---
Disclaimer: Harry Potter and co. are J.K. Rowlings, and as for the song (Hallelujah) - it belongs to Rufus Wainwright.
---
I heard there
was a secret chord
That David
played and it pleased the Lord
But you don't
really care for music, do you?
It goes like
this
The fourth,
the fifth
The minor
fall, the major lift
The baffled
king composing Hallelujah
---
A crack of leather, rhythmic and continuous, followed by the harsh slicing sound of it biting into flesh. Tortured screams barely muffled through the bolted door, ringing up the cold stone corridor. Heavy chain links of iron clanking with each new struggle. The constant pounding of a heart beating frantically, threatening to burst at any given moment. And above it all, the malevolent, taunting laughter that took pleasure in the anguish of the captive; that delighted in the snap of the whip and the writhing agony that ensued.
Music. That was it - a sick, perverse symphony that reverberated against the thick growth of mildew on the damp stone walls of a filthy cell and echoed inside his pounding head. As tears of pain trailed down a bruised face, caked with blood and the grime of the rat infested hole, he found fleeting irony in the fact that such horrors should be compared now to music.
In the insanity of the moment, where was the composer?
His body twisted involuntarily as the frayed rawhide lashed again across his already raw, aching back, and a cry escaped his lips. Blood flowed in dark rivulets from the open wounds, snaking its way like twisted crimson pennants down his pale, shredded flesh and soaking the tatters of his simple black shirt, before pooling around his knees and seeping into the cracks of the cobbled floor. The rusted smell of gore hung heavy in the air about him; he could taste the metallic tint of it, could feel it attempting to suffocate him. After a while, he found his throat too tender to protest any further, and was instead reduced to the pathetic moans of one defeated.
By the time the vicious flogging ceased, his head had dropped and his arms - stretched at an awkward angle by the burdensome manacles clamped about his wrists - had long ago gone limp. A vague darkness hovered just at the edge of vision, making false promises of deliverance and numbing his senses. Indeed, it seemed almost as though he were underwater; the dull sound of heavily booted feet clomping away across the cobblestones was barely audible above the pulsating of his head, as was the creak of the closing door. Only the click! of the tarnished bolt sliding into place on the opposite side of the wall was clearly perceptible - it served as the final note of the cruel concerto in which he'd been an unwilling participant.
Lungs burning from the effort it took just to breathe, an uncontrollable shaking possessed the desolate form of Severus Snape. Attempts to ward off the overwhelming spasms wracking his torn body were futile, but even more useless were the strained efforts to still the sense of contempt, of bitter self depreciation, that swelled within him and poured out in piteous whimpers.
Despite an end - however temporary - to the physical persecution, there was no escape from the psychological torment he inflicted upon himself.
Your fault, Severus ... yours alone. No one put you in this position but you yourself. And it is well deserved. If you had stated ... but you turned away, turned your back on the Master. It still doesn't set matters right. The trust of an old man is hardly enough to make up for choosing to walk the heathen road. You can't deny the things you've done, the crimes you've committed, the blood you've spilled. You can't plead ignorance, or innocence, or naïveté. Only sadistic murder ... did you enjoy it? Do you enjoy it now, when the tables are reversed? Bastard, you deserve a lifetime of this hell ... death would be too great of an honor for the likes of you.
If he craned his neck to the left, he could see it. The Dark Mark, burned onto the inner forearm. Sore and rubbed red from straining fruitlessly against the steel cuffs, a line of dried blood tapered down from his wrist, curling about the hideous blemish, embellishing it with exaggerated scarlet curlicues. With the branding of the mark of the Dark Lord onto his very hide, Severus had openly accepted damnation, had denied the laws of righteousness, of virtue and morality.
He was a fallen angel, dark and desperate now in a shadowy pit where rodents scurried along blackened walls, waiting for a body upon which to feast. Damn it, he hadn't the right to plead forgiveness, not when he'd given it up so willingly in a bout of adolescent idiocy. He had chosen to succumb to the force; he had been weak-willed, easily manipulated. Cowardly.
Shivering in the cool, dank atmosphere of his prison, Severus mentally reviewed the final chords of Bach's Harpsichord Concerto, if only for reassurance of sanity. Soon enough, it seemed, all of his sacrifices - for Potter, for the good of colleagues and students alike - would come to a breaking point.
