If the unwary or uninformed chanced to raise the subject, Minerva McGonagall's lips thinned, Albus Dumbledore's twinkle became uncharacteristically vague and Severus Snape simply glared. Of course, Severus Snape glared at a lot of things, so perhaps that was less informative that it might have been. Amongst the student body a rare form of mass amnesia appeared to have taken hold, although Hermione Granger could occasionally be heard muttering something under her breath about intersecting magical fields. Even the paintings, long recognised as the most complete source of information on Hogwarts, surpassing even Miss Granger - even the paintings shuffled and engaged in much fussing over cherubs, small dogs and bowls of fruit until the questioner moved on, never noticing the slightly smug look that broke out after they left.

Afterwards, no one could quite recall when or how The Incident had begun. Some said that it was the beginning of the year; others that it was closer to Christmas. But everyone agreed that one evening Albus Dumbledore stood up in the Great Hall at supper and said:

"Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to introduce you to your new Defence Against the Dark Arts Teacher, Professor di Semplice."

**********

Hermione Granger was sitting at the Gryffindor table, sandwiched as usual between two rival Quidditch conversations. On the one side of her Harry Potter was debating tactics with Dean Thomas and Seamus Finnegan; on the other Ron Weasley was trying to demonstrate to Neville Longbottom and his sister Ginny how, but for one dodgy line call, two utterly outrageous penalties and the small matter of a five hundred and fifty point deficit, the Chudley Cannons would have come top of the British League this year. He was busy emphasising his points with the salt and pepper shakers and would have made a much more persuasive argument had not the salt and pepper shakers themselves been joining in, complaining vociferously that Ron had got the whole pitch set up hopelessly wrong.

Hermione was part way through yet another mental revision of her primary homework timetable when Dumbledore's announcement caught her attention. She straightened up, and craned her head towards the teacher's table. Beside her, Ron carried on with his exposition, oblivious to what was going on. Hermione elbowed him. She had no idea whether Ron hadn't heard or was just not paying attention but a new teacher was a new teacher.

"... and the goal was clearly legal, anyone could, ouch Hermione, what did you do that for?" Ron's voice descended to a whisper as the hall quietened.

"Shh, Ron. There's a new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher."

"You don't say. Honestly, Hermione, we have one of those every year. They're all either mad or stupid."

Hermione bristled, attention distracted from the teachers' table.

"Professor Lupin wasn't mad or stupid," she hissed.

"No, he was a werewolf. What's this one?"

"I don't know because you keep talking to me."

Ron huffed beside her.

"Honestly, I don't what all this fuss is about it's just another ... bloody hell."

Hermione looked at Ron. He had tailed off mid-sentence and was now gazing at the teachers' table with his mouth slightly open and a semi-stunned look in his eyes. She looked back to the top of the hall. Dumbledore was still speaking.

"Now that I have your full attention, may I introduce Professor di Semplice. Do stand up, Professor."

As she did so a low murmur ran through the room, most of it male.

From this distance, Hermione estimated that Professor di Semplice was about five feet six inches, slender, with honey gold hair that hung loose to her waist. Even from where she was sitting, Hermione could see the candlelight shimmering, making the hair look almost liquid. The new teacher half lifted a hand to acknowledge the students and Hermione was struck by the grace of the gesture, a princess greeting her subjects. All along the Gryffindor table in front of her the boys were shifting in their places. Next to her, Harry Potter tried to flatten his unruly hair. Even the Slytherin table was quiet.

Ron moved.

"Bloody hell," he said again, reverently.

Hermione gritted her teeth.

"Anyone can be pretty," she said trying for a dismissive tone and suspecting that she had failed miserably. "It's what she knows that counts."

"Yeah, right, that's what counts," replied Ron, still with his attention firmly fixed on Professor di Semplice.

"And we'll find that out tomorrow morning," persisted Hermione, feeling as if she was trying to talk to treacle.

"Tomorrow morning," agreed Ron happily.

**********

Severus Snape was in a bad mood. This was not, in itself, remarkable. Even the fact that his bad mood was related to a woman was not a source of surprise. Women annoyed him all the time. Minerva McGonagall and her wretched Gryffindors annoyed him. Hyacinth Hooch and her eternal Quidditch annoyed him. Ermengarde Sprout and her gardening classes annoyed him, even more so because they were occasionally useful to him. Poppy Pomfrey and her woolly headed insistence that injured students needed sympathy and medication drove him to distraction.

But this ... this Professor di Surplus or whatever ridiculous name she had given herself ... this was a new level of annoying, even for him.

Albus had forced him to sit next to her at dinner, when she introduced herself to the school like visiting royalty.

"Be nice to her, Severus. She's new, Severus. Make her feel at home, Severus. Talk to her, Severus, she very interesting."

Talk to her indeed. Talking to her and making her feel at home were mutually exclusive things. The very essence of being at home at Hogwarts was being ignored by Severus Snape. Thank God, he had managed to avoid making small talk with the woman, but, unusually, he had found himself passing her things and, at one point, actually holding her chair for her.

He shuddered.

Of course, she was attractive in that overblown, flashy, non-specific aristocratic kind of way. Not the sort of woman than he liked, naturally. But attractive to a certain undiscerning audience. Witness the collective testosterone charge that had filled the Great Hall when she stood up. The house elves would spend the term clearing teenage drool off the floor with mops and buckets.

He shuddered again. Dumbledore must be insane. Or more so than usual.

And whatever Dumbledore had in mind, he, Snape, wasn't about to be part of it.

**********

Hermione Granger sat in the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom, upright, attentive and with her book open at precisely the right page. She was already fully familiar with the contents of the lesson, and she intended to devote a great deal of her time to establishing that this new Professor was nothing more than a pretty face.

Around her flowed the usual pre-class noises; scraping of chairs, rustling of bags, exchanges of threats between Slytherin and Gryffindor. But it wasn't quite business as usual. For one thing there was an unusual lack of scruff in the room. All shirts were tucked in, all collars buttoned, all ties neatly knotted. Even Ron's, whose clothes Hermione had privately long thought to have been victim to a permanent Disarrangement Charm, courtesy of Fred and George. Everyone seemed to have brushed his hair that morning and roughhousing seemed to have gone out of fashion.

Also, Millicent Bulstrode appeared to be wearing perfume.

Hermione didn't want to consider the implications of that.

As the school clock struck the hour, the door at the top of the stairs at the front of the room opened and Professor di Semplice came out of her office.

She smiled

"Good morning class," she said. "I'll be right down. I hope you haven't been waiting too long for me."

Her speaking voice was warm and melodious. There was a murmur of "no"s from around the room.

"That's kind of you to say so."

Professor di Semplice closed the door behind her and gracefully moved down the stairs. The honey gold hair was now piled on top of her hair in a simple, yet elegant style. She was wearing midnight blue velvet robes that fitted her perfectly emphasising her figure, yet were completely appropriate to her role. Close to, Hermione could now see that her ivory complexion was flawless, with the faintest hint of a rose blush over her delicate cheekbones.

Hermione steeled herself not to like her.

"Now, class, you all have your books open at page 394?"

There were brief sounds of pages turning. Professor di Semplice smiled again. Her teeth were white and even.

"Good. Now I'd like to do an exercise this morning with everyone working in pairs. Before we begin, I'd like to say that I know that there are some traditional rivalries between Slytherin and Gryffindor, but in this room I want to think of us all working for a greater cause - the protection of others in the dark times that lie ahead of us all. I want you to leave your rivalries for the Quidditch pitch. Within these walls I want you to stand together, leaving aside matters of house and blood, and working as witches and wizards, nothing more and nothing less."

Professor di Semplice paused. The room was completely silent although Draco Malfoy had moved slightly so that his profile was towards the new teacher. Hermione thought that he looked like he was posing for a statue. Picking up a piece of parchment Professor di Semplice continued:

"I have divided you all into working pairs. Let's make a start."

She read out the list and the room rearranged itself as people began work. Hermione looked with some trepidation as Pansy Parkinson made her way over. As she sat down beside Hermione, Pansy turned to her.

"I say, Granger, I'm so glad I've been put with you, because you're so good at this sort of thing and I really need the help."

**********

Severus Snape wearily banished the last remnants of his afternoon potions class - in this case from the ribs of the roof vaulting - and contemplated without enthusiasm the preparation of yet more wolfsbane. Supper had been a meal dispatched with even more alacrity than usual, given that he had been forced to sit next to Hagrid to avoid any proximity to That Woman, as he had taken to thinking of the new DADA teacher.

However, he now had an entire evening of peace and quiet and potions brewing, which would have been moderately enjoyable had it not been for the thought that the fruits of his labour were destined to keep that idiot Lupin on right side of social acceptability.

Still, he supposed that in his rather precarious position perched between light and dark, he should take such comforts as he could. He cleared a workbench and began to lay out the necessary materials.

An hour later he had everything prepared and was near to completing the first stage of the potion. The mixture simply had to simmer for another twenty minutes before it was ready to be filtered and then distilled. The dungeons were quiet and the Dark Mark was temporarily quiescent. He decided to take advantage of the rare moment of calm. He set a metal tripod over another small flame and began to prepare his coffee pot. It, too, was beginning to bubble in a most satisfactory manner when there was a light tap at the door. Snape closed his eyes. Was it written somewhere that for every moment of peace there should be a corresponding interruption?

