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a_t_rainPrevious installments of my very silly HP / Hamlet crossover fic are here. Congrats to ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lareinenoire and themolesmother for correctly identifying the wizard at the Danish court. Special thanks to angevin2 for pointing out an interesting fact about the relative efficacy of masks and hats as disguises in Renaissance drama.
Act Four: Rosemary for Remembrance
“My commission!” Guildenstern cried in anguished tones. “The pirates have stolen my commission! From the king, sealed with the royal signet!”
He leapt from the deck of one ship to the other, drew his sword, and began to slash his way through a dozen astonished pirates.
“Quick.” Severus pulled Hamlet away from the fray. “This is our chance to get back to Denmark.”
“The pirates...”
“Are somebody else’s problem. Let’s go.” Severus pushed Hamlet into one of the boats that hung from the opposite side of the ship and severed the ropes with a swift motion of his wand. The boat landed in the sea with a tremendous splash of icy water.
“Are you mad?” Hamlet spluttered. “We’ll be drowned!”
“Of course I’m not mad. I am a wizard. How many times do I have to explain it to you?” Severus gritted his teeth and tried to work out which spells were required to make the boat go. For an awful minute, he was afraid that Hamlet’s prediction might prove correct; but at last the little craft gave a great lurch and sped southward, toward the coast of Denmark. Severus hastily put up a shield to deflect the sea spray, but not before both travelers had been drenched a second time.
“When I think upon G-Guildenstern,” said Hamlet through chattering teeth, “my mind reproves me. How is’t that he – a lackey, a flatterer, a politic instrument – dares do battle with so many salt-water thieves, for no more than a king’s commission? And I, that have been called to fight for no less than a king’s life, have delayed these two months and more –”
“Shut up, or I’ll let you get soaked again,” said Severus. The freezing water had not improved his temper, and he recognized certain signs that the prince was about to start talking to himself again. “We’re going back to kill Claudius now, aren’t we?”
“Aye, so we are.” As the ships receded behind them, Hamlet, unexpectedly, grinned. “For Denmark!”
* * *
Even with Severus’s excellent spellwork, it was several hours before they reached a small fishing village on the Danish coast. Wet and exhausted, they trudged to the nearest tavern, where Hamlet ordered a couple of tankards of hot spiced ale and made enquiries of the landlord.
The name of the place conveyed nothing to Severus, but Hamlet frowned. “We’re farther than I thought from Elsinore. ‘Twill be two or three days’ journey at the least.”
“For you, perhaps. Not for me.”
“I had almost forgot. Truly, you have shown me wonders. When we were at sea, I hardly knew whether I dreamt or woke.” Hamlet stretched his limbs in front of the fire and yawned. “Indeed, I hardly know now. At Wittenberg there were scholars who used to tell dark tales of magic, but I never credited them nor thought to see it done.”
Hamlet went on to ask several intelligent questions about wizardry, betraying a lively curiosity and none of the prejudices that Severus would have expected to find in a sixteenth-century Muggle. Under the combined influences of mulled ale, a warm room, and admiration, Severus decided that the prince was really a decent person, after all.
Hamlet called for more ale, and this time, the landlord brought a platter of brown bread, cheese, and smoked fish without being asked. Both young men fell on the food with more eagerness than manners.
“Truly,” said Hamlet with his mouth full, “the working-folk eat better than we do in the palaces. When we were at the university, Horatio and I were used to go to the shoemakers’ quarter ... in hats, you know, ‘tis a curious thing but no one recognizes you if you wear a hat, while masks are completely useless –” He swallowed abruptly; it was plain that a more serious thought had struck him. “Horatio. I must write a letter to him and explain matters. Trust no one at court but him and, at a pinch, my mother. The best of men turn horse-leeches when one such as Claudius is king.”
* * *
Severus Apparated to Elsinore around mid-morning on the following day, having slept rather later than he meant to. Hamlet had promised to follow him as swiftly as possible, but, given the inconvenience of Muggle travel, Severus did not expect him for some days.
He aimed for a spot on the palace grounds that he had expected to be deserted. It wasn’t. Someone was singing in a piercing, but not very tuneful, soprano. They bore him barefaced on the bier, hey non nonny, nonny, hey nonny...
