My Father, My Brother
Chapter 1: If you have forgotten me…
"Treat your superior as a father, your equal as a brother, and your inferior as a son."
-Persian Proverb
The sound of the infant's shrill cry echoed through the darkness cutting through the air like a wand in the hand of a trained wizard. The rain from outside hammered onto the window beating down on the glass as if trying to break through to destroy everything on the other side.
Eileen Prince sat up in bed and glanced over at her husband who managed to sleep through the loud storm, and the cries of their son. Typical. Eileen put on her robe and exited the room into the hall. She nearly jumped as a loud clap of thunder crashed and echoed through the house, the sound of her baby's cries becoming louder. She quickened her tired pace and placed her hand on the handle of the door. Just as her hand touched the cool metal, the infants crying ceased. She paused holding the knob in her hand, almost afraid to go in. The sudden stop of the cry had been unnatural, abrupt.
Eileen slowly turned the handle and inched the door open, her silver wand held tightly in her hand. She put her hand on the light switch and flicked it on, but nothing happened. No light illuminated the room as it should have. She looked to the old electronic clock on the table in the hall and saw that the clock still held the correct time. It wasn't a power outage as she had hoped.
Flicking the switch back down she slowly entered the room and nearly dropped her wand at the sight before her. A man shrouded in a black cloak stood in the middle of the infant's room, holding her child in his arms. From what she could see, the infant was safe. For the moment. The child looked up at the man in an odd curiosity as it reached for his large hooked nose. She raised her wand at him angrily.
"Put my son down!" She demanded. The man smiled slightly at the infant a moment before he turned to her, his black hair falling like a curtain over his face.
"If you have forgotten me mother, I seem to recall I am also you're son." He said simply, his voice smooth yet nasally and at the same time seemingly too deep for a man his size. He was slim to say the least, tall and lanky. His hair was black and greasy framing his face making his skin seem all that much paler. In the moonlight he looked like an over grown bat with his black cloak falling off his arms like wings.
"Put my son down, and leave here at once!" Eileen demanded once again. The man snickered, the sound alone was bitter. He put the infant down in the crib once again, but did not leave. He pulled his own black wand out of his cloak and aimed it at his mother.
"What are you going to do mummy?" He asked. "What you should have done twenty three years ago?" He asked a cruel smirk on his face. "Should have made it easier on yourself and just drowned me as soon as I had been flushed from your filthy body." He said. She raised her wand but he was too quick for her.
"Expelliarmus!" The man laughed as her wand flew from her hand and clattered on the hard floor.
"What do you want?" She asked backing away from him as he advanced on her slowly. She backed into the door and he stopped a mere three feet away from her.
"What do I want?" He asked. "I want a lot of things mother… none of which I ever got… or will ever have…" He moved forward a bit more. "What I want now…. Is to know why?"
Eileen glared at him a moment confused. "Why?" She asked.
"Yes." The man confirmed. "Why?" He moved away from her again, turning his back on her. Showing her that he wasn't afraid of her. She glanced to her wand on the floor then to her infant son. "I've been watching you Eileen. You and Tobias." He continued, his monotone voice quiet, almost non-existent against the sounds of the storm. "For the past few days." He turned to her once again. "What makes him different from me?" He asked pointing at the infant with his wand. "Why is it that you never wanted me? But you want him?" He asked.
"He's…" Eileen paused not knowing what to say. "It's different now." Eileen said.
"Why?" He asked. "Why was I so wrong?" His voice rose slightly though it didn't seem to bother the infant. "What was wrong…. With me?" He asked.
"It was nothing to do with you…" Eileen said.
"Of course it had to do with me!" He yelled. He looked to the infant who was now looking at him trying to figure out where the yelling was coming from. "Everything I ever did was wrong. I was never smart enough. Never fast enough. Never good enough…. For either of you." He said. "I spent… my entire life trying to make you proud of me." There was a long drawn out pause as he moved to the infants crib and looked down at him. "I was never even acknowledged." He said quietly as if telling the infant rather than her. He ran the back of his hand down the child's cheek.
"Severus I-" Severus turned to her and smiled. It wasn't a happy smile. It was cruel… sad… defeated.
"I have done… everything… for you." He said. "I got good grades. I made the quidditch team… Sure I was no seeker… but I tried!" He said. "What did I have to do?"
"Severus you have to understand." She said. "When you where born it was…" She paused still not knowing what to say.
"What? Inconvenient?" He moved away from the crib and looked back at her. He noticed her glancing at her wand and used his own to bring the silver rod to him. He held it in his hands. It was ten and a half inches long, two inches shorter than his and about half the thickness. "This is a very nice wand." He said. "Unicorn hair is it not?" He asked examining the wand. Eileen didn't answer him. "Is it not?" He asked once again.
"Yes." She said simply.
"How very… ironic." He said. "Seeing as how you are…. Very not… pure of heart." He put his own wand back in his cloak and held hers in both of his hands. She held up her hand as if signalling him to stop. "Oh don't worry mother dearest, I'm not going to break it. If I did that would ruin all my plans for tonight." He said a smile on his face. He looked down at the wand and closed his eyes a moment before he held it out to her.
She looked at the wand wondering why he was suddenly giving it back to her. Wasn't it against the rules to arm your enemies? Or rather… flat out stupid.
"Oh don't worry mother… I'm neither arming you, nor am I stupid." She looked up at him.
