Happy Birthday.

By Rose Williams.

Rated PG-13.

Spoilers, very vague for the Angel episode Damage
(technically.)

Disclaimers, this belongs to Joss Whedon and J.K Rowling,
not me.

Author’s Note: This was written as a birthday present
for my friend KMMG. It’s a day late, but oh well. We need more
Buffy/Snape fics out there.

 

 

 

* * * * *

Buffy smiled nervously at the assembled teachers. They were
all much older than her, except the dark haired guy at the back, and he was
glowering at her.

“I would like to introduce you all to our new Defence
Against the Dark Arts professor, Buffy Summers,” Dumbledore said.

Buffy waved.

“I can assure you that Ms Summers has the skills and
the training necessary to teach the class, despite her apparent inexperience.
She has been actively involved in fighting many dark creatures since she was
fifteen, and has studied in preparation for the class. I would like you all to
make her welcome.”

Only Dumbledore and Minerva knew how she had got her
experience, and Minerva had been unsure of the plan to hire her. Privately
Buffy agreed, but with hundreds of Slayers across the globe now, she wanted a
somewhat normal and vaguely interesting job.

The other teachers gathered round and introduced themselves.
Hagrid asked if she liked ‘in’ressing creatures,’ Pomona
Sprout asked if she’d seen any of a number of plants.

Buffy just shook her head. Everyone had such fantastic
names. She supposed that Summers was a pretty good name for a Vampire Slayer.

The greasy haired man held his hand out to her stiffly.

“Severus Snape,” he introduced himself. Buffy
resisted an urge to giggle. He was obviously trying to be intimidating.
Unfortunately for him, she had suffered under Angelus’s tender mercies
and simply accepted his hand to shake.

“A pleasure to meet to you, Severus,” she said,
delighted when he grimaced as if in pain.

“Buffy is an unusual name,” he commented.

Buffy snorted. “It means God’s promise, or
shining one,” she said.

She thought both were quite good for a Vampire Slayer, too.

“What does ‘Severus’ mean?” she
asked.

He accepted the obviously insincere naivety with good grace.
Buffy thought she saw him repress a smile. But it was difficult to see through
all the hair. And Sibyl Trelawney introduced herself.

She eyed Buffy through her large glittery glasses.

“Death is your gift,” she breathed.

Buffy decided that no insect-pretending-to-be-a-person would
be so obvious.

“Delivered and returned,” Buffy said.

Trelawney’s eyes widened until they were almost larger
than her glasses. Buffy definitely heard Severus snort. Trelawney huffed and
gathered her shawl around her before gliding off.

 

*

 

The grounds of Hogwarts were a glorious place to stroll at
night. Buffy hadn’t gotten over the need to patrol, even when there was
no risk whatsoever.

Firenze had taken to coming out with her and showing her the
stars. In all her time outside Buffy had rarely taken the time out to look up.
They looked spectacular tonight, so far from city lights, and without a moon.

Firenze seemed equally fascinated by her. His first question
had been about Dawn’s welfare, and they had spent the last few weeks
discussing everything about both their worlds.

“There are spells on computers?”

“Yes, no. There are spells that you can see if go into
a computer, and look at what’s inside. Maybe. I’m not sure really.
But spells and Muggle technology can work together.”

“Not in this world,” Firenze said.
“Perhaps that is deliberate. You are making me think more about my world
than I did when I saw only the stars.”

He stopped to look up at the stars again. Buffy
automatically looked up too. She could rarely see what he did, but he often
said something profound as a result of what he saw and she would remember it to
add to her Slayer dream diary. It wasn’t the first time he had made the
comment about thinking more things either. As thankful as Buffy was for his
company and wisdom, she had heard Willow’s speeches about
‘civilising’ populations.

“Hmm,” he said after a moment.

Buffy glanced sideways at him, but he didn’t look at
her. She saw his eyes flick towards the forest and he raised an eyebrow.

“If you will excuse me, Ms Summers,” he bowed,
turned abruptly and galloped off.

Buffy had enough time to wonder where he had gone before she
was aware of someone behind her. She turned, arms raised and met the startled
face of the potions master.

“What are you doing out here?” she demanded.

“Collecting Moonwort,” Severus said.

He even raised the pouch he was carrying as evidence. Buffy
suppressed a grin; he was more rattled than she was.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

Okay, so not so rattled.

“I was walking with Firenze,” she said.

Severus looked around as if searching for the centaur. Buffy
sighed and turned back to the castle. She’d gone four steps before he was
back by her side.

“There might be things here that wouldn’t attack
a centaur, but would make for a young woman such as yourself.”

“There are very few women such as myself,” Buffy
said. “And I can take care of myself.”