Severus approached the little cluster of people with caution, but nobody had noticed his sudden appearance. The king, the queen, and a fair-haired young man who had the look of a courtier were all staring at Polonius’s daughter. The girl had impressed Severus as a singularly uninteresting little person, but there was something different about her now. Her hair and dress were disheveled, and she hummed snatches of song. You must sing a-down a-down, an you call him a-down-a.
The young man took a step toward her, pity and horror in his face, and the girl spoke.
“There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance; pray, love, remember; and there is pansies, that’s for thoughts.”
“A document in madness, thoughts and remembrance fitted!” said the young man.
Severus shook his head. “Not so mad as that,” he said automatically, and then realized too late that he had spoken aloud.
The king started. “Ah, Rosenstern. I did not think you could go to England and return again so quickly. Did you deliver my commission?”
Severus bowed low; he and Hamlet had agreed on a story. “Your Majesty, I am sorry to report that the commission – and the prince – have been taken by pirates. I escaped in one of the small boats, but I could not save him.”
“What? Pirates!”
“Put aside your fears, my lord. He was unhurt, and he is a valuable prisoner; you may ransom him at your leisure.”
“I may, to be sure,” Claudius agreed quickly.
Gertrude looked distraught. So, Severus thought, she knew she would never see Hamlet again if it were up to her husband. Would she have the courage to oppose him?
“There’s fennel for you,” said Ophelia to the king, “and columbines.” She turned to the queen. “There’s rue for you, and here’s some for me; we may call it herb of grace o’ Sundays. O, you must wear your rue with a difference. There’s a daisy; I would give you some violets, but they withered all when my father died.”
The king, the queen, and the fair-haired young man all looked baffled by this speech, but its meaning was crystal clear to Severus. The girl might be mad as Uric the Oddball, but she was a Potions genius – which almost made him lose sight of the fact that, under the circumstances, she was probably also a poisoner.
He resolved not to let her out of his sight – at least, not for longer than it would take to deliver the prince’s letter to Horatio.
* * *
“A wizard?” Horatio looked up from the letter. “Has he gone mad in earnest?”
“You tell me,” said Severus. “You seem – for some unaccountable reason – to be his friend.”
Horatio gave him a quizzical look. “I wonder whether you mean to insult me or him.”
“Both,” Severus replied, out of long habit, but without any real venom. He pointed his wand at a small rock and blasted it into shards. “Does that satisfy you?”
“I have seen mountebanks and charlatans do stranger things.”
“How do you know they were real mountebanks and charlatans?”
“You are a strange man, Severus.” Horatio folded the letter. “But the prince speaks most warmly of your abilities and your character.”
“He does?” said Severus. He mistrusted people who said that sort of thing.
“Aye. Read it for yourself, if you will.”
But Severus had no time to read the letter. There was a great splash from behind the willow trees, and a shrill cry from the queen.
* * *
“She’ll do,” said Severus. Ophelia lay on the bank, twitching and coughing; the blue pallor had begun to disappear from her lips. Severus felt more relief than he was willing to show. Pulling her out of the brook and expelling the water from her lungs had been a tricky bit of spellwork, and for a few awful moments, he had been afraid he was too late.
The queen crossed herself, wide-eyed, and then fell on Severus’ shoulder and started to pour out incoherent thanks.
“Don’t waste time thanking me! Go and fetch all those herbs she mentioned – rosemary, pansies, fennel, columbines, rue – and a good cauldron, or any sort of large cooking pot. Quickly, if you want to help her! Go!”
“For future reference,” said Horatio when she had bustled off, “it is considered proper to call the queen ‘Your majesty,’ or at the least ‘madam.’”
Severus ignored this. “Is there any place we can take the girl before she starts raving again? Somewhere private, where she won’t attract notice?”
“There’s a sort of a cabin farther downstream. The old king used it for storing his fishing-tackle.” Horatio looked dubious. “But it will be dirty and damp.”
“That’s all right. The main thing is to get her out of sight.” Severus started to cast Levicorpus, thought better of it, and picked the girl up in his arms.
It seemed to take the queen an age to return. She had taken it into her head that Ophelia would catch her death of cold without dry clothes, so her arms were full of an absurd amount of velvet and brocade. Luckily, she had also remembered everything Severus had asked her to bring. She dropped her bundle on the floor of the hut, scattering flowers and sprigs of herbs everywhere.
Severus turned his back as the queen tried to coax the shivering girl into a clean gown. He had a potion to brew.
