Circe was dozing dreamily in the early summer sun. The dappled light shone on her face through the tree which she snoozed under. It was the late afternoon on Friday. Teaching was done for the day. She was aching for a Pimms.
Earlier that day she had signed an employment agreement with Dumbledore for the continuation of her role at Hogwarts. Uptake for next year's Ancient Studies classes had doubled and she felt satisfied with her efforts. She breathed a sigh of well-earned relief and listened contentedly to the sounds of far away children at play and birdsong in the boughs above. A smile had settled on her lips as she rested in the warmth of July.
A black shadow passed over her closed eyelids and she opened one eye tentatively.
"Come to enjoy the sun, Professor Snape?"
"We need to talk." He replied simply.
She could not see his face in the glare of the sun but sensed from his tone that he was agitated.
"A herd of wild horses could not compel me to move from here, Severus…" she replied dreamily. "Why don't you sit down here?"
He shifted on his feet and looked around him, thinking about how next to proceed. When he was sure he was out of eyesight of the students, he reluctantly lowered himself down and sat on the grass beside her.
"I think something is going to happen soon." He said, looking out across the lake.
"What makes you say that?" She asked, sitting up and reclining back on her arm.
Her hair fluttered softly in the breeze and fell across her face. Her white blouse was dazzling in the sun, casually unbuttoned down past her breasts, revealing her simple white vest beheath and her bare, perfumed collarbone. On the breeze, he caught the delicious scent of her: peony and blushed suede. In the golden afternoon sun, she looked almost like a renaissance painting.
"Up in the courtyard, I overheard Potter and his friends conspiring."
"About what?"
"Me."
He looked to her as he spoke. He was her dark checkerboard square to her white. They made for a rather contrasting couple, both sitting together under the boughs of the tree in their monochromatic outfits. Circe almost admired Severus's commitment to black, even in the heat of the summer.
"Oh don't be such a tease, tell me what they said."
"They seem to think that I'm the one that's been causing all of this hassle. Heard Potter outright accuse me of being the braggart who sold Hagrid the egg."
"Ha! Of course they do…"
"Well, it wouldn't be the first time I was the villain of someone's story."
"But what are they doing, Severus? Sneaking about, checking out Flamel's book..."
"God knows. They were in conspiratorial whispers with one another when I overheard them. I almost confronted them, said that they were outright up to something. Weasley almost wet himself and Potter thought it was some kind of staring competition."
"Remind me to tell Minerva to keep an extra careful eye on them."
"I'm afraid Minerva will have her hands full over the next few days." Severus said, rifling through his pocket.
"Why?"
"This was pinned to the notice board in the Staff Room."
Severus handed her a piece of paper. Circe unfolded it and read to herself:
"Staff,
I've been called away to the Ministry on urgent business. Details lacking but I was advised to come ASAP. Please forward on any queries for me to Minerva as the temporary Head in my absence.
Dumbledore"
"Odd." Circe surmised to him.
"Indeed." Severus agreed. "Especially as Quirrell has been absent due to "illness" for the past week or so."
"Severus…" she asked, pausing to sit up straight and catch his eye. "Do you get the feeling that this is something like the calm before the storm?"
He nodded solemnly.
"If I was a betting man, I'd say something was going to happen tonight. If I was a clever man, I myself might even try to make a grab for the Stone now Dumbledore is out of the castle."
"You know… if you really think he's going to try something...you could try and catch Quirrell red handed. With his hands in the proverbial biscuit tin."
Severus scoffed and stood up. "That's if I could even get past all of the Stone's protection myself."
Circe too rose to her feet and faced him head on. "I'd come with you."
"No." He replied quickly.
"Yes, Severus. Think about it. You know your level of protection. I know mine. And we both know what Sprout planted thanks to her slip up at the beginning of the year in Dumbledore's office. I mean, between the two of us I'm sure we could figure out Flitwick and Minerva's enchantments. Really, there's no two people in Hogwarts better equipped to do this than you and I..."
"You don't know about the dog." Severus replied, raising his brow.