Severus insisted on walking step for step with her all the
way back up the grounds. Her stride was too short for her to outdistance him
without running. He even held the door open for her. She rolled her eyes at
him.

There was no way she was going to be able to explain to him
how she felt when Jenny had died. There was no way he was going to be able to
explain it in an abstract and fatalistic manner nearly convincingly enough for
her to think about it without getting angry.

 

*

 

She noticed a distinct coldness in his manner at breakfast
the following day, and for the rest of the week. She found herself grinding her
teeth as she thought about him. Why couldn’t he just do what every other
man did and ignore a woman’s outbursts. She realised that was probably
not actually true, but it didn’t help.

Forcing herself to calm down, even employing someone
Giles’s exercises, she made her way to class.

Classes were, for the most part, pretty good. The students
were either interested, scared, or worried enough about their marks to pay
attention. Except one.

“Mr Malfoy, you obviously already know everything
there is to know about a vampire’s power. I could arrange for you to meet
Angelus himself.”

“What’s Mudblood like you know about
vampires?” Malfoy sneered.

Every student in her class was suddenly in a different
place.

Harry was being held back by Ron and Neville. Hermione had
her wand aimed at Draco’s chest, but she didn’t seem to want to use
it yet. Parvati and Padma were flanking her, with several other girls behind
them. The other boys had formed a ring around Harry, Ron, Neville, Draco, Vincent
and Gregory. Except Blaise who was with Millicent and Pansy, their wands aimed
at Hermione. Most of the desks were lying on their sides.

“Everyone back to your seats,” Buffy said.

No one moved.

“Do you really have so little faith in my ability to
defend myself against the dark arts that I can’t take on a skinny sixth
year myself?”

The students slowly returned to their places, except Draco
who was left standing in the middle of the room with his wand out. Buffy had to
deal with him now. She sighed.

“Would you really like to meet Angelus?”

“No, Professor.”

“Good, because I don’t want to see him again
either. You will serve detention with Professor McGonagall tonight and the
first three days of next week. I’m deducting 20 house points from
Slytherin. I’m not deducting more,” she added at the
Gryffindors’ protests, “because you were wrong in characterising me
as a ‘mudblood.’ Please, sit back down, Mr Malfoy.”

Draco sat. Hermione scribbled something on her page of
notes. The class continued.

 

*

 

Hermione cornered her after class two weeks later. Buffy had
been waiting for it. Hermione had had the same look Willow had had many times.

“Miss Granger?”

“Ah, could you really have set Angelus on
Malfoy?” she asked.

Buffy grinned. “I could have got a close second,
maybe. But I don’t really want to see him either. What did you want to
ask?”

“You said you weren’t Muggle-born.”

“Yes.”

“But if you were born into a Wizarding family you
would have gone to school.”

“And you couldn’t find me in any
databases?”

Hermione blushed. Buffy sat on her desk so she could swing
her legs.

“But if you were a Muggle there’s no way they
would have hired you to teach here.”

“And the other option is…”

Buffy prompted. She was waiting for the sudden revelation to
hit Hermione.

“Well, if you were a magical creature?”

Buffy nodded, accepting the label.

“Female, human in appearance, not a vampire. Not a
Veela, or well, anything evil.”

“How much thought have you put into this?” Buffy
asked.

“Just since you said to Malfoy. I spent the weekend in
the Library, but I couldn’t find much. I know you haven’t used a
wand all term, even though you’ve taught us how.”

“So I don’t need a wand, even to deal with
Vampires and demons.”

Hermione blinked a couple of times before refocussing on
Buffy.

“You don’t look any of the descriptions of the
Slayer I’ve ever read …”

“They’re either out of date, or fanciful,”
Buffy said. “Technically I was only the Slayer for a year, so maybe
official records don’t have me anymore. But I’ve done a lot.”

“You’re really the Slayer the ‘one girl in
all the world’?”

Buffy got down off the desk, collected her things and opened
the door.

“I died for few minutes when I was sixteen. Since then
there have been two of us. About twenty months ago a friend of mine tapped into
the Slayer’s weapon to call all the potentials in the world.”

Hermione looked at her blankly.

“Oh Giles would love to have someone knew to practice
the speech on. Come on, I’ll tell you over dinner.”

 

*

 

Buffy’s third meeting with Severus came soon after
dinner with Hermione. She’d made it out of the Great Hall, leaving
Hermione behind with a list of books to find in the library. Hoping to train
some before having to mark assignments, she’d headed towards the nifty
room on the seventh floor.

Severus had taken a shortcut and appeared out of a wall
several steps in front of her. Buffy just waited for him to cross the distance.
She wasn’t going to let him know that she had been avoiding him.

