"Firstly," began Albus Dumbledore. "Let me congratulate you on your astonishing achievement."

Severus raised his head in confusion. "Sir?"

"Retrieving books from the Restricted Section in the Library without permission, either by day and therefore right out from under Madam Pince's nose . . ." The old man gave Severus a look from over his half moon glasses. "Or by night and thereby avoiding detection from Filch, is no small feat. I feel that your achievements must thus be recognized and so," he gave a small nod of his head. "I congratulate you."

"Er . . ." was all Severus could think to say. He couldn't decide if the headmaster was seriously congratulating him or mocking him.

"However," Dumbledore continued, placing the tips of his long fingers together. "Stealing from the Restricted Section-"

"I was going to return it." Severus interjected before he could stop himself. He did not want to get into trouble with the school or with Albus Dumbledore. The last thing he needed was to have a letter sent home to his father.

Dumbledore simply smiled. "My apologies," he said. "Borrowing from the Restricted Section without a signed permission slip is not something I can be expected to tolerate."

Severus shifted nervously in his seat.

"Therefore," said Dumbledore. "I will have to ask you to return the spoils of you victory."

"Pardon?"

Dumbledore smiled again, his blue eyes twinkling behind his glasses. "The books in your bag, Severus."

"Oh," said Severus, grasping the side of the bag he had slung over his shoulder. "Right." He opened the bag and pulled out two books, which he then handed over to Dumbledore.

The old man took them gladly. "I believe there is another, is there not?"

Severus blinked. How did Dumbledore know how many books were in his bag?

"Sorry," he said hastily, reaching into his bag and pulling out the third book as he continued to wonder how Dumbledore had known it was there. Of course, he was probably just jumping to conclusions. Madam Pince had probably told Dumbledore how many books had gone missing.

"And the five others currently residing in the bottom of your trunk, you will have to return those as well."

Severus stared. How in the name of Merlin could he possibly-? He suddenly realized that his mouth as hanging open in surprise and amazement. He closed it quickly, swallowed and said, "Yes, sir."

"By Thursday at the very latest."

"Yes, sir," he said again.

"Curiosity is not a sin, Severus." Dumbledore told him. "No doubt you find the Dark Arts to be . . . fascinating."

Severus looked at him.

"Maybe even . . . beautiful in their own way."

Severus nodded in admittance.

"Not to mention . . . all together tragic," added Dumbledore.

Again Severus nodded, wondering how the headmaster could spell it out so simply.

"There's noting wrong with an interest in the Dark Arts." Dumbledore told him. "In fact, I would go so far as to say that knowing about them - nay, even knowing how to use them is not all together wrong or evil. It is more how wizards and witches choose to use them, that makes them so dark. So, I don't believe that what you have done is in any wrong, Severus."

Severus nodded thankfully.

"But one does need to take caution." Dumbledore continued. "I do not believe it right to censor what one can or can not read. But, one would not give a small child a violent, gory story filled with blood shed to read, now would they?"

Severus shook his head. "I suppose not, sir."

"And, not that I'm implying that you are a child but, nor does one give books on the principles of the Dark Arts to thirteen year olds." Dumbledore concluded pointedly.

Severus nodded in understanding.

"However . . . " The headmaster rose from his seat and ventured over to the bookshelf behind him. "If you are looking for something 'fascinating,' 'beautiful' and 'tragic' to read . . . I would recommend this." The old man handed him a thin, leather bound book. "If you find it to your liking, you may keep it."

"Oy." Sirius elbowed Jams in the ribs. "What's Snively reading there?"

James leaned forward in Snape's direction and squinted in an attempt to read the title of the book. "Theories . . . and Principles . . . of the Dark Arts."

"Wasn't he reading The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts last week?" asked Peter as he began to climb the beach tree the foursome was gathered around.

"Yeah," said Sirius. "And I saw him with Magick Most Evile yesterday."

"Er . . . " said Remus, sensing a confrontation and trying to draw his friends away from it. "Anyone want to go down to the Quidditch Pitch and practice?"

"It's not normal," said Sirius, ignoring Remus and continuing to watch Snape.

"No one should be that engrossed in the Dark Arts," agreed James. "And he's up to his eyeballs in it."

"Hey, Sirius," Remus tried in another lousy attempt to draw his friends attention away from Snape. Yes, he agreed that the bloke's choice in reading material was strange, but he couldn't see any harm in it. Well, no, actually he could see a lot of harm in it, but . . . "Help me with my Divination homework, will you?"

Sirius actually turned to him. "Remus, if you didn't have us to drag you out of the common room, all you would ever do would be homework and you'd never have any fun."

Taunting Snape was not exactly Remus's idea of fun. "Well . . . help me with this and I'll go for a swim in the lake."