"What dog?" She asked, taken aback.
Severus took one last look out over the lake and sighed. It looked like he was going headlong into danger, with Circe refusing to let him go it alone.
She's too stubborn to take no for an answer now , he thought. And she is, rather infuriatingly, right about our collective knowledge. Perhaps it would be nice to have a companion to jump into the abyss with…
"What did you do with that guitar ornament from Christmas?"
-----
Severus waited for Circe to materialise on the lower floor of the stairway. They had planned to meet in this location a few hours after dark before bracing the trials of the third floor. He watched the staircases move silently, switching their positions supposedly at random whilst the innumerable portraits around him snoozed dreamily.
Why do they bother going to sleep? He wondered. Do portraits feel tired?
Severus couldn't picture a future in which anyone would want a portrait of him after his death, let alone a version of him that actually liked to sleep. Sleep was when his mind would torment him with unfiltered and unwarranted thoughts and feelings. Nightmares that gripped him with a terror that shook his bones, sadness that would leave his chest feeling hollow and crippled, faces of those he'd rather forget, nonsense speech of words he was desperate to remember. Things that lay buried and suppressed in the day came roaring to life with a frightening intensity when he slipped into dreams.
He had dreamt of Lily the night before, but a Lily that he had never known: a reproachful, vengeful spirit that clawed at his face and cried out in a jealous rage. She had screamed at him like a banshee, calling him "traitor", "disloyal". He knew in his heart, having conjured the image from deep within his psyche, that she wasn't referencing his previous sidings with the Dark Lord. But in his waking mind, he could not fathom exactly why she had called him those things regardless. Or perhaps, he chose not to remember...
"Severus…" a voice whispered to him, in the shadows at his back.
He turned sharply to the source of the noise and there was Circe. She carried nothing with her save for her wand and the small glass ornament that she had squirreled away as a keepsake after last Christmas.
"Are you ready?" she asked.
Severus nodded in reply. "I heard someone moving about on the upper floors about half an hour ago. Couldn't tell who it was, but they were definitely there."
"Well, if you were a betting man, Severus, the drinks would have been on you tomorrow."
"Mmmm." he grumbled, taking little pleasure in the fact that he had been right. "Come on."
In unison, they stepped onto a staircase that lifted them up the floors to the threshold of the third floor corridor. Circe walked inquisitively to the door that barred the way, fumbling with the already open lock.
"Well, if we were in any doubt before that someone was going to break in…"
"Bit careless of Quirrell to not lock it behind him after he'd passed through though, don't you think?"
"A little." she agreed, nodding thoughtfully to herself. She placed a hand on the door and stood still for a while. Circe thought she felt quite the commotion happening on the other side of the door...but no sound. "Is there a silencing charm placed on this door?" she asked.
"Of course. Wouldn't want that great bloody dog barking the entire school down and alerting everyone to its presence."
"Severus, come feel." she said, grabbing his sleeve and forcing his hand to the door.
Severus too felt the hard, powerful thuds of commotion happening on the other side.
"What the bloody hell is he doing?" Severus asked, pulling away. "He knows that the monster responds to music. Why has he deliberately got it agitated?"
"How big is this thing, Severus? It sounds massive."
"Huge. I'm surprised it didn't tear all of my leg off at Hallowe'en."
"Oh good God, so that's what injured you on that night…?"
Circe breathed in deep and tried to settle her nerves. Her stomach was already doing somersaults.
Come on, you haven't even started the trials yet. She said to herself. You can't be scared already.
She reached into her pocket and pulled out the guitar ornament, casting the engorgio charm on it once more. It bulged into life-sized in her hands and she tweaked a few strings to tune. She nodded solemnly to Severus when she was ready.
Severus flung the door open and instantly, the cacophonous sound of three dog heads barking at an alarming volume rattled her skull. Against her base instinct to turn and run, she willed herself inside and began strumming something, anything that came to mind. Fluffy's many heads snapped up at them and he stopped scraping agitatedly away at the trap door on the floor. Three drooling, fanged sets of knashers began advancing on her. Circe faltered and played a bum note, which elicited a growl from one of the heads. Her mind went completely blank as panic seized her and her hands froze, hovering over the strings.