"Go away," he said, betting that it would have no effect whatsoever.

The door opened.

Bet won, he thought. Bloody Albus Dumbledore.

"Professor Snape, I'm so sorry to disturb you."

Not Albus Dumbledore. That Woman.

"Professor di Semplice, I'm busy and it is evening. If you have school business to discuss I believe there is a staff meeting at four p.m. tomorrow. Good night."

Hopefully, that would be sufficiently rude to discourage this and any further incursions on his privacy.

There were footsteps.

Apparently not.

"Professor Snape, I wonder if I could ask a favour?" Her voice was deep and warm, with just a hint of uncertainty. "I realise it's an imposition ..."

He turned to look at her.

"I'm glad you realise that, although I see no signs that that knowledge has influenced your behaviour. I also don't imagine I can stop you asking your favour, but the answer will almost certainly be 'no'."

"Oh no, Professor, I don't intend to ask you to do anything for me. I know how busy you are and I wouldn't dream of taking up your time." She paused and gave a half smile. "At least, not more than I am currently doing." When he didn't respond, she continued, "I don't need to tell you that Dark Potions are part of the final year Defence Syllabus and I'm going to need some samples for use in class."

He sighed.

"And you want me to make some for you?"

She shook her head.

"Not at all. I was hoping to be able to borrow some workspace to make them myself. Small quantities, of course, and I would provide my own ingredients - or replace anything that I had to borrow from you."

It was a reasonable request, he supposed, which was annoying. The idea of someone intruding on his workspace was only marginally more irritating than having to make the potions himself.

"I was not aware," he said, "that you possessed any skill at potions."

"Oh, I don't, not really." That half smile again. Snape found himself watching the corner of her mouth as it quirked. "I studied a little with my father and, of course, I have his texts."

"Your father?" It meant nothing to him.

"Oh, didn't Albus tell you? My father was ...." She trailed off, her attention caught by the bubbling cauldron. "Isn't that first stage wolfsbane?"

He nodded, watching her suspiciously. She moved closer to the cauldron, inspecting the contents. Then she stepped back and looked at him, and he saw her eyes properly for the first time. It was difficult to be specific about the colour in the half light of the dungeon. At first he thought they were as black as his own, but then he realised they were actually a deep midnight blue, the same colour as her dress except that the light reflected subtle violet shades as well.

"Are you using dragon's claw to stabilise the mixture?"

"Yes." He wanted to add something cutting to the effect that it was standard procedure, but he was too unsettled by the shifting colours in her eyes.

"I think if you try adding half a drop of fool's tears as well, the degradation rate is significantly slowed."

"Fool's tears?" It made sense. Why had he never thought of that? How ... annoying. "I have some in the cupboard," he said eventually.

"It's not an obvious addition," she said. "I found it by accident really. Luck, you might call it."

He nodded. She was still looking at him. Some impulse that he couldn't quite fathom made him add stiffly:

"Would you like a cup of coffee?"

**********

Defence Against the Dark Arts classes were proceeding remarkably smoothly under the watchful eye of Professor di Semplice. Since the first lesson the Slytherins and Gryffindors had worked together with very little friction. Not only that, but the new-found détente was beginning to extend into other joint classes making even Potions a little more bearable.

As far as the lessons themselves went, Hermione was forced to concede that the new Professor knew her stuff, despite the hair, the cheekbones and the eyes. The eyes were the new main topic of conversation in the Gryffindor common room, even, on occasion, replacing Quidditch. Some said they were blue; other said they were violet. There were even those who said that they were some entirely new shade of blue-violet that only existed for Professor di Semplice. Hermione had left the room just at the point that Colin Creevey was trying to think up a name for this new colour and was excitedly asking everyone's opinion of "Semplicerine".

Leaving aside the adolescent males, who clearly couldn't see further than the end of their hormones, however, Hermione was beginning to believe that there actually was more to Professor di Semplice. For one thing, Hermione hadn't been able to ask her a question that she couldn't answer. That morning they were studying the history and structure of basic Egyptian curses. Hermione had been through the set text and all additional material in the library. She had a number of questions prepared, none of which had thrown the Professor for a moment. However, she had one final one, one which she was pretty certain would establish the credentials of Professor di Semplice once and for all.

She put up her hand.

"Professor di Semplice?"

"Yes, Hermione."

Today the professor was wearing robes of dark purple, which brought out the violet in her eyes.

"Professor, I was wondering. I was studying the structures of the curses as you said, and I've been comparing them with the structures of the hieroglyphs, and this last set don't seem to match the patterns from the Third Kingdom records."

Professor di Semplice just smiled.

"Hermione, I think you'd better see me after class."

That's it, thought Hermione. I've finally got her.

She stayed behind as everyone else filed out and tried not to think about the slightly disconcerting idea of Pansy Parkinson and Lavender Brown conversing at all, let alone exchanging ideas about hair and make-up. When the room was empty, Professor di Semplice held up a hand and said:

"Will you come up to my office, Hermione. I have something that I think you'll be interested in."

Hermione followed the other woman up the stairs.

The Defence Against the Dark Arts office had gone through as many incarnations as post holders. From the self-publicity of Gilderoy Lockhart to the kitten plates of Dolores Umbridge, each teacher had stamped their personality on it. It should not, therefore, have come as a surprise to Hermione, that Professor di Semplice had done the same. The room now was comfortable, a combination of the Lupin incarnation and her own study room. There were books and parchments, a surprisingly clear desk space and some deep leather furniture, lightened by some warm coloured wool throws.

"Have a seat," said the professor. "I just have to find a couple of books."

Hermione seated herself at the end of a sofa and waited. Eventually, Professor di Semplice found what she was looking for.

"Here we are," she said, "I knew they were here somewhere." She placed two books on her desk, and then came round to perch on the edge, looking seriously at Hermione. "I should have known that you would spot the lack of correlation in the Third Kingdom. You're absolutely right, they don't coincide. That's because the final set are actually based on the Sumerian form rather than the Egyptian. Of course, with most students, generalities are enough, but I think you should pursue a more rigorous treatment." She picked up the two books from the table, handing them to Hermione. "Here are the full tables of correspondences, and this is a Sumerian Primer. Perhaps you'd like to do an analysis of, say, the first six stele for me? For next lesson?"

Hermione was nodding. This was the sort of conversation that she'd always dreamed of having with her teachers.

She was convinced.

**********

Severus Snape wasn't entirely certain how he had let it happen, but little by little it had become customary for Professor di Semplice to occupy a small corner of his closely guarded working space. Then it had become usual for him to offer to make her coffee when she arrived. After a little while he found himself actually asking her about things - potions related things, naturally - to see if she might have a suggestion that was worth listening to.

When she wasn't there, when he was alone in his chambers, he pondered this turn of events, musing that if anyone had told him ... told him ... how long had she been here? He couldn't quite remember, but anyway, the point was that if anyone had told him however long ago it was that he would share his work space under anything less than Imperio, and get some sort of vague pleasure from the situation, he would have curtly dismissed it out of hand.

If he was honest with himself - and he occasionally did try to be - there was probably something suspicious about the whole thing. On the other hand, despite being a sour-tempered, mean-spirited bully, he was also a man, and a fully functional one at that. The presence of an attractive woman who appeared, against all expectation, to seek out his company of her own accord was, if nothing else, a decent sop to his ego, and his ego had suffered some rather nasty bruisings over the last few years thanks to Harry Potter. Not to mention that his fantasy life was in reasonably dire need of some fresh material.

It was almost certainly his duty to try and get to the bottom of the mystery. And he would. Eventually. He certainly wasn't taken in at all by her stunning beauty, her sweet temper and her slightly self-effacing skill in potions. No, indeed. This was merely the reconnaissance part of any investigation, in which he placed her at her ease, the better to prise her secrets from her.

He concentrated on her most recent idea, wrinkling his brow.

"So, why do you say that adding powdered Dead Sea Bladderwort at this point in the process would do anything other than cause a massive explosion and significant collateral damage?"

Professor di Semplice spread her hands, with that little half-smile that would have made Snape's breath catch if he were at all prone to that sort of reaction.

"I know it sounds insane, but the Bladderwort combines with the dried weasel sinus just before the mixture becomes unstable and the resulting salt clarifies the distillate. When you return it to the alembic you get a much purer result."

"Hmm."

"I have a record of the process here." She bent down to search in a bag at her feet and then pulled a heavy journal, bound with leather and brass straps. She handed it to Snape. "Here. I think you'll find some other interesting things in there."

He took it and turned it over. It looked like a standard alchemist's journal. Thick, well used, slightly burnt and stained in places. He opened the front page and nearly dropped the book.

"This is one of the lost journals of Pietro Foscarini! What are you doing with it? His library disappeared when he died. People have been searching for it for years."

She smiled again, a little sheepishly.

"I told you I had my father's texts."

He blinked. This couldn't be happening. Strange women did not just walk in off the street, as it were, and hand him a priceless treasure of modern alchemy.

