Leave me (a Severus and Edward friendship fanfic)

Chapter 7- Truth and Lies

“Any luck?” I asked Albus without looking at him; my eyes were captured by the ancient drawings that fronted every book.

“Not as of yet,” Dumbledore replied hesitantly as he quickly leafed through the volume he had begun, and then placed it on the top of the pile he had created to the right of his desk. “Though I hope the pieces will fall into place over time. How about you- did your reflections provide you with any further insights?” he enquired, his full attention now on me.

I could tell by the way he was eying me that Dumbledore had not forgotten the brief moment in the Pensieve when I acknowledged that ‘there are many strange things about this boy’. I sensed that Albus was as willing to listen to my thoughts as I was to share them, but the only way it would be of benefit, beyond a venting escapade, would be to do it methodologically.

“I am not sure,” I told Albus honestly. “I feel the information is right in front of us, but it has been difficult for me comprehend it; it’s all a mix of truth and lies,” I explained with a slight hiss in my tone that was directed at the boy for not being honest right from the beginning. Of course, I understood why he wasn’t (due to the bartender being present), but I was determined to make some sense of the memory before leaving Dumbledore’s office and he had made it extremely difficult.

“Share your thoughts with me,” Albus invited, and then leaned back in his chair evidently in preparation for a long discussion despite it being near midnight.

The list I had mentally created whilst still in my memory immediately came to the fore of my mind.

“I want to start with the facts- what we definitely know about him and/or his species,” I asserted, to prepare Albus for my train of thought.

“Excellent idea,” Dumbledore praised me, leaning forward slightly perhaps in anticipation of any knowledge he had not gained from his own observations.

 “His appearance is of supernatural quality, so perfect that he cannot be human,” I begun matter-of-factly.

Albus nodded his head in agreement.

“I noticed that his eyes were unnaturally bright; I have never seen anyone with crystal clear eyes nor any the colour of honey,” I moved on, hoping to get through my list reasonably quickly.

“Neither have I.”

I shook my head, lost in thought. “If his irises were more yellow than honey in colour, I would be willing to say his eyes resembled some animals, such as a cat’s or an owl’s,” I reasoned out loud.

“Mmm, an interesting theory, Severus,” Albus muttered as he began to scratch a sentence on a piece of parchment that had magically appeared in front of him. “He certainly appeared rather feline as he left the bar.”

I stared absentmindedly at the quill swaying in Albus’ hand as I recalled the way the boy crouched down in a rather animalistic fashion as he left my presence.

“Do you think he could be a shape- shifter- an Animagus from birth?” I asked Albus hesitantly, doubting whether such a thing was even possible.

Albus chuckled as he continued to write.

“Anything is possible, Severus.”

I growled in frustration; Dumbledore was right, the possibilities extended as far as we could imagine, and for Albus at least, that would mean endless years of speculation.

“Regardless, the colour of his eyes is not permanent,” I added, momentarily believing that that solved my problem; I had read that the eye-colour of Animagi remained the same even in their animal form.