My Children

The moonlight of a night's Fall, passing through the half-closed windows, enlightened two sleeping figures on a soft double-bed, embracing tenderly each other. One of them was a man whose face, crossed obliquely by a faint scar, had sharp features far from being easy on the eye and a huge hooked nose. His expression was quiet although there was still a old trace of his bad habit of frowning, a wrinkle printed between his thick, dark eyebrows. He carried it from the times in which he was a double-agent, always attentive and full of worries.

Leaning on his shoulder, there was the head of a curly blonde haired woman. Her hair were falling randomly on the flat pale chest of his lover, and were gleaming under that soft light like gold strains in contrast with the ivory complexion of him. Her slow breathing showed a calm sleep, not filled by restless nightmare or dying persons she used to dream before the end of the war.

Now, though, with the man who had always loved by her side freed from the dark slavery imposed upon him since his youth and an orphan that made her feel the joys of being mother, the nightmares had vanished, driven away by that serenity they had built together as a family.

Still unaware, the forms of her body were already softening in order to welcome a new life in her womb, the fruit of their love bloomed slowly through the years, the highest expression of their union. During her sleep she hugged him more tightly, a faint smile dancing on her lips.


The Prince Manor fireplace burst into green flames for a moment and Severus, after a whole day spent at Hogwarts teaching Potions, came out brushing his ordinary black robes from the dusty silver-gray ashes.

He was puzzled Emily wasn't there as usual to welcome him with a quick kiss and the detailed report of her day. He first took a brief look around then went to search her upstairs. He found her up there, standing in front of the bedroom window which overlooked the red-brown colored gardens of Prince Manor, lost in her thoughts. Her long pearl-white silky nightgown which wrapped her body gracefully made her resemble more to an angel come down to the earth in order to save him from the jaws of death.

He stood still leaning to the doorframe in quiet contemplation of her image, wishing to imprint it in his memory. Emily slowly turned her head towards the door as if she was waiting for him and made a little gesture to made him come closer.

He closed the gap in between and Emily took his hand to place it on her womb, smiling. She was watching him closely, moved almost to tears as she was sure to expect a baby, theirs, in her body.

Certainly she didn't expect a reaction of that sort, a hand that bears away, an unreadable look, a backward step.

"Severus" she tried to call, not understanding what was happening. She was happy for being pregnant and she thought he would have been so, too. Was she wrong, perhaps?

"I cannot be father," she heard him answer bitterly "my hands are bloodstained, Emily. I'm able to dispense only death. What example could I ever give?"

"To Cecile you are like a father and she admires you," she answered, hurt by his cold attitude but understanding the roots of his reaction.

"I am not his real father, Emily," he answered dryly.

"So, you're telling me you don't love her like a daughter?" she asked, her voice trembling for the muffled sobs.

Early the same day she confirmed her long-suspected pregnancy and had looked forward for Severus' arrival to break out the happy news. Not only he was crushing all of her happiness, she had to listen to all those hard words he spoke against her Cecile whom she thought as her very first child even if they weren't tied by blood.

Cecile had never called Severus "dad", but Emily knew very well that she considered him like a father. And she had always thought that Severus's aloofness was to blame to his character not used to affectionate gestures, to his reserved nature and a whole life spent in loneliness. So maybe she was wrong after all…

"I've never said it, less I have thought it," he answered vehemently. "But Cecile is still a child and as soon as she'll grow, she'll understand who really is the person she felt admiration for and whose fault is her being a orphan in the first place." he said, sitting on the edge of the bed and putting the elbows on his knees.

The man she stayed with for years and with which now shared the life still carried on his shoulders the weight of those years passed at the service of a Dark Wizard and, even if the Dark Mark wasn't branded on his skin anymore, the wounds of his spirit keeping painfully on bleeding. Emily couldn't help falling more in love with him and like she had eased his corporeal pain in the past, she tried to take care of his inner wounds in the present. She took again his hands and, with a renewed resolution, pressed them on her belly in order to force him to acknowledge the small life that was growing inside her.

"You're not only able to dispense death, can't you see? You've given life, our child is the proof of it. Cecile loves you exactly like a father and if now she can grows, goes to school, learns, makes friends is because you have given her the chance to live on, taking her away from that dark cell."

Severus raised his head losing himself once more in the depths of those blue eyes and feeling his heart skipped a beat. She was so strong to bear all this crap and she was always able to find the right words to heal the deep cuts of his being. Severus sank his face in his womb embracing her, while she caressed kindly his long dark hair.

"You are not a God, you cannot save everyone."

"But I would like to do so," she heard his answer, muffled by the cloth of her nightgown.


The month after, Severus came home early asking a special authorization to the Headmaster. Emily had felt some strange pangs around her belly and even if she had reassured him she was fine, he couldn't set his mind at ease.

He stood motionless with his eyes wide-open before the figure of his lover lying unconscious on the floor, her petite hand still on the womb, warm blood pouring from her core staining the white marble of dark crimson.

He had to force himself to act, shaking out from the fear that had took control over his senses. He raised her in his arms with extreme delicacy and carried her to the Medical Wing of Hogwarts through the fireplace via Floo. Lupin, who had taken again the DADA post at Hogwarts, had to drag him forcefully outside the room to let Poppy taking care of Emily.

Remus made him seat in one of the chair put outside the Hospital Wing and tried to talk to him but the only answer he got was only a prolonged silence filled with tension and worry. Severus stared wild eyed at his hands stained of Emily's blood, while recalling in his mind again and again the moment he left her asleep in the bed upstairs and the moment he found her on the floor. Then he suddenly stood up and began to walk back and forth in the corridor, incapable to remain still and let himself linger about what could go wrong during the operation kept behind that closed sterile white door.

"Severus,"

As soon as he heard the healer voice he stepped closer grey-ashen like he was never before, his heart loudly pounding in his chest and his legs slightly shaking.

"Emily had a serious threat of abortion and had lost a big amount of blood, but now she's fine even if she's still very weak. She must rest for two weeks or so in order to avoid other risks of the sort. It would be advisable for her to stay here,"

"I want to see her." he ordered still pale but encouraged from hearing she was out of danger.

He reached the last bed of the Wing where Emily was laying still, her eyes hardly opened, her face bloodless. He sat slowly at the edge to not cause the mattress to jump eventually, caressing her face with the back of his hand. His facial features were twisted in a mask of pure sorrow.

"Have you seen? Nothing good can come from me," he said in pain. He heard her answering with a feeble, thin voice so much different from his usual golden-haired angel's ringing one.

"I don't want to hear this nonsense form you anymore. Your son is determined and stubborn like you yourself. He is struggling to come to this world," she murmured smiling while her lips dug two dimples on her pale cheeks.

"And I am no less, I thought you knew me," she went on "The only thing I'll miss in these days here will be the song of the skylark of our gardens I use to listen to in the morning…"

Severus caressed her face again sweetly until she fell asleep, completely exhausted.

The morning after she woke up listening to the skylark song rested on a perch placed by her bed.