"Play something!" Severus shouted.
"What?!"
"Anything! Now isn't the time for stage fright!"
"Tell me something quick then!"
"I don't know music! I told you!"
Fluffy snapped his three massive jaws together with a murderous look in his eyes.
"You must know something….Say anything!" She pleaded, barely audible above the thunder-like growls.
"I don't know… ummm… The Beatles…"
"Which song..?"
"I haven't a clue! I DON'T KNOW MUSIC!"
"How can you not know any of The Beatles?!" She asked, shaking in fright.
Fluffy pounced at them and they both dodged to either side of his massive paws. Circe's mind fog finally cleared thanks to the threat of imminent death by mauling and she started strumming out a bit of 'Twist and Shout'. The great dog suddenly closed its jaws and looked upon Circe with inquisition. All three heads cocked to the side and started swaying to the beat of the tune.
"It's working, thank God." Breathed Severus. "Sing too!"
"We'll shake it up baby now
Shake it up, baby.
Twist and Shout.
Twist and shout…"
Circe sucked in her breath, hungry for air. The dog's faces twitched as her singing stopped.
"Help me out with the refrains, Severus."
"What…?"
"Just repeat what I say."
"We'll shake it up baby, now."
"Sh-shake it up… baby." Severus cringed deeply at himself.
"Twist and shout."
"...Twist and shout."
"Come on, come on, come on baby now."
"Come on baby."
"Open that trapdoor out..."
Severus looked to her, confusion on his face. She nodded desperately to the door on the floor as she relentlessly kept on playing and singing.
"Come get that trapdoor open, Sev.
Open it, Sev.
Your singing is no good.
Is no good.."
Severus paused in his heaving to cast her a scowl. She laughed at him and gave him a wink. Fluffy yawned contentedly and slid to the floor in slumber.
"You know we gotta be going, Fluffy.
Gotta be going.
So go to sleep for good.
Go to sleep for good, woooooo!"
With her final howl she jumped through the open door into the chamber below. Severus followed in hot pursuit.
-----
Severus made short work of the Devil's Snare, freeing Circe from the grasp of its tendrils with his charm. The only casualty of their encounter with the deadly plant was the guitar; smashed to pieces breaking her fall as she slipped from the tentacle-like grip.
Let's hope Severus has a newfound love of singing Circe thought, thinking about how they were going to get past Fluffy on the way out.
They passed through into the adjacent room to a sky full of tiny fluttering wings. Circe's mouth hung open as her eyes darted from tiny winged key to tiny winged key. They were so numerous that it was as if the cathedral-like ceiling was full of glitter. Severus walked solemnly over to where a lone broom sat hovering in the center of the room and turned back to Circe.
"Well, time to redeem yourself, Hufflepuff-eater."
Circe grimaced as he let slip that he'd heard her old Quidditch nickname. Probably when he was hiding from me in the staff room…
"Wait… what's that supposed to mean?" She asked defensively.
"After the way you froze up in front of that Cerberus..?" Severus responded, sneering at her. "You led me to believe that you weren't going to be a liability on this mission."
"Excuse me, Mister-Culturally-Dead, but the last time I checked you weren't exactly a guitar hero."
"I could have charmed an instrument…"
"And pardon me for feeling a tad threatened by the three-headed big boy behemoth who was eyeing me up like a squeaky toy!"
"If you want to go toe to toe with a dark wizard you're going to have to work much harder to suppress that fight or flight response, Circe." He spat, pointing a finger in her face.
She slapped it away, her hackles raised.
"Don't lecture me, Professor. I'm just as capable as you. We're still alive aren't we? And as I recall, the last time you tried to do this alone, you came limping back to safety with your tail between your legs!"
He had no response, he just stared at her seething with anger.
Circe breathed out a long sigh and looked up at the swarm of keys. After a moment's searching she spotted the key that most likely fit the ancient lock on the door. It was a tiny little thing, and her eyesight was not what it used to be when she was on the Quidditch team in school. She breathed deeply to calm herself and straddled the broom. The keys descended on her instantly, in a flurry of scrapes and stings.
