A/N: Hello there! I've had this idea for awhile now, and decided to finally post it. The other chapters are already in various stages of completion, so I'll post more depending on the response. Anyhow! Please enjoy the first chapter! I know I've seen this concept done a bunch of times, but I'm hoping to put a twist on it that I haven't yet seen done.

Of course, there's a fair chance that it has been done and I just haven't ventured far enough into the depths of FFN.

DISCLAIMER: I own nothing in this fanfic besides my OCs. Harry Potter and all associated titles are the properties of J.K. Rowling.

OF MONSTERS AND MEN

part one, chapter one: for the greater good

1981

"Fools rush in where angels fear to tread."

— Alexander Pope

October 31st, 1981

He'd gone there to save her.

Potter was already dead—he could see his half-collapsed form even from here, and Lily… Icy eyes narrowed, lips thinning into a slit. Lily was most likely dead as well. The Dark Lord would never permit her to live, of course, so he didn't know what he was expecting. He'd begged, begged, for a chance to get her away, to let her live. And he'd failed. They'd met and he had been nothing but civil, nothing but a worried friend, nothing but someone who cared, she'd still refused; couldn't leave her husband and son, she had said, how could he expect her to give up everything in order to be with him?

It was ridiculous—he didn't ask her to be with him. Never once had he thought about it after Voldemort had announced his intentions. Never once had he even dreamed that she would think that was what he was requesting.

It'd been for her. Everything had been for her.

Now she was dead—both Lily and her son.

The man's jaw tightened. He didn't mourn the death of James Potter—no, he had it coming. He should have listened, should have known not to trust Pettigrew—after all, hadn't he known him for years? Known what a coward the sniveling rat was? Severus hadn't been privy to the inner workings of their group, but even he could have told anyone that Pettigrew was as loyal as a snake—and not a Slytherin one.

But Lily…Lily hadn't deserved to die. Her son, perhaps, for bringing the entire ordeal upon her, but she most certainly didn't deserve to be struck down by an Unforgiveable for no reason other then she gave birth to the child of a blasted prophecy.

Blinking once, the hooded man squared his shoulders and strode past the gate, acting as if he didn't notice the conspicuous lack of wards against his skin as he passed. The door was ajar, and his steps fell heavy on the floorboards of the Potter household, their lack of creaking belying the amount of magic that had flowed over them only hours before.

A tall form was slumped lifelessly against a window, untamable black hair pressed against the glass and dark eyes glazed over.

Potter.

Despite his misgivings towards the corpse, the wizard paused in his quest, staring down at him blankly. Potter's glasses had fallen from his face and were probably somewhere on the floor, he supposed, seeing how they weren't anywhere on him. He'd thought that maybe seeing the man's body, seeing him dead would bring some sort of peace, some satisfaction for years of cruelty...

He felt nothing.

Potter had been a pure-blood, and a simple pure-blood at that—boorish and cruel, Severus'd never understood what Lily had seen in him. However, boorish and cruel as he was, the man had never used his blood status against him. Oh, he'd called Severus names. Awful, horrid names that still had him waking from childish nightmares filled with them—but never once had he said anything about his blood.

The wizard's lips curved in a rare smile—it was far from a pleasant one; bitterness and hatred had turned it to a grimace, and despite his young years, there were thin frown lines beginning to show on his face. Somehow, that fact made the torment all the more terrifying. Knowing that it hadn't been because of his blood, because of his parentage. It was because he was himself. Quite honestly, with that sort of cruelty that had transcended the easy excuse of childhood, he was surprised the man hadn't opposed the Order with his every breath. After all, wasn't that what Dumbledore stood against with every moral fiber of his being? The strong harassing the weak?

Severus shook himself, aimed one last glance at James Potter's limp body, and continued on. There was no use reminiscing. Potter wasn't worth the time, and he was running out of just that. He had to locate Lily's body and move it somewhere else, give it a proper burial—

A cry broke through the smothering silence, shattering whatever thoughts had been forming in the man's head.

