Author's Note: This is my offering for the LE/SS flying Challenge I am holding over at DeviantArt.

Flying too Close to the Sun

“Come on, Sev, stop being a baby. It’s not that high.”

“’M not being a baby…”

“Then why are you pouting like one.” That earned her a scowl, and Lily Evans laughed with delight. “You know I’m just teasing. Come on, the climb will be worth it, I promise.” She waited for Severus on the small ledge halfway up the cliff by the sea, and reached out a hand once he was close enough, but he refused it.

When he finally scrambled onto the narrow ledge beside her, and turned around to take in the view, he blanched, and threw himself back against the stone behind him with such force she was sure it would leave a bruise.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

He just shook his head.

“Severus Snape, are you afraid of heights?”

The dark eyes that turned to her then were so full of quiet pleading that it took her breath away. “But you’ve been up on a broomstick tons of times?!”

“Hated it,” he managed.

“Well, why didn’t you say something before we started up?! We can’t crawl back down. That’s too dangerous.” Severus nodded vigorously in agreement. “We’ll have to keep on up until we get to the top, and then we can take the road down.”

Severus turned paler still. “I can’t,” he breathed.

“Well you’ve got this far, Sev. I figure you can go the rest of the way. Just don’t think about it. You go first, and then if you fall, I’ll stop you.”

“But—I—I’ll knock you down with me.”

“If you do, I’ll just fly us down. I don’t see anyone about.”

“Underage magic…” he murmured.

“Well, if they’re going to expel me for that, then they can just go to Hell,” Lily exclaimed. “I think I should at least be allowed to save my own arse.”

She saw the corner of his mouth twitch. He was looking in her eyes now, and she had made him forget, for a moment, just how high they were. “You could do it too, you know. It’s easy. You just think happy thoughts, just like in Peter Pan.”

“It’s a little difficult to think happy thoughts when you are falling off a cliff, Lily.” There—a coherent sentence. He would be feeling better in no time.

“Well, I didn’t mean then. You have to get used to flying first, be sure that you can do it, and then you just stop thinking about falling. I mean it never really occurs to me.”

“Apparently.” Sarcasm—even better! “It’s Dark Magic, you know.”

Lily instantly felt herself on the defensive. “What is?”

“Flying,” he replied a challenge in his tone.

“It is not! Take that back! You—your only saying that because you want to drag me down onto your level, make me like those friends of yours, well, I—I won’t let you…” Tears had sprung to her eyes, and she wiped them away angrily. She hated that things had been like this between them lately. That he seemed so set on going down a path she feared she couldn’t follow, and that she had been on such a horribly short fuse.

That was why she had invited him to the seaside with her this summer. She had hoped that when they were alone together, away from school, that maybe they could forget all their differences. Fifth year was O.W.L. year. She didn’t want these kinds of distractions when it was important she prepare for the year end exams.

“I’m only saying it’s labeled Dark Magic, Lily, and if you get caught doing it outside of school it won’t just be Underage Magic you will be accused of. They—they could send you to Azkaban for it!” The wind had picked up, and he almost had to shout to be heard over it, but she could hear the undertone of fear in his voice, and she knew it wasn’t from the height, but rather, it was for her.

She sniffed loudly, and looked out to the sea. There were dark clouds on the horizon. It looked as though a storm was brewing. “Would they—would they really, do you think?”

“Yes, Lily! You’re fifteen years old. You’re not a child anymore.”

“Well, it shouldn’t be labeled Dark,’ she said with an air of finality. “There’s nothing Dark about it.”

“You know that, and I know that, but they,” he spat bitterly, motioning out toward the horizon, “they get to decide what is right and wrong, Light and Dark, and they say that a part of you, a part of you that is—that’s—beautiful,” he finally managed, “is ugly and wrong, and I—I hate them for it!”

His face was twisted with that hate. He was almost unrecognizable beneath the pall of it. She feared for him. “Don’t hate, Sev.”

