Fire in The Dungeon

Ch 8 The Letters

Snape felt like death the next morning and he probably looked like it too, even the Slytherin students stayed clear of him. When he took his place at the teacher's table in the Great Hall for breakfast, he dodged the towering stack of toast and went straight for the hot pot of coffee. He filled his cup to the brim and basked in it's rich smell and bitter taste. He lazily picked at the platters and filled his plate as he eyed  the room. The students were lively and buzzing from the excitement of the night before, his colleagues however, all looked as worn out as he did.

Hagrid and professor Sprout seemed ready to doze off, McGonagall had pronounced dark circles under her eyes, Lupin had blood shot eyes with three half empty cups of coffee in front of him, and the rest of the professors were all varying degrees of decrepit. All but Potami and Dumbledore, who were bright eyed and having a cheery conversation about whether waffles or crepes were better, when the mail owls began to arrive.

The several dozen owls dropped letters and packages all around the hall. Then, a hoard of owls swooped down to the teacher's table and dropped a flurry of letters and bouquets of flower, Potami seemed to be so stunned that she froze midway through removing her gloves. The commotion and constant loud thuds on the table forced everyone to look over at her more than usual. Even Snape looked over and examined the growing pile, some letters sliding off the table on to the floor. When the last owl left the final letter, there was a huge pile spread across the table and on the floor around Potami. She was stone faced and glaring down at the mess before side eyeing Dumbledore and speaking coldly, "Albus, explain."

"Well, it would appear you have mail." Dumbledore answered, coyly smiling as he sipped his tea and avoided her icy gaze.

"Merlin's beard! You must have a hundred letters here and another twenty on the floor!" explained professor Sintra who was seated beside Potami. She picked a few off the floor and looked at the sender's addresses, "They're from all over Europe and the United Kingdom, this one is from Greenland!"

Potami tutted as she began to organize all the letters into neat piles on the table. Her mood had severely soured in mere minutes. Snape then realized that despite his rudeness to her or the borage of people constantly pestering her for attention, she had never showed any outright negative emotions until now. Looks like even she has her limits, he thought to himself as he continued to eat his food.

A fourth year student from the Ravenclaw table suddenly stood up while holding a open magazine in her hand. "Professor Potami look! There is a column about you in the latest Daily Prophet, it even has a photo of you!"

Potami looked at the Ravenclaw girl and stood up from her seat holding out her hand, the girl quickly walked up the teacher's table and handed her the magazine.

"Thank you Ms. Chang, you may return to your seat." Potami sat down and scanned through the article before frowning and abruptly closing the magazine and handing it to Dumbledore and whispering in his ear, he placed a gentle hand on her own and after a moment she seemed to calm down some. The students were feverishly looking through their own copies, most had kept their burning stares on her. Snape overheard a few of the students reading the article cautiously out loud in low voices that he could only make out a few words: "Temptress... unmarried... seduce... squib..." then as he bit into his dry piece of toast, it dawned on him, they are all love letters.

He frowned as he got the gist of the article, apparently Andromeda Potami was an unmarried temptress who may or may not have gotten the position by seducing the headmaster and is a suspected squib. Snape's mind wondered away as he absentmindedly took a swig of his lukewarm coffee. The very insinuation that Dumbledore would be seduced by anyone was laughable, though their relationship seemed very friendly, playful even. He has seen them several lock arms as they talked and walked around the school grounds but surely that was because they were good friends. The thought that Dumbledore's wrinkled and bony hands would have explored such smooth and subtle skin... well it simply revolted Snape so much so that he resolved that it was not his problem whatsoever.