Dark eyes widened, and then narrowed within the same heartbeat. If the circumstances hadn't been otherwise, he would've gone as so far as to snort. Impossible. It was easy for him to dismiss the sound as the wind, or perhaps the house moaning around him, the magic of the wards that had fallen still screaming out in betrayal.

However, when the cry repeated itself, this time louder and far more human, the man found himself moving towards the staircase anyway, his heart suddenly in his throat and thoughts empty and unsure, wary of the possibility given to him in that cry. Quickly scaling the steps, all but leaping over the wooden boards that had collapsed in an effort to move towards the source of the crying, he ripped his cloak free from where it had snagged on a piece of wood jutting out from the wall.

The cry sounded again.

The man didn't bother trying to open the wreckage of splinters that remained of the door, simply banishing the damned thing instead before barreling inside, wand drawn. His eyes flickered around the room with a sense of panic.

The sprawl of red hair against the floorboards was sickeningly easy to pick out from the rubble.

Severus leaned against the doorframe, its sullen creak falling upon deaf ears. He could barely see her from this angle, most of her body hidden by the crib and rocking chair that lay between them, but he could see enough, could see the paleness to her skin, the milky veil that had descended over her eyes, the—

"Lily."

Lily was…dead? Dead. He had suspected as much, but to actually see...to actually see her laying here... There was no hope now. He dropped to his knees almost reverently, pale hands trembling as they clutched her to his chest, and a dark head bowed, body curling over her. Whatever sound he made earlier, it would not repeat itself—when he opened his mouth, the only thing that emerged was a low gasp that sounded dry and brittle, even to his own ears.

"Lily…Lily, no," Severus pleaded. His voice broke around his words. "It wasn't supposed to be like this, Lils—you were supposed to live, he promised, he told me that you would live—"

Excuses continued to pour uselessly out of him, most of them half-finished thoughts and promises, some of them apologies; apologies for being sorted into Slytherin; for not telling her about his father; for calling her that word, that stupid, horrible word. What else could he do? Maybe if he had been someone more like Potter, young and stupid but with options beyond joining the Dark Lord—maybe if he hadn't killed—if he hadn't overheard that damn prophecy—

If he hadn't been fool enough to trust Dumbledore and Voldemort, all their pretty words of 'truth' and 'honor' and 'righteousness'—

Cries that had been steadily escalating in volume speared through the numb veil that had been hanging over his thoughts, and his head jerked upwards so fast that he could hear his spinal chord crack. Slim fingers tightened in red hair.

No, it can't be. But wasn't it that very noise that had him come up here in the first place?

With a trembling press of his lips to her forehead, Severus gently set her back on the ground, shutting her eyelids with a brush of his fingertips. He shakily stood, mistrust of his ability to remain upright sending his hands grasping at the crib bars.

A tuft of dark hair. Green eyes. Tears. Harry Potter.

He took in the toddler in a manner that would be almost eager, if not for the spite that glinted in his eyes. The dark hair was James' for sure, yes, but the eyes, those eyes… His lips twisted up into something akin to a smile, expression bitter as long fingers reached towards the wailing boy, lifting him from his crib as if he were made of glass. He handled him awkwardly, the boy's fat limbs sticking out at angles and his head lolling against his chest as his thumb lightly pressed down on the scar on his forehead that sluggishly oozed blood, stemming it with a delicacy that belied the anger that shook him.

Besides the scratch, not one mark was on this...this abomination's body. How could he live? How could he continue to breath, while Lily had perished? The boy wasn't part of the deal, he knew—but he didn't care. There could always be another brat made, another husband found—but Lily?

There would only ever be one Lily.

Flint bore into jade, and Severus realized how easy, how damnably easy, it would be to wring the life from the brat. His neck could be snapped in an instant, his heart stopped in less time than that; a single thought, and the child would die. So why did the Dark Lord fail and Lily die instead of Potter's brat?