"So," he said, trying to sound calm, "you are the daughter of Pietro Foscarini. Would you care to explain how exactly you failed to mention that and, more to the point, why you are teaching here of all places?"

She sagged a little.

"It's a long story."

He didn't doubt it.

"Perhaps we should move this conversation to my office."

She collected the bag at her feet and followed him into his office, where she folded herself into one of the armchairs, looking tired, but he was still struck by her grace and dignity. Seating himself opposite, he waited for her to begin.

"Di Semplice is not my real name," she said, "or, at least, not my birth name. My real name is Alexandrina Maria-Suzette Foscarini. My father was Count Bernardo Pietro Foscarini, but he changed his name to di Semplice just after he married my mother. Both of them had too many enemies pursuing them at that time. He did it to protect her - and me."

"Enemies?"

"Yes. My mother was ...," she paused for a moment and then rallied herself. "My mother was Anastasia Nicolaievna Romanova."

Snape struggled to place the name for a moment, then shook his head.

"Your mother was a Russian princess? I thought that Anastasia was killed in the Revolution with the rest of the Russian royal family."

She looked at him and held her head up. Suddenly royal lineage didn't seem so unlikely to him.

"No. The world believes that Anastasia Nicolaievna died in a cellar in Ekaterinburg on the 7th July 1918. But my mother's family carried magical blood, but only she and my brother Alexei were gifted. When they came to shoot her, she and Alexei were able to apparate out of the cellar." She paused to brush at the corner of her eye. Snape found himself giving her a handkerchief. "It was the first time she'd ever shown any magical power. She must have been so scared ...."

She touched at her face again. He noticed that the tears just made her eyes more luminous, rather than red and swollen as tended to happen with other girls.

"I'm sorry," she said eventually. "Even now, it's difficult for me to tell the story."

He waved her protests away, dimly aware that any other weeping female would have been in the corridor by now.

"Go on," he said.

"Well, my mother apparated out of the cellar, with no idea where she was going. Fortunately, she was found by a group of gypsies, who recognised her powers, and who were able to smuggle her out of the country. They got her from Russia to Italy, and she was fostered with a magical family in Venice."

Snape was nodding.

"The Foscarini family? As I recall they were powerful alchemists, although they only managed to produce one Doge."

"Yes, that's right. My grandfather took her in. He was old even then, but he had a son - Bernardo Pietro, my father. He fell in love with my mother, and married her. When he found out who she truly was, they fled into hiding and he changed his name to di Semplice." She sniffed elegantly. "He used to play games with me and he taught about alchemy. I promised him before he died that I would guard his library and not let it fall into the wrong hands."

Snape grimaced.

"Your father might have had his own opinion of about the goodness or otherwise of my hands."

She looked at him with large blue-violet eyes.

"Oh no. One of my mother's special talents was being able to see into a person's character. She could tell a person's goodness just by looking at them. I have it as well. I know you have a dark past, but deep down, I know you're a good man."

**********

Two days after the revelations in his office Snape was still off balance. Or at least, he sometimes thought that he should be off balance, but then other things entered his mind, such as the lost Foscarini library, or a woman who thought that he was a good man. So astonishing were both of these things that all idea of prising secrets from anybody had rather fallen by the wayside.

However, this evening it was time to put these thoughts aside and get back to more serious business, namely the defeat of Voldemort. That translated itself in the immediate term to a meeting of the Order of the Phoenix in Dumbledore's office.

He strode along the corridor to the gargoyle and gave the password, idly wondering what had possessed the headmaster to choose "Faberge". The gargoyle slid aside and he stood on the bottom stair and was carried up the Dumbledore's office.

It appeared that he was the last person to arrive. Dumbledore was sitting behind his desk with various other sitting or standing around the room. The paintings were as somnolent as ever.

Snape briefly acknowledged the murmured greeting of the others - Shacklebolt, the Tonks woman, Dumbledore, McGonagall, Arthur Weasley and Lupin. Mercifully, it seemed they were to be spared the presences of Moody and the malodorous Fletcher.

"Good evening, Severus." A warm familiar voice greeted him. Alexandrina di Semplice was also be seated comfortably in an armchair.

"Severus," beamed Dumbledore, "now that you're here we can begin." He gestured towards Professor di Semplice. "I think you've all met our newest recruit Alexandrina di Semplice. We've all seen the skills that she can bring to us - it's not often that we get to work with someone who has quintuple doctorates from Oxford in Defence Against the Dark Arts, Potions, Transfiguration, Theoretical Arithmancy and Healing. I've invited her to speak to us this evening as she has some excellent ideas as to how we might run the campaign against the Dark Lord. In fact, I think she may very well be the only one with the power to save us." He stood up. "Alexandrina, my dear, would you like to take my place at the desk?"

Above the desk, the portrait of Armando Dippet sank deeper into his armchair.

**********

Later that evening the Fat Lady was sitting in a portrait in an anteroom just off the Great Hall, chatting to her friend Violet and drinking tea.

"Well, I don't know what's going on," said the Fat Lady. "All I know is that they're having some kind of secret meeting in Professor Dumbledore's office and they only let the headmasters and headmistresses go to that. Sir Cadogan once tried to sneak in and got chased out."

Violet pouted - a gesture which she was too old and wizened to render terribly attractively.

"But you always know what's going on, what with you being the Common Room Door."

The Fat Lady sighed.

"I know, dear, I know. But there's been hardly any activity lately. Mr Potter's been comfortably tucked up in bed by 'lights out' every night. No one's been wandering out anywhere. The Slytherins haven't even been up pretending to be Gryffindors so they can get in and create havoc. It's just been peaceful."

Violet thought.

"Does that seem, well, unnatural to you?"

"Compared to the last six years? I should say so. I keep expecting something dreadful to happen. My nerves are wrecked, I tell you, wrecked." The Fat Lady took a swig of tea and selected a fairy cake from the plate in front of her. She took a bite and then said conspiratorially, "I shouldn't tell you this really, but the senior paintings think it's something to do with Her."

"What, that new teacher?"

"Yes. Her. Haven't you noticed? She's good at everything and everyone likes her. She's even gone to the meeting tonight. What does that tell you?"

Violet nodded.

"Does everyone like her?"

The Fat Lady drew breath, but before she could speak there were footsteps in the corridor. A shadow crept along the wall.

"Ooh," hissed Violet, "it's Her."

"Shh," whispered the Fat Lady.

The shadow became Professor di Semplice. Suddenly, she stopped and crouched down. Violet and the Fat Lady held their breath for symbolic more then effective reasons.

"Hello there," she said in a low cooing voice, "hello, Mummy's pretty girl. Does Mummy's girl want a cuddle. She's such a pretty girl, isn't she?"

There was the sound of light claws on stone and then a large, rather ratty grey cat with glittering yellow eyes emerged from behind a statue. Professor di Semplice was still making soft cooing noises. As the cat walked up to her, Professor di Semplice straightened and held out her arms.

"Come on then, Mummy's girl."

The cat leapt from the floor into her arms. Professor di Semplice caught her deftly and turned her upside down, rubbing the soft white belly fur. Four giant paws were splayed out indecorously and a low growling rumble filled the corridor.

It was a sound much speculated upon but never before heard in the main body of the school.

Mrs Norris was purring.

The Fat Lady looked at Violet in horror.

"Headmaster Dippet is right," she said. "Something has to be done."

**********

"Something," said Armando Dippet with conviction, "has to be done." There were murmurs of agreement from all around the walls of the room. "This di Semplice woman threatens everything that we've worked for."

"Hear, hear, Dippet. Couldn't agree more. Don't know what real people are coming to these days that they can't see through the blasted woman in an instant. I mean, who has five doctorates? Five. One's bad enough. Hmph."

"Fortescue's right," said Dilys Derwent from her armchair. The corpulent wizard harrumphed again in satisfaction. "She knows everything. She solves everything. Everyone likes her. There's no inter-house rivalry left."

"Rivalry? Don't get me started," interrupted Fortescue. "Did you see what happened today at the match? Did you see? Gryffindor against Slytherin, ninety-seven minutes in, Gryffindor only fifteen points ahead, weather closing in, young Malfoy within an ace of catching the Snitch and Potter taking it from under his nose. With That Woman playing referee and zipping around on her broom like some kind of stunt jockey. And after it all, did you hear what Malfoy said to Potter? DID YOU HEAR?" Many of the portraits began shaking their heads sadly. "He said ... he said ...," Fortescue became so incensed that paint fragments began to flake off his canvas, "he said 'Well played, Potter, good game'. Good game? GOOD GAME? What kind of behaviour is that for a Slytherin, sir, what kind?"

"Calm down, Fortescue, do," said Dilys, "you'll give yourself another seizure."

Fortescue subsided a little, muttering to himself.

"I couldn't agree more, Fortescue," said a cool voice from the other side of the room, "the match was evenly balanced, fairly played, and refereed with skill, judgement and outstanding fairness. It was a complete travesty of everything we've come to expect from inter-house Quidditch."

"Is there any chance of you coming up with anything constructive, Nigellus, or are you simply going to mock?" This from a sallow faced wizard with dark hair. "Don't you share our concerns?"

