Shadows || A Severus Snape Fanfiction

Chapter 13 - A Hollow Hogwarts

Asha grinned. "Don't worry, I'll behave myself. Thanks, Hagrid."

The heavy doors swung shut and the castle was silent. Asha was alone. She pulled a scrunched up piece of old parchment out of her pocket and lobbed in front of her before channelling 'Alarte Ascendare'. The ball of parchment launched upwards and gently tapped the lofty Entrance Hall ceiling before falling. Asha jogged to catch it and threw it up again, this time aiming her wand and causing the paper to burst into a bright blue flame before disintegrating. The whole way down to her Hufflepuff dorm she couldn't stop smiling.

*

As it turned out, Asha enjoyed the castle a lot more when it wasn't full of gossiping students. In the weeks that followed, she made sure to respect Dumbledore's rules and tried to stay out of the way of any staff. She spent a large portion of her time working on the tasks Snape had set her. He had given her permission to use his classroom and ingredients from the supply cupboard (strictly third year supplies only). It was a painful process, completing a potion after an hour of tedious brewing only to be forced to admit she had made a mistake (no matter how small) and needed to start again. When her tolerance for potions exceeded a certain threshold, she found herself procrastinating by trying to spark conversations with paintings in the castle - most were friendly, while some pretended to be asleep or blatantly left their frames.

Asha also, of course, worked on her magic. She had been practising conjuring spells. Conjuring even the simplest of objects was significantly harder than transfiguration. When she was finally able to produce a rickety wooden rocking chair from thin air, she got into the habit of taking library books up to the top of the Astronomy Tower, spending a few challenging minutes trying to conjure her feeble attempt at a chair, casting an additional cushioning spell to make up for it, and reading. The view from the Tower was beautiful and aiming spells off the balcony was a great way to practice without damaging anything.

She also took the time to explore parts of the castle she had seldom visited. Initially, she only ran into Filtch every few days, but in the couple of weeks leading up to the beginning of term, most of the professors returned to prepare for the new school year. She tried her best to avoid them.

One week before school was to restart, Asha was mucking about on the moving staircase between floors three and four. She stood on the bottom step and prepared for the staircase swing around to the west wing (she had come to know the movements of the staircases very well by this point). Mid-way through the rotation, another set of stairs appeared one floor below. Asha lept into the air and dropped. She desperately tried to focus on casting Arresto Momentum, as opposed to the rapidly approaching marble. Unfortunately, her spell was not powerful enough and she landed hard, twisting her ankle. She quickly healed it, feeling more put out by the fact this was her fourth failure to non-verbally cast that spell.

Asha brushed herself off, pointed her wand above her head and murmured "Ascendio". An invisible force propelled her upwards. It was an exhilarating feeling. Just as she reached the peak of her ascent, a staircase rumbled beneath her and she dropped only a few inches before her feet landed on the marble. There was no denying she loved that rush of adrenaline. It made her feel alive.

Suddenly Asha had an idea. She climbed up on to the bannister and turned to face the landing (there was a rather nasty drop behind her which she tried not to think about). What if she were to levitate her shoes... while she was standing in them? She grinned at the absurdity of the idea but stuck out her jean-clad leg all the same and eyed the Converse on her right foot (she had transfigured her old sneakers nearly a week ago).

"What in Merlin's name are you up to this time?" said a pompous man to Asha's right. He was within a painting of five wizards who were sat around a circular table, holding goblets.

"Whatever it is, you can be sure it's going to be daft," piped in the blond-haired warlock next to him. The group sniggered.

Asha ignored them and aimed Wingardium Leviosa at her right foot. She felt the shoe become a force of its own and nearly lost her balance. Keeping her wand as steady as possible, she cautiously tried to move her weight onto her suspended foot. For a fleeting second, she thought it was going to work. Then, as she tried to balance herself, her wand arm began to twitch and her shoe wobbled back and forth. Before she knew it, her foot shot upwards and she was violently flipped upside down, narrowly missing cracking her head on the marble floor by only a couple of feet. The Converse slipped off her foot and shot into the air as Asha crumpled head-first at the top of the staircase. A second later the shoe hit the floor, bounced, and landed neatly next to her. Raucous laughter ensued from the nearby painting and Asha stood up and gave them a dramatic bow.

"Yes, I suppose there's a reason people don't do that," Asha concluded with a grin. She pulled her shoe back on and turned around. There, standing at the base of the staircase, was Severus Snape. He was holding his wand with his arms crossed. Levitating beside him was a rack of vials no doubt intended for the Hospital Wing. His scowl was so lethal that Asha was certain he had just witnessed her ridiculous magical performance. She burst out laughing.

"I'm glad to see your extra hours of learning opportunity are being put to good use," he said in his most disapproving tone.

"I finished my second batch of Shrinking Solution this morning!" Asha protested, "I figured I deserved some... recreational time."

"Indeed," Snape growled. He walked up the stairs and Asha stood aside to let him pass, leaning against the bannister and crossing her own arms. Now that the surprise of meeting him under such absurd circumstances was wearing off, seeing him again felt unnerving. She assumed he was feeling the same but he gave nothing away. When Snape reached the top of the stairs he paused and faced her.

"I want you in my classroom nine o'clock Wednesday morning with all six potions prepared for me to inspect," he said in a bored voice.

Asha gave a nod, "Okay."

"Okay, what?" he snapped.

"Okay, professor."

If anything, Asha was relieved at his usual ill-tempered demeanour. It suited her just fine to pretend that the summer at Abersoch had never happened. Snape turned towards the Hospital Wing and Asha hurried down to the dungeons to try for what felt like the hundredth time, to brew a perfect Doxycide.

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