What It Cost Him
Author's note: This was written for the Hunger Games Competition, Round Two with the Prompts- Word: Impossible, Emotion: Anger, Character: Neville Longbottom, Genre: Angst, Weapon: Whip
Severus survived the war. He had paid his debts in that final battle at Hogwarts, when it had almost cost him his life, and he began to build a life with someone new. He said once that he loved her because, when she looked at him, she never saw a deatheater or an order member. She saw a man. Just him. Exactly as he was, and she loved him. For a while it seemed as though he was free. That he could move on and let his past die with the other victims of the war. For a while. Until the ones who escaped found him again. Until their lust for vengeance ripped his mind to shreds and stole away everything he held dear.
They say that one night, after curfew, when everyone else was asleep, he wrote her name on his wall using glow in the dark stars. They say he stood back and stared and breathed. They found him like that the next morning, standing in the middle of his room. Still staring. Still breathing. The light from the stars fading in the light of the sun. There were so very many indications that he remembered her. That he knew what she had been to him. For him. His companion in the dark. His advocate in the storm of hate and resentment that always seemed to follow him. Haunt him. His lover in the light of their wedding day. All the mediwitches said it was impossible, but he still knew her. You could see it in his eyes. Feel it in his words. In his anger. In his loneliness. They say you could see the pain of losing her cut through him like a knife…but no matter how many times she came to see him…no matter how many times she visited, he could not recognize her for who she was. It was as though the cruciatus curse had blinded him to everything that was familiar. Everything he loved. He was lost in plain sight, and he could not find his way home.
The night he broke out of St. Mungo's would be[Mh1] on the cover of every newspaper by the next morning. He knocked out the mediwitch who was looking after him that night. When questioned later, she claimed he attacked her while her back was turned. She said he kept saying the same words over and over again. "They took her. They took her. They took her." He left her lying on the floor of his room. Some say he went mad in his grief. One said he was faking it for the attention. Another said he faked it to escape punishment after the war, and that the mediwitch had been helping him. It was a conspiracy. No one knows for sure, though, what drove him into that rage. No one knows why he chose them. No one except for him. Only the trail of blood he left in his wake was clear.
Amycus Carrow was his first victim. Even with Severus's instability, even without a wand, Severus had been too fast for him. Amycus Carrow was found dead in his front yard with an Axe embedded in his chest. The second victim was Amycus's sister, Alecto. She had never stood a chance against him. Alecto was pulled from her sleep in the middle of the night. He slit her throat with a kitchen knife. The papers claimed these two victims were understandable. They had tormented children in his care while he had been Headmaster at Hogwarts. The papers called him a vigilante, and screamed justice had been served. Then there was a third victim, and this one made the wizarding world tremble with fear in their homes.
Neville Longbottom had only inherited his grandmother's home a week before the incident. Before that, he had been travelling abroad with Luna Lovegood. He was home to pack away his grandmother's things before selling the house. The night before he was to leave the country again, the professor who had once been his worst fear slipped into his room and woke him from his sleep. He woke from his sleep to a nightmare, staring him in the eyes.
"Tell me where she is!" Severus demanded.
"W-Where who is?" Neville stuttered. The shock of seeing Severus Snape standing in the middle of his grandmother's old house paled in comparison to the terror he felt at the way he was yelling at him.
"You know who! Give her back to me!" Severus raged at him, snatching Neville's grandmother's old riding whip from out of a nearby box. "Give her back!"
"I- I don't know who you're talking about, P-professor Snape." Neville answered swallowing hard. He eyed the riding whip with horror in his eyes and glanced at the night stand where he usually kept his wand, but it wasn't there.
Severus took one menacing step closer. "Give her back."
Neville's screams woke the neighbors. Only minutes later, Severus was spotted fleeing the house with fresh blood on his robes. Aurors found Neville lying unconscious in the middle of his bedroom, beaten and bruised. Barely breathing. Severus had been long gone by then, and the wizarding world was shaken. Neville Longbottom was no deatheater. This was not the retribution of a vigilante, and if members of the Order of the Phoenix could be attacked in their homes, no one was safe.
Severus stumbled down the street, anger and desperation still boiling inside of him, even though the adrenaline rush they had given him had faded when Longbottom had fallen unconscious. The boy had faced Severus's wrath rather than tell him where he had hidden her. They all had. Severus didn't know how far he had gone or how much time had passed. He was oblivious to the blood staining his robes and drying on his hands. He kept going, pushing himself forward lifelessly. He wished he were dead. It should have been him. They should have taken him. Not her. He had been the one to betray the Dark Lord. She was innocent.
Severus's foot caught on a large stone. He stumbled and fell, and only then did he realize where he was. He had wondered into a cemetery without realizing it. His wife's name was carved into the stone in front of him. His eyes stung. His vision blurred as he reached out a hand to touch the cold letters of her first name, smearing blood on the stone. "No…please..." Severus's hand fell to the ground and he curled into himself. "Please…please, no…." Darkness tugged at his vision and his eyes closed.
