After

It was while she finished the last of the stonework in the Charms Department that she recalled something Albus had said, “...you have been too stubborn to look into the pensieve to find your answers.”

She wondered if the questions she had really could be answered there. She knew the basic facts of everything and some of the motivations and reasoning, but it wasn’t the full story. Perhaps, perhaps she would have to take a look in that pensieve. Maybe he’d left her a fully recorded story and a reason why he’d left her out of it all in the first place. Maybe her anger was over-blown and this would do something to soothe the constant refrain of memories of broken trust and lies. She didn’t dare hope for too much, but she couldn’t help but hope. 

There was precious little else to hold on to in that present time, nearly everything was up in the air, it was a time of unprecedented undecidedness. It was not a time in which Minerva had wanted to be questioning not just the events of the last few years but one of the most important relationships of the last seventy years of her life. 

The years of deception, her unwavering trust being so broken, the wars, the deaths, the lives that were so scarred by it all, and the necessity of moving forward- it was too much. How could anyone be so haunted by the past, both recent and long ago, and yet required to move on?

She leaned against the newly repaired wall and breathed a miserable sigh. She recalled the total crash she had faced nearly two weeks ago and realised she was on that path again. There were volunteers and skilled craftswizards who would be arriving imminently to help with repairs, and they would already be shocked and appalled by the amount of work she had done ahead of their arrival. So she gave in, shaking her head and sighing again she gave up the work and disapparated to her rooms.

Sinking down into a chair before the empty fireplace, exhausted, Minerva thought again of the little she had let Albus say in between her ranting. The Pensieve… that bottle she’d found in Severus’s desk…an explanation. There was nothing that could excuse their behaviour in her mind, not one thing that either of them could say that would wipe their slates clean and restore her opinion of them, but the thought of an explanation of any kind was suddenly an appealing idea. She had avoided that bottle at first because she had decided that she didn’t want to see whatever it was that they had left for her. She thought that she would rather stay angry at them without the context than have to learn their reasoning and understand their motives even though there was nothing they could say that would fix what they had done. She had just wanted her already complex feelings of betrayal and rage not to grow any more complicated. Was that too much to ask?

Now though it seemed that even though it was bound to show her little more than their idiocy, to have any of this situation illuminated for her might bring some modicum of comfort. Just to know what they were thinking, even if it was inane, might help her understand why they had cut her out, why they had done all that they did. It could never justify their stupidity, but if they just answered her question of why they had done it, it might… well, it might make her feel better. 

Though she was aware that it was part of Albus’s plan, she folded to the idea. Minerva stood up from the chair again and disapparated, appearing in the headteacher’s office, to the surprise of headmaster Dippett. 

“Ah, you’ve returned. I must say I didn’t expect you so soon,” He commented, back in his own frame again.

“Yes, well, I have something I have to do. He may have been an insufferable, arrogant, childish, idiotic, pseudo-martyr, but I’ll take any explanation I can get,” Minerva answered, pronouncing the insult more loudly to be sure that Dumbledore’s portrait (which was still turned to the wall) heard what she had to say.

If he did he did not have a response, that was all the same to Minerva. She turned to the cabinet that housed his pensieve and opened it with a wave of her hand, filling that corner of the room with the soft silvery glow. She crossed the room and took down the bottle that Severus left for her in his desk drawer. Emptying its contents into the basin she prepared herself for what must lie ahead of her and plunged into memories.

The feeling was not unfamiliar, the silky coolness that enveloped the senses as the silver mist swirled before her until clearing into an image of the office she had just left behind.

She caught sight of someone leaving as Albus, who was whole and hale and very much alive behind his desk, shouted after her, “I’ll be sure to complete that, Minerva, I swear it.”

“How many times do I hear that in a week?” She heard her own, annoyed, voice reply as the door closed. Minerva felt a pang of some emotion she couldn’t really name, guilt almost, but still self-righteous enough not to be that. She shouldn’t have been so shrill all of the time. She had become someone she didn’t quite recognise in the last 17 years. 

