a Monday was not bad enough any other week.

~ ~ ~

At lunch, Celia was absent once again. This time it was Severus who asked after her.

“I dunno,” Hagrid answered. “Maybe she wanted t’ do some markin’. Patrollin’s been takin’ a big chunk out of everyone’s nights, an’ everyone bu’ her’s goin’ t’get a break.”

“I suppose that’s true,” he replied. “It can’t be helped, though.”

“Oh, I know tha’,” said the half-giant as he returned to his meal.

Severus narrowed his eyes and scanned over the four long tables of students. Which one of these dunderheads thought it would be a brilliant idea to invite a vampire onto the grounds? All of this, everything that has happened since Saturday night, falls squarely on that student’s shoulders.

As he was thinking this, Celia appeared at the doors to the Hall and called for the N.E.W.T. students to join her for their class. He noted that she still looked quite drawn, but resolutely ignored this observation. She had the Invigoration Draught to get her through her classes, and that was his only concern. After Hagrid led the fifth year Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws out of the Hall, Severus rose and called for the fourth years from the same houses. Following them to the dungeons, he wondered when he had started minding a quiet lunch.

~ ~ ~

At dinner, she appeared to be ravenous. Oddly enough, the fact that she was eating unusually fast seemed to have brought out her extremely inefficient American dining style, something she had abandoned last autumn. He found himself amused at the sight of her dance of utensils from hand to hand, then shook it off. Despite his intentions to the contrary, he found himself asking, “Did you actually skip lunch completely?”

She shot him an indecipherable look, then shrugged and said, “Pensieves don’t agree with me, and I had Harry take a look at that dream during the free period we both had right before lunch.”

“What do you mean they ‘don’t agree with you’?” he asked, annoyed with himself for finding this bit of information … annoying.

“I mean I get very nauseous, and it takes me a couple of hours to recover,” she replied.

“Why?” He supposed it could have something to do with what had been done to her mind, though that did not quite make sense. Had that teacher of hers blocked off other memories at the same time? That would be a much more logical cause for such a reaction.

“How should I know?” She appeared irritated. “And why would it matter?”

It would not. It was none of his concern, and he was unsure why he had asked at all.

“I don’t suppose it occurred to you that I could have provided the memory,” he said snidely.

“I wasn’t planning to ask you for any special favors.”

When she did not continue, he asked, “And did you learn anything useful?”

“No. All it said was ‘I’ve found her, my Master will be so pleased.’ Since it was, in fact, looking for Dawn, that doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with the current situation.”

“But it could refer to your charge,” he pressed. He found the idea of a giant viper saying anything remotely like that profoundly uncomfortable. It seemed far too much like something best left in the past.

“It could,” she agreed, face and tone still unreadable. “However, since the only outsider who has found anyone in the past couple of days is now dust, that’s not the most helpful lead ever.”

“No, I suppose not.”

She set down her utensils, wiped her mouth briefly with her napkin, and pushed back from the table. “Time I set out, then. I’ll send a message if I find anything.”

Turning so that he could speak more softly, he said, “You should send an all-clear message every hour and when you finish for the night.”

She raised her eyebrows. “To both you and Minerva?”

“No, send to Minerva only if there is trouble.”

She nodded, though her expression was guarded. “Okay then. I have six-thirty now.”

As she turned and left, he felt oddly pleased that they had managed to have such a civil, professional conversation.

~ ~ ~

By the time her final Patronus arrived at half past twelve with the message, “All clear. Calling it a night,” he thought he might finally be getting used to having a silver snake slithering down the hall or across his desk at him. At least it had stopped unnerving him after the second time. Minerva had told him what to watch for yesterday, but as there had been no problems to report during the night, Celia had not sent any until he’d requested tonight’s check-ins. Ironic that the Head of Slytherin House should be so uncomfortable around snakes, but then, anyone who had spent any time at all around the Dark Lord surely would be.

Such an odd form for a Patronus to take. He’d never heard of anyone with a snake or really, any reptile Patronus. He had no idea what the Dark Lord’s Patronus might have been. Obviously he would have had no need to use one to repel Dementors, as they answered to him, and he had never discovered that it was possible to use them for communication. Fortunately. But if anyone were to have a serpent of some kind for a Patronus, he would have expected it to be the Dark Lord, not a Slayer. Shouldn’t she have a bear or a panther or something?

It was obvious that he needed to get some sleep. There was only so long even he could function running on Invigoration Draught. That was the only possible explanation as to why he was wasting time wondering about this at all. Just because her Patronus brought up old memories was no reason to dwell upon them much less speculate about what he thought it should have been. He pushed away from his desk, went to the tapestry that guarded the door to his quarters from this office, spoke the password, and walked through, determined not to give the matter any further consideration.