EXEUNT III: THE SHACK
Severus
Despite my best efforts to alight as soundlessly as a bird, as I'm sure the Dark Lord would have, I hit the ground hard. I was able to dispel most of the force from my steep trajectory deep into the forest floor, but I still had to drop and roll several times to protect my leg joints from injury. I came to rest on my back. Cold was crawling into my robes through the slashes unyielding branches had torn through them; at least the trees had helped take some of the speed out of my fall. Unlike the faux-Patronus doe I'd finally perfected a month after returning from Nova Scotia last year, I'd never completely got the hang of flying without a broom.
I simply lay there for a moment. The canopy and night sky above me were just a collage of indiscernible patches of dark and darker. I didn't know what time it was exactly, but it had to be quite late. Checking the clock had been one of the last things on my mind as I rushed down from my office the moment I felt one of the Carrows trigger their Dark Mark. The siblings shared a natural link between their brands due to the fact they were fraternal twins and Marked in the same ceremony. As soon as they'd arrived at Hogwarts, assigned by the Dark Lord to fill the two empty staff positions, I'd made sure to connect my own Mark to theirs without their knowledge, allowing me to be alerted if they used it to summon the Dark Lord to my school. Of course, the Dark Lord had made it perfectly clear they were only to summon him on one condition. I still wasn't sure which one of them it had been tonight, but Alecto had been stationed in Ravenclaw Tower on the Dark Lord's orders to keep watch for Potter. It had most likely been her.
God damn it! I thought, and pounded the wet ground on either side of me with clenched fists. He was there! I know Potter was there somewhere! Damn it, Minerva, I was so close!
Of course the Head of Gryffindor had no idea what she had just done by openly duelling me and forcing me to flee the school. Undoubtedly she believed she'd just saved me from taking Potter prisoner, assuming he had been hidden there somewhere beside her under his Cloak. I could almost be certain he was; the boy always brought a signature feel to a place when he was occupying it. It was one of those things about him I'd always lamented, being charged as I was with the Herculean task of trying to keep him alive. I'd always hoped teaching the boy Occlumency would help shield his raw emotions along with his mind, making them less obviously felt in the atmosphere around him to one trying to search him out, but of course, we all knew how smashingly those Occlumency lessons had gone.
With a groan I lifted one of my battered arms to my chest and pressed around my robes gingerly. At least that hadn't suffered any damage. The careful probing of my fingers revealed the thin flask stashed in my breast-pocket was still in one piece. Everything else about me I could put to rights in an instant. Losing that flask wouldn't have been the end of the world, but recreating it would have been of the utmost difficulty right now. I knew within moments the Dark Lord would be descending on the school.
I clambered to my feet and leaned my weight against a beech tree. The pale bark gleamed in my wandlight as I drew the instrument up and down my body, healing the gashes and bruises resulting from my slightly ungraceful touching down. I looked up through the mess of my hair towards the school. I was too far away now to pick out which exact window I'd just leapt out of like some sort of suicidal Gryffindor. Besides the aches from my fall, a few sharp stings on my cheek along with a thick, warm wetness dribbling down to my chin alerted me to the fact that I hadn't broken through the glass as effortlessly as I would have liked, either. I traced my wand tip over the facial lacerations. Breathing a sigh of relief when all the minor injuries were healed, I took stock of my surroundings.
For the moment I was alone, standing on the outermost fringes of the Forbidden Forest. I was certain this solitude would not last long. Since Potter had apparently finally returned to Hogwarts, just as the Dark Lord had predicted, he would be taking no chances now. The Dark Lord wanted the boy dead once and for all.
Right on cue the Dark Mark on my arm burned with black fire. As the throbbing subsided, I heard the word, "Hogwarts," hissed in my mind. The Dark Lord had just summoned every single Death Eater in his service to the gates of my beloved school.
I glanced around desperately. I only had seconds, but there had to be something I could do. I couldn't risk approaching the castle itself to attempt to add any warding to it. I would have to rely on the expert magic of the professors within to hold off the Dark Lord's assault. But Hagrid's hut was within sight of me … I hadn't been able to do anything to protect the man the last time I was in this situation, when I'd fled the school with Draco a year ago, but I could do something his time.
I'd had to endure many things over the past year in my masquerading as the Dark Lord's chosen ruler of Hogwarts. I'd had to appear unconcerned every time I entered a room containing my colleagues and their conversation had cut off, unfailingly and utterly, the moment they noted my presence. I'd had to push aside embarrassment and anger the times I'd accidentally overheard these same professors gossiping about me when they thought I was somewhere else, mainly swapping rumours about how my wife had most certainly run from me the year before, perhaps guessing ahead of them that my loyalty to Professor Dumbledore was all an elaborate ruse. I'd been forced to turn a blind eye to the brutal punishments doled out by the Carrows to students committing minor infractions and to disregard the righteous, indignant rage of the Heads of Houses the few times they'd gathered their courage to confront me about it; my response to them was always the same one I told myself over and over to get through it all: it could be worse. I'd had to ignore looks of disgust, hatred, and strangled fury on the faces of my former friends and allies all year as headmaster, from every single one of them at one point or another, except for Hagrid. The way that Hagrid had never once even met my eye had been harder to bear then all the others' scorn combined.