"You're…"
"Yes… I'm a Legilimens." He said. "I can as easily read your thoughts as you can read the expressions on my face." He smiled. "Course I am no expert but and as you know the mind is not a book, to be opened at will and examined at leisure. Thoughts are not etched on the inside of skulls, to be perused by any invader. The mind is a complex and many-layered thing... It is true, however, that those who have mastered Legilimency are able, under certain conditions, to delve into the minds of their victims and to interpret their findings correctly."
"How?" She asked.
"How?" Severus asked her.
"Who taught you?" She asked. Legilimency wasn't something simple to learn. Only another Legilimens can teach someone to use Legilimency.
"Now that… is an interesting story." He said. "One of which I will not be telling you. Where is Tobias?" He asked. "Still sleeping I take it?" Eileen didn't say anything. "Does he still snore as obnoxiously as he used to?" Severus smirked at her silence. "I guess we'll just find out." He said moving towards the door. She raised her wand to his face causing a heart felt laugh to erupt from him.
"Like I said mother…. I am not stupid." He said. He pushed her away from the door and moved out into the hall.
Eileen came out after him and aimed her wand at him. "Incarcerous!" She yelled. Severus paused and turned to her a smile on her face. She looked down at her wand when nothing happened. "Expelliarmus!" She said aiming her wand at him again. Once again nothing happened. "What did you do to my wand?" She asked angrily. Severus smiled and turned making his way down the hall.
"I put a simple repressing curse on it." He said. "Only lasts maybe ten to fifteen minutes but that's more than long enough for me to finish here."
"I'll call the ministry!" She said. Severus once again laughed.
"Oh please do it'll save me the trouble." He said. He reached his fathers room and turned the door handle. Opening the door he stepped into the dark room. Tobias woke as the door slammed shut. He jumped awake and stared blurrily at the man before him. Once his vision cleared his eyes widened in shock.
"You." He said angrily. "Get out of my home boy!" He yelled. "Before I-"
"Before you what?" He asked aiming his wand at him. Tobias froze.
"What are you going to do?" He asked. "You don't have the guts to do anything to me." Severus aimed the wand just beside his head. "Sectumsempra" He said. The headboard next to Tobias' head nearly exploded with the force of the spell.
"Don't I father?" He asked moving his wand back into Tobias' face. Tobias backed up on the bed, the sheet falling loose revealing the mans ill fitting dull grey boxers.
"Don't… please…" He said suddenly afraid of what he might do.
"You're pathetic you know that." Severus said. "How many times have those words come from my mouth?" He asked. "Have you ever once stopped?" He asked. "Have you?!"
Tobias shook slightly. "No." He said quietly.
"What was that?" Severus asked.
"No." Tobias said louder.
"No…" Severus said. "Then why should I stop?" He asked.
"Because…. I… I'm your father." Tobias said hoping that the words would at least mean something to the boy. Severus laughed.
"My father?!" He asked. "Some father you are. Tell me where you planning on drinking every night and beating that thing you call a child?" He asked pointing his wand in the direction of the infants room. "Or was I just a special case?"
"I never-"
"You never…" Snape interrupted him. "Yes… you never… you never will again!" He said holding his wand. "Avada Kadavera!" The blast of green energy flew into Tobias' chest. It wasn't long before Tobias' life was gone.
Severus didn't even glance back at the man as he made his way back out into the hall. Eileen had heard the spell he had used, she sat crying in the hall way knowing that her husband was dead.
"Why?" She asked looking up at him. Severus looked down at her and sneered.
"Yes that seems to be the question of the night doesn't it?" He asked moving into the infants room. Eileen got up and tackled him knocking him to the floor.
"You will not harm my baby!" She cried out. Severus raised his wand a knocked her back.
"Harm him?" Severus asked. "I am not so much a monster to be harming an innocent infant." He said. "His only crime is belonging to the two of you. But that shall be remedied soon." He picked up Eileen's useless wand and laid it in both his hands next to his own. He closed his fingers around the wands and muttered something under his breath.
"What are you-" She watched him a few moments as he muttered to himself. What was he doing? He opened his eyes a few moments later and smiled. He handed her wand back, which was now fully functional.
He looked to his wand. "Deletrius" He said. The spell removed any evidence of the Avada Kadavera he had cast with his wand.
"What did you do to my wand?" She asked.
"I didn't do anything." He said. "I just simply moved the spells that had been cast from my wand… into yours. The deletrius charm removed any evidence that I did anything at all."
"That's impossible. It's not possible to move the signature of one wand into another." She paused her eyes widening in sudden realization. "You're using dark magic." She said. Though why she was surprised she didn't know. She raised her wand to him. "You're going to frame me for the death of my husband." Severus smiled.
"Ah you always where so intelligent." He said. "Incarcerous" He said. The spell tied her up with an invisible rope causing her to fall to the ground.
"The ministry should have word of the death curse being used and should be on it's way." He said picking up the infant from the crib. The infant once again reached out for his nose but he shook his head and pulled away. The infant ignored him and turned to play with his cloak chewing on the material on his shoulder.
"Put my son down!" She demanded. Severus smirked as the infant turned again to look at his mother. He reached out to her and Severus took his hand in his. He rocked him a bit and moved his hand so that the infant was waving to his mother.
"Say good-bye." Severus said in a tone that one would generally use when talking to a baby. Eileen cried for Severus to leave her son alone once again, tears streaming down her cheeks. He laughed as he grabbed onto the port key that he had placed on the table upon arrival, his laugh echoing through the room even after he had gone.
((AN… So… What did you all think? Hope it was decent. Please R&R))