“Drink,” he said curtly when he had finished.
The girl shook her head. “‘Tis for Prince Hamlet. We’ll sing like swans, to welcome death, and die in love and rest. There are more adders in the world than have fangs. I must warn him.”
“You need it more than he does. Drink.”
“I think you had better do as Rosencrantz asks, my dear,” said the queen. “I never knew he had so much in him.”
Severus handed the cup to Gertrude, who held it to Ophelia’s lips. She stopped humming to herself and drank.
The change was almost immediate. Ophelia blinked, looking around the small hut with eyes that were bewildered, but sane. “How came I here?”
“I’ll explain in a minute,” said Severus. He turned to the queen and Horatio. “I must have a word with her in private. In the meantime, I think you’d better go and tell everyone at the palace that she drowned. She will be in grave danger if certain people know she’s alive.”
Horatio looked as if he were about to balk at leaving Ophelia alone with Severus, but the queen seemed to have decided she trusted “Rosencrantz” implicitly.
* * *
For the second time in his life, Severus found himself telling a Muggle-born girl she was a witch. Like the first time, it didn’t go as well as he expected. Ophelia burst into tears.
“Oh, stop crying, you tiresome girl, the way you’re taking on anyone would think magic was some terrible curse.” He recalled that it was all too likely to be a curse, especially for an untrained girl in the sixteenth century, and modified his tone. “Truly, Ophelia, being a witch isn’t what they’ve told you. It’s a gift – a great gift – only Muggles are too ignorant to understand it. Most of them, anyway.”
“I never thought of it as ... as witchcraft. M-my grandfather called it art.” Ophelia swallowed a sob and looked curiously at Severus. “Are you one, too, Rosencrantz? Someone like him?”
“Yes, I am a wizard. My real name is Severus Snape. I never knew your grandfather, but I’ve heard good things about him.”
“He was a wonderful man,” said Ophelia. “He taught me ... a little of what he knew, and he said I must not tell my father or Laertes, but he would be able to teach me more once I turned eleven. But then he took ill and died in the winter when I was ten. After that, I tried to teach myself by reading his books ... oh, I must tell you that he left me his books, and Father said they were not fit reading for a girl, so he locked them away in his cabinet, and I was terribly angry at him, and suddenly the glass in the cabinet shattered of itself, and I was so frightened. Have you ever heard of such a thing, Severus?”
“Yes. It’s quite common, and nothing to be frightened of. Go on.”
“Father did not blame me – he thought one of the servants must have cracked the glass, and while he was trying to find out which of them it was, I took the books and hid them. I hated to disobey Father, but they were the only things Grandfather left me, and...”
“They were your heritage and your birthright,” said Severus, now furious on Ophelia’s behalf, “and your father was an old fool.”
Ophelia turned a flushed face toward Severus. “He was not a fool. People always said that he was, but he was a good, kind man – it was only that he never understood certain things...”
Polonius hadn’t understood most things, by all accounts, but Severus kept the thought to himself.
“And perhaps he was right. I wish I had not meddled with those books.” Ophelia went abruptly silent. She looked terrified.
“How did the old king come to die?” Severus asked, as gently as he could manage.
Ophelia started. “Oh! My father’s servant, Reynaldo said ... He said that the Duke – King Claudius, I mean, he was only a Duke then – needed a mixture to poison rats. I found a receipt for one in my grandfather’s books. I knew not what I did, or what he meant to do – and then King Hamlet died, and the new king gave out that he was stung by a snake, but I knew...” She burst into tears again.
“You brewed the poison yourself?”
Ophelia looked miserable. “I am sure of it. Please don’t tell the queen. She knew nothing of it – I am sure of that, too.”
“I won’t tell anybody. How did you come to choose hebenon?”
“I thought it would be the easiest. The receipt looked simple.”
Severus could no longer hide his excitement. “It’s too complicated for most wizards. I don’t think one in a hundred would get it right on the first try. And the Sanity Solution – the books say that one wasn’t invented until 1820, and your formula is more elegant than Golpalott’s. Did you work it out yourself? How did you come to think of adding the columbines?”
“The king,” said Ophelia, “is dead.”
“I know he’s dead!” Severus snapped. A moment later he felt like he could have bitten his tongue off. Was he cursed to make a bloody mess of it every time he tried to be tactful? “Look, I know you feel bad about it, but you can’t bring him back. But you have a gift that you can use to help other people. That’s worth something, isn’t it?”
