Snakes, Secrets, and Revelations

Chapter 3

I screech and shriek. I swoop and I snatch. I am both the predator and prey. What am I?

The doorbell rang and Edmund swung open the door to see the secretive fellow that was Lucy's father. "Lucy!" Edmund called.

A minute later, Lucy was walking with Severus to Diagon ally.
"Where's Lucy?" Susan inquired.

"Oh, Lucy went with someone to a wizard place, dear." Helen replied without slipping any significant details.

Helen would leave it to Lucy to divulge or withhold any information regarding her parentage from the other children as Lucy saw fit.
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Severus and Lucy entered the almost completely deserted ally. In a month, when it would be closer to the school year, it would be teeming with wizards and a few muggles here and there, but now it was more or less abandoned.
Just the way Severus liked it.

Lucy on the other hand was marveling at how empty it was compared to the insane fiasco it was the last time she had been there. The difference was astounding. It might as well have been a whole different world. Lucy felt a slight pang as she recalled her home, but brushed it off as Severus led her into a certain shop.

"You seem to be lacking an owl. Pick one." Severus instructed in his slow speech.

Lucy grinned, delighted. There were countless owls! Cawing and screeches filled the air. There were Horned, Screech, and True owls. Barn owls, eagle, snowy, barred and great horned owls. Great gray owls and so many many more.

As Lucy wondered up and down aisles she came across a small owl. It looked at her a moment before falling and sticking a twig leg in the air.

"Playing dead, it is. That on', Elf owl, it is." The manager informed them.
Despite his bad grammar, he was clean shaven and dressed in only slightly dirty clothes.

(After all, you can't take care off animals and be perfectly clean. Susan had scolded her so many times for getting dirty from animals as well as a various other things.)

Lucy, however took no notice of this, her focus on the bird. She softly cooed and gently ran her finger over the small owls head through the cage bars. The tiny thing gradually opened its eyes and stood. The Elf owl cocked its head to the left and seemed to be regarding her. It blinked and then gave a hoot. Lucy beamed and turned her gaze to Severus. He nodded in consent and eyed the manager expectantly.

"You be want'in this on' then? The play dead on'?"

Severus began to deepen his frown and Lucy stepped forward.

"Oh yes please!"Lucy's enthusiasm brightened Severus' mood a bit. "This will be my first owl! How long have you been working with owls?"

"My whole life." the manager proudly shared.
"Really? That's amazing!..........."
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When the sun began its careful and slow decent the father and daughter started for Lucy's home.

Lucy suddenly halted at the corner of her street and looked down at her feet.

"Professor Snape?" Unbeknownst to her, Snape flinched at her use of his name and title. "Do you......want to be my father?"

"I do." Severus answered. Lucy turned her head back up towards him, the setting sun surrounding her head alike to a halo and smiled a pure and genuine smile.

"Thanks, Dad."
Severus' heart warmed and he smiled a teeny, tiny smile, but a smile nether the less.

Answer to the riddle. An owl.
Interesting fact
Owls can't turn their head to a complete 360 degrees, but can turn them 270 degrees, which is still incredible.