In a way, over the years he had been my most ardent supporter, even though he'd never told me personally. Trusting Professor Dumbledore was almost like a religion to him. He owed his own position at the school to Professor Dumbledore and therefore believed wholeheartedly that I had deserved my own second chance when the previous headmaster had allowed me to take up the post of Potions master. When I appeared to betray that trust and murder the man who had put so much faith in both of us, a part of Hagrid seemed to die.
Whispering several incantations under my breath in a rushed torrent, I pointed my wand at the half-giant's cottage to ward it from harm. Hopefully Hagrid himself was inside asleep right now, for the enchantments would then spread over him and give him an extra advantage. That was all I had time to do. I didn't know if the Dark Lord was already waiting for me to report in. I withdrew into the night shadows of the woods until was certain I was completely hidden from sight. I stripped out of my muddy and torn school robes, changing instead into a cloaked, armoured Death Eater. After smoothing down my hair and tying it back, I conjured my Death Eater mask into my palm. I stared at the inside of the etched silver before raising the freezing metal to my face. The moment it touched my skin, the edges of the mask melted to form a painless seal around my hairline and jaw. I breathed heavily through the vented mouth-guard. Once again, I was perfectly trapped in my own personal prison.
My first priority was to abscond from the school grounds. If the Dark Lord discovered I was still safely within the boundaries, he would without a doubt put me to use taking down Hogwarts's defences from the inside. I had to assume Minerva had already dealt with the Carrows. I don't think she would have dared duel with me openly otherwise. The Dark Lord would understand that I had to flee my post at the school when the entire staff and student body turned against me. Simply running to the gates as I had the night of Professor Dumbledore's death wasn't an option. I would hope my fellow professors had made further securing the gates their first priority. Anyway, I had to assume at least some Death Eaters were already waiting there. If I showed up myself on this side of the gates and didn't simply let them all in, it would cause inconvenient questions.
Only one option remained for me, so I wrapped myself in the strongest Disillusionment Charm I could produce and burst from the confines of the forest at a sprint. Along with Hagrid's hut, the Whomping Willow was in sight. I knew from my secret sojourn into the school last summer that the Shrieking Shack tunnel had remained woefully unguarded until I'd fortified all of the secret passages' defences myself the moment I returned as headmaster. It was pathetically easy, therefore, to bypass the murderous tree and my own spells to crawl my way off the grounds.
I was out of breath and harbouring some renewed soreness when I emerged in the abandoned hovel outside the village. I hastened to pull an old crate across the passage entrance to hide it from view. I also waved my wand over my Death Eater robes to restore them to their immaculate, pre-potholing state. Because Professor Dumbledore had carved out that particular secret entrance to and from Hogwarts himself decades after the Dark Lord's time as a student, and also because telling the Dark Lord of it myself had always just seemed to slip my mind, its existence remained unknown to him. It was my intention for it to stay that way.
I'd never actually timed how long it took to creep through the underground tunnel from the school to the Shack. I just knew many precious minutes had passed while I'd been scrambling along in the dirt. I hesitated now in the middle of the pitch-black, empty room. I assumed I should go find the other Death Eaters. Though our masks kept our identities secret from those fighting us, each Death Eater's mask was unique and therefore easily recognisable to his comrades and master. If I didn't show my masked face soon, my absence would certainly be noted.
My self-questioning was halted by the sound of the Dark Lord's voice echoing throughout the air. I'm sure everyone in the village and school could hear it as well. The Dark Lord chastised the residents of Hogwarts for preparing to stand against him. He demanded Harry Potter be surrendered and promised his mercy once the boy was in his hands. He gave them until midnight to hand over the boy. As the disembodied voice trailed off, I lit my wand to read my watch that had also, thankfully, survived my crash landing along with the flask still stashed safely against my heart. There was a mere half-hour until midnight. The arm holding my watch aloft burned once more. I recognised that signature pain. This time the Dark Lord was summoning me especially to his side. I tucked my watch away and closed my eyes. Despite the air vents in my mask, my breath still felt hot and oppressive against my face. I forced deep, slow inhales nevertheless and ran a mental hand over the thick wall of Occlumency guarding the dangerous, traitorous parts of my mind. I was ready. I turned and Disapparated.
I appeared at the Dark Lord's side where I had anticipated I would. I felt a jolt of surprise, that I couldn't stop from flickering into hope, when I saw the snake Nagini draped around the Dark Lord's neck like a scaled stole. I remembered Professor Dumbledore's final instructions to me. Potter's sudden return to the school had felt like a definite omen, and it was highly unusual for the Dark Lord to take Nagini into battle, but not unheard of. I mentally stamped that bit of hope back down into the dirt. I would need more proof that the time was at hand than just those two things before I acted.
At least Hogwarts's gates still stood barred against the Dark Lord, but I knew they wouldn't keep him out for long. The Dark Lord had set a pair of giants to batter the tall bars physically while at least ten Death Eaters were working on unravelling the gates' enchantments with their wands. A mass of other Death Eaters milled around the sides of the lane that led down to the train station, waiting for further instructions.