"Jesus Christ, these things are like bees!" She shouted as she rose up into the ceiling space.
"Oh, what a shame. I'm sure you'll cope, you're capable. " Snape responded sarcastically.
Circe tried to outrun the swarm, closing in on the key she had targeted. She had always been a beater, not a seeker, and keeping her eye on the minuscule moving target proved difficult. Yet after a while, her fist enclosed around it and she called back down to Snape.
"Catch it and unlock the door, Severus!"
Snape made no move to acknowledge that he'd heard her, and as she threw it down to him he remained stoically stood with his arms crossed across his chest. The key fluttered away back into the cavernous roof.
"Oh I'm sorry, did you speak to me? I think I'm now "Mister-Culturally-Dead"." He said, his voice dripping in sarcasm.
"Oh for fuck sake." Circe muttered as she grabbed the key again. "We can have our married couple's tiff when we've caught Quirrell. Now unlock the door, Snape!"
Snape blushed and the next time she threw the key down to him, he caught it without complaint.
The door yawned open and he stood aside, holding it open for her. Circe swiftly dismounted from the broom, throwing it unceremoniously on the floor, and went sprinting to safety from the stinging keys. As soon as she was over the threshold, Snape slammed the door shut behind her, hearing the tiny little thuds of the keys crashing into the wood.
As Circe lay panting on the floor, she turned towards Severus and gave him a knowing look.
"Truce, Severus?" She asked, extending a hand.
"Truce."
He extended his own and helped her up to her feet.
-----
Circe passed through the purple fire, the feeling of ice in her belly. She had her eyes closed as she felt the flames licking at her skin. A tickle but not a burn. Severus's hand enclosed around her wrist and guided her to the other side confidently.
"You're through now." He said slowly. "Open your eyes."
"Wow, that felt weird." Circe said, chuckling slightly.
"If I am completely honest I wasn't sure there was enough of the correct potion left for us both to pass through safely."
"Oh, cheers Severus." She responded coldly.
"Would you have felt better if I'd had told you that before you stepped through the flames?"
"No… probably not." She conceded. "Why was there so little left in that vial?"
"I was just thinking that myself."
"Quirrell alone shouldn't have drunk that much of it."
"No."
They walked on to the next room, both in silent thought.
"Do you think he has an accomplice that we don't know about?"
"Possibly. But I've been intercepting all of his correspondence since the New Year and there was nothing there to hint at a partner in crime."
"And neither of us have seen him meeting with anyone here at Hogwarts."
They strode together down a long, dark corridor, both of them lost in thought.
"Oh, congrats on the puzzle by the way." Circe said. "A lot of wizards don't have a scrap of logic in their brains, they'd have never been able to figure out your level of protection."
"Oh.. uh.. Thank you." Snape replied awkwardly. "I thought it was simple, but effective. If I'm right, we should be coming to your level of protection next. That will be a fairly simple task too, I imagine-"
"Yeah, about that…" Circe mumbled.
The room which they had just entered erupted into light. Huge flame torches ignited around the walls, casting deep ominous shadows in their wake. In front of them was a huge set of bronze scales, etched with ancient hieroglyphic symbols and embedded with lapis lazuli. On one end of the scales sat a pure white feather, seemingly hovering in mid air, which glowed with a heavenly golden hue. The other end of the scales was empty. And standing like an ancient sentinel next to them was a fifty foot high statue of the Egyptian God Thoth.
"Professor, what the bloody hell is this?" Snape asked angrily, scanning the contents of the room.
"The weighing of the heart rite, from The Book of the Dead." Circe responded simply. "You must weigh yourself against the feather of the goddess Maat , the goddess of truth. Only when you are not found lacking, and the scales tip in your favour, can you be granted the scarab-key..."
She pointed to the roof and there hanging just out of reach was an inscribed stone scarab about the size of a fist.
"So how do we tip the scales so that we weigh less than a blasted feather?!"
