Chapter 38: 'Til We Meet Again

Severus and Rosetta had held each other tightly that morning, their hearts breaking at having to say goodbye after only just admitting their feelings for each other and physically sealing their love. Severus was once more consumed by guilt as he held her close. She had guessed the truth, but she didn't know the whole story. It was true that Dumbledore had him over a barrel, but he had omitted to tell Rosetta why.

There were many reasons, if Snape were honest with himself, why he felt he couldn't tell her about Lily. Firstly, because he knew it would hurt her and she would, understandably, feel second best to a dead woman. Secondly, it was his most guarded secret and the thing he had hidden away from everyone – Voldemort, Lily's son, the whole of the wizarding world. It was his weakness and he had to bury it inside him, because if the truth came out, it would be used against him – especially by Voldemort and the Death Eaters themselves. A Death Eater in love with a Mudblood? They would laugh as they killed him in the dirt. And thirdly, it would be a burden for Rosetta to know. It wasn't that he didn't trust her with the information but as far as he was concerned, the least amount of people who knew, the safer his secrets were away from Voldemort's prying mind and the less danger she would be in. He, unlike Rosetta, was a skilled Occlumens after all.

If he survived the upcoming war and Voldemort fell, he promised Rosetta he would flee to Rhodes to carve out a new life and tell her the full story, warts and all. But until that time, he knew he had to stay guarded and pretend to be the Severus Snape everyone knew him to be – cold, unfeeling, callous, and without sentiment.

That afternoon, the tears now dry on her cheeks after their painful farewell, Rosetta took some time to stroll around the Hogwarts grounds before leaving for Rhodes. The old castle looked breathtaking in the afternoon light, the sun glinting off windows and shimmering across the still waters of the Black Lake, reflecting a warmth that was not in her heart.

It was just her luck that she had fallen for someone who could not love her back. Or could not love her back right now, she corrected herself. But knowing he felt the same way as her did not make the bitter pill any easier to swallow. She knew that Severus' role in helping Dumbledore bring Voldemort down would only get more dangerous as the one he called the Dark Lord grew in power, and she also knew he was protecting both of them by cutting contact with her until the war was over. But how long it would take to bring Voldemort down, she did not know. Neither did she know just how Dumbledore had convinced him to deflect, Severus had promised he would tell her everything in time, if he survived the war. A chill ran down her spine at this thought, that horrible if, an icy reminder that he was risking his life by switching sides and how there was a very real possibility she would never see him again.

As she strolled around the perimeter of the lake, Rosetta reflected on how her life so far seemed to run in cycles of wanting something, getting it and then losing it, and having to rebuild from scratch. She'd had to reinvent herself time and again, starting with her time at Gringotts.

It had been her first job and she'd wanted it so badly and had worked so hard. Who could blame her, as an eager rookie Treasure Hunter, for wanting some of the glory for herself after all she'd done? It wasn't her fault she'd ended up doing two jobs. She had fought her corner about the useless Curse-Breaker partner to which she had been assigned and how she had been carrying them both, having to both source and secure the treasure, but to her fury the bosses said she had overstepped her role and was no longer welcome in the Wizard Bank. They had suspected her of taking treasure, but they'd had no proof.

So she'd lost her job at Gringotts and had to try her hand at another career, this time at the Ministry of Magic. Her formidable language skills soon snagged her a job in the Merperson Liaison Office and within a year of hard work she'd become the head of department. She'd forged links between the elusive Aegean merpeople and European wizards, setting up an alliance and rebuilding trust after years of silence and exclusion. And when the merpeople wanted to trade, Rosetta gladly helped them. As far as she could see, it was a mutually beneficial arrangement. Corruption, the Ministry officials had called it in their written warning of conduct. Rosetta had called it earning a living, a supplement for her meagre Ministry wages.

Feeling unfairly treated after all she'd done, she'd left the Ministry and moved to Greece to become a trader full-time, once again reinventing herself and living on the outskirts of wizarding society, licking her wounds from her double fall from grace. That was fine for a while; it felt like she was self-sufficient and finally finding her niche in life with no bosses to answer to, until she'd ended up at Hogwarts. That decision had been driven only by the need to survive, to get enough gold to live out her days in freedom. And then she'd ended up falling in love, which was not part of her plan at all.

She was suddenly struck by a phrase she'd heard a long time ago, perhaps in a Muggle song, or from a well-meaning relative: You can't always get what you want, but sometimes you get what you need.

Well, she supposed as she turned back from the lake and up the old dirt path that led towards the gates, perhaps she got a bit of both this year. She wanted gold and she got more Galleons than she would earn in a decade. She needed Severus but she couldn't have him right now. She might not get to have him at all, and she needed to make peace with that. The war effort could take years and who knew if he'd end up alive? She would have to trust in their promises to each other, stripped bare of lies and presumptions. If they were destined to be together, it would happen one day. She needed to believe it.

But beyond that, she knew that once more she would have to make it on her own and this time, life wouldn't be so tough. Because she'd reinvented herself before and she knew she had the depth of character to do it again. And because this time, she had something more precious than gold, and more reliable than love.

Rosetta stopped short in front of the wrought iron gates and pulled out a silver cylindrical object from her pocket, watching it glint in the sun. This was her future; the cost of her work for Dumbledore and the payment for her broken heart. It was priceless.

With a tight smile, she stowed the ornate scroll case back inside her robes and held her head up high as she walked through the gates, never once looking back.

THE END

(Or is it?)

A/N: Thank you to everyone who has read this story, I know it's taken a long time to complete (damn you, day job!) You get extra House points if you were reading from the very start! My intention was to make this as canon compliant as humanly possible in sticking with the plot points and timelines of Chamber of Secrets, and yet weave a fresh tale that would sit alongside it that could feel plausible without interrupting canon. It was no easy task but I did it the best that I could under my self-imposed parameters.

Rosetta's character had been with me for a few years before writing this so I am so pleased I have finally managed to get her out of my head and woven in to a story. The story also took a turn that I wasn't expecting, either. I set out to write a traditional love story along the boy meets girl, boy and girl hate each other, boy and girl end up getting together sequence of events but as I started writing it was clear that Rosetta had her own tale to tell and it wasn't going to work out like that after all! It wasn't my intention to have Severus and the story of their romance at the peripheral of the story but that's just the way it happened.

Thanks again for reading this far and who knows? Maybe Rosetta will nag me to write another! It certainly feels like there is unfinished business between the two of them.