And then they would see if his years of personal destitution had all been for naught.Your faith
was strong but you needed proof
You saw her
bathing on the roof
Her beauty
and the moonlight overthrew you
She tied
you to a kitchen chair
She broke
your throne, she cut your hair
And from
your lips she drew the Hallelujah
---
Combined with the simple exuberance of his youth, education had been Severus' downfall, intelligence the tool that had unraveled him. He'd held too much arrogant faith in himself, placed too strong a belief in the strength of his own mind, and it had left him ruined. He hadn't even realized he'd been seduced by the power the Dark Side had to offer until it was too late. But it was knowledge that silently destroyed him, experience that invaded his dreams at night and prevented the blissful escape of sleep. It ate away at him, deteriorated his mind, demanded constant sacrifice.
Power - she was a ruthless entity, bloodthirsty and malicious. Her grasp was cold, entwining, inescapable ... and humiliating. The resolve of a most virtuous man could be distorted by her broken promises, overshadowed by her lies, and easily demolished through her manipulation. Even so, she was intoxicating, thrilling, arousing. The forbidden fruit, carried by the serpent into the grasping, needy hands of the sinner.
For a time, Severus had believed what he had been told - power led to utter control, to reverence and respect, to immortality.
The idea corrupted him - mind, body, and soul - and in the end he was granted none of what had been assured. No, instead, the results of power's trickery left him battered, despondent, and without the control he'd sought. She had stolen away what remained of his integrity, left his name and his decency in question. He'd been brutally stripped of both dignity and respectability, and had been left conquered, without any of his previous morals or standards to live by. Dumbledore had offered shelter and repose for his world-weary soul when he'd come crawling back with his tail between his legs, pleading forgiveness, but even the great headmaster could not rebuild the shattered platform that had housed Severus' ego, that had sheltered his very existence.
There would never be ease to the pain of a shredded life. He was an outcast and a pariah by his own bidding, despite the intense loyalty exerted for Dumbledore and the side of light, despite the blind risks he'd taken for the cause. There could never be a sense of belonging or of normalcy.
Only continuance of what already was.---
Maybe I've
been here before
I know this
room, I've walked this floor
I used to
live alone before I knew you
I've seen
your flag on the marble arch
Love is not
a victory march
It's a cold
and it's a broken Hallelujah
---
"Come now, Severus, stop this foolishness. Surely you'd much rather agree to the Master's terms than continue on with this idiocy? It can't really be all that ... pleasant, can it?"
The smooth, derogatory voice rang oddly calm in Severus' ears, but he sensed the underlying tone of malicious condescension, of sadistic cruelty. Raising his gaze from the cracked stone floor, he could just make out the face of Lucius Malfoy through his blurred vision.
When he spoke, it amazed him that one word could be so filled with weary emotion, after all he'd been put through in the past three - or was it four? - days. "No."
Livid frustration now emanated from Malfoy, filling the room with added tension. "Damn you, Severus! You lead me to believe you enjoy this. If that is the case, we shall be more than happy to oblige you. Of course ... you are absolutely certain you wouldn't prefer to reassess your current situation?"
For an imperceptible moment, confusion flickered into the tired, glittering black eyes of the professor, further distorting his vision. Was he fully certain that he didn't wish to reconsider? The 'Master's terms' granted him release from this hell - albeit the price, in return, was the precious sanctity of another human life. A second face floated into view, a face that had been locked away in the safe confines of his memory. The face of his first victim, whose life had been taken under much the same circumstances: It was kill or be killed, deliver or be delivered. Yes, he was positive. Severus had chosen an erroneous path of uncertainty nearly twenty years earlier. Now, when given a second chance, he refused to make the same mistake.
Breathing in shallow, furious gasps, his eyes - suddenly hardened against the world - raised on level with those of a man who had - long ago - been considered an acquaintance, a brother. Barely conscious of his actions, Severus spat squarely in the hated face, a feral growl rising low in his throat. "I'd rather burn in hell."
Disgusted and outraged, Malfoy's eyed shone like hot coals as he wiped away the saliva with the sleeve of his robes. "You're already in hell, Severus. But if it's burning you want ..."