She turned her attention from the closed door back to Albus and noticed that Severus had appeared when he certainly wasn’t there before. Had he been hiding somewhere? They must have thought that she was catching on to their game, they overestimated her.

What Albus said made her sure that Severus had really been hiding from her in the office. “I shouldn’t say this, but I wonder if this is what it feels like to cheat on a nagging wife.” Minerva flinched at that. Shocked, but mostly appalled. Is that really how he thought of her?

A flash of surprise registered across Severus’s face as he answered, somewhat awkwardly, “I wouldn’t know.” 

“Ah, nor would I,” Albus said, in a way that she could tell that there was a joke coming, “But in the analogy, you do realise that that would make you the other woman, Severus?” He asked with a chuckle. 

The younger man’s brow darkened and he huffed and changed the subject, “Shall we get back to the matter at hand.” 

Albus chuckled again, “You really should lighten up, my boy, but  I suppose you’re right. What were we on?” 

Severus answered, sitting stiffly in the chair opposite Albus. “We were discussing Potter’s hearing, and how you were to proceed with his defense. We can rest assured that the ministry is looking for any possible way they can find to silence and discredit him. Of course, if that nitwit could keep his mouth shut we might find an easier solution to their problem,” His scowl deepened when he spoke of Harry.

“Bastard,” Minerva muttered to herself, rolling her eyes at the scene before her. 

After a moment of thoughtful silence, Albus said, “I will simply have to do my best to avoid him at the hearing, I cannot let him be defended by anyone less capable than I. We need him to keep disrupting their peace, the sooner we get the ministry to believe that Voldemort has returned the better off we certainly shall be.” 

“And you think that Potter will be able to get through to them?” Severus asked, disbelievingly, raising one eyebrow.

Albus bent his head slightly, looking at the desk in front of him, “I am almost sure that he cannot, but the more he is persecuted by them now the more reliable he shall appear to be when they realise the truth. That should be helpful in mobilising the ministry when we need them.” 

“Sure, Albus, let the poor boy go through character assassination and national public shaming at sixteen years old so that he can be a better martyr,” Minerva muttered angrily, though she wished that memories could hear.

“I suppose you understand that he will attempt to contact you while he is here. You do have a rapport with him, he will seek you out,” Severus said coldly. 

“Yes, well, I will do my best to be away as often as I can, the school can go on without me for as long as Minerva is here, after all,” He said with a soft chuckle.

“I have no doubt she’ll be thrilled at the prospect,” Severus replied sarcastically.

Albus just continued chuckling, shaking his head and taking up a quill he said, “Oh, no doubt, and I will have to hear all about it each time I get back.” 

To hear them speak so coldly of her felt like a knife in the heart. After all that she did for both of them, all that she had sacrificed, they could sit there and make light of her. 

She sighed as she heard Albus add, “Ah, but what would we do without her?” and her spirits lifted slightly at that.

Then Severus said, “I couldn’t say but I assume celebrate,” and Minerva’s heart ached. Not that she cared about his opinion, but she had given so much to both of them, and as they chuckled over his comment her heart sank. 

“Now, now Severus,” Albus chastised lightly. “You know that we wouldn’t last without her. But back to the point, it seems likely that the ministry will attempt to interfere at Hogwarts this year, and in such a case it is likely that I will at some point be ousted from this office.” He spoke calmly, as usual, with no trace of anxiety over his position. Then he continued, “There is no one else that I would want to entrust the Headteachership to than Minerva, I insist that you do whatever is in your capability to ensure that she takes over if I am run out. And Severus I want you to put aside your rivalries and petty squabbling. I know she can be… how to phrase this… a bit much? But Severus there are only a few people in this building who are tied to the Order, you, myself, Pomona, Filius, and Minerva, and Harry only knows about three. If something happens to me he is sure to go to Minerva, and likely to her before me at any rate.” He was rambling a bit now, but Minerva was glad that he saw her as so important... because she is. 