Sirius raised his eyebrows at him, and Remus realized too late that he'd said the wrong thing. He never went swimming. There were scars on his body that he simply couldn't explain to his friends. They had been trying to get him to go swimming in the lake for three years. He'd tried it once with his clothes on . . . that didn't work out so well.

"Okay," said Sirius eagerly, sitting down beside Remus and grabbing his Divination book. "And you can't back out later like you did last time."

Remus cursed silently to himself. Great. Now what was he going to do?

"What's he doing?" asked James, who hadn't removed his eyes from Snape. "Sirius, look at this. He's gone all funny."

Sirius left Remus side to stand next to James. He took the Divination book with him. "Well, that's odd," he said.

"What's odd?" asked Peter from his tree branch.

"He looks like he's muttering under his breath or something."

"He's probably just reading aloud," said Remus.

"No," said James. "I don't even think he's looking at the book. His eyes aren't moving."

"How can you tell from over here?" asked Remus. Curiosity got the better of him. He stood and walked over to stand next to Sirius. James was right: Snape wasn't looking at the book. "What is he staring at?" Remus tried to follow Snape's line of vision. A little farther away sat a group of girls. The one sitting nearest had a mane of fiery red hair.

"Lily Evans," said James. "He's trying to curse her."

"James, it's theory." Remus pointed out. "Snape can't curse her with theory."

"You said so yourself, Remus, that magic is ninety percent theory to begin with." James reminded him as he reached into his pocket for his wand. "And I'm willing the bet that with all the Dark Arts stuff Snape's into he knows enough practical stuff to make up the other ten." He started in Snape's direction.

Sirius shoved the Divination book back into Remus's hands and followed James.

Remus slapped the book to his forehead in frustration. Were they ever going to leave Snape alone?

"Expelliarmus!" shouted Sirius.

Snape's book went flying out of his hands, landing three feet away from him. He dove for it, but-

"Wingardium Leviosa!" shouted James.

The book levitated into the air. Snape scrambled to his feet, but the book was soon floating above his head. He jumped for it, but to no avail.

James gave his wand a sharp flick, and the book went soaring in the direction of the lake. It landed with a soft splash.

Snape spun around in James's direction, looking absolutely furious as he pulled out his wand.

"Expelliarmus!" Sirius shouted again.

Snape's wand flew out of his hand. Sirius caught it.

"What are you going to do now, Snivellus?" taunted James. "Can't go cursing anyone without your book or your wand, now can you?"

"You prat!" spat Snape, diving at James and knocking him to the ground.

"Oy!" yelled Sirius. He dove at the mess of flailing arms and legs, trying to pull Snape off James. There was the sound of a soft crack and Sirius jumped back, clutching his nose as blood began to seep between his fingers.

Above him, Remus could hear Peter as he began to scramble down from his branch, apparently having decided that Sirius and James might need some help. Remus realized that he couldn't ignore what was happening any longer. Pulling out his wand, he made his way toward the two wrestling teenagers. But before he could think of a spell, a voice rang out.

"Break it up!"

There was loud BANG. Snape and James flew six feet away from each other, landing splayed out on the ground.

Remus looked up to see Lily Evans standing across from him, her wand out, her cheeks flushed, and the expression on her face absolutely livid. "That's enough," she emphasized, looking between Snape and James.

Snape, who was sporting a busted lip, got to his feet. He swung his bag angrily over his shoulder, picked up his wand from the ground where Sirius had apparently dropped it, shot a somewhat desperate look back at the lake, and stormed off in the direction of the Entrance Hall.

"He jumped me," said James in a mixture of anger and disbelief as he touched a hand gingerly to his black eye.

"Well, I certainly would have thought so," said Lily hotly. "I think I would have jumped you too if you'd thrown my book in the lake." She spun abruptly on her heel and headed off in the direction of her friends.

"I bet you would love for her to jump you, eh, James?" laughed Sirius.

Lily spun back around, her wand pointed at Sirius. He took a step backward and raised his hands in the air in a gesture of peace.

Lily considered him for a moment. Then, apparently deciding that it wasn't worth it, lowered her wand and walked away to rejoin her friends.

Sirius let out a low whistle.

"What is up with her?" James demanded. "Did she not notice Snape was trying to curse her? We were only helping her out and she thinks we just randomly attacked him!

"Crazy bird." Sirius muttered, wiping his bloody nose on his sleeve.

Remus couldn't get passed it. It had been a library book, after all. It wasn't right to leave it floating around in the lake.

Later that night, when everyone else was asleep, Remus took James's invisibility cloak out of his trunk and headed outside to the Hogwarts grounds.

The search proved harder than he had thought it would be. Even with a lit wand, the darkness distorted everything into shadows of strange shapes and sizes. Many times he thought he had seen the book, but so far he'd discovered everything from someone's lost shoe to a patch of mud.