"Severus," the Dark Lord said lazily when he noticed me standing next to him. "Was it simply that easy to get away, or had you already abandoned your post when I requested your presence?" His tone was casually conversational, but that didn't mean he wasn't furious. With the Dark Lord, it was often impossible to tell.
"Forgive me, my Lord," I said, dropping to a knee on the gravel drive and pulling my mask free with one hand. The low stance put my now bare face more in line with the snake's than I would have liked. "I had no choice but to withdraw. The Carrows allowed themselves to be captured shortly after summoning you. I found myself cornered almost immediately afterwards by McGonagall and Flitwick. They instigated the rest of the staff and students into rising against me."
"Did you see sign of the boy?" the Dark Lord demanded eagerly. He motioned fiercely for me to rise with his wand held in the tips of his fingers. It was only all of my years of practice that kept my face expressionless when I caught sight of what exactly he was holding. As I stood back up, I took extra care to keep my eyes focused on the Dark Lord's flat profile as he stared intently up the hill towards the school. I did not spare another glance at the wand in his hand. Professor Dumbledore's wand.
"No, my Lord, though I don't think Alecto would have pressed her Mark unless she'd seem him herself. The way that the staff suddenly revolted furthers my belief that Potter is indeed in the school and rallying his supporters."
The satisfaction my educated guesses brought the Dark Lord distracted him enough so he didn't think to ask me how exactly I'd left the grounds myself. Perhaps he was confident enough in the brute force he had attacking the gate for it to not really matter, in his mind.
"I shall soon be finished here organising our battle plans. Of course I don't expect the fools will hand Potter over to me so easily, but it never hurts to put forth the appearance of offering mercy. When they undoubtedly stand against us at midnight, they will come to regret that they didn't accept my generous terms.
"I need a place where I can withdraw myself, once the battle commences. You know this area perhaps better than anyone, Severus. Though he does not know it yet himself, before the night is through, Potter will come to me of his own free will. Until then, I need somewhere quiet and isolated where I can both await him and direct my forces undisturbed." The Dark Lord turned to me with a hairless brow raised. "Do you know of such a place?"
"I do indeed, my Lord. There is an abandoned property on the outskirts of the village, the 'Shrieking Shack.' It is rumoured to be haunted, but that is only because it was utilised years ago to shelter the werewolf Lupin when I was at school here with him. It is both shunned and remote, though coincidentally has an excellent view of the school from its hilltop location."
"You will bring me there, Severus, when I have finished mobilising our forces. Wait for me." With that, the Dark Lord turned from me and moved away to speak to Dolohov and Yaxley. I stood silently with my hands clasped behind my back and tried to listen in. A headache-inducing clamour rendered nearly every one of his words incomprehensible as the giants continued their relentless assault on the gate. The bars protested with a high-pitched squealing but continued to hold fast. I hoped he would send me into battle with the others once I'd escorted him to the Shack. It was bound to be chaotic on the grounds. It would be easy to use the confusion to my advantage and take down Death Eaters from behind before they even knew what hit them.
Once had had finished conversing with Dolohov and Yaxley, the Dark Lord continued his progress around his swelling army. Every passing minute brought more and more servants to his side. The platoon of Death Eaters stationed in Hogsmeade reported for duty after securing the village. Another giant had thundered down from the mountains and stood around blinking dopily. The most disturbing arrival was an entire host of Dementors that glided through the thick tangle of the forest as though it were nothing more than slippery seaweed. I wasn't the only Death Eater to wrap his cloak more tightly around himself until the ghoulish company had passed by.
It must have been minutes to midnight when the school's gates finally succumbed to the ceaseless onslaught. A fierce cheer resounded from the company around me. The cacophony was such that no one appeared to notice I didn't lend my own voice to it. Off to the side, I saw the Dark Lord give an almost lazy wave towards the bent and warped metal. With another battle roar, his army charged through the narrow space and scattered, each group armed with its own assignment. The lane had already half emptied when the Dark Lord returned to my side. A smile of joyless gratification was holding the skin of his white face taught as a drum.
"Now, Severus, let us retire. Show me where this delightfully named 'Shrieking Shack' lies. You may Apparate. Nagini and I shall follow."
I bowed my head then made to obey his command. I didn't ask how he would follow me without holding on for a Side-Along. I knew, after all, that Avrille had been able to do a similar thing, tracing the path of my magic, the day she'd finally figured out how to Apparate herself. I turned and Disapparated, reappearing on almost the exact spot inside the Shrieking Shack's main room that I had left only a half-hour ago. Seconds later the Dark Lord was pacing barefoot across the dusty floorboards of the Shack, taking the place in. His sudden, silent company didn't surprise me. I'd discovered long ago that most experts in Apparation could do so without the loud cracking of suddenly vacuumed space that amateurs were prone to creating. I was one such person who had eventually perfected a silent coming and going. A master of every single thing he put his mind to, the Dark Lord was another.