Teeth bared in desperate snarl, Severus whisked his wand from his sleeve, the tip of it nudging into the soft, pudgy skin beneath the boy's chin. One curse. He wouldn't even need to speak. He could accomplish what the Dark Lord hadn't, and then—and then—

And then what?

Harry let out a gurgle, tears still drying on his cheeks as chubby hands went grasping at the long strands of the wizard's hair. Severus simply stared at him, the ache going unnoticed. The boy was the reason Lily was dead, if he would've just let the Dark Lord kill him instead of making Lily get in the way—!

But neither his lips nor his mind would form the curse, and he was instead left locked onto eyes that he knew too well. Those blasted eyes. Those damned, bloody, green eyes: Lily's eyes. Severus felt rage surge back into him; how dare he? Hadn't he taken enough away from her? Her life, her future...and yet...and yet!

His wand quavered, and Severus could only feel betrayed by his own body as his hands numbly lowered the tip towards the ground.

He couldn't kill him. He, Severus Snape, couldn't kill a mere child. He had killed Aurors and wizards and witches and Muggles so caught in their own glory they didn't recognize the power of the Dark Lord; was he now so weak that he couldn't kill a child who held no more power than a squib?

The boy let out another coo, giving a gummy grin as the man tried to summon up another burst of anger, only for it to fall horribly short and a sort of vile, loathsome emotion rise in its place, bringing an acrid taste to his mouth and a stone to his stomach: shame.

He should have been more persistent. A warning wasn't enough; wasn't enough for people as stubborn and wild as she was. He should've made Lily listen, made her pay attention, made her...

If only he had been less weak.

"Hey, Snivellus—even if you are a slimy, greasy git, isn't this going a bit far?" Black shakes his mangy head in disgust. His robes are dark, wet. Severus doesn't know with what.

If only he could bring the Dark Lord back. Surely he'd be able to—

Potter grins toothily at Lily as Severus finds himself being flung into the lake, robes drenched and hair hanging in a wet curtain around his face. "Oi, Evans! You wanna go get some butterbeer now?"

If only this boy had died at birth—

Severus' wand points threateningly at Lupin's face, the curse he had created falling all too easily from his lips and the werewolf collapses with a wet, shuddering breath onto the forest floor. "Septumscrumptia."

If only—

A scrawny body curls over in a bow at the Dark Lord's feet, mousy hair falling in straggles around his ears. "The Potters have made me their secret keeper, My Lord." A laugh slithers out from the darkness, and Severus can only feel horrified as he realizes what it means and Disapperates on the spot, the Dark Lord missing his absence in his joy.

Why hadn't she just listened?

Red hair is fire among the soft, glowing embers of the kitchen lights, fists curled on the table top, voice quiet but trembling with rage; "How could you, Sev? I only let you in because of what you said, but can all you do is lie?" The chairs rattle as she shoves herself away, standing and aiming her wand at Severus' face with a cold mercilessness that he's never seen on her soft features. "Get the hell out of my house, and never come back!"

But was it really his fault?

Hadn't he tried his best to warn her, risking his own life, playing as Dumbledore's dog in order to protect her? Everything, everything, he had given up, and yet she had just spat in his face at the help he offered! Potter and Dumbledore and Black and Lupin—all of them had been fools. They didn't see the signs; they didn't try hard enough to protect something truly valuable. If anything, Lily was the victim to their foolishness. And her son...

Severus' features twisted in an ugly snarl, but he still held the child in one arm, his hands trembling and white at the knuckles where his fingers curled viciously around his wand. Her accursed son was all that remained of Lily, of Lily's face and Lily's eyes and Lily's smile and Lily's everything.

He couldn't kill him. Oh, but how he wanted to. How he wanted to see pure terror creep into those eyes, the same terror that Lily had probably felt upon seeing the Dark Lord and the terror that the boy was responsible for making her feel. But he was all that remained of Lily.

