View From A Portrait
by Teresha K. Duncan

The choice of wood for the frame was quite acceptable, thought the portrait of Severus Snape as he trailed a fingertip along the edge of the deep mahogany. Peeking out, the Headmaster's desk was, for the time being, unoccupied. He was uncertain whether to feel relieved or dejected over the absence of a living presence beyond his frame. Certainly there would be no one at Spinner's End. He knew the place to be boarded up and under enchantments to prevent entry from vandal-minded Muggles or indeed from wizarding kind eager to lay bare his secrets. Not a place in which to go seeking interactions, though he felt certain he would depend on the isolation as a refuge in the ages to come.

He took a look to his left, then to his right, before looking up to find Albus Dumbledore aving cheerfully to him.

"So he's done it, then," said Severus flatly. Albus beamed happily back at him.

"Oh, yes, and brilliantly so," said his former employer and erstwhile friend. Dumbledore templed his fingertips before him as he settled back into the comfortable chintz chair that he so often would conjure for himself in life.

Severus sighed heavily. "So that's it then? Lily's son has gone?" The mixture of anxiety, grief, resentment and muted rage twisted his pigments into a grimace, evoking a baffling grin from the portrait of Dumbledore. Whispers sussurated around the office, as the other headmasters and headmistresses shared in the secret to which Severus seemed not to be privy. He glared around at each and every one of them, then turned his focus on Albus, waiting.

"Oh, yes, that's right, you hadn't yet joined us," said Dumbledore, infuriatingly mystifying. He lowered himself into Severus's painting, bringing his chintz armchair with him. Before sitting, he stood with his hands at the top of the chair's back and gave Severus a measuring look before telling him soberly, "No, Severus, Harry Potter is not dead. Nor even mostly dead," he added with that familiar genial twinkle in his bright blue eyes. The dumbfounded look on Severus Snape's face wrought chuckles from Albus Dumbledore. He settled himself into the chintz chair and sat there gazing peaceably up at Severus, who took that as his cue and set himself on his less comfortable, burgundy leather upholstered high back wood chair.

"Allow me to explain -- assuming I can," Albus offered. Severus tilted his head curiously, and no small measure of irony tinted his voice as he bowed slightly and invited, "Please, Albus, do. If, as you say, you can."

Once he'd heard the entire tale, how Harry going willingly to his death had saved him from dying while rendering a protection to all wizarding kind, and how the confusion over the rightful mastery of the Elder Wand led to Voldemort ultimately destroying himself, Severus found himself, rather than pacing as he'd begun while listening to the tale, seated cross legged on the floor at Dumbledore's feet.

"That seems... so improbable," said Severus wonderingly. "So many ways for things to have gone wrong, for it all to come to utter disaster."

"Indeed," agreed Albus amiably. Severus narrowed his eyes and peered judiciously at Dumbledore. "Well, as Minerva was wont to say, sheer dumb luck has its own value," Albus added with a defensive spreading of his hands.

"And... and Harry?" he asked, his voice thickening suddenly with suppressed emotion. Again Albus smiled, but this time did not call attention to Severus's use of Harry's given name rather than his surname.

"Harry has told all who would listen that you were, in fact, loyal to me, and that you were the bravest person he'd ever known," he informed Severus solemnly. A convulsive look of agony and regret passed over Severus's face. Albus rested a hand on his shoulder, and rather than flinch away, Severus covered that hand with his own while taking a deep, calming breath.

"Lily's son," he said softly, choosing in that moment to forgive all that had gone before, to forgive the misfortune of Harry's paternity, and to acknowledge that the best of Harry came from the woman who had Severus's heart.

"I say, is this a private party or can anyone join in the fun," came a familiar, unctuous voice from the left. Looking up, Severus offered a faint, wry grin to Phineas Nigellus Black, who peered in with a bottle of wine in one hand and three crystal wine glasses in the other. "Bit of a welcome to the family, as it were," Phineas explained as he set the glasses on the small end table and uncorked the wine. Severus chuckled softly. He'd been deeply grateful to see that the room his portrait had been set in was identical to his living room, right down to the fully stocked book case behind his leather chair. He strode over and ran a fingertip over the bindings, checking the titles and noting that some of them were unnamed.

"Ah, yes, new books that would suit your interests will supplant those blanks as they come into being," Phineas assured him. "Trust me, it's one of the finer perks of this existence. Another wry grin crossed Severus's lips. The only book he'd really wanted to come across would have been...

But no, he thought with a sudden chill, his finger resting over what was clearly a young girl's journal. He dared not draw it out, not with company. At Spinner's End, perhaps, he would try reading this, if it proved to be what he suspected it was. He cleared his throat softly and turned back to the two Headmasters vising his frame.

"To eternity," he toasted wryly, raising his glass to them both. "Hear, hear!" chimed in Phineas Nigellus, while Albus Dumbledore simply tilted a nod to Severus that spoke volumes of understanding, before all three drained their glasses to the dregs.