A few flicks of Professor Dumbledore's wand cleared a view of the castle as a set of mouldy boards obscuring a window fell away. The Dark Lord whispered a phrase of Parseltongue to the thick serpent coiled around his neck. Nagini hissed something back then slithered to the floor with a dull thud. The Dark Lord ignored my presence as he worked his next spell. He swayed gently as he waved his stolen wand in a few graceful arcs. His movements reminded me of a conductor bringing forth a tender adagio from an orchestra. Nagini was plucked from the ground where she'd coiled herself. Hovering in mid-air, she was soon encased in a crystalline orb that looked like a ball of nebula scooped directly from deep space. Nagini struggled against the confines at first. She settled into another dormant coil as the Dark Lord shushed her in Parseltongue with a worded caress.
Seeing that odd starry cage, and especially how Nagini had not been able to free herself from it, brought all of my senses to sudden hyper-clarity. This could not be a coincidence now. This had to be the time Professor Dumbledore had predicted, the time where the Dark Lord would keep his snake close at hand and under protection. That meant my time had come. I had done the Dark Lord's bidding and brought him to this secluded place. Perhaps now he would allow me to go forth into battle, and I could fulfil the mission for Professor Dumbledore that I'd been anticipating for over a year.
"If that is all, my Lord, I beg leave to return to the castle," I said with my head bowed and my right hand over my chest in salute. Beneath my clenched fist I could feel the finger-shaped glass flask vibrate with the thudding of my heart. "I know the school better than any of your other Death Eaters. I am confident I can avoid detection and bring Potter to you myself."
"I thank you for volunteering for such a dangerous mission, but I do not require that service of you." The Dark Lord turned from eyeing his snake's glowing prison and walked slowly across the filthy floor towards me.
"But surely, my Lord," I argued gently and with an ingratiating half-smile, "wouldn't it be better to end this fight sooner rather than later? It seems a waste to spill any pure blood, even that of those standing against you with their misguided insurgency in the castle."
The Dark Lord continued to approach me. I held my ground, knowing that was something he always respected me for; I refused to be physically intimidated by him. He turned away from me inches before he would have brushed against me and walked instead towards the cold hearth. He placed his feet carefully to avoid the splintered wood of demolished furniture in his path. His trailing robes flowed behind him without a single snag, gliding over the rough obstacles like water.
"You are not incorrect," the Dark Lord said with his back to me. "I regret those fools at Hogwarts have forced matters to come to such a head. However, I have already said to you once that tonight Potter will come to me. You do not usually need to have things repeated to you, Severus. I'm finding this sudden unreliability of your memory tiresome."
"Forgive me, my Lord." I bowed my head fully, wishing I could allow my restrained hair to fall forward to provide another temporary mask for my face. I settled for clenching my jaw in frustration before releasing it and continuing, "I was merely trying to think of a way that I could best serve you tonight after being forced to abandon my post at the school prematurely."
The Dark Lord ignored my apology and continued his circuit around the almost bare room until he was standing in front of the window that now offered a view of Hogwarts far in the distance.
"You have always been one of my more eager servants, Severus, and I appreciate that," he said to me with his back still turned. "There is a valuable service you can do for me in a little while, but for now … now I must think."
With that, he withdrew all attention from me. He stood as motionless as one of the decimated pieces of furniture tossed about the room. I figured he was most likely sending his thoughts out to the battlefield, communicating mentally with his Death Eater commanders. This suspicion was strengthened each time the Dark Lord sighed in obvious irritation out of nowhere. I certainly hadn't been able to discern anything different about the random flashes of light out the window I could glimpse.
"He will come," I heard the Dark Lord whisper to himself at one point. "He will come, and I will be ready for him."
Those were the only words he offered for an indeterminate amount of time. He merely stood at the window with his arms crossed, occasionally tapping Professor Dumbledore's wand on a silk-swathed bicep. I stood even stiller, barely moving a muscle except to occasionally shift my standing weight from one side to the other. I might not have been currently engaged in battle at the school, but I was certainly waging a war within myself against rapidly mounting frustration and panic. I had to get out of here. I needed to find Potter. No one else possessed the information I did, those vital details Potter needed to receive and process or else this whole war and all of the lives undoubtedly being lost right now, as I stood here idly, would be all for nothing.
Every time those exasperated thoughts and feelings rose within me, I battered them back down. I was too close to the Dark Lord right now. Even distracted directing his war, he would sense it if my emotions spiralled out of control. So minute after agonising minute, I forced calm over my senses. I forced myself to be patient. Barring perhaps the time I'd been trapped inside my father's tomb with the Revenant, those mindless hours standing helplessly behind the Dark Lord was the hardest thing I'd ever had to endure.
Finally, the Dark Lord turned halfway to look at me out of the corner of his eye.
"Forgive me, Severus, I almost forgot you were here," the Dark Lord said with a cold smile. I highly doubted he'd not had a thread of attention fixed on me the entire time. "I think the time has come for you to do that service for me I spoke of before."
"Whatever you command, my Lord," I said. "I only wish to serve you."