He woke just before dawn to the sound of urgent voices wafting through the cemetery and a woman's high-pitched laughter. Bellatrix sat on top of his wife's headstone, her mess of dark hair floating around her shoulders as her eyes mocked him. "It's not her grave, Severus. Did you really believe I would make it so easy as to give you a place to mourn for her? This is what it cost you to betray the Dark Lord. You're getting what you deserve. You fell asleep on a stranger's grave, and now they've found you. You will never find her." Bellatrix laughed as aurors surrounded him.
"No!" Severus snarled. He didn't understand why they were arresting him when Bellatrix was sitting so close. Just out of his reach. "No! She took her! Ask her where she took her!"
"Just calm down, Severus. We're here to help you. Who took who?" One of the aurors asked, trying to ease his mind.
"She did!" Severus pointed at Bellatrix. Bellatrix only laughed. "Bellatrix Lestrange. She took my wife! Arrest her!"
The auror's eyes widened in surprise. They all looked at the stone, but none of them moved. "She couldn't have, Severus. Bellatrix Lestrange is dead, and that's not even her grave. Your wife is safe. She's waiting to see you."
"She's not dead! She's right there!" Severus snapped angrily.
The auror looked again, but took a step closer to Severus. "There's no one there, Severus. There is no one in this entire cemetery except for you and us. We made sure of it. We cleared the area. Bellatrix Lestrange was killed five years ago, in the Battle of Hogwarts."
Bellatrix leaned towards Severus and smiled gleefully, "They can't see me, Severus. They'll never see me. Just like you'll never see your wife again."
Severus lunged at her, just as a bolt of red light hit him squarely in the back. He fell to the ground as the darkness closed in on him.
"How is he?" The woman asked, standing up as soon as the mediwitch entered the room.
The woman's dark hair looked as though it hadn't been brushed in days and her violet eyes were red and wet from tears. The mediwitch didn't want to speak with her, but she had been the one who had messed up and let the woman's husband escape hospital. The others thought it only appropriate that she answer for her mistake by being the one to break the bad news.
"Mrs. Snape," The mediwitch said meekly, "I'm sorry. Although he is coherent, there are no improvements in his mental state. He claims to see people no one else can see. He says they kidnapped you. I'm afraid he was the one who committed the murders of the Carrows and attacked Mr. Longbottom."
The woman shook her head in disbelief, tears falling from her eyes again. "He wouldn't have done it. He would never…"
"Not even if he thought they had hurt you?" The mediwitch pointed out.
"Then I should see him." The woman said, pleading desperately. The aurors had ordered no visitors for her husband. "When can I see him?"
"I don't think that's a good idea, Miss. He's no more likely to recognize you now than he was before. He's getting worse, not better." The mediwitch objected.
"Let me see my husband." The woman snapped at her firmly. This time her voice was not pleading, but a sharp demand.
The mediwitch flinched, he eyes widening. "Ok," She replied, taking a step back from the woman, "Just let me ask the aurors first."
Mrs. Snape watched as the mediwitch scurried back to her husband's room and began whispering to the auror stationed in front of the door. The auror looked up at her with pity in his eyes, but Mrs. Snape didn't care. She just wanted to see him. After a moment, the auror nodded, and the mediwitch returned. "You can see him now, but only for a moment, and you're not to approach him. He's violent, Miss."
"He would never hurt me." Mrs. Snape answered firmly. The mediwitch looked doubtful, but led her to the room anyways.
Mrs. Snape stopped just inside the doorway, as she was instructed, and pressed her fingers to her mouth. "Severus!"
He was sitting up on the edge of his bed, staring hard at the floor. His eyes flashed up at her at the sound of his name. For a moment, the movement sparked a hope within her that he might recognize her, but the anger in his eyes quickly extinguished it.
"Do you want to know who has your wife, Severus?" Bellatrix whispered behind him, moving her lips close to his ear.
Severus tensed, but didn't respond.
"Its her. My old friend." Bellatrix smiled, "Why else would she come so often to see you in your misery? She enjoys it, just as Amycus and Alecto and Neville enjoyed tormenting your dear lover. Only she knows where your wife is now. She is the only one who knows."
Severus's eyes darkened as his visitor took a step closer to him.
"Severus, its me." The woman said pleadingly.
"You see," Bellatrix whispered, "Its her. She knows."
"Where is she?" Severus snarled, standing up from the bed.
"Where is who?" Mrs. Snape asked. She started to take a step closer, but the mediwitch grabbed her arm, reminding her to keep her distance.
"Where is my wife?" Severus demanded.
"Severus, I'm right here. I'm here." She objected.
"Give her back to me!" Severus yelled, lunging towards her just as the auror grabbed her and pulled her out of the room. The mediwitch snapped the door shut behind them just before Severus reached it and began pounding on it. "Give her back to me! Tell me where she it!"
"No!" Mrs. Snape objected, trying to get back to the door, "No! Let me see him, just for a little bit longer. Let me see my husband!"
It took two mediwitches to pull her away from the door into another room, this one empty and quiet. "Calm down, Miss. It's for your own good." The first mediwitch objected. "He was going to hurt you."
"He wouldn't hurt me!" She cried, tears forming in her eyes again. "He would never hurt me! He's going to get better. He's going to get well again and he's going to come home." She turned away from them, pressing the palms of her hands against her eyes.
"It's impossible," The second mediwitch answered firmly. "It's time to face the facts, Mrs. Snape. There is no cure for the cruciatus curse."