"The great god Thoth…" she pointed to the looming statue by the scales. "Will quiz you and decide your fate. He is the god of knowledge. He holds the answers to many things on his scribes."
Severus looked at the ibis-headed god with contempt. True to her word, the statue held in his hands a small roll of papyrus and a thin quill poised above the paper. He could read nothing in the beady black bird's eyes as he stared down his beak at them both, seemingly watching he and Circe approach the scale.
" Quiz you?" Severus asked, hoping for clarification.
"Riddles."
"Ah…"
As soon as their feet touched the golden disc of the scale, the statue sprang to life, bowing its great head to them. Severus flinched and strode to Circe's side, ready to protect her, as the statue lowered his arms slowly.
" Who approaches Thoth to weigh their hearts against the Feather of Truth? " the statue boomed.
"Professors Circe Smith and Severus Snape." responded Circe.
" Three riddles I shall ask. Respond with truth and you shall ascend, respond with falsehood and you shall suffer the consequences. "
"Well we should make short work of this, Professor. This is after all your creation so you should know all of the answers before he finishes speaking!"
"Professor Snape, there are over three hundred different riddles and spells in the Book of the Dead alone…I told you before I didn't keep a record of anything I used for this. "
"So you don't know..?"
"The answer to three hundred different riddles? Of course not!"
Severus had no reply for her. The scales groaned and creaked as the disc they stood upon lifted them up so they sat level with the feather. Severus cast a sidelong look at her and steeled himself. He nodded.
"We are ready." Circe said to the statue.
" I talk, but I do not speak my mind
I hear words, but I do not listen to thoughts
When I wake, all see me
When I sleep, all hear me
Many heads are on my shoulders
Many hands are at my feet
The strongest steel cannot break my visage
But the softest whisper can destroy me
The quietest whimper can be heard."
Circe's face fell. Severus too became slightly worried. He looked to her as she furiously puzzled, thinking it through. She had her tongue stuck out to the left side of her mouth again, and Severus knew from this she was deep in concentration.
"You don't know do you?" he asked flatly.
"Let's just think about this for a minute…"
"Oh this is ridiculous." Severus strode up to the statue, grabbing on to one of the thick bronze chains that kept their disc suspended.
"Severus wait…"
"A liar." he said to Thoth, completely guessing.
"Severus!"
The floor beneath their disc fell away in an instant, revealing a deep cavernous hell-pit. Severus looked down into the newly open hole and gasped as he saw a hideous crocodile-headed monster waiting for him with snapping jaws. The disc lurched downwards and Severus and Circe cried out, hanging on to the chains for dear life. They stopped just short of the ground, now perilously close to the mouth of the monster.
"If we are found lacking, our hearts will be fed to Sobek, the crocodile God!" Circe shouted at him.
The beast beneath them roared, almost punctuating her point.
"You couldn't have told me that before?"
"Would you have felt better if I did?!" she replied sarcastically, mimicking his sarky question from earlier.
" The correct answer was, an actor." Thoth informed them.
"We have two riddles left. We have to get them both right, otherwise we'll never reach the scarab." Circe said, leaving out what would happen to them if they got one wrong.
" I am a house, but not a home.
One enters blind, but comes out seeing.
Although despised by many, I am insanely craved by some.
And even though I'm all stress and work, I only want to improve your being ."
"Oh, this is good." Circe said, her mood brightening. "I remember this one. Any guesses Severus?" she asked, smiling at him.
"Are you serious?" he asked, incredulously. "If you know then tell him the bloody answer."
"Oh no, go on…"
He sighed deeply, folding his arms. "Lets see.. a place in which you enter blind, metaphorically I'm presuming, and come out seeing. Despised by many…" he pondered. "School." he said resolutely as the lightbulb moment came.
"School." Circe told Thoth confidently.
The Thoth statue was unmoving and silent as Severus held his breath. The confirmation came when the disc was raised upwards slowly, and they were once again level with the feather. Severus cast his eye up to the scarab that still hung tantalisingly just out of reach above him.