Swallowing something in his throat—Severus suspected it was a bezoar, despite the fact it probably wasn't—he gave a shaky exhale, running a trembling finger over the boy's face with such delicacy it was no more than a butterfly's wing brush against his skin.

He was suddenly, and inexplicably, aware of Lily's body behind him, sightless eyes burning holes into his back.

"Goddammit, Lily. Goddammit." His voice broke around his words, anger fracturing and falling to the floor like a broken windowpane.

He couldn't leave her here.

Couldn't leave either one of them.

Dumbledore would no doubt listen to the prophecy, and manipulate the boy just as he had him: through guilt, guilt that Lily had died to protect him, guilt that he was the only one able to oppose the Dark Lord. Guilt of what would happen if he didn't oppose him.

Lily. Lily, Lily, Lily.

Bitter rage swept through him with surprising suddenness at the thought of the old wizard, and no matter what fate befell him, he was sure, in that moment, that he'd rather Voldemort get his hands on the boy rather than Albus Dumbledore.

No child, regardless of who they were, deserved to live a life of a human weapon. As a hero, expected to fight a battle that was never his—the Chosen One, how ridiculous. Dumbledore had failed to hide his weary satisfaction when he had first heard the prophecy, eyes glinting with something like desperate hope even as he turned towards the Potters, grim-faced, to tell them of their son's fate.

Of someone whose future was decided before he could even talk.

Staring into green, Severus closed his eyes for a long moment. "Damn you, Potter." What use were all your words of protection if you couldn't even save the life of your wife and son?

What use were my warnings?

What use was your sacrifice?

Oh, he hated James Potter. He hated him from the moment he had grinned winningly at Lily, and then immediately proceeded to insult him to his face. He hated him for every jeer, every snicker, every damning sneer that had Severus avoiding him in the halls.

He hated him for following him to the Shrieking Shack.

He hated him for saving his life.

But the one thing that loomed over the rest, dark and forbidding, was the fact that he had been the first to fall, the first one to charge at the Dark Lord when he entered his house, stupidly dying before him instead of escaping with Lily.

Severus hated him for his heroism.

Feeling as if the world had spun sickeningly on its axis, he turned around shakily, arms trembling where he held Harry; the brat gurgled at him, happy and wholesome in a way that had onyx looking blankly down in response, still unable to formulate a proper response. He could only numbly stare, the weight of him against his chest suddenly feeling far more heavy than it had before.

Then he caught sight of the horribly familiar wand besides Lily's body, and bile rose in his throat like acid. It burned as he swallowed. Blankness turned to horror, and then to a steadily rising, roaring fear.

The Dark Lord's wand.

The pale wood was hidden by the shadows cast by the room, but it lurked there nonetheless. Smooth. Powerful. Deadly.

Abandon.

Why would he leave his wand here? No matter how cruel his mockery, the Dark Lord was no fool. No wizard willingly left his only tool to conduct magic alone. Not even Dark Lords.

Had something happened?

Where was the Dark Lord?

Where is Voldemort?

Harry had fallen silent in his grasp, as if in silent agreement of the sudden barrage mounting in Severus' head. His breath was shaky as he exhaled, choking him with its sharpness.

What was going on?

The Dark Lord would have never fled, never dared to let a target, let alone a small boy, live. Never would have left his wand, never left without telling someone or sending Nagini to them, never left without giving them orders—

Fear and confusion had adrenaline coursing through him with each jerk of his heart, so when a sharp crack echoed through the night—had someone found him?—the drop to the floor and the sudden reaching for the Dark Lord's wand with one hand while the other held Lily's son—Voldemort will come back and he'll need his wand—was completely out of desperate reflex.

A heartbeat later, he Disapparated from Godric's Hollow, just in time to hear footsteps sounding beneath them and the whimpers of a crying child. Then they were gone.