"Oh, I share your concerns, Everard," said Phineas Nigellus, "I'm just not certain that enumerating the Woman's substantial achievements is the way forward." He straightened from where he had been lounging on the frame of his picture and adjusted his robes. "We are all agreed, I think, that Professor di Semplice is, to speak colloquially, too good to be true. We are also all agreed that this fact appears to have escaped anything still living and breathing within the castle. In ordinary circumstances this would simply be irritating. However, she now appears to have assumed the direction of the Order of the Phoenix. In the absence of more clear headed leadership it seems to be up to us to Do Something. However, we have yet to define precisely what that Something entails." He gave a small bow in the direction of Armando Dippet. "Have I missed anything?"

The elderly wizard glared at Nigellus.

"No, thank you, that seems to cover it. Now, where can we count on support? What about the ghosts?"

"We've lost the ghosts," said Everard. "This morning I saw Peeves holding the door open for her and offering to hang up her cloak."

There were more sighs at that.

"Surely not everyone is influenced by her?" said Dilys. "What about that Granger girl. She's always seemed uncommonly sensible."

"No, ma'am, if you don't mind me saying so," said the Fat Lady in a rush. She wasn't normally invited to these headmaster's study and was a little overawed by the occasion, She was hovering nervously at the edge of a painting of a dumpy little witch seated at a table covered with cards. "Erm, I was at the entrance to the Common Room yesterday and she came in going on about how Professor di Semplice was the only teacher with whom she could really talk and how she was getting lots of really interesting stuff from her."

"Thank you, dear lady," said Dippet, making the Fat Lady go bright red and shrink back even more. "So Miss Granger is lost. How about Severus Snape? I never thought he was likely to be swayed by appearance or intellect."

Phineas Nigellus looked up from where he conducting a careful examination of his fingernails.

"You would think so, wouldn't you? I will talk to him, but I tell you now I don't hold out too much hope in the quarter."

"So, so," sighed Dippet. "Even Snape seems deceived. It looks like we are the only people who are able to stop this woman."

"Excuse me, Headmaster Dippet, sir," said the Fat Lady suddenly, "and I'm sorry if this is a silly question, but why do we need to stop her?' The room went silent. The Fat Lady went red again, but for a different reason. "Well, it's just that I know she's good at everything and popular and has lovely hair and skin and never puts on any weight no matter how much she eats, but if she's got a plan to defeat You-Know-Who and it's a good one, then why shouldn't we let her get on with it?"

Dippet and Nigellus exchanged looks.

"Because of the prophecy," said Dippet.

"The prophecy?"

"Yes. There is a prophecy. The one with the power to vanquish the dark lord was born at the end of the seventh month, to parents who had defied Voldemort three times, and he would be marked by the Voldemort." He paused. "And there's some other details, but that's that gist of it."

"And that's Harry Potter?" asked the Fat Lady.

"Yes, we think so," replied Dippet.

"Actually," interjected Everard, "there is a substantial body of opinion that says that it might be young Longbottom."

"Neville?" said the Fat Lady in surprise.

"Yes, yes," said Phineas impatiently, "the point is that there is no body of opinion that thinks that it refers to this Alexandrina Maria-Suzette Foscarini di Semplice person. Voldemort must be defeated as per the prophecy, however that plays out. The presence of this woman in the school is distorting reality. If she is allowed to put her plan into action the prophecy will not be fulfilled, and Voldemort will not be defeated. The best case scenario is that he will simply be drastically weakened, will go into hiding and will return to rise again at some future date. I prefer not to contemplate the worst case."

"Oh." The Fat Lady subsided.

"So what do you suggest, Phineas?" asked Dilys, with a glint in her eye.

Phineas shrugged.

"I would say that before we can defeat this creature we have to discover what it is."

"I say we have to devise some plan of attack." Fortescue was ready to enter the discussion again.

Phineas raised one thin eyebrow.

"Oh, do think for a minute, Fortescue. We're paintings. How exactly do you suggest we attack her? Attempt to asphyxiate her with varnish fumes? Sometimes it astounds me that Hogwarts survived your tenure as headmaster."

"I say, sir, I say," spluttered Fortescue, going red again.

"Stop it, both of you," snapped Dilys. "Now, Armando, what are your thoughts?"

"I agree with Phineas," said the elderly wizard. A fierce glare from Dilys stopped whatever comment Phineas had been about to make. "We need to find out what this woman is before we can work out how to deal with her." He looked around. "I think a trip to the library might be called for."

**********

Severus Snape decided that it was an inevitable progression. First she had occupied part of his work space, then part of his office, and now she was here, in his personal chambers.

It had started off with one visit, unusually late. There had been a knock at the door and there she had been, golden honey hair carelessly caught back, holding a book and asking whether he thought that Arbuthnot's translation from the Persian was exactly correct at this point. He had found himself asking her in, if only to minimise gossip; God knew that often more students could be found in the halls of Hogwarts by night than by day. That conversation had led to more coffee and a shy kiss on the cheek goodnight.

The next visit had been somewhat less shy, and had involved suggestions considerably more interesting to Snape than adding powdered Dead Sea Bladderwort to a potentially unstable distillate.

She was in his rooms now, reading from a small volume, elegantly stretched out on a long black leather sofa, which seemed to have arrived in his rooms one day without his conscious intention. Nevertheless, it was here and so was she, hair unbound, flowing loose over her shoulders like liquid gold. She had changed out of her robes into a long silk gown of a shade somewhere between blue and green that shimmered like the summer sun on water. If he squinted he could imagine that she was some kind of mermaid - the sort of mermaid that over-excited Muggles wrote about, rather than the sort that actually lived in the school lake. The gown dipped into a v at the front, showing off her chest and hinting at what lay beneath, It was fastened at the front with a wide velvet ribbon of midnight blue, which exactly matched her eyes.

"Severus," she said softly, as if she had been aware of his thoughts. "Have you finished that yet?"

Finished? In truth, he hadn't even started looking at it, so wrapped in her had he been. He put down the parchment he had been holding.

"It's not important," he said briefly, and turned to her.

She had put down whatever it was she had been reading and moved up the sofa a little. He walked over and sat down beside her. She settled again with her head on his shoulder.

"I love your rooms," she murmured, "they're so peaceful. I could stay here for ever."

He was silent for a moment.

"Alexandrina, I don't know why you bother with someone like me. You could do so much better than an embittered ex-Death Eater. You need to be with someone that you aren't ashamed to be seen out with."

Even as he said the words there was a faint sensation of wrongness in the back of his head, a prickle of discomfort, but other thoughts suppressed it ruthlessly before it could take concrete form.

"I'm not ashamed of you, Severus. You're what I want. And you know I think you're handsome. I don't understand why no one else sees how special you are."

He was about to reply, when she lifted her hand to trace the length of his jaw. He caught her hand and kissed the tips of her fingers softly. She rubbed against him. He let go her hand, and cupped her chin, bending his head to kiss her lips. They were warm and yielding and tasted of strawberries. Deepening the kiss, he slid his hand over her shoulder and down under the silk of her robe to cup her breast. His fingers moved over the nipple feeling her moan and shift under his touch. The nipple tightened and she pushed into his hand.

Feeling an urgent need, he let go of her and pulled the blue velvet ribbon undone, pushing the fabric back to reveal her naked body. Carefully he stood up, laying her down on the sofa, and pausing to enjoy the sight of her naked, the swell of her breasts with their dusky nipples, the golden curls at the top of her legs, her long, slender legs.

It was odd, he thought fleetingly. Up to this moment he would have said that he preferred a woman to be more ... well ... proactive. But now he looked at Alexandrina, she was so very lovely and so very pure, and maybe it was unreasonable of him to think of one so ethereal in such crude terms.

He shrugged out of his top robe and jacket. He toed off his boots and kicked them somewhere across the room.

"Sweetheart, let me please you," he whispered.

Her only response was to breathe his name.

Sitting back down beside her on the sofa he began to outline her jaw with light kisses, tracing the line of the bone from the ear to the chin. He inhaled the sweet scent of her hair, mixed with a spice of leather from the chair. He moved down the side of her neck to the base, kissed each collar bone, and then down to the top of her breasts, tasting her there, savouring the edge of light soap and the beginnings of fine sweat.

"Please," she said softly.

In response he took one nipple in his mouth, sucking and biting very gently. With one free hand he began to caress her other breast, eliciting soft cries from her as she arched against his hand. She brought her hands up to bury themselves in his hair, which lately didn't seem to have been as greasy as usual. That was another phenomenon that he was in no mood to examine too closely, or, indeed, at all. Although she was not pushing him at all, he sensed that she wanted him to move on, so he started to caress her belly, getting gradually lower with each kiss, each touch. As he reached the top of her curls, she parted her legs.

The pressure in his own groin was becoming more insistent now. He raised his head long enough to undo the top buttons of his shirt, and the cuffs. In one movement he pulled the shirt over his head and threw it to one side. Then he bent his head again to her to explore her fully, licking and tasting until he felt her shudder against him and cry out his name.

He lifted his head and looked at her.

"Sweetheart," he said in a half question.

She smiled.

"It's all right," she said, "I want to feel you inside me as well."