"Last chance." he said.
"The rich men want it,
the wise men know it,
the poor all need it,
the kind men show it."
"Well?" Sape asked expectantly.
"Ah shit…" Circe muttered, turning to Severus wide eyed.
"Please tell me you're joking."
Circe shook her head slowly. "Let's just talk it through. You know these types of things, they seem obvious once you hear the answer."
"But we don't know the answer!" He shouted. "We are royally fucked!"
Sobek roared beneath them, rattling the great brass chains they still clung to.
"Shut up! Let me think…What do rich men want that they don't already have?"
"Pfft… um. Happiness? That would work for the kind men too."
"But what wise man do you know that's ever happy?" She responded. "And you can be poor and happy too."
"Then what?" Severus asked shortly.
Circe sat down and put her head into her hands. She thumped at her skull and moaned, desperately trying to conjure up the answer. Severus too began to pace the edges of the disc like a caged tiger. He stole a furtive glance over the edge at the monster pit beneath him and swallowed hard. Sobek paced around its edges, just like he did.
Then, almost in unison, it came to them. Severus froze almost in mid-step. Circe snapped her head up from her lap. They locked eyes and stared at one another. Wordlessly, they sussed that the other had come to the same conclusion.
"Does it work…?" Circe asked, doubting her epiphany briefly.
"For each one, yes."
Circe laughed at the simplicity of it. She rose to her feet and touched Severus on the arm.
"You say it. Redeem yourself, Snape." She added with a wink.
Severus initially bristled at her comment but decided not to retaliate. He relinquished his pride to her and gave a small smirk. He cast his eyes on the emotionless face of Thoth, who waited stoically for their answer.
"Love."
Thoth gave away nothing. And in the suspenseful silence that followed, there was no noise other than the pounding of both of their hearts. The scales creaked beneath them. Lurching this way and that, teasing them for the briefest of seconds with the outcome. The disc rose and Severus almost jumped for joy. Circe squealed as the scarab lowered into her outstretched hands. She snatched it down from the sky and cradled it to her chest. Sobek roared in a blood-chilling way one last time as the hell pit closed, denying him his fleshy feast.
"What do we do with it now?" Severus asked.
Circe extended it out to Severus, beaming from ear to ear. He took the scarab from her, his hand lingering on top of hers for an excruciating moment.
"Give it to him." Circe said, her voice a hoarse whisper.
Her eyes darted back to Thoth and she watched a flicker of something she couldn't quite place pass over Severus's face.
Once where there had been the look of a predator eyeing up prey, there was now something softer. Something sweeter. A look that made her legs feel like mush. It had been gentle and slow, she realised. Like a frog sitting in a boiling tub of water. A complete surprise, but not really… Much like a small animal that is being stalked, she realised too late that she was gone.
Oh Merlin, I… fancy him!
Her crush on Severus had rather successfully snuck up on her.
She watched as Severus extended the scarab out to Thoth. The giant took it from him in one of his great hands and much like Circe had done, cradled it to his own chest. Light shone from his core which blinded them both and made them turn from the dazzling rays. When they looked back, a door had emerged in the chest of the statue. Severus was the first to climb down from the scales, extending a hand out to Circe to assist her. She didn't resist the goosebumps that bloomed up and down her arms as their skin touched.
"Once more unto the breach, dear friends." Severus said, pausing at the door to turn to her.
"Shakespeare." Circe said with a nod of approval.
"I may not know The Beatles, but I'm not totally culturally dead."
"Nor emotionally either, it seems. You big old softie."
"What?"
"The rich men want it, the wise men know it, the poor all need it, the kind men show it." she repeated.
"Ugh." he groaned. "I feel I may vomit. It sounds like one of your t-shirts."
Well, let's perhaps stick to one startling revelation at a time. Circe thought to herself.
"Shall we?" she gestured to him to enter through the door before them.
"We shall."
Severus strode off with that determined swagger that she had come to know him for. Against her better judgement, Circe found herself wondering if his bum, somewhere beneath those great swathes of black cloth, was as pale as his face...