The Dark Lord turned towards me the rest of the way and narrowed his red gaze. "I truly believe that is true," he said. Something about the careful consideration in his tone almost made him sound human for a fleeting moment. I couldn't stop my eyes from following his wand as he raised it slowly. He held it pointed straight out at my chest for several heartbeats. The fingers of my right hand tingled uncomfortably with the unfulfilled desire to reach for my own wand. I also felt a phantom burning sensation on the side of my neck, the source of which I couldn't guess. But then, with a quick flick to the side, the Dark Lord lit a small fire in a clouded gas lamp, and the false sensory inputs crawling over my skin vanished.
"Bring Draco to me," he said simply as he took a few steps closer to the weak flame.
"You wish me to go into the school?" I asked, wanting to ensure I had unequivocal permission. I didn't allow the sudden bubble of hope within me resonate in my voice. It remained as detached and collected as ever.
"Yes, if you think he is there. He has not joined me as many of his Slytherin schoolmates already have."
"Perhaps Lucius might know," I offered. "I could question him then have him bring his son here while I aid my loyal brothers until Potter comes to you."
"No," the Dark Lord voiced vehemently. To cover his strange disconcertion, the Dark Lord added with a much calmer tone, "No, you must be the one to bring Draco to me. I don't trust anyone else but you. Lucius and Narcissa have failed me far too many times lately to be trusted with this task." For some reason this thought seemed to mollify the Dark Lord further. I considered it strange that he didn't trust Draco's own parents to deliver him safely from the school but knew better than to argue.
"Of course, my Lord. I will return with Draco directly."
It wasn't ideal, but at least the Dark Lord was sending me out temporarily. After bowing a final time to his back as he stared up into the struggling fire, I Disapparated.
The sudden noise and spasmodic flashing of lights would have been startling after so much time spent in the dark and silence if I hadn't prepared myself for it. As before, I stood on the border of the school grounds just outside the smashed front gates. The sloping hill before me was alight with curses and charms sparking like fireworks that sizzled and cracked, on top of the constant glow of scattered fires that no one was bothering to extinguish. I did note with a small swelling of pride that from this distance at least, Hagrid's hut appeared to have suffered no harm. It continued to squat in a patch of darkness near the Forbidden Forest, a defiant, thatched citadel.
I pulled out my wand and blanketed myself with every defensive spell I knew as I steeled my courage to charge headlong into the fray. I curled my left hand into a fist and kissed my wedding ring before conjuring my Death Eater mask into my hands again. I stopped the motion of raising the silver to my face when I heard a hoarse voice call out to me from somewhere to my left, "Severus?"
I turned and spotted Lucius Malfoy crouching in the shadow of one of the now headless boar statues that flanked the likewise demolished gates.
"What are you doing?" I demanded. Lucius winced visibly at the accusatory sting in my voice. I can't say I was surprised to see him there, cowering in fear and well out of sight. The Dark Lord had never given him a new wand after Potter had disintegrated the one the Dark Lord had "borrowed" from him. What the Dark Lord had given Lucius was a thorough beating following Potter's escape from Malfoy Manor, when the boy had taken all of the other prisoners with him. Lucius's face was still a mess of fading, yellow bruises. His right eye appeared droopier than the other, as though he was only just now able to open it again after having it swollen shut. The lankness of his hair and dark shadow along his jaw made me guess he'd barely bathed or shaved since the Dark Lord had made his extreme displeasure with the Malfoy family known over a month ago.
Lucius licked his lips and averted his mismatched eyes. "Narcissa has gone into the school to look for Draco. She wanted me to wait here in case he left this way. He didn't evacuate with the other students, and he has her wand. We don't want him to do anything foolish."
"Draco is a Death Eater and apparently is in the school doing his duty, unlike you," I reprimanded. I couldn't help myself. I wasn't a chauvinist by any means, viewing Lucius cowering here in relative safety while his unarmed wife had rushed into battle to rescue their child thoroughly disgusted me. Also, the sight of even more fading bruises along Lucius's neck and collarbone that were visible from the way he'd unfastened the top of his Death Eater armour to help him breathe reminded me too much of how Avrille's battered body had looked the night she'd returned from her mission for Professor Dumbledore. She had risked her life that night in an attempt to protect me, just as how Narcissa was now risking hers for her son.
However, the pathetic way Lucius had started again from my brutal tone, along with how he had an arm wrapped around his torso to brace it, obviously still in pain, softened my irritation somewhat despite myself. The man probably shouldn't even be out of bed. Who knew how many internal injuries he was suffering through right now, most likely forbidden by the Dark Lord to heal them. He hadn't been given a choice but to report here when the Dark Lord commanded him to.
There was something else about the defeated crumpling of Lucius's face that I'd never seen there before, and that was what moved me to slight pity for him. Even before I'd become a father myself, I had questioned how much Lucius truly loved his son. Whenever I'd met with Lucius in the past to discuss Draco's life at school, the boy's father had always approached the conversation with the same sort of detached interest that I'm sure he held for his various financial investments. However, seeing the misery contorting Lucius's abused face now as he sat wilting beneath my self-righteous indignation, I could tell I'd always been wrong about him. He loved his son, and right now he was petrified of losing him.