He stood to undo his trousers and to kick them off, together with his underpants. He was so hard by now it was nearly painful, but he knew that the preliminaries would be worth it. Carefully, he lowered himself onto the sofa, positioning himself between her legs. Then he lifted her left leg and draped it over the back of the sofa. She looked so adorable, so vulnerable laying open before him, complete trust in her eyes. He slid himself forward, supporting himself on his elbows and very slowly entered her.

She was, as he knew she would be, tight and warm, enclosing him. He waited, just to savour this moment in time, then he began to thrust, slowly at first, then more vigorously, responding to the cries of encouragement from beneath him. He kept his eyes open, occasionally dipping his head to kiss her lips, her breasts, revelling in the sight, the sound, the smell, the taste, the feel of her. He held back until he could bear it no longer, then convulsed and released as pure pleasure shot through him. And, as he cried out, he felt Alexandrina stiffen and then relax as her own climax took her.

As his breathing slowed, she shifted so that he could lie beside her.

"That was wonderful," she said, reaching across to stroke his cheek.

He just planted a small kiss on her shoulder in response.

"I was wondering if you would do something for me," she added.

"Anything," he said sleepily.

"You can say no if you want to, I know it'll sound rather strange."

"What is it?"

"Read to me."

"Read to you?" She was right, it did sound strange.

"Yes. You have such a beautiful voice and I've always wanted to hear you read poetry."

"Poetry?" Even stranger. "I don't have any poetry."

"I know. I brought some with me." She smiled that maddening half-smile again, and then reached down to the side of the sofa to pick up the volume he had seen her with earlier.

"Shakespeare Sonnets," he read.

"He was a Muggle poet and playwright," she said.

"I know that much about Muggles," he answered. "I don't know these, though."

"That's all right. I have one marked." She opened the book and handed it to Snape.

He looked at it. This really did feel a most unsettling thing to be doing. On the other hand, consider the benefits ... He took a breath.

"Shall I compare thee to a summer's day ...," he began.

**********

In the library two wizards, a witch and a sleepy and somewhat disgruntled shepherdess huddled under a willow tree. It wasn't actually raining, but it had been in the recent past and the tree was dripping steadily on them. The moon frequently disappeared behind intermittent rain clouds, but when it did emerge, gave just enough light for Dippet, Dilys and Phineas to peer out at the library.

"There's no one there," said Dippet.

"Told you there wouldn't be," said the shepherdess sulkily, who was none too pleased at having been woken up in the middle of the night. In the distance, the occasional resentful bleat suggested that her flock shared her view.

"What do we do now?" asked Dilys. "You're certain there's no chance of getting Madam Pince to help us?"

The shepherdess shrugged. Rural idylls were rarely invited to take part in school politics.

"If you mean something to do with that Italian bird, then I'd say no. She turned up here one day, said something about cataloguing and some Muggle thing called Hazey or Dewey and they were off talking like long lost sisters. Ever since then she's had the run of the place."

"I might have known," said Phineas.

"I suppose there's no way of getting to the books ourselves?" said Dilys.

Phineas looked at her.

"We're paintings. That imposes certain, shall we say, restrictions of movement."

Dilys glared at him.

"Of course we can't use these books. But surely there's a painting of a library somewhere."

"Well, you won't find one in here," said the shepherdess.

"Naturally not," said Phineas. "Why on earth would someone put paintings of books in a library?"

"I'm telling you." The shepherdess bridled. "It's not exactly a life of thrills and adventures up here you know. I've driven my sheep through every painting, and all of them are pastoral scenes or still lifes. Apparently, they help the students concentrate. Bloody boring if you ask me. And I've been banned from the still lifes," she added, "for nibbling."

"Er, thank you my dear," interposed Dippet, before the shepherdess could launch into a full list of her grievances. "I suggest we leave you in peace, and continue our search elsewhere." He turned to his companions. "Shall we meet in the small music room? It's in the Minor Dutch collection."

"Anywhere, as long as it's dry," said Phineas.

Five minutes later, the three of them were in a large room, with black and white domino flooring and a small spinet in one corner. In the middle of the back wall was a fireplace, and Phineas Nigellus was installed in front of it, sliver and green robes steaming gently.

"Thank heavens this was painted at a more clement time of year," remarked Phineas. "I have little enough patience for the countryside in warm sunshine."

Dilys Derwent was sitting by the spinet, idly picking out a tune.

"I used to play, in my youth," she remarked.

"Lovely," responded Phineas tartly, "We must remember to hold a cocktail evening here, when this is over."

"Phineas," chided Dippet, "we have work to do. Now, does anyone recall a library painting in the school?"

There was silence as they thought.

"I don't think that anyone actually ever painted a library as such," said Dilys eventually. "Books tend to get used as background colour. There are some in my portrait at St Mungo's - all books on healing naturally. The top few are clear, but below that the artist got a bit, well, impressionistic. It's a blur."

"We'd better split up," said Dippet. "Ask around and see what people can remember, especially in the less used corridors. We'll meet back in Dumbledore's office in three hours. All right?"

Dilys nodded.

Phineas pulled at his still damp gloves.

"I'll do what I can," he said. "I still have the pleasure of a heart to heart with my successor as head of house."

"Do your best, Phineas. Snape may be our last hope. Good hunting everyone!"

**********

Alexandrina di Semplice had left his chambers an hour or so previously. She never stayed. He found that he didn't want to expose her to the inevitable gossip that would follow if she were seen by a student leaving his chambers in the early morning.

Snape reclined on the sofa, wrapped loosely in his outer robes; he hadn't bothered to get properly dressed. He would be going to bed soon, and for now he was content to sit, inhaling the mixed scent of leather and woman.

A sharp rapping brought him out of his reverie. He looked around, not immediately able to identify the source.

"Have you recovered sufficiently to be able to talk?" enquired a reedy voice from the wall.

Opposite the sofa, in the middle of his picture of Arsenius the Ambivalent, stood Phineas Nigellus, resplendent in slightly damp Slytherin House robes.

"What are you doing here at this time of night?" demanded Snape. "And why are you wet?"

Nigellus twitched at his robes.

"I've just been in a field in the library," he said, as if that should be explanation enough for anyone. "And now I want to talk to you."

Snape straightened on the sofa and realised his state of undress. Self-consciously, he pulled his robes across his body.

Nigellus snorted.

"I shouldn't worry about modesty if I were you," he said. "You don't have anything that I don't have, even if I'm temporarily incommoded in its use."

Snape did not find this a comfort.

"I suppose there's no chance of you coming back when I'm dressed?" he said gracelessly.

"None at all," replied Phineas. "Now, young man, we need to talk."

Before he could continue, a small, bent little man wearing a blue striped nightshirt and cap, and carrying a poker came scuttling in from the left side of the picture frame.

"You, you, whoever you are! Get out of my picture now. I've got dark and dangerous things in here you know. I'm not afraid to make you leave if I have to."

Phineas sighed.

"Arsenius, we both know that there's nothing more dangerous in here than some very old hair tonic and some rather dubious aftershave."

The little man stopped.

"Oh, oh, Headmaster Nigellus, I didn't realise it was you."

"Evidently. Otherwise I assume that you would not have considered attacking me with the fire-irons."

"Of course not, Headmaster." Arsenius was trying to hide the poker behind his back. "Can I help you, Headmaster?"

"No, thank you, Arsenius. I just want a quiet word with Professor Snape here."

"Very good, Headmaster, very good." Arsenius was nodding and bowing, but not actually leaving.

"In private, Arsenius." Phineas raised one eyebrow.

"Oh, of course," said the little man and retreated, flustered.

Phineas shook his head.

"I don't know how you tolerate that little weasel, Severus."

Snape shrugged.

"He's better than the previous incumbent. He was too dismal even for my taste."

"Hard to imagine," murmured Nigellus.

Snape glared.

"Did you come here just to deplore my taste in art, or can I go to bed now?"

"No, Severus, I came to deplore your taste in women."

"Women?" Snape was startled. He hadn't thought that his relationship with Alexandrina was common knowledge. Or, more to the point, he would have thought that Phineas Nigellus was the last person who would care about his extra-curricular activities, even if he knew. In fact, he rather thought that the old headmaster would have approved. "Jealous are you?" he suggested snidely.

"Hardly," returned Nigellus, "although she's presentable enough, I'll give you that." He stepped back and spread his hands out as Snape bridled. "Yes, yes, I know, she's the most beautiful, graceful, delicate creature that ever walked the earth." He drew breath. "Severus, I am a headmaster of this school and a former head of this House. You will hear me out."

Snape subsided gradually. Nigellus had the right to be heard on both counts, and he wasn't one to scruple about using his position to enforce his will.

"Very well," he said. "Say what you have to say and then leave."

"This Professor di Semplice. What do you actually know about her?"

Snape was confused. He didn't see why her background was significant; it wasn't as if Nigellus was a close blood relative of the Snape family and this was a breeding issue.

"Her mother was Anastasia Romanova," he began, "and her father was ..."

"Yes, yes," Phineas interrupted. "Her father was Pietro Foscarini, she escaped from the Communists, they ran away together and lived happily ever after, all very romantic. I'm talking about where she's from. How she came to the school, Why she was recruited - besides her unrealistically long list of accomplishments."

