Current location:	desk 2
Entry tags:	fandom: harry potter, fanfiction, pairing: ss/hg

Vision
Title: Vision
Fandom: Harry Potter
Pairing: SS/HG, kind of
Status: first chapter can stand as a one-shot, the story itself is an abandoned WiP
Rating: PG
Summary: It happened during the Sorting ...
Author's Notes: Not beta'd, ergo full of mistakes. Probably.
Disclaimer: The characters really all belong to Rowling.

Vision

It happened during the Sorting – in Severus’s eyes one of the most boring episodes in the whole school year. He knew most of the students that got sorted into his House anyway. There were rarely any surprises. Today, it had been none so far.

Granted, they had only reached G, so there might still be hope for a little change. But when he let his eyes sweep over the gathered first-years, he somewhat doubted it.

His gaze fell on a small, black-haired boy. Potter. Son of his nemesis from his own time as student at Hogwarts. Severus sneered. The boy resembled his father very much, even at this young age. No doubt he would be as arrogant a Gryffindor as his father had been.

‘Goyle, Gregory,’ McGonagall called out, and a thickset boy shuffled forwards. Severus sighed as the Hat shouted ‘SLYTHERIN!’ There were some he could do without, pure-blood or not.

And then the lightning struck.

‘Granger, Hermione.’

Severus started and sat up straight as the girl, no woman, marched over to the stool and eagerly jammed the Hat on her head. He watched, his eyes glued to the slender form under the scruffy old Hat, insides for some reason squirming with nervousness, as she sat still and let the Hat sort out her mind.

‘GRYFFINDOR!’ it shouted finally, and Severus fell back in his chair, blinking. He slowly shook his head. Now, what had happened? Dazedly, he watched as a girl with an enormous mop of curly brown hair and oversized front teeth emerged from under the Hat. He followed her progress to Gryffindor table with his eyes and kept watching her throughout the meal, but the vision did not return, and neither could he find an explanation for its occurrence.

Later that night, alone in his quarters, he sat in front of the fire and tried to sort out what had happened. He had not been the most talented Divinations student, but even he could recognise a vision and differentiate it from an illusion. He had clearly been met by a vision. But why? What was there about the girl that had triggered the vision? She was a Muggle-born, he had already checked on that. Why would he, Head of Slytherin House, be visited by visions about a Muggle-born Gryffindor? They were at the opposite ends of the wizarding world, and that left the age difference unconsidered. Why then he? Why this vision?

Severus shook his head tiredly, none the wiser. But it didn’t matter that he couldn’t find an answer to the questions right now. The girl was a student. She would be in his care for the next seven years. It was time enough to figure out this riddle.

He went to bed, and as he extinguished the bed-side candle, he resolutely pushed all thoughts of her out of his mind and concentrated on his new students. It was not long before he fell asleep – there was little as boring as eleven-year-old children – and when he dreamed of her and once more saw a pretty young woman with a head of curly hair, a wide smile, and warm brown eyes march over to the stool instead of a scrawny eleven-year-old, well, then it wasn’t his fault. Even a master Occlumens cannot control the messages of his own subconscious.








II.

Severus watched the girl closely throughout her first year, and at the end of the year he knew more about her than he wished to know, but still hadn’t found the answer to his question.

He knew she was bossy, and that this bossiness covered shyness and deep insecurities. He knew she was a know-it-all and did little but studying, and knew that she tried to win acceptance and affection that way. He knew she was an expert liar when the need arose – her stories were feeble, but with no gesture or blink did she betray the truth. It needed a Legilimens to see the truth.

He knew she revelled in a teacher’s praise, and that she longed for him to acknowledge her achievements. Not that he ever did acknowledge her. She was a Gryffindor, after all. He knew she was logical, loyal, hard-working, without imagination in her studies, and that, with the correct training, she could one day be truly brilliant.

Not that she would ever get the training she needed to excel. Hogwarts provided a thorough education for many, not an excellent one for few. He felt almost sorry for her.

Furthermore, due to the close watch he kept on her, he necessarily got to know a lot about Potter and the youngest Weasley offspring, who were her closest friends after the Troll-incident on Hallowe’en. More than he actually thought necessary to keep Potter save. He had been forced to keep a close watch over the boy, thanks to Dumbledore and his scheming, but still he learnt more about the boy than her ever learnt about most of his own Slytherins.

This knowledge, too, was something he could have well done without. He disliked Molly Weasley excessively – vulgar hyena that she was – and with her all her brats, and Potter had a way of looking at him that reminded him too much of the boy’s father that he could bring himself to see the shadows in the child’s eyes.

