I want to start this off by saying that I am not a Snape fan. I will usually give myself three or four paragraphs of any Snape-fic to see if it's something that I can tolerate reading. Here, I was *well* beyond tolerance within three or four sentences. I was sucked in pretty well immediately. Your characterization is fantastic - I absolutely loathed Eileen from the beginning, but I could not stop myself from feeling sorry for her. Even when the realization of what she'd done with the Gobstones sunk in, I still pitied her despite the distaste. This was an outstanding fic from start to finish, and while I'm normally no fan of the grit-and-dirt school of realism in fiction, I found it to be perfect here. Very well done.