Snape began to nod.

"I see it now, Phineas. You are jealous. Jealous and threatened. Threatened by a woman who surpasses you in learning and jealous to think that she might be interested in me." He stood up indignantly, forgetting that his robe was open at the front. "Is it so hard to believe that an attractive, intelligent, spirited, gentle woman might be interested in me? That she might be able to see past the man you all think I am?"

Phineas exploded.

"Of course it is, you damned fool. Listen to yourself, for God's sake! What did you say? 'Spirited and gentle'? What does that mean? Since when did you talk in bad poetry and declare yourself unworthy of such 'delicate grace'?"

Snape opened his mouth to reply and then shut it again. The nagging sense of wrongness was back. Phineas carried on into the silence.

"Snape, man, you know what you are. You're a hard headed man. You've got a sharp mind and a strong will. You're a excellent Potions Master and an effective spy. You're unsentimental and bad-tempered and arrogant as hell. Your usual complaint is that you don't get what you deserve, not that you don't deserve what you've got. And you do not, not, I repeat, read poetry. Ever. You are, in short, a fine Slytherin."

Snape met Nigellus' eyes. He could feel the old headmaster's anger radiating from the picture. He couldn't think of a response but he was damned if he would be the first to break eye contact.

"Tell me, I'm wrong, Snape. Tell me that you've just been waiting for the opportunity to become the servant of some pretty creature that whispers 'look after me, darling' in your ear."

He couldn't do it. The sense of wrongness began to take on definition. The poetry, the ministrations, the declarations of unworthiness - this was not him. He'd been behaving oddly since Alexandrina has first arrived in the school.

"So," he said eventually. "What is your point?"

Phineas let out a long audible breath and stepped back to lean on Arsenius' workbench. He continued in a calmer tone.

"My point is, that there is something wrong about this woman. Think about it, Severus. There's no discord in the school, the houses are cooperating, the students are disciplined and studious, and Professor di Semplice is now directing the fight against Voldemort." He cocked his head. "This plan she has to defeat You-Know-Who; does it involve her playing a central role?"

Snape nodded.

"And does it involve Harry Potter being tucked up safely in his bed where no harm can come to him?"

Snape nodded again.

"And does everyone think this is a good idea because she's so brilliant and all they wanted to do was protect the little kiddies anyway."

"Yes, yes," Snape said impatiently.

"And what happens to the prophecy?"

Snape shut his eyes as the impact of what Nigellus was saying dawned on him.

"If Voldemort isn't defeated in accordance with the prophecy, he wins or lives to rise another day."

Phineas folded his arms.

"Exactly," he said in satisfaction, "you see my point?"

Snape did. He really did.

On the other hand, there was Alexandrina. She was very lovely, there was no doubt about it, warm, pliant, responsive and best of all, in his bed or on his sofa or wherever. And he hadn't got laid, not regularly laid for ... well, for some little while. And he hadn't been laid for free for a bit longer than that.

He thought.

"I see your point," he said slowly. "But I fail to see how it affects me."

Phineas blinked.

"You fail to see how the fate of the wizarding world at the hands of Voldemort affects you?"

"Yes," said Snape smoothly. "As I see the possible outcomes are these: firstly, Voldemort is actually defeated by this plan. In that instance, everyone is happy and I carry on my, er, relationship with Alexandrina. Secondly, Voldemort is temporarily defeated. Now, I have considerable experience in maintaining two apparently contradictory positions to the satisfaction of all sides." He smiled briefly. "I believe you were good enough to comment on my effectiveness in that capacity. Therefore I am in no worse a situation that I am now and there seems to be no bar to me continuing my relationship with Alexandrina. The third option is that Voldemort wins the encounter. In that event I can simply maintain the single position that I am his loyal servant - a situation of which he is already convinced - and I will be able to continue my relationship with Alexandrina. Assuming she survives that is." He met Phineas' gaze. "There appears to me to be no negative outcome. So, I say again, I fail to see how this affects me."

Phineas' lips thinned.

"I suppose it's useless to appeal to your sense of the greater good?"

"Phineas, you've been hanging in Dumbledore's office for too long."

"So it would seem." The portrait suddenly looked very tired. "If that's your last word on the subject then I'll bid you goodnight."

"It is very much my last word."

Phineas nodded.

"Good night," he said quietly. "Oh, and Severus, do cover yourself up. You may not have anything that I haven't got, but no one needs to see it quite so prominently displayed."

**********

At four o'clock in the morning a group of very dispirited paintings met back in Albus Dumbledore's office.

Armando Dippet was the first to speak.

"Phineas, did you have any luck with Snape?"

The thin wizard shook his head.

"Not at all."

"You told him of the dangers?"

"I did."

"And would he not understand?"

"Oh, he understood perfectly."

"Well, then?" Dippet looked puzzled. "Will he not help? Is he not a member of the Order."

"Do I smell treachery?" demanded Fortescue.

"Shut up, Fortescue, and no, he won't help. I'm afraid he's thinking of quite another member at the moment."

There were some small noises of shock and others of confusion.

"I don't understand," said Fortescue.

Phineas sighed.

"Put simply. Severus Snape is - involved - with this woman and he hasn't had regular sex since ... since... well, certainly not that I can remember. And Snape is a Slytherin. He thinks that whatever happens he's going to land butter side up."

Armando Dippet shook his head.

"Oh dear, Phineas, must you be so graphic?"

Phineas looked at him.

"Armando, when you've had to face what I had to this evening, then you can talk about graphic." He folded his arms. "We can forget about Snape. Any luck with libraries?"

Dippet shook his head again.

"Very little I'm afraid. Dilys has some healing texts. We found some scattered Herbology texts on the third floor and some usable Transfiguration volumes in the portrait of Ursula the Unstable."

"It seems," added Dilys, "that most people wanted books as props or background colour. It appears that no one has been interested in just painting a library."

"I can't believe," said Everard, "that in an institution of learning there should be no depiction of the tools of the trade, as it were."

"Can't you?" said Phineas. "I don't exactly remember you as a long time library fan, Everard. Quidditch and Zonko's wasn't it?"

"Well, do pardon me for being fourteen," snapped Everard.

"Oh, do shut up," said Dilys sharply, causing everyone to suddenly fall silent. "I'm sorry, but this isn't getting us anywhere and Albus will want to be using this office soon and then we'll have to pretend to be asleep and who knows what damage That Woman will do in the meantime." She looked around. "Is there anywhere we haven't looked?"

There was silence and a certain shuffling of feet and adjusting of robes.

"Well," said Everard eventually, "there is the Attic."

"You mean you haven't gone up there?" Dilys glared at them.

"Well, I thought Armando was going," said Everard defensively.

"I thought Everard was going," suggested Dippet.

"Don't look at me," added Phineas, "I've spent the time trying to prick the conscience of Slytherin."

"Well, someone has to go," stated Dilys. "And soon."

The paintings eyed each other for a moment. Then Phineas spoke.

"Look, if we have to go up to the Loony Bin, we might as well all go and get it over with."

"Splendid idea," said Dilys before anyone could object. "Armando, Everard, let's get cracking."

Fifteen minutes later the four of them were huddled in the dubious shelter of a skeletal tree, clinging to the side of a crag in sheeting rain. There was a general clutching of hats and pulling of robes in a vain attempt to gain some protection.

"Delightful," muttered Phineas. "That wretched field in the library was bad enough."

"Dilys, my dear, isn't there a more clement landscape up here?" Armando Dippet sounded querulous.

Phineas snorted.

"My dear Armando, just be grateful that the worst thing currently in this painting is the weather."

They peered out. There was no source of outside light, but in the occasional flashes of lightning, they could see a long room, about the length of the Great Hall. Dark stone walls faded into the shadows of long beams that supported the castle roof. All around were the outlines of paintings, some hanging on the walls, some propped up with others swathed in heavy cloth or placed face down on the floor.

"Welcome to the Loony Bin," said Phineas with an expansive gesture. "The place where paintings come to gibber."

"How do we find out exactly what's up here?" asked Dippet ignoring him.

Everard took a pace forward.

"I say, hello," he shouted over the howling wind. "Is there anyone up here?"

There was a moment and then the Attic began to lighten as some of the outward facing paintings began to glow. It was not a wholesome light.

"Hello," Everard called again, less certainly.

"Look," said Dilys, pointing. "something's moving over there."

Opposite them a single line was appearing in the middle of an apparently blank canvas. Then it undulated and snapped open to reveal an enormous eye.

"Oh," said Dilys faintly.

"Well, I'm not going to be the one to go over and ask to have a quick look at its bookshelves," said Phineas.

A low noise began to echo around the room; a confused jumble of sighs and moans and muffled shrieks, laced with vague animal sounds, none of them identifiable and all of them unsettling. A sudden blast of wind shot up the ravine where the four wizards were crouching, whipping the tree over and catching Everard just above the kidneys.

"Can't we go somewhere else?" he said, rubbing his back. "We're all too old to be out in this sort of weather."

"Be my guest," said Dilys tartly. "If you want to take the risk of meeting the owner of that eye, or worse."