“Yes,” Severus interrupted, clearly asking what the point of this was without asking.

“Right, well, the point being that Minerva is central to his defense, whether she knows everything about it or not. He will not come to you if I am gone, he doesn’t know who else here is attached to the Order, he will go to Minerva. So she must be here,” He said the last part with a certain level of forcefulness. “You and I both know that she can be rash, quick to the draw, and protective in a way that will lead her to throw herself in front of others, Don’t Let Her.” 

Severus seemed confused with this order, “How am I to hold her back from anything, what ever I ask of her she will do the opposite, you know that.” 

“Yes, I do, but Severus when she throws herself in front of someone, as she inevitably will, throw yourself in front of her.”

Snape’s brow darkened, and he spoke sourly, “You expect me to accept whatever harm is coming to her? Am I not integral to the Potter boy’s protection? Why would you have tasked me with looking after him for so long if I were not?”

“Severus, to be frank, I would have to change my name,” Albus joked, against all signs that he should not, then leaned forward, pressing the tips of his fingers together,  “But to be brutally honest Severus, you are the last person in Scotland that Harry would come to looking for protection. Minerva is his first point of contact with the order. I can go, you can go, but she is essential should things go the way I anticipate they will.” Minerva felt her anger at him receding slightly, at least he had tried to protect her. 

“Fine, but you know I am only one man, and she is very adept at getting into sticky situations,” Severus said coldly. Minerva couldn’t really disagree, but it was rude that he said it.  The office began to fade out of focus as silver encroached on the memory. Minerva knew how that so-called protection of Severus’s had worked out, she threw herself in front of Hagrid and he was nowhere around and she wound up in St. Mungos just when Harry needed her most, and then Sirius wound up dead. She had taken on a lot of guilt for her dear Sirius’s death, and she was more than willing to push just a little of it off onto Severus. 

The office that had just swirled out of focus appeared again, a year or so later.

Severus, inspecting the damage done to Albus’s hand, ordered, “Drink the rest, it will contain the curse to your hand for the time being…but it will spread.”

Appearing almost unfazed, Albus replied, “How long?”

“Maybe a year,” was the answer Severus gave before standing abruptly as if to leave.

Albus stopped him. “Don’t ignore me, Severus.” The younger man turned back and Albus continued, laying out the plan. “We both know Lord Voldemort has ordered the Malfoy boy to murder me.” He spoke as if it were a far less urgent situation than it appeared to be. Then his voice took on a conniving tone and he said, “But should he fail I would presume the Dark Lord will turn to you.” 

A look of concern, just barely recognisable, crossed Severus’s face. Albus did not let him get a word in there. “You must be the one to kill me Severus, it is the only way. Only then will the Dark Lord trust you completely.

Severus again began to protest, but Albus continued laying out his scheme, “There will come a time when Harry Potter must be told something, but you must wait until Voldemort is at his most vulnerable.”

Severus pulled back from him further, a look of mistrust on his face as he asked,“Must be told what?”

Albus stood from behind the desk, stepping around it slowly to face Severus again. “On the night that Lord Voldemort went to Godric’s hollow to kill Harry, Lily Potter cast herself between them.” Severus looked pained at the recollection. 

Albus went on anyway, “When she did the curse rebounded. When that happened a part of Voldemort’s soul latched itself onto the only living thing it could find, Harry himself.” Severus looked as if he expected that was the truth. Albus went on convincing him anyway, “There’s a reason Harry can speak with snakes, there’s a reason he can look into Lord Voldemort’s mind. A part of Voldemort lives inside him.” 

Severus drew further away from him yet again, eyes widening ever so slightly in surprise as he seemed to realise the implications of this. “So when the time comes… the boy must die?”

Albus, with less than half of the respectable amount of shame, nodded gravely and replied, “Yes. Yes, he must die.” Minerva felt the anger and hatred for him rear up in her chest. How could he have done this to Harry?