"The Dark Lord has ordered me to find Draco and bring him to his side," I said, forcing a measure of careful empathy into my voice. "There is a service he requires of Draco. If I see Narcissa inside, I'll send her back out to you."
"Thank you," Lucius whispered, with obvious shame. He turned his face solidly away from me again and leaned back against the fractured statue. I nodded curtly then hid my face behind a shield of silver. I pressed one hand against my mask to ensure its seal while drawing my hood up with the other to completely conceal my hair and my identity.
Getting into the school was not as difficult as I was expecting originally. It appeared the Death Eaters had already breached the defences of the castle itself. Any sounds of fighting outdoors came to me trailing an echo, denoting that their source was somewhere around the back of the school. The expansive lawn was nearly empty of fighters, creating a relatively clear path for me leading up to the great front doors, which I could tell from here had already been blown apart in a way that rendered them completely useless for further security. That didn't mean, however, that the way back out would be as easy. I could hear a roaring crash of something enormous—I guessed another giant, maybe two—forcing its way steadily closer from the far inner depths of the woods. A swarm of something relatively smaller, though still large enough to make quite a racket of their own through the underbrush, sounded near to breaking through the line of trees behind Hagrid's hut. As much as I wanted to, I didn't attempt to stymy the approaching horde; the metallic chittering of innumerable mandibles that was growing louder and more frenzied with each passing second gave me a hint as to what approached, assuring me without needing visual confirmation that there was no way I could stand against them alone.
I continued on, running up the hill to the castle as quickly as I could with my back hunched to make myself a smaller target. The school's defenders must have been too distracted with their inside battles for no one challenged me until I was halfway up the front stairs. I spun aside to avoid my first stunner there, the spell whizzing past my shoulder with a shriek before dissipating into nothing in the distance. I shot up the last few stairs and threw my body into the shelter of the stone castle wall with my back to one of the splintered doors. When no additional spell or caster found me, I left my spot of safety with my wand held at the ready.
I made it a full three paces into the Entrance Hall before I was besieged; almost the moment my foot touched the marble tiles, Kingsley Shacklebolt descended on me with a string of Stunning Spells so steady, I wasn't able to counter each one individually. Fortunately my pre-emptive Shielding Charm protected me from the red sparks my purposeful deflections missed. Someone else must have had their eye on me, for an additional shot of red light that didn't come from Kingsley's wand flew past my hood so near that I instantly smelled the acrid stench of scorched fibres. Glancing around, though, I couldn't discover the location of the caster. Everyone else appeared firmly entrenched in their own battles.
Out of my peripheral vision, I spied former duelling champion Filius dishing out such a walloping of spells to Yaxley that the unmasked Death Eater was sweating visibly from the effort to hold his ground. Knowing that both my enchanted leather armour and personal defensive spells would protect me, I purposefully absorbed the brunt of Kingsley's next wave of jinxes bodily and directed my magic into stopping the Auror himself instead of his spells. Kingsley hadn't expected my tactic, and his unpreparedness cost him. With a single sweep, I had him knocked off his feet and then swept unconscious across the room. His body came to rest amidst a pool of emeralds dropping to the tiles with a clatter from the shattered Slytherin hourglass. I threw several protective enchantments after Kingsley, to shield him from harm until he came to his senses. Beside me, Yaxley looked like he only had enough strength for a few more counter-curses, so I hurried from the doorway to be out of range when the expert Charms professor inevitably overcame him.
The Entrance Hall was a mess of debris and prone bodies. Blood spatter smeared with mortar dust coated large patches of the floor in a sticky, grimy paste. Combatants dashed back and forth in a dizzying dance. I had a moment of despair, wondering how I would ever find Draco in this chaos. The idea I'd had before of potentially being able to find Potter as well and pass on the information I needed to give him seemed absolutely unrealistic now. I could either devote all my attention to finding Draco and delivering him as quickly as possible to the Dark Lord as I'd been commanded, or I could disobey those orders and search out Potter instead. There was no feasible way for me to do both.
The flow of battle around me gave me the impression that the Death Eaters currently had the upper hand. Until the resistance was somehow able to turn the tide, I couldn't risk openly defecting and joining them once more. It was also certain the Dark Lord currently had one of his omniscient eyes focused directly on my progress. I couldn't do anything to aid Potter until my mission for him was complete. My choice was made even easier when, as luck would have it, I spied Draco crouching in terror directly ahead of me on the first-floor landing.
As I rushed across the beleaguered Hall with my focused fixed directly on Draco lest I lose him in the dusty cloud of battle, I saw a pair of bodies tumble off the railing near him. I was able to shoot out a spell to cushion their landing on the unforgiving marble ground, but there was nothing I could do to stop the rushing blur of Fenrir Greyback as he descended on the groaning figures. Fortunately, someone else came to their rescue, and Greyback was thrown head over feet across the base of the stairs and out of my sight.
I'd just grasped the cracked balustrade when screams of panic following a thunderous crash echoed around me. I spun to see the swarm of Acromantulas I'd avoided narrowly myself on the school grounds had finally burst free of their Forest prison. The enormous spiders swarmed the Hall, moving with terrifying speed on legs the size of bent jousting lances. I decided to take advantage of the commotion the spiders' appearance caused instead of joining in the fight against them. I don't know if the Dark Lord hadn't planned on the monsters joining the fight, or if they were simply out of his control, because they were charging after fighters from both sides indiscriminately. For the moment at least, Death Eaters and castle defenders were united in their attack on a common foe.