"Well, we have to do something," said Armando with decision. "As I recall, the worst of the pictures are face down, covered or stacked - the ones that couldn't even be hung. I'm going to try one of the hanging ones."

He disappeared.

A few moments later he reappeared, hat askew.

"Oh dear," he said, "oh dear, oh dear."

The others waited.

"Oh dear," he repeated, adjusting his hat, although the wing immediately dislodged it again. "I found a young woman, who told me repeatedly about her Dunstan and treachery and manticores. She screamed at lot as well. I don't think she had any books. I couldn't really get a sensible answer from her."

"You must have found Veracita Moloney. She used to hang in the corridor to the kitchens. She's quite mad now." Dilys sighed. "I remember going to her frame to certify her mental state."

"Is there anyone sane up here?" asked Everard.

"Oh yes," said Phineas. "Some of them are monsters. Others are merely dangerously psychotic. I, myself, have relatives who belong up here. And of course we mustn't forget the occasional less than pastoral landscape, such as this one."

As he finished, the ground under their feet began to move. Dilys clung to Phineas, who, in turn, clung to the tree.

"An earthquake?" she squeaked.

"That or breakfast," replied Phineas. "Either way, I think we should move."

"Hey, you! You people!"

The voice came from a painting on the other side of the Attic. Little could be seen of the occupier other than dark robes against a dark background and rather white flesh.

"Hello!" called Everard peering out.

"You people. What do you want up here?"

It was a coherent question and the location seemed a better prospect than their current one.

"We'll be right over," said Everard.

"Over" was indeed dark. The incumbent of the painting was a tall, almost cadaverous man, with pale skin, lank hair and dressed in unrelieved black. He had been painted in a low vaulted room containing a long workbench and various alchemical equipment. He watched as the four other portraits dripped copiously onto the uneven stone floor.

"What do you want?" he said unceremoniously, in a heavy Germanic accent. "It is late you know. Even we up here are entitled to our privacy."

Dilys and Phineas exchanged looks.

"I'm sorry to bother you," said Dippet, stepping forward. "I'm Armando Dippet, and this is Dilys Derwent, Phineas Nigellus and Everard ...."

"I know who you are," stated the man. "I asked what you were doing here?"

"Well," said Dippet, "we're looking for some help."

"And you seek it from me, ja? After condemning me to exile in this place, after ignoring me for years, now you seek my help. And why should I help you?"

"Just our luck," muttered Everard. "The only sane person up here and he turns out to be a Slytherin."

"We're asking help from anyone, my dear sir," persisted Armando. "Perhaps you could tell us who you are?"

"You do not know who I am?" The thin man seemed outraged.

"No," interjected Phineas, "we don't. I'm sorry Armando, but we simply don't have time for tact." He turned to the man. "I'm sorry we've invaded your home, but there's something of a crisis going on among the independently three-dimensional and we need to do something about it. Now, tell us who you are, or don't, but either way we need to have a look at your bookshelf."

The thin man subsided.

"I am Johannes Friedrich Jung," he said sulkily, "alchemist and philosopher, and I shouldn't be here."

It was true that he didn't seem to fit in with the general tone of the place.

"Why were you put up here?" asked Dilys. "I don't recall ever visiting you."

"I used to hang in the rooms used by the Potions Masters. I was put up here by that one who's down there now. Said I was too depressing for him. Ha! I was too depressing for him! I was replaced by some spineless non-entity."

"Well, you could come back down if you wanted to," said Dilys.

Jung bridled.

"And why should I? If I'm not wanted in my own home why should I wander the halls, looking for charity, the corner of a picnic blanket, a seat at someone else's fireside? Not me. I prefer to stay up here, thank you very much."

Dilys shrugged.

"It was just a suggestion.

"Ja, ja. So, what is this crisis you speak of."

The three men all looked at Dilys and then pointedly headed for the back of the room. Taking a deep breath, Dilys began to explain the situation.

When she had finished, Jung looked at her in silence and then threw back his head and began to laugh. It was a high sound with an edge that suggesting an uncomfortable amusement at someone else's stupidity.

The three wizards stopped their investigations.

"Do please share the joke," said Phineas acidly.

"Ah, it is such a shame that my brother is not here to see this, ja. He would have loved it. He would have explored every tiny little detail and then written some long and rambling book about it all to entertain the Muggles."

"Herr Jung, we would all be grateful if you would explain yourself." Dippet did not raise his voice, but the authority in it was unmistakeable.

Jung subsided a little.

"I am from a Muggle family. My elder brother was not magical, but he had a lifelong interest in wizardry. Amongst the Muggles he had some notoriety - you have heard of Carl Gustav, ja?" Dilys nodded but the others looked blank. "It is no matter. He wrote about magic and alchemy and the mind, and most of it is rubbish; just a lot of deluded nonsense about it all being symbolic of the purification and transformation of the soul. I worked with him for years, taught him, showed him, but he never truly accepted alchemy as a physical reality, never."

"Herr Jung," prompted Dippet gently.

"Well, as I say we worked together and I learned from him as well. And what we have here is what he would have called a 'collective projection'."

"Go on," said Dilys, who was listening intently.

"This is a school, ja? Full of nasty sweaty children, raging with fantasies and hormones?"

"Sadly, yes," said Phineas.

"Well, these children want things; they want girlfriends or boyfriends; they want to be beautiful; they want to be clever; they want to be thin; they want so many things and that wanting takes on a power of its own. When that power meets a strong magical environment - " he gestured " - poof. A Professor di Semplice arrives."

"So," said Dilys slowly, "you're saying that this woman has been somehow created by the adolescent fantasies of the student body?"

"Ja, exactly," said Jung.

Phineas shook his head.

"Wait a minute," he said. "We have nasty, sweaty, hormonally charged children in this school every year. This is the first Professor di Semplice."

Jung shrugged.

"Who knows?" he said. "There are special circumstances perhaps. This Potter child. The prophecy. Voldemort. A war. We have the magical - what is the phrase - resonant frequency? The exact combination of initial conditions to produce a freak effect."

"Fascinating," said Dilys. "The power of her presence appears to have affected everyone living in the castle. But why aren't we affected?"

"I think I can answer that," said Dippet. "We're all pictures. The process of painting has fixed us all at the point in time at which we all posed. Of course, there is the scope for some development, but only within certain limits. We do not, as it were, have the same sorts of desires as the truly living. Thus we are not as susceptible to appeals to the emotions or the sub-conscious."

"And, more to the point, how do we get rid of her?" asked Everard.

"How do you cure any fantasy?" replied Jung. "It depends if the fantasiser wants to let go of it."

Phineas had been deep in thought.

"I don't understand," he said eventually. "The looks, the brains, the outstanding ability at everything - I can understand that as the accumulation of a large number of individual wishes. But where does Snape fit into this?" He looked at Dilys. "I appreciate that I have never been an adolescent girl, but I really cannot bring myself to imagine what sort of fantasy would involve having sex with Severus Snape."

"Oh, I don't know," said Dilys, "there's that whole dark and brooding thing. You'd be surprised how many otherwise intelligent girls dream about reforming the bad boy through the power of their love."

"Nauseating as that concept is," said Phineas, "I still can't apply it to Snape. He's ugly, arrogant, intolerant and vindictive. Whatever his positive qualities - and he does have them - he's certainly not some mysterious tormented soul waiting to be redeemed through love. And any girl foolish enough to think that he was would be disabused of that notion extremely abruptly."

As he spoke Dilys' attention became more and more focussed.

"What?" demanded Phineas, disconcerted. "You think differently?"

"Phineas, you're a genius. You may just have found the answer."

"Oh. Good."

"Let's go," said Dilys, "we have work to do."

"What about me?" demanded Jung. "I'm a genius as well, you know. I told you the answer. You wouldn't have worked it out without me."

But the other four had already left.

**********

"So," said Violet to the Fat Lady as she nibbled on a slice of Battenberg, "you mean him and That Woman have been carrying on all this time and no one knows about it."

"So Headmaster Dippet said," replied the Fat Lady through a mouthful of Eccles Cake. "And let's be honest, if you were, well, doing that with Severus Snape, would you want the whole school to know about it?"

Violet shuddered delicately.

"The thought makes my blood run cold. Is there any more cake?" The Fat Lady passed over the plate. Violet picked up another slice and began to absently peel the marzipan off the edges. "And we have to make sure that people know about it without actually telling them?

"What we have to do, according to Headmaster Dippet, is to be overheard gossiping about it and then look furtive if we're caught."

"I don't know if I can do that," said Violet. "I wasn't painted to be furtive."

"We have to," said the Fat Lady with decision. "It's for the Headmasters and the Good of the School."

**********

It is possible that the staff and students at Hogwarts never knew exactly how closely they were watched during that last week, before the end of The Incident. Day by day observations were made and notes anxiously compared. As word spread, reports came back. The Fat Lady said that Professor di Semplice had hesitated over an answer in class. Elfrida Cragg noticed some shoving between Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy. Violet saw the beginnings of a pimple.