Severus seemed to be thinking along similar lines, though he expressed himself in different terms, “You’ve kept him alive so he can die at the proper moment. You’ve been raising him like a pig for slaughter.” 

Albus seemed grotesquely amused, “Don’t tell me now that you’ve grown to care for the boy,” He asked, raising an eyebrow at Severus. 

Minerva’s blood boiled, “Maybe he hadn’t but I had, you Monster,” She shrieked, almost missing Severus’s next words.

“Expecto patronum,” It became clear to her what he had said when his patronus lit up the office. A doe, exactly that of Lily Potter, Minerva recalled. So he had been obsessed with her this whole time? So many years after she had moved on from him? So many years after the tragic death of her and her much-beloved husband? She almost felt some pity for Severus then, it was all too pathetic, really.

Albus seemed to think the same, he asked, “Lily? After all this time?”

Severus was resolute when he declared, “Always.” 

Minerva recoiled from that slightly, “She never loved you that way, Severus, never a day in her life, you sick bastard.” 

Severus who, of course, could not hear her, asked again, as if trying to understand, “So when the time comes the boy must die?”

Albus, still resolute and only half shameful, responded, “Yes, he must die. Voldemort himself must do it, that is essential.” 

“Why?” Minerva asked aloud in her exasperation, “Why would that be essential? You daft, cowardly, pathetic, manipulative, mean, old…” The memory swirled away in the midst of her ranting. There were tears welling up in her eyes as she thought of all that Harry had been put through by those two and how she had been complicit in that. 

She reigned herself in again as the swirling silver began to refocus. The next memory to appear around her was on the grounds between the lake and the forest. Severus walked up from the forest side to where Albus stood waiting. “Did you make contact with the centaurs?” 

“Yes, they refused to speak with me about anything prophetic, and they have, in a manner of speaking, disowned Firenze. They refuse to corroborate his prophecy,” Severus said, standing stiffly as he reported back. 

“Well, I didn’t really need them too, I did hope that they would be more forthcoming, however.” Albus sighed, shaking his head, and added, “I shall have to take Firenze at his word. And his impression does substantiate Sybill’s so I can only assume that we are taking the only track possible.” He paused discontentedly, “No matter how little I like it.” 

They turned back to the castle and Severus asked with a sardonic smirk, “What did Minerva find to be so pressing this time?”

“Severus you shouldn’t be cruel about Minerva, she is very dear to me, as you well know,” Albus said, chastising only lightly, casting a sideways glance at the younger man which was tempered by a small smile. “The Ministry changed their security measures, she has a number of friends who keep her appraised of the happenings in the Wizengamot, you know. Anyone coming in through the floo system will have an automatic revealing charm cast on them, among other things. It seems that they are preparing for war, at long last. She got word before I did and wanted to give me the news, as well as collect my signature on a number of forms I should have done last week.” He sighed laughingly, and added,  “We wouldn’t last two days without her.”

Minerva nodded, approving of his assessment that she was essential to the school, but scoffed nonetheless, “Please, you couldn’t get past the two-hour mark, you two-faced old backbiter.” 

As Minerva threw hopelessly old-fashioned insults at someone who couldn’t hear her, the memory went on in front of her. 

“Yes, I am aware of the many virtues of Minerva McGonagall,” Severus responded begrudgingly, rolling his eyes. “But you have to admit she can be…. Insufferable.” 

“What did I do to you, you greasy prat?” Minerva scoffed at Memory Severus though well aware he couldn’t hear her. She continued to mutter to herself discontentedly Albus only shook his head in response to Severus’s complaints. “What did I do? Let’s see, I gave you the benefit of the doubt. I tried to treat you with respect. I trusted you a damn sight farther than I should have. I didn’t ostracise you from the rest of the staff. I was downright friendly, you prick.” 

She ceased her disconsolate muttering when Albus spoke again. Softly, with a woebegone expression, he said, “I almost told her the truth today.” He shook his head and sounded genuinely regretful. 

Severus looked at him as if he were insane. “What do you mean?”