『• • •』

Two figures landed in the harsh cradle of Spinner's End's cold and dreary study, the air splitting around them with a violent crack. The dark-haired man was crouched, staring blankly at the spot where a woman's body should be, a boy and a wand that were neither his in hand.

He had forgotten Lily.

Seemingly heeding the cue of the loss of his mother's body, the small child began to stir and wailed loudly, green eyes shimmering with tears. The cries echoed oddly in the cramped room, bouncing off the walls that were stuffed ceiling high with tomes and scrolls, yellowed parchment leaning precariously out from their bindings as if to peer out at the strangers who had just appeared.

Severus hushed him none-too-gently; instead his words of attempted soothing were cracked by panic, and emerged more of a strangled hiss then the coo of a concerned adult. Which, was to say, Severus was not at the moment. A concerned adult, that is. At least, not the type of concerned adult that any sane man or woman would want looking down at their child with frenzied, wild eyes.

Oddly enough, the sound earned him a quieter wail, which then dissolved into hiccups and half-hearted spit-bubbles. Severus decided, after staring at him for several moments, to let it be.

His focus blurred, turning the small boy into nothing more than a smudged image in his hands. Hands, he noticed, curiously detached, that were shaking. How queer. Why would they be shaking? Of course, his vision then went and had the audacity of covering itself in spots of darkness, cleverly obstructing much of the already dim view.

Slightly amused, he wondered if this is perhaps why people like James Potter needed glasses.

Didn't help him enough to stop him from getting killed by the Dark Lord, though. The thought was sudden, and then Severus found himself on the edge of hysteric, hollow laughter, the sound clashing oddly with the shallow breaths that were doing nothing to successfully give him oxygen. Blasted thing, what use was a body if it didn't work?

It took him a long moment of mental silence and empty eyes, despite the twisted expression on his face and the violent shuddering of his body, to figure out what was going on.

He was panicking.

Lily and James Potter were dead, Voldemort had vanished, Harry Potter was currently drooling on the only clean robe he had left and Severus was panicking.

How droll.

A deep inhale. Dark eyes blinked. Another scratchy breath, clawed down into his lungs. A steadily focusing glare aimed at the carpet beneath his knees. He'd always had a particular...weakness when it came to reacting to certain situations. If not anger it was...this. His lips twitched into a sneer. This. His body went had contented itself with throwing a tantrum befitting of a mandrake, while leaving his mind alone and free to pick up the remainder of his thoughts.

Really, it was irritating. And the disgust towards such a reaction was on a deeper, more fundamental level that would have sent Dumbledore into a hand-clapping, eye-twinkling tizzy simply out of acknowledgment that he had other weaknesses besides Lily Potter.

The dark-haired man gathered himself somewhat abruptly and made to stand, balance tilting dangerously as he stumbled over to the study's double doors, opening them with a surge of magic rather than any physical force. Slowly, he trudged down the hall and began up the stairs—however, at some point his knees failed him; leaning heavily on the weary banister, which couldn't summon up much more then a groan at the sudden action, he scowled.

His shoulders drooped and with a tired croak, he summoned the house elf. "Remy."

The pale-blue elf popped into existence next to him, watery green eyes as large as moons in his frail face. "Yes? What can Remy be doing for Master Severus, sir?" His voice was high and thin, wavering about in a manner that Severus typically find rather irritating, and would have reprimanded him for speaking so shrilly if not for the fact that he scantly trusted himself to speak at the moment without tumbling over his own words.

Not bothering to explain himself, he shoved Lily's son rather unceremoniously at the small creature. The pale frail arms wrapped around the comparatively thicker ones of the boy, and then tightened in preparation to Disapparate when Severus next spoke, "Put him to bed. Anywhere. I don't care. Just—" his voice faltered, and the man cursed himself for his weakness before continuing, "just not in the master bedroom. Understood?"

"Remy be listening to Master Severus, sir," the house elf informed him cheerfully. "Remy understands, sir. Remy will not put boy in master bedroom. Remy will be putting boy in Master Severus' room!"