“Why not! You—you don’t care that they say that what you can do is wrong, that the thing that you have been doing since you were a child, since before you knew you were a witch, the thing that made me…” Another great gust of wind blasted in from the sea, sending her hair whipping wildly about her face. His voice trailed off for a moment, and he looked at her with the look that was becoming more and more frequent, the thing that sent little shivers up her spine every time she saw it, the thing that terrified her almost more than anything else. “The thing that made me know you were a witch, is wrong?” he finished weakly.

“I do care, but it’s Ministry law, Severus, so I don’t suppose there is a thing that can be done about it.”

“Change the fucking law!” He spat, looking wild, with his dark eyes flashing passionate fire and his hair whipping about his face.

“I don’t suppose it’s that easy,” she snapped back.

“Well, you should at least try, Lily—for Merlin’s sake! Do you want the wizarding world to remain the broken ruin that it is? Someone—someone has to do something, or—or people like you—people who can do beautiful things, powerful things—they will never be anything more than outcasts!”

“That’s not you talking,” she choked desperately. “That’s Lucius Malfoy, and his lot.”

“Well, maybe they have the right idea!” he shouted back.

At that moment a cold blast of rain pelted against her face, and she gasped, turning to look out at the water. It had risen into a terrible froth, and the storm had descended upon them much faster, and was much worse than she had anticipated. The wind was buffeting her so strongly now that she almost feared it would knock from their precarious perch.

She turned at the feeling of a hand on her arm. Severus was pulling on her sleeve. “Sit down,” he shouted over the roar of the wind. “Sit down or it will blow you off.”

She did as he said, and huddled in close beside him for warmth. It had only been raining for a few moments, and already her teeth were chattering from the cold. She felt his arm wrap around her shoulder and she leaned in even closer. “What are we going to do?” she said, craning her neck to look up at him.

He was looking out at the violent sea, one hand lifted to shield his eyes. She shivered again, and his grip around her tightened. His hand dropped and he looked down at her. For one horrible moment she thought that he meant to kiss her, but then suddenly, the rain and the wind stopped, and the air around them grew warm.

She sat up in shock, and looked around her. They were encased within a Shielding Charm, and it felt as though there had been a Warming Charm thrown in to boot. “Are you doing that?!”

He nodded. “You’re no good at wandless magic, remember.”

“But—but the Decree against Underage Magic,” she gasped.

“The Ministry can go to Hell. I should at least be allowed to save my own arse,” he echoed back to her with a weak smile.

“But, Sev, you’ll be in so much trouble, they—they could expel you!” She could feel tears coming to her eyes again.

“Well, what did you think I was going to do, let you sit here all night and freeze to death? I—I’ll deal with the Ministry if it comes down to that. Besides,” he said, the slightest bit of bitterness returning to his voice, “it was magic cast to save one of Hogwarts’ golden Gryffindors, that’s got to count for something in Dumbledore’s books. Who knows, maybe I’ll get lucky and he’ll put in a good word for me with the Ministry.”

“You—you shouldn’t have, Sev…”

“Well, I did,” he bit back. “Just—just forget about it.”

She was crying now, and the sight of her tears seemed to make him even more miserable. Leaning back over, she wrapped her arms around him in a tight embrace. “I got us into this fix, and I’ll stand for you at the Ministry, if it comes to that, Severus. I promise. And I’ll teach you how to fly too, if you like; just as soon as we get back to school. We can sneak off to the Forbidden Forest. It’s really quite easy, you’ll see, and it’s very useful for getting you out of all sorts of tight binds.”

“Even though it’s Dark Magic?”

“Labeled Dark Magic – and yes.” She felt him shiver next to her, and she got the feeling that it wasn’t from the cold. “Thank-you so much for this, Sev. It’s all my fault and now you’re the one who’s going to get in trouble for it.”

“That’s okay,” he muttered. “I’m used to it.”