“I mean I was on the verge of telling her everything, Severus. I mean that the guilt has built up enough that I almost told her to sit down and allow me to explain everything. I know that I cannot, that I should not, but it is increasingly difficult to lie to her.” He held up the hand that was affected by the horcrux’s dark magic. It wasn’t yet as bad as it was going to get, but the effects were noticeable. 

“Yes, well clearly you didn’t find it all that difficult…” She said with a scowl, though her anger was softened slightly, “You kept at it long enough.”

“You know just as well as I do, Headmaster, that she would only serve to …complicate matters,” Severus said dispassionately as if they had had this conversation more than once recently.

Albus sighed, starting toward the castle again, “Yes, and that is the polite way to say it. Which is why I did not tell her anything. I know that she is too moralistic. Refuses to see the grey in between black and white. I’ve known that about her for decades. When it comes to her students there is only protecting them and madness, there is no room for the prophecy in her worldview, and we both know well her opinions on Divination as a whole. She would only rail against us and attempt to sabotage the plan.” He rolled his eyes, shaking his head and sighing as they crossed the lawn past the lake. 

“Did you ever stop to think that is because your plan is a load of inane recklessness predicated on the manipulation of teenagers?” She asked loudly, though she was the only one who could hear it.

The memory swirled out again and let out an exasperated shout in the silvery void between memories. 

The next memory solidified before her, back in the office again, Albus behind the desk, now though, he looked much older, his illness taking full effect now. “It is nearly the end of the school term, Severus,” Albus said as if the younger man would know what he meant by that. 

“Yes, I realise that,” Severus replied coldly, though, really, no colder than he said everything else.

“And the Malfoy boy has not yet managed to do what he has been tasked,” Albus began, clearly intent on continuing his reprimand.

“I realise what this is about, Albus,” Severus said sharply, turning away from him, “But if I just killed you, here and now, or any time before I have been ordered to, it would not come over well with the Dark Lord. He is intent that Draco prove himself. If I were to complete his task now only suspicion would greet me.” 

“I know,” Albus answered calmly, adding, “Not to mention that you likely would not make it out of the castle if you killed me now.” He smirked and shook his head. “You only have about two minutes before Minerva walks through that door,” He said nodding to the office door with a wry smile. 

“At any given time of day,” Severus responded sardonically, with only the faintest hint of a mocking smile. He did derive such pleasure from his own derisive comments.

“Maybe if I hadn’t been doing the job of four fucking people I wouldn’t have had such a tendency to be running between offices you oily prat,” Minerva muttered, glaring daggers at him and hoping he could feel it in the grave. 

“At any rate, Severus, the time is upon us, I am sure that Voldemort will not wait for the start of next term. I need your assurance that you will take on the job when he gives it to you,” Albus said seriously, and hurriedly as he was very aware that they didn’t have much time before their meeting was interrupted. “I know it is unpleasant, Severus, but it is essential. Your word?”

“I will do as you ask,” Severus answered gravely. 

“Yes, you would, you prat,” Minerva muttered as the two of them stood in grave silence a moment, “Well Albus, at least you didn’t push that off to a teenager, unlike everything else.” 

“This is the only way, Severus. The only way you will be in the full confidence of Lord Voldemort. The only way Harry will be able to fulfill the prophecy. Years of carefully laid plans will be wasted if you are not the one to kill me,” Albus spoke hurriedly, impressing the importance of his statements on Severus at the same time. He sat back and said, “Now go out of the office before Minerva gets here, she’s getting more suspicious all the time. It’s a good thing this won’t last much longer or she’d certainly find us out.” He was almost smiling. 

Minerva was still stuck on the phrase, “Years of carefully laid plans” as the memory swirled away. Years, more than a decade of so-called carefully laid plans, most of Harry’s life was a carefully laid plan by Albus Dumbledore, and he would have sorted Harry’s death out too if it weren’t for sheer dumb luck. All those years, he was lying to her. 