Before Severus could correct him, Remy had disappeared with a similar pop as to when he arrived, and dark eyes stared at the spot he vacated before slumping against the wall. This time, both the wall and the stair protested at him, and he violently wondered why the damn house hadn't been torn down and rebuilt. Certainly looked as if it were to collapse at any moment. Burning it down would only hasten the inevitable.

While entertaining the idea of casting a Fiendfyre and allowing it to consume the house in its entirety, his steps had slowly slipped their way back down the staircase, each one slow and heavy. The Dark Lord's wand was held in limp fingers, in danger of falling from his grasp entirely.

Crack.

Severus' unfeeling fingers instinctively tightened around the wand at the sudden noise. The study? Placing the wand almost brusquely within his robe, his own wand was immediately in hand, and he threw open the doors. His cloak was fluttering around him from the sudden rush of air that the action brought, and his eyes were hard, pitiless rocks in his face as he stalked into the only place he liked in the entire damn house, only to come up rather short.

"You..." he hissed.

The only woman among the group of four that had suddenly Apparated into his study cackled at him, red lips spread wide. "Aw, is poor ickle Sevwy angwy?" Bellatrix Lestrange's coos ground wretchedly upon his eardrums, and Severus found a sneer easily being pulled onto his lips despite his feverish state of mind.

"Bella, I'm afraid I quite do not fully appreciate being talked to like a child." His scathing tone earned him a disappointed moue from the other Death Eater, as well a deep chuckle from the man that loomed behind her.

He eyed Rudolphus Lestrange with thinly veiled wariness, taking several moments to gather himself before shifting his focus to Rabastan, who stood behind him. The two brothers being in each other's company wasn't unnatural as it was unexpected, but it was the sight of Bartemius Crouch Junior lurking just off to the side that had him bemused. What purpose did these four have with him? He had a sort of uneasy truce of...something, with them, something less than friendship but sturdier than the simply solidarity, but that was no reason for the sudden visit.

The longer he silently stared at the group, the more panic and confusion prickled at him, and the further his face smoothened, leaving nothing behind besides a mask in its place. While Bellatrix was currently leering at him, the two brothers behind her looked somewhat unruffled, although Rudolphus had the look of a man who was about to release the tension coiled in his shoulders on the next person to cross him.

Barty was an entirely different story; the man looked as if he had gone several nights without sleep, dark bruises lurking under his eyelids, and there was a nervous aspect to the manner at which he looked about the room that Severus could rather relate to at the moment.

Sitting down in the armchair to his left, Severus assumed a somewhat dismissive expression as he spoke. "What do you want?"

The grin fell from Bellatrix's lips shockingly fast. For a heart-stopping moment, he thought it was because he had angered her—which did nothing to assuage the panic bubbling beneath his skin like a potion long over-brewed—before realizing that she had lapsed into an uncharacteristic silence, expression looking torn somewhere between fury and hurt.

Rudolphus spoke from her shoulder, looming over her with a broad build that couldn't be disguised by the obviously hastily donned cloak, "We're here to ask...questions."

As if that statement wasn't vague enough, Severus inwardly sneered. Questions. That could range from your friendly-variety inquiry or demands accompanied by a snarl and a threat to sic their Lord's rage upon him.

It was only when he stepped out from behind Bellatrix did the mask in his hand glint; Severus could only wonder how utterly thick they had to be to come here, in the Muggle World where he was hiding, garbed in Death Eater uniforms.

He leveled a scowl at him, but the other man only gave him a grim smile in return, a muscle jumping in the sharp curve of his cheek.

"Questions?" Severus drawled, still managing to sound bored, although there was a twitch to his brow and tightness to his lips that bespoke of his annoyance. "How cute. I don't suppose you might ask those questions?"