After narrowly avoiding being trampled by Hagrid, who pushed blindly past me on the stairs in a rush to defend his beloved, deadly creatures, I finally managed to reach Draco. The horror of the enormous, glistening black bodies below him had kept the boy from fleeing, making my job easier. He continued to crouch on the edge of the landing, with his face pale except for a smear of blood at the corner of his mouth.
"Draco! Come with me!" I ordered. I reached down and grabbed Draco under his arm, using my full strength and a bit of magic to pull him to his feet. For some reason, the boy reeked of foul smoke.
"Professor Snape?" Draco gasped in surprise, recognising my voice and my mask. He must have heard from Minerva already how I'd apparently abandoned my post as headmaster.
"The Dark Lord has ordered me to bring you to him in the village. We have to get out of here," I said. I glanced over Draco's scrawny shoulders when a renewed chorus of screams resounded through the Hall following a smashing of glass. Wonderful. Most of the spiders had been driven back out, but now a giant was blocking our escape route with a colossal foot thrust through the doorway.
"This way. Follow me," I ordered and took off down a first floor corridor with Draco on my heels. As we ran, I wrapped both of us up in the strongest Disillusionment Charms I could muster in my increasingly exhausted state. Our almost near invisibility was rendered completely useless for a little while because before we'd disappeared, several portraits on the walls had begun yelling to whomever might be nearby that two Death Eaters were escaping that way. Even when we blinked out of sight, the portrait residents continued to hound our audible, rapid footfalls. Fortunately no one was in that part of the school to answer the call for reinforcements. After pushing Draco in front of me through a hidden panel behind a tapestry, we soon lost our painted pursuers.
The slender, secret door was not one commonly known to the staff and students, except perhaps those most dedicated to mischief-making, but I had used it on occasion myself when I was a student. It opened ever so slightly into a stone passageway of claustrophobic tightness. Being slightly broader than the last time I had ventured through here twenty years ago, I had to turn myself sideways to shuffle into it after Draco. I closed the entryway when I was fully inside, lighting the tip of my wand to hold back the oppressive darkness. Along with light, the thick walls also blocked out all sounds of the far-away fighting. Nothing but the rustle of our robes sliding against the rough stone wall and the rush of our breathing filled our ears.
The passage was merely a hollow between the walls of two adjoining classrooms, and once we skirted the length of the classroom wall to our backs, I whispered a caution to Draco ahead of me. He stretched out a foot and tapped around in the shadows coating his shoes until he felt a step that was invisible to him without me forewarning him of it. Missing that step would have most likely led to a bone-shattering tumble of his down a flight of narrow stairs that descended non-stop from the first floor to the dungeons, by-passing the ground floor entirely. I hastily removed our Disillusionment Charms; it was hard enough to see where Draco was in front of me without the added difficulty of him being invisible. Placing our feet with the utmost care on each step that was only a few inches wide and treacherously slick with damp moss, we were soon underneath the castle.
At the bottom I reached past Draco to tap my wand on a solid piece of wall trapping us. With a whoosh of air, the entire section of wall rotated and spat us out the other side. We emerged with a stumble in the middle of one of the dungeon corridors, about halfway between the Slytherin common room and where my former quarters were situated.
"Shouldn't we be going the other way, sir?" Draco asked me in whispered confusion when I turned and headed towards his dormitory instead of the way he knew led out to the Entrance Hall.
"Not unless you fancy trying to fight your way past whatever else has decided to invade the Entrance Hall since we left," I muttered back.
We'd only gone a few hundred feet more when I reached out and pulled Draco back with me around a corner. Somewhere up ahead I could discern the frantic clacking of hard-heeled shoes. The vaulted ceiling of the dungeon passages made it impossible to guess where exactly it was coming from. We didn't have to wait long to find out. A few moments later a tall, blonde figure raced past where we were concealed.
"Mother!" Draco called out. I rolled my eyes behind my mask. It would have been so much easier to bring Draco out alone and let Narcissa fend for herself, but I couldn't simply leave her now, knowing what was waiting on the floor above us and her without a wand.
"Draco!" Narcissa gasped and threw herself at her son, pulling Draco into a crushing embrace. After kissing Draco on both cheeks, which I'm sure embarrassed the seventeen-year-old to no end, Narcissa turned and scrutinised my mask.
"Is that you, Severus?" she asked, with obvious relief.
"It is," I said. "The Dark Lord has charged me with escorting Draco from the castle." Narcissa's shoulders collapsed with relief before I had the chance to add, "He needs Draco at his side now. There is a task he must perform." That only seemed to bother Narcissa slightly. Mostly, I could tell, she just wanted Draco away from the epicentre of the fighting.
"We have to go," I insisted, when Narcissa still held tightly to her son.
"We can't just leave her here," Draco said to me, scandalised. He knew as well that his mother was currently unarmed.