But still Professor di Semplice was chairing the meetings of the Order. The paintings in Dumbledore's study watched eagerly for every owl, for every furtive agent who flooed in to give some hasty account of the outside world and then leave. And through it all there was no sign of any alteration in the new master plan.

Initial euphoria was replaced by anxiety and then by cold dread. Even Fortescue seemed subdued.

A week after the whispering campaign had begun the paintings met in Dumbledore's study.

"I don't know what else we can do," said Dippet, "and we're running out of time."

"Dilys, do you have any suggestions?" asked Everard. "Dilys? Dilys?"

Everyone turned to look at Dilys Derwent's painting. The big armchair was empty.

"Does anyone know where Dilys is?" asked Phineas carefully.

There was silence.

"She knew about the meeting," said Dippet. "Perhaps she'll be along in a minute."

A minute passed. There was no sign of Dilys.

"Well, we'll just have to rescue her," said Fortescue.

There were nods of agreement.

"And does anyone have any idea where to start looking for her?" asked Phineas.

That prompted a general shaking of heads.

"I don't think I've seen her since the staff meeting this evening," said Everard. "She doesn't normally go out of a walk unless it's on Hogwarts' business or some poor mad soul needs curtaining."

"This is wonderful," said Phineas. "All we need is to start losing each other."

Fortescue was half way through organising search parties when there was a cheerful greeting from behind the armchair.

"Hello, everyone, sorry I'm late."

Dilys Derwent emerged into her picture wearing a floor length bright yellow rain cape and matching sou'wester. Water streamed off her and pooled at her feet. She took of the hat and shook it at arm's length. Then she undid the cape and stepped out of it, holding the edge of her robe away from the wet patch on the floor. She shook out her silver ringlets.

"Welcome Dilys," said Phineas dryly. "Fortescue here was just about to rush to your rescue."

"At least someone was going to, sir," barked Fortescue, glaring at Phineas.

"I'm fine," said Dilys, "I've just been upstairs talking to Johannes Friedrich."

"That must have been a joy," remarked Phineas.

"Anyway," she said, taking no notice, "we've been discussing what's going on, and I think I know what we've missed." She looked at the foul weather gear on the floor, which as beginning to steam in the heat of the study. "Armando, dear, can I come over to your painting? Mine's soaking and I want it to dry out before the frame warps."

Dippet made a courtly gesture. Dilys disappeared and reappeared a moment later next to the frail headmaster.

"Right," she said. "I think we're on the right track here, but we're trying too hard." She paused. "What forms part of every adolescent girl's fantasy?"

"Calorie-free chocolate cake?" suggested a rather portly witch hanging in an alcove.

There was a titter of laughter. Dilys shook her head.

"Actually, I think I'm generalising too much. What forms a significant part of many adolescent female fantasies?"

"Something horrific, no doubt," said Phineas.

"Marriage," said Dilys. "Or at least some kind of lasting relationship with a significant other, often accompanied by children."

"So I was right," said Phineas.

"How does this help?" asked Everard.

"Simple," said Dilys. "This woman is playing out the collected fantasies of the student body. All we have to do is let that run to its logical conclusion."

"Marriage?" said Everard. "How will that get rid of her?"

"Think about who she's seeing," said Dilys.

They did.

"Oh my," said Dippet weakly.

"Quite," said Dilys. "Professor Alexandrina di Semplice is carrying the seeds of her own destruction."

**********

The end came at supper time.

There was an air of expectancy at the staff table. Hagrid was grinning broadly, Professor McGonagall had a fond smile on her face and Albus Dumbledore's twinkle was more benign than usual. Professor di Semplice was luminous, hair glittering in the candlelight. Beside her, Snape sat rather stiffly, with an air of slight disconnection from reality.

The meal was over and the plates cleared away and the school was waiting for the dismissal.

Dumbledore stood up.

"Ladies and gentlemen, before the usual notices I am happy to tell you that a very special announcement is to be made. Normally, I would do this myself, but in this case, I can think of no better person to do it than Professor di Semplice." He made a half-bow in the direction of the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher. "Alexandrina, if you will."

Professor di Semplice stood up. She smiled and extended her hand to Snape.

"Come along, Severus, this is your announcement too."

Slowly Snape stood up, rather as if someone else had temporarily taken control of his motor functions. Professor di Semplice took his hand and led him around the end of the table and along the front of the dais. She was wearing exquisitely cut robes of forest green that swirled around her as she walked. A more striking contrast to Snape could not have been imagined.

The two stopped in the centre of the room and stood together, hand in hand, in front of the whole school. Professor di Semplice had a radiant look on her face; Snape, on the other hand, looked more like a man suffering from a profound attack of indigestion. Whatever his internal struggles, it was clear that the outcome was uncertain.

There were shufflings within the hall, and some murmurs of mingled surprise and confusion.

"Ladies and gentlemen," began Professor di Semplice, "colleagues and, I hope, friends, Severus and I have a very happy announcement to make. I came to this school hoping for a rewarding job, guiding the minds of the younger generation. I did not look to find love, nor did I expect to find it. But find it I did."

The murmurs became more pronounced.

"Tell me that what I think's happening is not happening," said Ron Weasley to Hermione Granger.

"I've heard the rumours," said Hermione, "but they can't be true. Professor di Semplice just wouldn't."

Professor di Semplice began to look less sure of herself.

"Yes," she continued, "Severus and I are engaged to be married."

The murmurs ceased abruptly. Deathly silence fell as the student body began to process this information and implications of it.

Professor di Semplice began to look distinctly worried.

The students began to find their voices.

"But that would mean she'd... she'd ... with him ... oh, bloody hell," said Ron.

"Oh, my God," said Hermione faintly.

"But she's so good at Quidditch," said Harry Potter.

"But my father approves of her," said Draco Malfoy.

"I know he's my head of house, but that's just wrong," said Pansy Parkinson.

"Huh?" said Vincent Crabbe, who had taken advantage of the confusion to steal some extra trifle from his neighbour's bowl.

It may have been that in the hearts of some of the older girls - or boys - the lure of the bad boy still exerted some sway. But for every member of the school below sixth year, and for most of those above there could only be one reaction.

In the last act of cooperation and solidarity for some time to come, the houses of Hogwarts united in one powerfully expressed opinion.

Revulsion.

Professor di Semplice blinked out of existence in a wave of appalled sound.

Snape stood alone in the middle of the hall. His complexion slowly went from very pale to brick red. Eventually, he drew his wand and pointed it at the hall.

"Silencio," he roared. The sound abruptly stopped. "Now, pay attention," he added.

Gradually people stopped even trying to speak, even on the staff table.

Snape glared at the room.

"I want you all to understand one thing," he said deliberately. "If anyone, and I mean anyone, mentions this ... this ... incident ever again, anywhere, under any circumstances whatsoever, I will know about it. And that person, and their children and their children's children even unto the seventh generation will know no rest. I will devote the remainder of my natural life to that end. If necessary, I will add special provisions to my will to ensure that that person and their descendants live lifetimes of suffering beyond imagination." He looked around the room. "Do I make myself absolutely clear?"

There was a wave of mute nodding. Even the occupants of the staff table were showing a sudden intense interest in the markings on the cutlery.

"Good," he said.

With a sweep of his wand he removed the spell and left the hall.

"Somehow," murmured Dumbledore at his retreating back, "I don't think that anyone is going to be too keen to spread the news of this."

**********

Later that evening, after explanations had been given and excuses agreed and Dumbledore's office was empty, the paintings gathered again.

"Ladies and gentlemen," said Dippet, "I think we can say that that was a job well done in the finest traditions of Hogwarts and its headmasters and headmistresses."

There was a pop from Fortescue's painting.

"Wine, anyone?" he said. "Everard and I got them from a rather nice al fresco picnic outside the hospital wing."

He set out some glasses on a tray and began to distribute them.

"Splendid," said Dippet. He raised his glass in a toast. "Ladies and gentlemen, I give you 'Reality'."

"Reality," they all replied.

"And that concludes our business, I think."

"Er, not quite, Armando," said Dilys.

"Don't tell me there's more," said Phineas.

"There is the small matter of Johannes Friedrich Jung."

"What about him?" asked Phineas.

"Well, in order to get him to talk to me again, I had to promise him that I'd do what I could to get him moved back downstairs."

Phineas groaned. Dilys looked indignant.

"For heaven's sake, Phineas, he did help us. And he doesn't really fit in up there."

"I beg to differ," muttered Phineas.

"He doesn't," said Dilys sharply. "He's not mad or dangerous and if being a waspish, cantankerous old sod was a criteria for being put in the Attic, he'd have a lot more company up there."

She looked pointedly at Phineas.

"What are you saying, Dilys?" he returned.

"I'm saying, Phineas, that we owe it to him to find him another home."

"You're too soft-hearted. It must be left over from all that Healing."

Dilys just looked at him.

Phineas smiled suddenly.

"On the other hand, the current head of Slytherin did subject me to an extensive and prolonged view of his anatomy and perhaps that privilege should not go unrewarded. Not to mention that fact that he's probably feeling a bit lonely right now." He took a long sip of his wine. "Leave it with me, Dilys. I'll pay a call on Severus tomorrow. I'm sure we can sort out for Herr Jung."

**********