The elder Lestrange brother let out an odd combination of a growl and a grumble, temper flashing across his face before being replaced with the countenance of someone straining to not hex everyone in the room. It was an emotion Severus was very well acquainted with, but he couldn't say that the sight of it on Rudolphus was something that soothed him.

"Cute," Rudolphus shot back, mocking the word Severus had aimed at him moments before. "However, Snape, we're not here to verbally spar. As much as I'd love to more time in your lovely Muggle dunghill," the word was sneered, and the dark-haired man simply leveled a cool stare at him, unable to find it within himself to disagree, "we have things to do. People to kill. A Dark Lord to find."

Fear flickered briefly in his eyes before he managed to drown it, his lips drawing into a thinner line then they had been before. He refused to let his mind wander to the boy upstairs, or the wand burning in his pocket.

When he remained silent, Rudolphus's face twisted into an ugly snarl, marring the skin creased in smile lines and the usually mischievous amber of his gaze looking deadly. "You know, don't you? We can't find him, but you know, and I swear—!"

The roar was suddenly cut off by the rather threateningly saccharine, "Hubby dearie," of his wife, while Rabastan eyed them both warily, his gaze then flickering to Severus' in a manner that could be described as apologetic.

Severus offered him a tilt of his head in return, and something like a smile ghosted across Rabastan's lips before he turned around to Barty. Severus felt a pang of loss when he realized that he had just lost the focus of the only other sane person in the room, and begrudgingly turned his attention back to Bellatrix.

Immediately, he sneered, ignoring the sudden flutter in his chest. "Bellatrix, the Dark Lord doesn't take the Inner Circle murdering one another very lightly," he murmured, mirroring her pointed wand with a steadily aimed hold on his own.

Smiling at him once more, although her eyes glinted darker than Severus' ever could, Bellatrix purred, "Oh, come now, Snape. Be a good little Death Eater and tell us where our Lord is. But really," the teeth flashed in her grin were far more predatory and blood-thirsty then he liked, "I hope you don't tell us. I'm rather bored, you see—I've got a thirst for the blood of a traitor."

"I don't know where he is now," came the immediate denial, and Bellatrix cackled with joy and parted her lips to curse him, Rudolphus louring behind her, but Severus raised his hand slightly in a sign of acquiescence. She bared her teeth at him. "The last I was aware, he was going off to…take care of the Potters."

"Potters?" the dark witch rolled around the name in her mouth. Recognition flashed in her eyes, and dark curls fell across her face as she let out a bark of laughter. "Ha! Oh, you mean that mudblood bitch that you begged the Dark Lord for?" Bellatrix's grin morphed to a snarl, all blood-red lips and crowded teeth, and suddenly Severus found himself fighting to remain seated as the woman stalked forward out of the group. "How dare you," she shrieked, "waste our Lord's time! Any favor, and you ask for the life of a Mudblood?"

Severus snarled, anger and irritation crashing over him in a sudden, black wave, "I will curse you—"

"I dare you to try, you fucking blood traitor—" Rudolphus roared.

"Oh please, Sevwy, like you even could—"

"Stop acting like children, all of you!" The sharp, cold edge of Rabastan's irritation cut through the suddenly heavy atmosphere. Magic still crackling around each of them and both of the aggressors bristling from their dark hair down to their leader-clad toe, no one made a move—including one to back away.

Pinching the bridge of his nose, looking as if his patience was being tried far past its breaking point, bright blue turned stare at him. There was nothing remotely kind in that look, the pale iciness devoid of anything close to compassion, but it was far more preferable then Bellatrix's unhinged, wild anger, or Rudolphus's merciless rage. The Potions Master thinned his lips and slowly slid his gaze to focus on the younger Lestrange brother, although his wand still remained pointed at the husband and wife before him.

Rabastan looked as if he were about to comment, before apparently thinking better of it and simply sighing. "Severus, please."

