HP: The Maenad of Dionysus

[This is an alternate universe story about the parents' generation from Who Wants to Give Whom a Whole Lifetime, and it is still the story of Salome de Polignac and Severus Snape. The story spans a long period of time.]

In September 1973, Severus Snape had already spent two full years in this castle, long enough to understand his own talents and to pick out which books in the dusty Restricted Section of the library were worth risking trouble for. He thought his third year would be no more than the same monotonous routine, like this moment, sitting midway down the Slytherin table, with tiny bits of dried grass, gray-green and brittle, clinging to the cuff of his school robes.

Then he saw her. The French girl who had come from far away was sizing up her unfamiliar territory like a predator: who was prey, who was one of her kind, who could be ignored, and who needed watching. He thought her beautiful, wealthy, and perfectly at ease. He warned himself to stay away.

Many years later, sitting at the teachers' table in this Great Hall and gazing once more at the candlelight beneath the enchanted ceiling, he would think back to that September night. He did not yet know it, but through countless sleepless nights he would come to understand this: it was the beginning of a fate from which there could be no turning back.

Theme: Because you have strength and grace, you can see through my veil. Yet time is so indifferent and cruel. You see the true face of my soul.