There were other shadows he had to think of. One of his colleagues was possessed by his old master, and he had to tread cautiously not to arouse unwanted suspicion. They tried to rescue the inexperienced young man, without letting him or the one who shared his soul know. There were attempts at young Potter’s life, and as a good, dutiful teacher he could not let it happen.

Damn duty to hell. And since it was already on its way, let duty take all the essays he had to grade with it!

In his spare free-time, he did some research on visions, combing the library and even going so far as to cautiously ask Silly, pardon, Sybill Trelawney for advice. She had been absolutely no help, with her vague and mysterious blathering, and after he had left Trelawney’s office, he aired his robes for 48 hours to get the damned vanilla incense out of it and swore to himself he’d never set a foot in there again.

His mood was, therefore, not the best when the school gathered for the Leaving Feast, and that Dumbledore deprived his House of its well-earned victory by awarding 160 points to Gryffindor – and Potter’s rule-breaking! – did nothing to improve it. He had to shake McGonagall’s hand and pretend he congratulated her, while all he wished was to curse someone. Preferably Potter.

The fact that Hermione Granger, barely thirteen years old, had solved his Potions-riddle and he could not even boast of her accomplishment aggravated him even further.

And he had still neither an answer nor any idea where to look for an explanation of the vision.





III.


At the end of July, he had combed his library as well without ever getting closer to an explanation. By now, he was an expert on all kinds of visions, and if Dumbledore would ever become fed up with his constant re-applying for the Defence post and fire him as Potions master – not every likely, but you never knew – he could apply as Divinations professor. He would certainly be more effective than Silly Trelawney.

What he did find, however, crammed in one of his mother’s old books, was a clipping from the Daily Prophet. It was an article on the famous Welsh Seer Gwen Gweleis, and it spoke it rapturous terms about her abilities – and the precision of her predictions. Being at the end of his wits and troubled by recurring dreams of the vision, he wrote a letter to the Prophet with the request to please let him know where the woman now lived if she was still alive.

He spent one week in distraction before he got an Owl from the Prophet. It turned out that the woman was still alive, and sharper in her predictions than before now she had lost her sight. His most faithful servant Timothy Burns even provided him with Gweleis’s address. The next day, Severus Apparated to see her.

Granny Gweleis, as everybody in the tiny Welsh village called her, lived in a nice, small cottage that stood in an overgrown garden. The predominant flowers were roses. Severus itched to blast them apart. But as he did not want to anger the Seer, he refrained from doing so and merely fought his way to her door.

He knocked three times, and an old voice called, ‘Enter.’

He opened the door and stepped into the cottage that seemed dark after the brightness of the day outside. It took a moment until his eyes had adjusted to the twilight inside, and then he spotted an old woman sitting in a chair by the window. She wore faded purple robes and a cap on her steely-grey hair. She had a sharp, pointed nose and missed her two front teeth. Her milky-white eyes regarded him without blinking.

‘Ah, Professor Snape, it’s you. Please come in and sit down.’ She made a motion to the chair opposite her.

Severus remained where he was and glared at her. How did she know it was him? Had the Prophet let her know he had asked?

The old woman smiled. ‘I saw you would be coming this summer,’ she explained simply. ‘Do sit down, please.’

Severus stalked over to the chair and sat down, regarding the woman with deep mistrust. Saw he would be coming, did she? Rubbish.

She smiled at him, revealing the gap in the teeth. ‘And what brings you here, Professor Snape?’

‘Haven’t you seen that as well?’ he snapped.

‘No. Neither did I know when you would be coming. Only that you would.’

Severus snorted, for some reason feeling cheated.

‘Well, now, what brought you to me?’

‘I had a … vision,’ he explained reluctantly. ‘Last year. I have tried to find an explanation for this event, but couldn’t find anything.’

‘And so you’ve come to me,’ Gwen Gweleis chuckled. ‘Tell me about your vision.’

With even greater reluctance, Severus told her exactly when, where, what, and who. She listened in silence, thoughtfully tapping her cheek with one finger. When he was finished, she remained silent and thoughtful, and Severus finally snapped, ‘Well? Can you tell me anything about it?’

She grinned cheekily. ‘Why, yes, of course.’ A giggle shook her body, and then she began to laugh outright.

Severus glared at her in seething anger. It was not enough that he had been plagued by a vision about one of his students and that he had felt obliged to come her in spite of his misgivings about Divination, he now had to endure this old hag laughing at his expense!

‘Would you please inform me about your deductions,’ he begged icily.

Gwen gave another fat chuckle and wiped her eyes. ‘Ah, my dear Professor,’ she exclaimed. ‘This is no occasion for anger! You have been graced with a very rare and precious present. That young woman you’ve seen is your other half and will, so the Heavens allow it, be your wife one day.’

