The Loss of Ours: Chapter 1
By Polexia Aphrodite
Rating: T
Summary: Hogwarts and how it all began.
1974:
Louisa Rosier had seen Severus before, but never really looked at him until the start of her third year.
She knew that he was friends with her brother, but Evan had made a concentrated effort to ignore her since the middle of his second year (her first) and she barely ever talked to him or any of the other fourth years. But she certainly knew them by reputation. Avery was the handsome, foppish one the girls in her dormitory whispered about; Rodolphus was the swarthy one that had asked Sylvia Poste to Hogsmeade the year before; Wilkes was the blond one whose wicked glares sent first years running; Regulus was the quiet, aristocratic third year that had somehow infiltrated their circle; and then there was Severus. Severus was the one who, rumor had it, had been nearly expelled for his violent hexes at least a dozen times. Together, they formed an impressive bunch. They were the epitome of danger, glamour, and mystery to the thirteen-year-old Louisa.
It was in that year that the fourth year group solidified, inspiring countless other Slytherins, Louisa among them, to long to join their furtive conversations in the back of the Common Room.
At that year's commencement speech, she had looked down the long Slytherin table and inexplicably met Severus' glance. He was tall, thin, unusual, and she had heartily agreed with her friends that he was the least attractive of the Slytherin fourth years. But, to Louisa, it wasn't just his appearance that made him unattractive. Even at her young age, she sensed something too dangerous, too dark, about him, and it made her shiver and look away quickly that night.
As the year progressed into winter, she found her gaze increasingly drawn to him, usually during meals or when she discovered him in the musty avenues of the school's ancient library. She never spoke to him, being too intimidated by his age and demeanor. She didn't like him (a fact of which she was certain, having never experienced the giddy, fluttering sensation that gazing at Regulus Black often inspired), but instead found herself observing him as though he were a scientific specimen. Years later, she would find journals from her school days with the occasional idly written comments about Severus' quick, anxious movements, blank stares, or the oddity of his remaining at Hogwarts over holiday breaks.
1975 :
Winter thawed into spring, and she came to notice that she always saw him with that girl. That red-haired Gryffindor girl. Something about her made Louisa's stomach clench.
It might have been because she was a mudblood, or because she was a Gryffindor, which, Evan was beginning to teach her, were almost equally bad. But there was something else. Something about the way Severus made that girl smile, the way their heads almost touched when they whispered together in the library, that made Louisa's eyes narrow and her chest burn.
It was a sensation that only increased as spring bled into the warmth of summer. In time, her discomfort became deeply felt suspicion. Louisa asked her brother why he associated with Severus if his blood was as bad as any other mudblood's. Evan had told her that Severus was valuable and that he had knowledge that was useful, though she couldn't have fully known what he meant then.
Evan had introduced her to Narcissa that autumn. She met Lucius. And Mulciber. It was the year that Evan stopped rolling up his sleeves.
1976:
Louisa hadn't been present on the bright, hot June afternoon when Severus had called the red-haired girl a mudblood. She wished she had been. She wanted to see the hurt on Lily Evans' face.
When school started again, Louisa in her fifth year, Evan in his sixth, Severus seemed more distant than ever. Some of Evan's friends started talking to her, asking what spells and hexes she knew, what she thought of mudbloods, but not Severus.
Severus Snape seemed angrier, darker, more vindictive than ever. He started teaching the other Slytherins new curses. He stopped rolling up his sleeves.