He shouldn't have waited until nightfall. It certainly would have been easier by daylight. But there was no way he would have been able to get away from Sirius, James and Peter. And if he had told them that he was looking for Snape's book, they certainly would have thought him a little mad.

There was also the fact that his search could only be conducted by the shoreline (or the small bit of it that was accessible). The book could have easily floated out into the middle of the lake by now.

Just when he was about to resign himself to the idea that the Giant Squid had probably eaten the blasted thing, he saw it. There! In the patch of tall grasses growing out of the water.

He rescued the book from the water, extinguished his wand, and hurried back into the castle and up to the Gryffindor common room.

The first odd thing he noticed about the book, as he sat it in front of the fireplace to dry, was that its jacket was too large for it. Which could only mean that the jacket did not belong to the book.

Snape had not been reading up on the Dark Arts.

What had he been reading that he'd felt he'd had to hide? And why cover it up with the jacket of a Dark Arts book? Was what he had been reading so terrible that having people think it was a Dark Arts book was actually better than exposing the true title?

Curious, Remus very carefully undid the jacket from the leather bound book. The cover was blank, its title worn off either by age or water damage. He couldn't tell which.

Just as carefully, he lifted the cover. The page beneath it was blank. Remus didn't dare to try separating the pages just yet, fearful that he would tear them in their current delicate state.

He sat down in one of the armchairs, leaving the book sitting by the fireplace, and watched the minutes on his watch tick by.

Eventually, he fell asleep and dreamed.

There was a dark man - Snape, only much older - a colossal snake and skull burning black on his arm.

A flash, and Snape was listening at a door. A hand suddenly reached out, grabbing at Snape's robes. He had been discovered.

Another flash, and Snape was talking to a man with red eyes. Snape spoke without speaking. The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies.

Flash. "I had no way of knowing that the Dark Lord . . ." Snape trailed off, shaking his head at Albus Dumbledore. "The prophecy - I . . . I didn't know," Snape continued, a tear running down his face that he tried to conceal but couldn't. "I swear I didn't know."

Flash. Snape was speaking again with the red eyed man. Snape was asking him to spare Lily Potter's life.

Flash. Snape was standing in the ruins of a house. He was looking for something. And then he found it: The body of a woman with dark red hair. Grief washed over his face, and then . . . a sound. A baby was crying. Snape turned at the sound, followed it, and found himself staring down at the woman's son. He raised his wand, cast a shield charm over the crying child, turned on his heel . . . and vanished.

Flash. Snape was pointing his wand at Dumbledore. "Avada Kedavra!"

Flash. There was a boy. He looked a lot like James only with green eyes and a strange lightening bolt scar on his forehead. "And if I meet Severus Snape along the way, so much the better for me, so much the worse for him."

Flash. A wand was pointed at Snape's chest. The faceless owner of the wand cried out, "Avada Kedavra!"

There was a flash of green light . . . and Snape fell.

Remus jerked awake, the images of the dream instantly fading from his memory.

He remembered dreaming, and yet, now that he had awoken, he could not remember what he had been dreaming about. Snape had been in it, he remembered that. Snape doing . . . terrible things . . . Though what those things had been, he couldn't remember.

Why on earth would he be dreaming about Severus Snape?

All that stuff James had said before about Snape being up to his eyeballs in the Dark Arts must have gone to his head.

Remus rubbed his eyes. It took him a moment to remember why he was sitting in a chair in the common and not laying in his own bed.

He reached for the book. The pages were slightly crumpled now from the water damage, and they were still a little damp. But he felt confident that he could turn them now without tearing.

As he went to open the book, he noticed something he hadn't before. There was a piece of string sticking out from between the pages. Snape must have been using it as a bookmark.

Remus separated the pages the string had marked and read:

O lest the world should task you to recite,

What merit lived in me that you should love

After my death, dear love, forget me quite,

For you in me can nothing worthy prove.

Unless you would devise some virtuous lie,

To do more for me than mine own desert,

And hang more praise upon deceased I,

Than niggard truth would willingly impart:

O lest your true love may seem false in this,

That you for love speak well of me untrue,

My name be buried where my body is,

And live no more to shame nor me nor you.

For I am shamed by that which I bring forth,

And so should you, to love things nothing worth.

Remus sat back in his chair, running a hand over his face and giving a nervous laugh.

A sonnet.

Snape had been reading a book of Shakespearean love sonnets.

And he had been reading one, this one . . . to Lily Evans.

For Cassie,

Who had watched Sense and Sensibility, had associated Alan Rickman with Snape, and had thus been unable to handle Alan Rickman reading Shakespearean love sonnets. Because it just wasn't something Snape would do. :)