“What do you mean by putting Draco in detention with
McGonagall?”

“He obviously doesn’t respect me, so the threat
is hardly worth the breath. If I spend detention bringing him back into line,
he’s won something. There is not a soul in this place apart from Peeves
who doesn’t respect Minerva.”

Severus was quite taken aback by her straightforward explanation.
Buffy waited for him to recover. It would be fun to see if she could put him
off guard again.

“I believed he raised some valid concerns, which you
failed to address.”

Buffy raised an eyebrow at that.

“I told him he was wrong to describe me as Muggle-born,
although the word he used was Mudblood. Other than that, I don’t believe
he said anything constructive.”

“You threatened to feed him to a vampire, Miss
Summers.”

“I said I could arrange for him to meet Angelus, Severus. He declined my polite offer, insulted me, and
questioned my experience. I gave the worst punishment I could think of through
the rage. If you’ll excuse me, there are things I have to do.”

Severus was standing over her again. Buffy rolled her eyes,
again, and stepped to go around him. He stepped to block her way again.

“You don’t have any experience,” he said.

“Professor Dumbledore obviously disagrees with you. I
can’t assure you that I have seen worse than you have, because I
don’t know anything about your past. I would appreciate you making the
same concession for me.”

Resorting to Slayer strength Buffy pushed him out of the way
and headed to the room. He jogged alongside her.

“Who are you and what have you seen?” he asked.

“Who are you and what have you seen?” she asked
him. “And why should I trust you?”

Severus stopped as if he’d walked into something.
Buffy turned to face him. He knew that he couldn’t argue that Dumbledore
trusted him because it was the same argument he’s just refuted. He went
for intimidating instead of pleading.

“You can’t,” he said. “I’m
evil.”

Buffy chuckled.

“You’re can’t be as evil as Angelus, and
he knew more about me than you ever will. Also, I told Spike things before he
got his soul. He knew stuff when he was evil, too. Not to mention my Watcher
has an evil demon tattoo on his arm. Could you stop trying to be intimidating,
I’m not eleven.”

It was Severus’s turn to chuckle. He looked reasonable
when he smiled, Buffy decided. She toyed with the idea of telling him, but the
laughter might have been cut off, so she let it slide.

“Okay, so I was a spy on the Dark Lord.”

“I’m a Vampire Slayer.”

Severus frowned. Overall his reaction was even as good as
Hermione’s.

“So there’s more than one,” he said.

“Since May last year there are thousands.”

“No, I mean there was more than one forever.”

“One Slayer dies, another called, blah, blah,
blah.”

Severus looked at her darkly. It was a look Buffy was sure
she could get sick of very quickly. Before that could happen Severus stepped
past her and disappeared down the hallway.

 

*

 

Buffy didn’t see Severus for several weeks. She knew
that he was still alive and grouchy because her students had come into class
complaining about him. But she began to get worried about what he was doing.
She decided that the only thing to do was talk to Dumbledore.

“I’m sorry, Buffy, I can’t just tell you
that,” the Headmaster said. It didn’t help that he seemed amused
rather than put out.

“I need an excuse to see him. This is good.”

“Severus is an intently private man, Buffy.”

“And I’m not … either a man or intensely
private. I promise I won’t try to offend him. But he is rather touchy,
and he thinks he’s evil.”

She shook her head before continuing. “I have
something picked out. Unless I’ve only got, like, a week, in which case
he’ll have to made do with half. But I promise I can do non-offending,
non-scaring away. If that’s what you want?”

Buffy had worked quiet hard at presenting a calm and mature
front to the rest of the school. She thought she had most of them fooled, too.
Dumbledore, though, was well aware of her reputation.

He steepled his fingers and looked at her through them.

“Have a seat, Buffy.”

Buffy sat.

“You’ve settled in here well, it seems. So
I’d to discuss with you a broadening of your duties.”

“If you tell me when Severus’s birthday is,”
Buffy said.

She wasn’t normally so forward as to make ultimatums
to her boss. But this was looking to be a professional negotiation. And
Dumbledore, as always, seemed to have taken it already into account.

“I’ll also tell you why I keep him
around,” he offered.

Buffy settled herself for a good story.

 

*

 

Buffy checked her appearance in the mirror again. It still
felt strange to wear robes, even after several months. She tended to wear
Muggle clothing in class and to patrol, but Dumbledore had explained Severus’s
appreciation of propriety. Finally deciding to do up the top button, Buffy
turned in a swirl of purple and headed towards the dungeons.