Ophelia looked uncertain. It occurred to Severus that there were many good reasons why he had never considered a career in suicide counseling.
“Worth more than throwing yourself into the river, anyway. What were you thinking?”
Ophelia shook her head. “I remember very little. I think ... I began to fear that I might be a witch, and I had heard it said in the village that witches will not sink in deep water, but float. And I thought, ‘twould be better to know the worst, and I care little if I drown. I am not sure that is what I thought. Ever since my father died, there have been black times – hours when I scarcely knew what I was doing, or remembered afterward.”
“Some part of you had the will to survive and be sane. You would never have come up with that potion if you hadn’t.”
Ophelia frowned. “I meant it for Hamlet. I thought ... I could help him, a little, even though he would never forgive me if he knew.”
“Oh. Right. Hamlet.” Severus had the uncomfortable feeling that something that had appeared simple had just become very complicated, although he couldn’t work out why.
* * *
The next three days, however, were blessedly uncomplicated. For the first time since he had swallowed the Plothole-Plugging Potion, Severus felt completely in control of the situation. He spent most of his spare time in the hut by the brook, beginning the long and laborious process of brewing Veritaserum. Ophelia was eager to help once he explained what the potion was for, and she proved a quick and apt pupil. He would have to see about getting her a wand of her own.
On the fourth day, Hamlet arrived, and all hell broke loose.
The queen had arranged a funeral for Ophelia – a quiet, understated one, as befitted a death that had taken place under suspicious circumstances, but public enough to settle any rumors about the death. She and the king were in attendance, along with several other courtiers, and everything proceeded decorously until Ophelia’s brother decided to pick a quarrel with the priest and leap into the grave.
Before any of the mourners could react, Hamlet stepped forward from behind a gravestone and plunged into the grave after Laertes. “This is I! Hamlet the Dane!”
Laertes grabbed him by the throat, and they both went down in a cloud of dust.
“I loved Ophelia,” Hamlet gasped as the priest and the queen pulled the combatants apart. “Forty thousand brothers could not, with all their quantity of love, make up my sum! What wilt thou do for her?”
“Please,” said Horatio in Severus’s ear, “can’t we tell him she’s alive?”
“No.”
“Not here, I meant. After the others have gone.”
“The answer is still no. She begged me to let Hamlet think she was dead. She said it would be better that way.”
Horatio glanced back at the grave, where Hamlet, astonishingly, was challenging Laertes to eat a crocodile. “Better for whom? He’s half-mad with grief, for God’s sake! What makes her more important than the prince?”
“What makes her any less important than the prince?” Severus asked, and walked away without waiting for an answer.
* * *
The next thing anyone knew, Hamlet and Laertes were apparently the best of friends, and the court was buzzing with plans for a grand competition that involved the wager of six Barbary horses against an equal number of French swords. Severus found it all baffling.
“What, exactly, is this contest that Hamlet and Laertes are planning to have?” he asked Horatio.
“A fencing-match. Laertes is reputed to be excellent.”
“They compete to see ... who can build the biggest fence?” This struck Severus as a very strange pastime, particularly for royalty, but Muggles had odd ideas about what constituted fun.
Horatio laughed. “No, no. Do you not have fencing in England?” He described a sport which sounded like a sort of Muggle duel.
Severus frowned. “Do people get killed that way?”
“No, never. The foils are blunted, you see.”
“Never?”
“Well ... hardly ever. ‘Tis said in Wittenberg that a student lost an eye once, but that was before my time, and besides, he was drunk.”
“I don’t like it.”
“I am not sure that I like it, either,” admitted Horatio. “Let’s go seek him out.”
They found Hamlet in the hall where the fencing match was to take place. He and Horatio spoke earnestly for a moment, too low for Severus to hear.
“If your mind dislike anything,” said Horatio at last, “obey it. I will forestall their repair hither, and say you are not fit.”
“Not a whit,” Hamlet replied. “We defy augury; there’s a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, ‘tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come; the readiness is all. Since no man has aught of what he leaves, what is ‘t to leave betimes? Let be.”