Close to three hours later, when Severus was finally alone again in his cell, he succumbed to the pain. Feeling his stomach contract, he leaned as far forward as his bindings would allow and retched onto the squalid surface of the filthy floor. Angry, swollen red welts joined purpling bruises and open, festering wounds in decorating the upper portion of his body, and the stench of burnt flesh wrapped itself firmly about him in a nauseating dance. Exhausted, his eyes slid closed.
Was this what he had worked for? To die miserably, a meaningless pawn trapped in the vendetta of the damned Potter child and the Dark Lord?
For close to a decade there had seemed no significant reason for his existence; and then ... then, Harry Potter had come to Hogwarts. He'd known then on that first of September that his ordeal was not yet over, that dark times would return. And he had feared. But, hate the boy as he did, Potter granted him meaning and gave him the possibility of redemption. With the imminent clash of Dark and Light, he had been provided with a purpose. The time would come to prove his loyalty to all things good; it was the chance to wipe clean that which had labeled him Judas and damned his soul.
Without that objective to strive for, he'd had nothing.
Heat birthed by Malfoy's wand still lingered in the darkness of Severus' confine, but a hostile chill nestled deep within his very bones, causing his body to tremble violently. The convulsions resulted in an emptying of the scant contents of his stomach a second time, before he at length dropped off into a deep, cataleptic sleep.---
There was
a time you'd let me know
What's real
and going on below
But now you
never show it to me, do you?
Remember
when I moved in you?
The holy
dark was moving, too
And every
breath we drew was Hallelujah
---
When Severus awoke, the intense pulsing of a vein in his temple, combined with the offensive ache that enveloped his entire body, seemed as fierce and brutal as the inflamed abhorrence of his torturers, and the desperate desire for deliverance overwhelmed him. Whether it be in the retreating form of sleep or into the frozen hands of death, he cared not. His shoulders cracked sickeningly as he shifted, the sound exploding in his ears like a potion gone wrong. Aside from the ironically soothing whoosh! of the shackles swinging gently back and forth, and the distant squeaking of rats, there were no other disquieting noises, no unnecessary clamor to disrupt his solitude. For the first time, Severus felt truly alone.
Deserted.
Why don't they come, dammit? Albus ... Minerva ... someone. What in hell are they waiting for, the bloody end of the world?! The end ... They must know I've gone missing. Surely - surely they can't have forgotten me? Please. Oh, please come for me. Someone, anyone. Don't leave me here. Help ... don't let me die. Not here, not like this ...
"Please ..." It was on this simple word that his voice broke and a single tear wound its way down the curve of his cheek, leaving a clear white trail behind in the refuse covering his face. As it dripped to the floor, shining brilliantly in swift descent, what little hope remained to him fled from reach, and faith was lost to the scum of the world.
He'd assumed that liberation was ever near at hand, that someone would be sent to free him from his incarceration. He was a trusted member of the Hogwarts staff; he was needed by the headmaster. Certainly they had noticed at the castle that he had not returned from Bristol on schedule ... a course of action must have been developed ... they wouldn't simply leave him to fend for himself, to die ...
And therein had been his folly. Thoughts turning bitter, Severus scoffed at his predicament. There was no plan of rescue, because his 'value,' his 'importance' had merely been invented, escalated in his own demented mind. When he pondered it, he wasn't really all that needed. Potions was a dying art, and his positions at the school could be easily filled. The world would continue to turn without him, and defeat of the Dark Lord was still imminent. Nothing depended on his existence. Nothing.
Yes, this would be his end. Not merely a pawn in Potter's battle, but the damned court jester pinned beneath Dumbledore's thumb.
Fury and anger filled his mind, hopelessness and sorrow his heart. With a bestial shout, he tugged viciously at the restraints, the despondent realization that he was on his own weighing down his soul. The sound of clanking chains bounced harshly from the menacing walls in disharmonious confusion; teeth bared and sweat beading on his skin, Severus pulled grievously until the blood ran freely from his chafed wrists, rambling nomadically down his arms and assaulting him with the warmth.
It was sacrificial. The Dark Side had been religion, the Master their Lord, and he a priest. Now he was but a consecration, offered up for slaughter. Offered up for the pleasure of a vindictive, false god. He recalled the evil, twisting its way through his veins, invading his system like a narcotic drug and numbing his senses to the world about him. It had moved within him, controlling him. It still controlled him.
Panting in the dim light, he struggled against it still, with each new yank at the fetters punctuated by a routed, frantic sob.