They were dank and slightly mouldy. No one came here
voluntarily, certainly not anyone who wasn’t a Slytherin. Even the
students stayed away from the heavily marked wood that was Severus’s
door.

Buffy knocked brightly and waited. She could hear Severus
shuffling about inside. She knocked again when it seemed he was considering
ignoring her.

“I know you’re in there,” she called.
“I can hear you. Open the door!”

Snape pulled the door open and glared at her. Buffy grinned
back at him. He really was an amazing man to look at with his dark hair and
narrowed eyes. He was staring at her with unbridled suspicion.

“Happy Birthday!”

The suspicion didn’t lessen.

“Dumbledore also told me that you’re not evil
anymore, so I would like to say congratulations. I have a friend who went
through a bad patch, so I can understand a little.”

“Thanks,” Severus said.

“Are you going to invite me in?”

“Do you need an invite?”

Buffy pushed past him into his office. She had expected
ornate and dark like the segment on the movie review programs. Instead the
furniture was sparse. He had a desk, a several bookcases and a short cabinet;
well made, but plain; and a few glass display jars of icky things. It reminded
Buffy a little of the basement Angel had had in Sunnydale.

Buffy wandered around the room checking things out. With a
start she realised where she was, and why had come there. Turning quickly she
discovered that Severus had been watching her.

“I promise I won’t break anything. I brought you
a present.”

“Present?”

“For your birthday.”

Reaching into her pocket she pulled out two blood filled
vials. She saw Severus’s eyes widen. He leant forward to get a better
look. Buffy had thought that blood would be a good present, even though he
wasn’t technically a vampire; skin tone and dungeon living aside.

“This one is the blood of the, well a, Slayer. The
second is the blood of the human vessel of the Key of Dagon.”

Severus snatched his hand back from where he was reaching
for them. He stared at her. She was startled.

“How did you get that?” he demanded.

Buffy shrugged. “I asked for it.”

“And the Slayer’s?”

She raised an eyebrow at him.

“I’m sorry, I’d forgotten,” he said.

Buffy couldn’t help but smile. Too many people were
overawed, or deliberately dismissive of the Slayer. Few had as little reaction
as he had.

He’d gone back to examining the blood, without
touching either.

“I don’t know if there are any potions with
blood in them, Willow always did the chemistry. But I thought, you know, more
things in jars that no one else has.”

“You know the Key?” he asked.

Buffy immediately stepped into defensive stance at his
casual tone. He must have realised exactly what the effect of his words had
been because he turned slowly and reached out a hand to place on her arm. Buffy
didn’t relax. But she was aware that no one had been in a position to
hold her arm like that, warm and strong, in quite a while.

“I don’t want to know anything about who, or
what it is. Although it is obviously dear to you.”

“It can be used to destroy the world,” Buffy
said. “And the monks did send it to me.”

“Of course,” he said. But he didn’t sound
like he believed her. And he didn’t take his hand off her arm.

“Severus …” she begun, not sure she had an
ending.

“You’re a fighter, Miss Summers. But few people,
even a Slayer, would voluntarily walk into this conflict.”

“Dawn’s in Italy. But I never got the hang of
Italian.”

Severus raised his other hand to cup Buffy’s cheek.
She had to stop herself from closing her eyes.

“You seek death?”

“I’ve died twice. It doesn’t scare
me.”

“But living without the threat does,” he said.
“What do you do if it’s not just what keeps you alive.”

Buffy did close her eyes. She didn’t want to look at
him anymore. His statement had been as much for himself as for her, and she was
sure it would be reflected in his eyes.

The cold of the dungeons finally wormed its way through the
layers of her robes with a cool caress. She shivered. Just as gently Severus
put his arms around her and she was able to lean against his body. It was warm
though the black linen.

She smiled, revelling in the feel of a human body so close
to her own. The small cynical part of her mind she’d had enough trouble
ignoring before she’d been pulled
out of heaven asked how long she thought this spell would last.

Her arguments with it were cut short when he pulled away.
Her eyes opened and she looked straight into his for a brief moment before he
kissed her.

His lips were dry and Buffy didn’t think he’d
kissed anyone in sometime. But then, neither had she, and this felt so nice. She leant into him, lending him her weight. He
wrapped his arms around her more firmly and she smiled. He took the opportunity
to deepen the kiss.

Dragging a hand up her back, Severus tangled his fingers in
her hair.

“Sev… mmm,” Buffy managed to say.

She gave up trying to speak and kissed him back instead.

He broke the kiss long enough to breathe her name and draw
her closer.

Buffy’s brain decided that it was an opportune time to
interrupt her. It told her in uncertain terms that if she didn’t pull out
now, things were going to happen.

Buffy told it, as best she could, that she was going to let
them.