After six days of pouting (and several lectures from Lily Evans on friendship), Severus Snape was finally cooling down. On the following Wednesday, he sat quietly next across from her in Great Hall.
"Morning Freya," Lily smiled brightly at the girl across from them.
"Good Morning Lily," Freya returned, her dark eyes flicking up from her homework. They then moved to her other friend. "Sev." Phase two of her plan was supposed to take place much later, the Daily Prophet did not even deliver their weekly mail till Friday, and she had used this week's content on her first attempt. But, still, she counted this as a success.
Lightly, Lily nudged Sev on his sides. "Freya."
"Oh, good morning Regulus." Regulus Black murmured so quietly only Freya caught it, and she sent him a look. He raised his eyebrow in innocence.
Since none of them were particularly adept at conversing, there was a long stretched pause of silence before Lily pointedly cleared her throat. The boy with the oil slick hair pressed his lips together, then barely glanced at Freya. "Your Laughing Potion was very well done."
"Thank you," Freya replied. "As was your Hiccoughing Solution."
With the curt nod of his head, Sev took a sip of his orange juice and Freya resumed doing her homework.
That was it? Lily thought to herself and opened her mouth. As soon as she did, Regs shook his head at her in warning. Pouting, she slouched slightly in her chair and wondered what those hour-long speeches were actually for. Defeated, she ate a piece of bacon. "Do you guys want to go to Hogsmeade this weekend?"
"As a group?" Sev asked lightly and Lily nodded. Unsuccessfully, Sev tried to hide his look of disappointment.
"I could use some new quills." Regs shrugged and looked to Freya. She gave a quick nod of agreement to Lily.
With a large grin, the redhead said, "Very well, then I'll meet you at the usual place on Saturday."
A stone dropped in Freya's stomach. "Saturday isn't good for me."
"We can move it to Sunday." Lily offered.
Sev's brows knitted together. "What is wrong with Saturday?"
The hair on the back of Reg's neck rose and slightly stiffen. Freya thought about her words carefully. "I have a prior engagement."
"With who?" He scoffed lightly.
"Sev," Lily said in warning, but he seemed to be rather upset already.
"It is simply a prior engagement."
"Of course it is." Cold and bitter, he pressed his lips together. "I have lost my appetite." He stood up and left the table, briskly walking down the hall. A puff of air left Lily's mouth, and Regs wondered if he could still get his quills that weekend.
***
Back to square one, Freya found this whole business more and more ridiculous. Classes were over for the day, and she sat in the common room pouring over advanced attack spells.
While Regs sat on the floor with a pained expression on his face as he did his potions homework. Finally, he gave up. "Freya." He drew her name out, and she didn't even look up. "What are you supposed to do after you add ground Occamy eggshells to liquid luck?"
"Stir slowly and then heat the cauldron." She flipped the page, still unable to find one that could have been the spell Barty had tried to use on her. "Then sprinkle powered common rue."
"Powered... common... rue. That all?"
Tentatively, she combed over the last spell in the book over again. "If you want to fail potions: yes. If you want to have liquid luck, then stir vigorously and heat the cauldron one more time before waving your wand into a figure eight and say Felixempra."
"And that's all?" Regs looked rather unimpressed. "Doesn't seem too hard."
"It's only hard if you make hard." An idea flickered in her head, and she closed the book. "I'm going on a walk." This wasn't uncommon for Freya to do and Regs knew she was simply telling him for safety purposes rather than an invitation.
"Try not to lose house points this time."
Freya tossed a pillow at him and glared, but he chuckled.
***
With a kind touch, Freya tickled the painting of a pear next to the Hufflepuff entrance. It was half an hour till ten, and she was supposed to have been back in the common room. Once the painting flung open, she could hear the bustling noise of the house-elves in the kitchens.
"Good evening." She greeted, turning the hood of her coat.
Several chimed back or grumbled in response to her, and a big-nosed elf with large forest green eyes whisked flour in a bowl. "Hello, Madam Freya, how can we help you today? More sandwiches?"
Her cheeks pinked in embarrassment. "No, thank you, Kipper."
"Tea, then? With scones?"
This was possibly her least favorite thing about visiting the kitchens; it made her feel rather useless. Quickly, Freya mustered a polite smile. "Chocolate cake would be nice."
"Right on it," Kipper shouted and snapped her fingers. The bowl whisked on her own, and Freya watched it in wonder. "You've got your journal, eh? More questions?"
"If you are not too busy."
"Not at all, Ma'am. Ask away."
Before Freya could ask her first question, a cup of cocoa was placed next to her by another house-elf named Gee and her cake was baking in the oven. After she led a series of questions regarding their magic(since Kipper had informed her prior that house-elves did not need to follow the Principal Exceptions to Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfiguration), Kipper went on a tangent about cooking since Freya had been looking rather thin since the summer.
"And it's two cups of sugar for every pot, any more, and the whole pie goes mush," Kipper explained. "Any less than.. well, it's not going to taste very good."
"Thank you, Kipper." Though it had not been her intent to learn another recipe, she still wrote it down just in case. "Elves can perform defensive magic, correct?"
"Of course, if our Master requires it."
"And would you be able to perform dark magic as well?"
"I dunno, I've never been asked to, Ma'am."
"What about on your own accord?" Kipper looked rather confused and Freya decided to rephrase the question. "If I asked you to perform a dark spell, would you be able to?"
"Dumbledore wants no dark magic!" Another elf, Gigs, stated loudly.
"No dark magic." Kipper clicked their tongue, and a napkin floated over to Freya. Then they looked at the clock on the wall. "Oh, dear. It's far past your curfew, you should go Ma'am. Please come again to visit, though."
"I will. Thank you for your time," Freya said, closing her notebook and standing up from the stool.
"Take a slice for your friends." The elf waved their fingers, and the cake wrapped itself up in a white cloth.
She took the cake with a nod of appreciation and then left the corridor. Kipper was right; it was far curfew, all the lights of the halls were turned off. Holding her breath, she waited for five counts before lighting her wand to a low level.
With cautious and quick footsteps, Freya retraced her walk back down to the dungeons, but then stopped. Now was the perfect time to go to the restricted section. Very carefully, she went back to the stairs she had just come down from went into the library.
In the far corner was the restricted section, and she became rather familiar with this aspect of the library. It had always caught her interest and it was not until she managed to convince her charms teacher that her essay about the dangers of bogus charms that she was able to obtain a pass to the section. As the librarian unlocked the chains around it, Freya's eyes clung to the process and repeated it the next night.
Once Freya undid the charms and locks(Dumbledore's been slightly more cautious the coming years since You Know Who has been stirring the pot), she quickly grabbed one of the silent books about the Dark Arts and hid it under her cloak.