He swept his hair out of his eyes and flashed Horatio a crooked grin. Severus did not find the gesture at all reassuring. Hardly knowing what he did or why he was doing it, he ran out to the little cabin to fetch Ophelia.
lareinenoire and themolesmother for correctly identifying the wizard at the Danish court. Special thanks to angevin2 for pointing out an interesting fact about the relative efficacy of masks and hats as disguises in Renaissance drama.Act Four: Rosemary for Remembrance
“My commission!” Guildenstern cried in anguished tones. “The pirates have stolen my commission! From the king, sealed with the royal signet!”
He leapt from the deck of one ship to the other, drew his sword, and began to slash his way through a dozen astonished pirates.
“Quick.” Severus pulled Hamlet away from the fray. “This is our chance to get back to Denmark.”
“The pirates...”
“Are somebody else’s problem. Let’s go.” Severus pushed Hamlet into one of the boats that hung from the opposite side of the ship and severed the ropes with a swift motion of his wand. The boat landed in the sea with a tremendous splash of icy water.
“Are you mad?” Hamlet spluttered. “We’ll be drowned!”
“Of course I’m not mad. I am a wizard. How many times do I have to explain it to you?” Severus gritted his teeth and tried to work out which spells were required to make the boat go. For an awful minute, he was afraid that Hamlet’s prediction might prove correct; but at last the little craft gave a great lurch and sped southward, toward the coast of Denmark. Severus hastily put up a shield to deflect the sea spray, but not before both travelers had been drenched a second time.
“When I think upon G-Guildenstern,” said Hamlet through chattering teeth, “my mind reproves me. How is’t that he – a lackey, a flatterer, a politic instrument – dares do battle with so many salt-water thieves, for no more than a king’s commission? And I, that have been called to fight for no less than a king’s life, have delayed these two months and more –”
“Shut up, or I’ll let you get soaked again,” said Severus. The freezing water had not improved his temper, and he recognized certain signs that the prince was about to start talking to himself again. “We’re going back to kill Claudius now, aren’t we?”
“Aye, so we are.” As the ships receded behind them, Hamlet, unexpectedly, grinned. “For Denmark!”
* * *
Even with Severus’s excellent spellwork, it was several hours before they reached a small fishing village on the Danish coast. Wet and exhausted, they trudged to the nearest tavern, where Hamlet ordered a couple of tankards of hot spiced ale and made enquiries of the landlord.
The name of the place conveyed nothing to Severus, but Hamlet frowned. “We’re farther than I thought from Elsinore. ‘Twill be two or three days’ journey at the least.”
“For you, perhaps. Not for me.”
“I had almost forgot. Truly, you have shown me wonders. When we were at sea, I hardly knew whether I dreamt or woke.” Hamlet stretched his limbs in front of the fire and yawned. “Indeed, I hardly know now. At Wittenberg there were scholars who used to tell dark tales of magic, but I never credited them nor thought to see it done.”
Hamlet went on to ask several intelligent questions about wizardry, betraying a lively curiosity and none of the prejudices that Severus would have expected to find in a sixteenth-century Muggle. Under the combined influences of mulled ale, a warm room, and admiration, Severus decided that the prince was really a decent person, after all.
Hamlet called for more ale, and this time, the landlord brought a platter of brown bread, cheese, and smoked fish without being asked. Both young men fell on the food with more eagerness than manners.
“Truly,” said Hamlet with his mouth full, “the working-folk eat better than we do in the palaces. When we were at the university, Horatio and I were used to go to the shoemakers’ quarter ... in hats, you know, ‘tis a curious thing but no one recognizes you if you wear a hat, while masks are completely useless –” He swallowed abruptly; it was plain that a more serious thought had struck him. “Horatio. I must write a letter to him and explain matters. Trust no one at court but him and, at a pinch, my mother. The best of men turn horse-leeches when one such as Claudius is king.”
* * *
Severus Apparated to Elsinore around mid-morning on the following day, having slept rather later than he meant to. Hamlet had promised to follow him as swiftly as possible, but, given the inconvenience of Muggle travel, Severus did not expect him for some days.
He aimed for a spot on the palace grounds that he had expected to be deserted. It wasn’t. Someone was singing in a piercing, but not very tuneful, soprano. They bore him barefaced on the bier, hey non nonny, nonny, hey nonny...