Severus sat frozen for a moment, digesting the information, before he shot up. ‘What?’ he snarled. ‘That … that girl?! A Gryffindor? My wife?? Never!’

The old woman nodded placidly. ‘Oh, she will be, she will be.’

‘Woman,’ Severus hissed dangerously. ‘That girl is my student and is twelve years old at the moment! I am thirty-three! You do perceive the idiocy of your words?’

Instead of being intimidated, Gwen chuckled again. ‘One day, she will cease to be your student. And I’ve always heard people say that an older man is just the right thing for a young girl to marry.’

‘She is a child, for Heaven’s sake!’ he shouted, infuriated at what she was insinuating. ‘I am not interested in children! What do you take me for?’

With an angry hiss, he turned and stalked out of the cottage, slamming the door behind him. The old woman at the window giggled surprisingly youthful and looked inward at the image of the young woman, smiling up at the dark-haired man in her arms.

‘Tut, tut, Severus,’ she said mischievously. ‘There is no running away from what the Heavens decided. And if I judge her correctly, there is no running away from Hermione Granger, either. Just give in, lad, just give in.’






IV.


A week later, Severus had calmed down sufficiently to consider the old Seer’s words rationally. And consider them he did, to his own surprise. But then, he told himself, as asinine as Granny Gweleis’s words had been, they were an explanation for the vision, so of course would he consider them. Everything was better than being plagued by ignorance.

The girl was his other half, the old woman had said. She would – perhaps – be his wife one day. Severus highly doubted it. Twenty years his junior, and a Gryffindor, and Harry Potter’s friend to boot. No, it was not very likely to come to pass.

Besides, there was this tiny matter about his former master, who wasn’t as dead as the general wizarding world thought him to be. One day, the Dark Lord would be back. And then he, Severus, would have to fight again. The chances that he survived a second time were rather low.

And that, of course, was not taking into account that one of his dunderheaded students might have blown him up by that time - the name of Longbottom came to mind, closely followed by the Twins of Terror, Fred and George Weasley.

Severus sipped his thin, black tea and wondered whether it was good or bad that he would most likely be dead before the girl was old enough for him to even vaguely consider her suitable. He put the cup down and the thought away. Good or not, it was depressing.

Taking up the book that lay on the table, he sat back comfortably. For the time being, the Dark Lord was a bodiless spirit, there were no schemes or plots going on to take over the world (or at least wreak havoc at Hogwarts), and the Granger chit was still a student and would be for another six years. And he still had two weeks before he had to return to Hogwarts.

Severus sighed contentedly and opened his book.

Six years was a lot of time. So much could happen. He might be able to find out how to avoid Granny Gweleis’s prophesied outcome. The girl might fall in love with the Potter brat and marry him on graduation day. Hell, even he might meet someone he could come to respect and cherish (you never knew).

Yes, it was useless to worry too much about the girl. He would deal with her when the time came. And with that resolution he put Hermione Granger out of his mind for the rest of the summer.





V.

Two weeks later, Severus was back at Hogwarts, preparing everything for the new school-year. Sitting hunched over timetables and class-outlines in his dungeon office, he longed for the easy days when all that troubled him were an unexplainable vision about a student and Professor Quirrell’s performance as the Evil Minion.

His application for the Defence Against the Dark Arts post had once again been denied, and he faced another year of having to teach numerous untalented and uninterested students the finer art of potion brewing.

He and the rest of the staff had been informed that the vacant Defence post would this year be filled by none other than famous Gilderoy Lockhart, an announcement which had the witches on the staff flustered and flushed, and Severus inwardly seething. That poncy peacock!

He remembered Gilderoy very well from his days as a student; he had been a sixth-year when Severus started school and famous for his vanity, his ability of charming teachers into giving him top marks when he couldn’t earn them the usual way, his utter inability at Transfiguring anything, and his expertise at all kind of Memory Charms.

The feather-brained fag Lockhart as Defence Against the Dark Arts professor! It was ludicrous! Severus felt insulted.

To make matters even worse, he had received an Owl from Lucius Malfoy which was full of cryptic hints at a scheme he had hatched to wreak havoc at Hogwarts and rid the school of all Muggle-born students; a sinister plan that would get the Potter brat into deep trouble and eventually expelled. Yet nothing straight forward that could be used against him, of course.

Severus had dutifully carried this missile to his headmaster, and in return had been burdened by the grateful Dumbledore with the task to do his best to uncover the plan and keep the Potter boy safe.

He could already see that this year was going to be even worse than the last.