---
Maybe there's a God above
And all I ever learned from love
Was how to shoot at someone who outdrew you
It's not a cry you can hear at night
It's not somebody who's seen the light
It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah
---
A gentle wind had picked up out-of-doors, and in the obscure night sky stars sparkled high and minute above the drowsy earth, providing a beacon for weary travellers. But inside the foul brig, several looming figures hovered about the dismal, defeated shape of Severus Snape.
Kneeling prostrate on the hard, freezing cobblestone, his arms pulled taut and head hanging limp, he was a pitiable form. Mussed black hair matted with dirt, sweat, and blood fell lifelessly forward into his eyes. Open sores and infected wounds festered, bruises and acrimonious blisters bedecked the upper portion of his body, and ragged strips of skin hung from his back, torn by the lashing of the cruel whip. His wrists had been rubbed raw from struggling against the constraints about them, and he was surrounded by the blood and gore of his suffering.
Rocking slightly in place, his breath came in forced, laborious gasps. The reticent wand-bearers that had created a half-circle about him murmured to one another in hushed tones, but fell immediately silent as the cell door creaked open, its hinges screeching in protest. Severus was dimly aware of heavy, ominous footfalls approaching from out of the lurking shadows; he heard the rustling of robes as his branded brothers shifted, leaving a gap at the center of the semi-circle. But he was in no way prepared for the wicked voice that sliced through the utter stillness of the room - his flesh crawled as it reached his ears, and a horrified shudder worked its way down his body.
"Ah, the mutinous Severus Snape. It has been years since your departure ... you are aware of my displeasure, I assume?"
A thousand varying remarks, biting and sarcastic, bubbled to his lips, even as he cringed at the feet of the Dark Lord. What would his students pay to see the despised Professor Snape as he was now - cowering, weak, and at the mercy of another being? Would Longbottom find pity for him after all of his scathing remarks? Would his situation strike a chord in Weasley's heart?
"You are charged with being a renegade and a spy, and with the act of treason. As you are well aware, the punishment is death. How do you plead?"
Dull black eyes, devoid of emotion, shifted to the booted feet before him. So they would serve him with a mock trial? Somehow, it seemed fitting. For a reason unfathomable to his own mind he held his tongue, sensing the Master's growing frustration and knowing full well he would suffer for his insolence. Off to his left Severus heard a snicker from one of the obviously more dim-witted stooges assembled, and a small sigh escaped him. It was the breaking point. The Dark Lord would not be made a fool of, and the dreaded word - "Crucio!" - swept down in an unwanted invasion upon his world.
Immediately hurled into excruciating agony, Severus thrashed against his bindings, his mind trained on little more but the pain. How had he forgotten the immensity of it all, of the thousands of red-hot knives plunging repeatedly, relentlessly into his body? He was falling into a torment worse than anything he had thus far experienced, diving head first into madness. And then ... nothing but the echo of his own swinish howling, and the quiet laughter surrounding him.
When again the Master spoke, his voice was considerably more severe, a scorching hiss cutting through the darkness. "How do you plead?"
Pride and his own code of honor tightened Severus' lips into a firm line and strengthened his resolve, preventing him from speaking. And it was a turbulent temper that sent him reeling back into the vexing torture. Bathed in sweat, the stitch in his side left respiration an arduous task and had him seeing double.
"Once more, Severus. How - do - you - plead?"
What did anything matter anymore? There would be no salvation; he was to die in the foul-smelling hole, wretched, isolated, forlorn. No friends, no family, no support or beliefs. Not even the comfort of religion and the promise of a savior.
Alone.
Heaving up from his knees to stand on wobbling legs, eyes filled with misery and quiet pleading locked with those of the Dark Lord for the first time in over a decade. They were more horrible now, as death breathed its icy breath down his neck, than he recalled from his dreams.
"Guilty."
In the sudden explosion of light that followed, Severus was overwhelmed by horrible sensation. He was vaguely aware of animalistic, inhuman screams filling the dingy cell and a red haze infiltrating his surroundings. Cold and broken, with spread arms adding to the difficulty of survival, his gaze lifted upwards. The cry burst through his lips without his realizing it. "Why?!"
And then the voice of Albus Dumbledore was whispering in his ear, calm and frustratingly soothing. "Better to die standing than to live on your knees."
---