Severus approached the little cluster of people with caution, but nobody had noticed his sudden appearance. The king, the queen, and a fair-haired young man who had the look of a courtier were all staring at Polonius’s daughter. The girl had impressed Severus as a singularly uninteresting little person, but there was something different about her now. Her hair and dress were disheveled, and she hummed snatches of song. You must sing a-down a-down, an you call him a-down-a.
The young man took a step toward her, pity and horror in his face, and the girl spoke.
“There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance; pray, love, remember; and there is pansies, that’s for thoughts.”
“A document in madness, thoughts and remembrance fitted!” said the young man.
Severus shook his head. “Not so mad as that,” he said automatically, and then realized too late that he had spoken aloud.
The king started. “Ah, Rosenstern. I did not think you could go to England and return again so quickly. Did you deliver my commission?”
Severus bowed low; he and Hamlet had agreed on a story. “Your Majesty, I am sorry to report that the commission – and the prince – have been taken by pirates. I escaped in one of the small boats, but I could not save him.”
“What? Pirates!”
“Put aside your fears, my lord. He was unhurt, and he is a valuable prisoner; you may ransom him at your leisure.”
“I may, to be sure,” Claudius agreed quickly.
Gertrude looked distraught. So, Severus thought, she knew she would never see Hamlet again if it were up to her husband. Would she have the courage to oppose him?
“There’s fennel for you,” said Ophelia to the king, “and columbines.” She turned to the queen. “There’s rue for you, and here’s some for me; we may call it herb of grace o’ Sundays. O, you must wear your rue with a difference. There’s a daisy; I would give you some violets, but they withered all when my father died.”
The king, the queen, and the fair-haired young man all looked baffled by this speech, but its meaning was crystal clear to Severus. The girl might be mad as Uric the Oddball, but she was a Potions genius – which almost made him lose sight of the fact that, under the circumstances, she was probably also a poisoner.
He resolved not to let her out of his sight – at least, not for longer than it would take to deliver the prince’s letter to Horatio.
* * *
“A wizard?” Horatio looked up from the letter. “Has he gone mad in earnest?”
“You tell me,” said Severus. “You seem – for some unaccountable reason – to be his friend.”
Horatio gave him a quizzical look. “I wonder whether you mean to insult me or him.”
“Both,” Severus replied, out of long habit, but without any real venom. He pointed his wand at a small rock and blasted it into shards. “Does that satisfy you?”
“I have seen mountebanks and charlatans do stranger things.”
“How do you know they were real mountebanks and charlatans?”
“You are a strange man, Severus.” Horatio folded the letter. “But the prince speaks most warmly of your abilities and your character.”
“He does?” said Severus. He mistrusted people who said that sort of thing.
“Aye. Read it for yourself, if you will.”
But Severus had no time to read the letter. There was a great splash from behind the willow trees, and a shrill cry from the queen.
* * *
“She’ll do,” said Severus. Ophelia lay on the bank, twitching and coughing; the blue pallor had begun to disappear from her lips. Severus felt more relief than he was willing to show. Pulling her out of the brook and expelling the water from her lungs had been a tricky bit of spellwork, and for a few awful moments, he had been afraid he was too late.
The queen crossed herself, wide-eyed, and then fell on Severus’ shoulder and started to pour out incoherent thanks.
“Don’t waste time thanking me! Go and fetch all those herbs she mentioned – rosemary, pansies, fennel, columbines, rue – and a good cauldron, or any sort of large cooking pot. Quickly, if you want to help her! Go!”
“For future reference,” said Horatio when she had bustled off, “it is considered proper to call the queen ‘Your majesty,’ or at the least ‘madam.’”
Severus ignored this. “Is there any place we can take the girl before she starts raving again? Somewhere private, where she won’t attract notice?”
“There’s a sort of a cabin farther downstream. The old king used it for storing his fishing-tackle.” Horatio looked dubious. “But it will be dirty and damp.”
“That’s all right. The main thing is to get her out of sight.” Severus started to cast Levicorpus, thought better of it, and picked the girl up in his arms.
It seemed to take the queen an age to return. She had taken it into her head that Ophelia would catch her death of cold without dry clothes, so her arms were full of an absurd amount of velvet and brocade. Luckily, she had also remembered everything Severus had asked her to bring. She dropped her bundle on the floor of the hut, scattering flowers and sprigs of herbs everywhere.
Severus turned his back as the queen tried to coax the shivering girl into a clean gown. He had a potion to brew.
“Drink,” he said curtly when he had finished.