Usually, Severus would be more disbelieving towards a Death Eater using such a luxurious, hollow word such as 'please', but Rabastan Lestrange was nothing if not polite. Rudolphus on the other hand…it was appalling the man was a pure-blood at all. Or perhaps it was the fact that his temperament was that of a wild, savage animal. Let it not be said that he lacked pride—far from it, and he could play the part of a noble wizard when needed. But there was a certain aspect to him that Severus found disturbing similar to that of Sirius Black; the barking laughter, the mischievous eyes, the tendency to be ruthless to those they deemed beneath them—if not separated by house and politics, it wasn't hard to believe that Sirius Black and Rudolphus Lestrange might have been friends.

Rabastan steadily watched him, dark hair messily framing the pale ice of his gaze, as Severus glowered back. Rabastan let out another sigh, looking for all the world as if he were a parent dealing with a petulant child, and ran a hand over his jaw. "If you know anything," he began, "about where the Dark Lord is...please." Even with the added plea, his voice was still nearly flat and monotonous; it unfailingly raised the hair on the back of his neck, and yet Severus didn't move.

Pale skin and dark robes seemed to have transfigured to marble, a sudden flaring of his nostrils and a blink the only sign that any life was still clinging to him within. "I haven't the faintest. He's gone." The words left his lips in a succinct rasp, mouth gone dry despite his best efforts. "I went to the Potters—all of them are dead." Dead. The word felt hollow as he said it, and he nearly faltered, feeling as if his throat was about to close. Still, the threat on his life outweighed whatever panic he was about to throw himself into, and the man persevered in his speech. "However, there is the possibility the Dark Lord went to the Longbottoms. They're messy loose ends—and our Lord is clever enough wizard."

Seeming to be appeased with his apparent cooperation, Bellatrix's focus shifted as she swung around to stare at Rabastan, waving her wand about haphazardly. "Longbottoms! Off to see the ickle Longbottoms now, we are! Frank and that silly girl Alice—don't you remember them, love?"

It was then that Severus felt the slightest twang of regret, seeing the suddenly joyous expression on her face.

Rudolphus blinked and then gave a feral grin, anger bleeding away to something far more dangerous. "Lucky we have someone else to hunt now, Snape, or I'd be—well." Here, the large man let out a loud laugh, teeth glinting under the dim lighting. "Better if I didn't upset that delicate stomach of yours, aye?"

Resisting the urge to sneer at him, and ignoring the prickling of the skin on his neck and the sweat suddenly beading at the small of his back, Severus simply stared flatly at the space somewhere between Rudolphus, Rabastan and Bellatrix. It was with a small jolt that he then realized he was staring at Barty, but the other man did nothing but give him a slow blink, the smile that crossed his lips fleeting and out of character for one that usually smirked at anything and everything.

"Well, thank you, Severus. Now, we have a family to interrogate and a Lord to find so...good evening." This time, it was Rabastan that spoke, and Severus allowed his gaze to shift hollowly back onto his face. His stomach burned with acid, guiltily eating away as the impact of what he had just said slowly began to become clear. He wasn't any better then Pettigrew. Alice and Frank Longbottom had never committed a crime against him, had never done him any wrongs—so why? Why had he spoken their name, out of all the others he wished dead?

Crack.

Ah… they also have a son, don't they, thought Severus suddenly, and the churning in his stomach stopped, but only because that it had moved into his throat and mouth, bile threatening to surface. So, it was with a pale face and drawn features, black eyes looking oddly unfocused, did the dark-haired man speak: "Good evening."

But it was a moment too late, and by the time that he had, he was the only one left in the study, his words falling on the deaf ears of the yellowing parchment around him.

A/N: And there you go folks, the first chapter. Generic Severitus beginning (well, this or him stealing Harry away from the Dursleys is the usual go-to), but I assure you this will not be Severitus. I will stress that a lot-and it'll become more apparent in later chapters why it's not Severitus.

Also, no, it's not going to be a Snarry pairing either. I mean, until far later in the chapters, there won't even be a romantic interest. So all you wary souls, fear not!