There was no next memory, apparently Albus had explained all that he was going to. Minerva found herself back in the present day, in her office, with rage building in her heart again. “Years of carefully laid plans,” She whispered the phrase again to herself. Her voice grew progressively louder as she said, “Years of lying. Years of working myself to the edge of madness. Years of being taken advantage of. Years of unwittingly raising my students to be killed.” In a blind rage, she seized the bottle that had contained the memories and flung it across the room. In an accidental feat that proved the aim that had made her such a good Quidditch chaser in her school days, the bottle flew right through the open window. 

Her surprise at her unwittingly good aim did not stop her from further rage, in fact, it only inspired her next steps. She seized the Pensieve from where it floated in mid-air, the cold stone of it hardly seemed to weigh anything. Peering into its depths again, seeing flashes of the memories she had been shown, both Albus’s and Severus’s, she grew ever angrier. 

Thinking of Severus she raged to the empty room around her, “All because he was obsessed with Lily, he did all of this because he was obsessed with Lily, who couldn’t have cared less for him in the end. All by his own fault. He claimed to love her and joined the Death Eaters. Well, I suppose the old adage is right, once a Death Eater always the same. He didn’t even care for Harry. Would have been happy to see him and James dead as long as he spared Lily. He didn’t even care for Harry, he hated him like he hated his father. Never even gave the boy a chance except that he had Lily’s eyes.” Her breathing was rapid as she crossed the room to the middle with the Pensieve in hand. 

She left it floating as she turned Albus’s portrait around. He seemed glad to see her as if he thought it was all understood and forgiven. “You monster. You raised him like livestock and you let me do the same.” He tried to speak but Minerva didn’t want to hear it, “Silencio.” 

She turned away from him and went back to the pensieve, “I never liked this damn thing anyway.” She circled it, pondering its connection to Albus’s plans, how he had used it to search the past for hints at the future, and what that led to. “You always wanted to go back and relive and study the past as if it could do anything. If this is the way you informed your future plans then it was not only worthless it was wicked.”

 She seized the floating bowl and, shaking, drew it closer to the window. “I will never be like you, you son of a bitch. I have no need to revisit this past. I have learned every step of the way here, I do not need to go seeking in my past or yours for lessons, I have all of my memories where they belong and yours are as useless to me as you were.” With that, she took the hovering dish and tipped its contents out the window. The stone dish grew heavier in her hands then, as if the memories had created its weightlessness. 

She watched as the memory evaporated in the air, a light silver mist dissipating in the wind. She glanced back at the portrait, “Perhaps instead of constantly referring to your own experience, instead of relying solely on your own past and opinions and ideas and perspectives you might have spoken to someone else. You might have asked me what I thought. You might have sought anyone else’s counsel, but no, the great Albus Dumbledore didn’t need anyone, he had a catalogue of his own ideas to look back into and borrow from.” She scoffed and considered the empty dish in her hands, “So you didn’t ask, you didn’t seek counsel, you just looked inward to make decisions that affected not just the people around you but the entire world as we know it. You looked to your past self never thinking that perhaps that is why history’s horrors were repeating themselves.”

She caught a look at the horror on Portrait Dumbledore’s face, but it only fueled her enraged state. “Not me, Albus. I never did mind learning something new. I may be the most competent person to grace these halls, but I still not above taking another perspective. I don’t need this.” She gestured to the Pensieve, “And if it helps people to turn out like you did, I don’t want it.” With that she didn’t just drop it out the window, she flung it towards the metal spires on the roof below her. It hit the spire dead center, splitting in half and falling on opposite sides of the gabled roof. One half fell out of sight as the other hit a gargoyle, shattering the pensieve and the head of the stone creature. 

She did not turn to look at the portrait, nor did she remove the silencing spell. She only stood, feeling momentarily vindicated, and then, calmly slightly after that moment of satisfaction, a bit foolish. She huffed and turned out the office door, not knowing where she was going, but knowing that it was very likely there would be alcohol there.