The girl shook her head. “‘Tis for Prince Hamlet. We’ll sing like swans, to welcome death, and die in love and rest. There are more adders in the world than have fangs. I must warn him.”
“You need it more than he does. Drink.”
“I think you had better do as Rosencrantz asks, my dear,” said the queen. “I never knew he had so much in him.”
Severus handed the cup to Gertrude, who held it to Ophelia’s lips. She stopped humming to herself and drank.
The change was almost immediate. Ophelia blinked, looking around the small hut with eyes that were bewildered, but sane. “How came I here?”
“I’ll explain in a minute,” said Severus. He turned to the queen and Horatio. “I must have a word with her in private. In the meantime, I think you’d better go and tell everyone at the palace that she drowned. She will be in grave danger if certain people know she’s alive.”
Horatio looked as if he were about to balk at leaving Ophelia alone with Severus, but the queen seemed to have decided she trusted “Rosencrantz” implicitly.
* * *
For the second time in his life, Severus found himself telling a Muggle-born girl she was a witch. Like the first time, it didn’t go as well as he expected. Ophelia burst into tears.
“Oh, stop crying, you tiresome girl, the way you’re taking on anyone would think magic was some terrible curse.” He recalled that it was all too likely to be a curse, especially for an untrained girl in the sixteenth century, and modified his tone. “Truly, Ophelia, being a witch isn’t what they’ve told you. It’s a gift – a great gift – only Muggles are too ignorant to understand it. Most of them, anyway.”
“I never thought of it as ... as witchcraft. M-my grandfather called it art.” Ophelia swallowed a sob and looked curiously at Severus. “Are you one, too, Rosencrantz? Someone like him?”
“Yes, I am a wizard. My real name is Severus Snape. I never knew your grandfather, but I’ve heard good things about him.”
“He was a wonderful man,” said Ophelia. “He taught me ... a little of what he knew, and he said I must not tell my father or Laertes, but he would be able to teach me more once I turned eleven. But then he took ill and died in the winter when I was ten. After that, I tried to teach myself by reading his books ... oh, I must tell you that he left me his books, and Father said they were not fit reading for a girl, so he locked them away in his cabinet, and I was terribly angry at him, and suddenly the glass in the cabinet shattered of itself, and I was so frightened. Have you ever heard of such a thing, Severus?”
“Yes. It’s quite common, and nothing to be frightened of. Go on.”
“Father did not blame me – he thought one of the servants must have cracked the glass, and while he was trying to find out which of them it was, I took the books and hid them. I hated to disobey Father, but they were the only things Grandfather left me, and...”
“They were your heritage and your birthright,” said Severus, now furious on Ophelia’s behalf, “and your father was an old fool.”
Ophelia turned a flushed face toward Severus. “He was not a fool. People always said that he was, but he was a good, kind man – it was only that he never understood certain things...”
Polonius hadn’t understood most things, by all accounts, but Severus kept the thought to himself.
“And perhaps he was right. I wish I had not meddled with those books.” Ophelia went abruptly silent. She looked terrified.
“How did the old king come to die?” Severus asked, as gently as he could manage.
Ophelia started. “Oh! My father’s servant, Reynaldo said ... He said that the Duke – King Claudius, I mean, he was only a Duke then – needed a mixture to poison rats. I found a receipt for one in my grandfather’s books. I knew not what I did, or what he meant to do – and then King Hamlet died, and the new king gave out that he was stung by a snake, but I knew...” She burst into tears again.
“You brewed the poison yourself?”
Ophelia looked miserable. “I am sure of it. Please don’t tell the queen. She knew nothing of it – I am sure of that, too.”
“I won’t tell anybody. How did you come to choose hebenon?”
“I thought it would be the easiest. The receipt looked simple.”
Severus could no longer hide his excitement. “It’s too complicated for most wizards. I don’t think one in a hundred would get it right on the first try. And the Sanity Solution – the books say that one wasn’t invented until 1820, and your formula is more elegant than Golpalott’s. Did you work it out yourself? How did you come to think of adding the columbines?”
“The king,” said Ophelia, “is dead.”
“I know he’s dead!” Severus snapped. A moment later he felt like he could have bitten his tongue off. Was he cursed to make a bloody mess of it every time he tried to be tactful? “Look, I know you feel bad about it, but you can’t bring him back. But you have a gift that you can use to help other people. That’s worth something, isn’t it?”
Ophelia looked uncertain. It occurred to Severus that there were many good reasons why he had never considered a career in suicide counseling.
“Worth more than throwing yourself into the river, anyway. What were you thinking?”
Ophelia shook her head. “I remember very little. I think ... I began to fear that I might be a witch, and I had heard it said in the village that witches will not sink in deep water, but float. And I thought, ‘twould be better to know the worst, and I care little if I drown. I am not sure that is what I thought. Ever since my father died, there have been black times – hours when I scarcely knew what I was doing, or remembered afterward.”
“Some part of you had the will to survive and be sane. You would never have come up with that potion if you hadn’t.”
Ophelia frowned. “I meant it for Hamlet. I thought ... I could help him, a little, even though he would never forgive me if he knew.”
“Oh. Right. Hamlet.” Severus had the uncomfortable feeling that something that had appeared simple had just become very complicated, although he couldn’t work out why.
* * *
The next three days, however, were blessedly uncomplicated. For the first time since he had swallowed the Plothole-Plugging Potion, Severus felt completely in control of the situation. He spent most of his spare time in the hut by the brook, beginning the long and laborious process of brewing Veritaserum. Ophelia was eager to help once he explained what the potion was for, and she proved a quick and apt pupil. He would have to see about getting her a wand of her own.
On the fourth day, Hamlet arrived, and all hell broke loose.
The queen had arranged a funeral for Ophelia – a quiet, understated one, as befitted a death that had taken place under suspicious circumstances, but public enough to settle any rumors about the death. She and the king were in attendance, along with several other courtiers, and everything proceeded decorously until Ophelia’s brother decided to pick a quarrel with the priest and leap into the grave.
Before any of the mourners could react, Hamlet stepped forward from behind a gravestone and plunged into the grave after Laertes. “This is I! Hamlet the Dane!”
Laertes grabbed him by the throat, and they both went down in a cloud of dust.
“I loved Ophelia,” Hamlet gasped as the priest and the queen pulled the combatants apart. “Forty thousand brothers could not, with all their quantity of love, make up my sum! What wilt thou do for her?”
“Please,” said Horatio in Severus’s ear, “can’t we tell him she’s alive?”
“No.”
“Not here, I meant. After the others have gone.”
“The answer is still no. She begged me to let Hamlet think she was dead. She said it would be better that way.”
Horatio glanced back at the grave, where Hamlet, astonishingly, was challenging Laertes to eat a crocodile. “Better for whom? He’s half-mad with grief, for God’s sake! What makes her more important than the prince?”
“What makes her any less important than the prince?” Severus asked, and walked away without waiting for an answer.
* * *
The next thing anyone knew, Hamlet and Laertes were apparently the best of friends, and the court was buzzing with plans for a grand competition that involved the wager of six Barbary horses against an equal number of French swords. Severus found it all baffling.
“What, exactly, is this contest that Hamlet and Laertes are planning to have?” he asked Horatio.
“A fencing-match. Laertes is reputed to be excellent.”
“They compete to see ... who can build the biggest fence?” This struck Severus as a very strange pastime, particularly for royalty, but Muggles had odd ideas about what constituted fun.
Horatio laughed. “No, no. Do you not have fencing in England?” He described a sport which sounded like a sort of Muggle duel.
Severus frowned. “Do people get killed that way?”
“No, never. The foils are blunted, you see.”
“Never?”
“Well ... hardly ever. ‘Tis said in Wittenberg that a student lost an eye once, but that was before my time, and besides, he was drunk.”
“I don’t like it.”
“I am not sure that I like it, either,” admitted Horatio. “Let’s go seek him out.”
They found Hamlet in the hall where the fencing match was to take place. He and Horatio spoke earnestly for a moment, too low for Severus to hear.
“If your mind dislike anything,” said Horatio at last, “obey it. I will forestall their repair hither, and say you are not fit.”
“Not a whit,” Hamlet replied. “We defy augury; there’s a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, ‘tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come; the readiness is all. Since no man has aught of what he leaves, what is ‘t to leave betimes? Let be.”
He swept his hair out of his eyes and flashed Horatio a crooked grin. Severus did not find the gesture at all reassuring. Hardly knowing what he did or why he was doing it, he ran out to the little cabin to fetch Ophelia.