"Of course not," I said with forced patience. "You'll come with us, Narcissa. Lucius is waiting for you by the gates. Stick close to me." I waved my wand in several streaks in the air to coat Narcissa with a similar layer of protective charms then re-Disillusioned all three of us.
I led the Malfoys through corridors that branched and twisted with such regularity that I'm certain the pair would have gotten themselves lost without me to guide them. Students were never encouraged to deviate from their direct routes to and from their dormitories and classrooms. Having lived in the dungeons for over twenty years altogether myself, I'd memorised their labyrinthine sprawl a long time ago. The route I was taking now was certainly longer than if we'd just fought our way out the front doors, but I'd been convinced it would be safer. Therefore I was dismayed when we reached the end of our subterranean trek to discover combat was raging outside this exit as well.
I'd carefully cracked another hidden door that opened on the rear side of the castle where the grounds steeply gave way to the lake. Fortunately the portal was concealed behind a thick curtain of hanging ivy for it sounded like a giant was ripping the upper battlements to pieces with his bare hands a foot away from me. I pulled back into the dungeons before a falling chunk of fieldstone took my head off, gesturing silently for Narcissa and Draco to stay where they were. We were forced to wait there, crouching in the damp darkness, for quite some time. Finally the giant seemed to catch sight of something more interesting to attack than empty ramparts. With a roar and a series of running footsteps so heavy they shook the dungeons around us enough to send dust trickling down onto our shoulders, the giant disappeared, and we were able to creep from our hiding place.
The thickest throes of the battle must have still been taking place near the front of the school, as I'd hoped. Barring that one temporary set-back, it was almost easy to dash from the shadow of the castle to the edge of the lawn. While it was nearly impossible for anyone except, well, Professor Dumbledore to cast a Disillusionment Charm so perfect it rendered the subject completely invisible even when moving, I must have done a good enough job on ours. Maybe everyone who should have been standing watch over the grounds was simply too distracted trying to stay alive. Either way, no one caught sight of us until we'd hugged the treeline to reach the gate and I'd removed our charms to appear in front of Lucius, still crouched in a pathetic ball where I'd left him. He leapt with painful-looking gracelessness to his feet when he saw I'd safely delivered his wife and son.
He started to stammer out an embarrassing profusion of gratitude, but I stopped him before he could get too far and reminded him that Draco needed to come with me immediately. We had already kept the Dark Lord waiting too long. Narcissa embraced her son again. Lucius, probably trying to resuscitate some of his dignity before me, settled for merely clapping Draco on the back.
"I will return him to you as soon as I can," I said solemnly. I couldn't imagine anything the Dark Lord needed Draco to do would take very long. From what I'd seen during my brief foray into the castle, the school's defenders couldn't hold out for much longer.
"Come, Draco," I said, taking hold of my former student's sleeve. He was still dressed in his school robes from earlier in the day. I noticed a splash of dried potion on the fabric I clutched in my hand; Wolfsbane, most likely, from the way the stain shone faintly silver in the light of the setting half-moon. I gripped the sleeve and the arm underneath it more tightly then stepped forward with a half turn, pulling Draco into nothingness after me.
I Apparated for the third time onto the almost exact spot I'd vanished from a little while ago. The Dark Lord had returned to his place of vigil in front of the bare window. When he didn't turn around at our appearance, I stepped forward, still holding Draco firmly by the arm, and said, "I have brought Draco as you commanded, my Lord."
The Dark Lord swivelled at my words. Satisfaction was evident on his serpentine face. Besides the single lit gas lamp and the otherworldly glow of Nagini's orb-like cage, the room was only lit by the occasional flash of light shooting through the window from the besieged castle. I felt Draco retreat physically beside me, as he usually did before the Dark Lord, slumping his shoulders and ducking his head in an attempt to avoid the Dark Lord's notice. Unfortunately, that tactic was completely useless this time. The Dark Lord had eyes for nothing else in the room but him.
"Draco. Just the person I needed," the Dark Lord said silkily.
"My Lord," Draco muttered looking up briefly before pitching his head forward again until his profile was hidden to me behind a short curtain of white-blond hair. The words had quavered as they left his mouth. I moved my hand that had been gripping Draco's sleeve to push on his back instead, trying to discreetly encourage the boy to stand up straighter. Draco looked aside at me in obvious confusion. I sighed to myself before vanishing my mask and clasping my hands behind my own back instead.
The Dark Lord didn't even spare a glance for me as I asked, "May I return to the castle now, my Lord? Their resistance was pathetic to begin with and surely cannot hold out much longer."
"No. If their defences are that close to breaking, your presence in the field will do little to hasten it. No, I need you here with me still, Severus."
He began a lazy, strolling descent on us from across the room.
The Dark Lord began to question Draco, almost casually, about the battle. Draco offered only one word answers when he could. When more than that was required, he wasn't circumspect about watching me out of the corner of his eye, as though attempting to draw courage from the sight of my presence beside him. When asked why he didn't immediately report to the Dark Lord's side like the other Death Eaters, Draco explained since he was in his dormitory and unable to Apparate directly out, he decided to hang back and attempt to bring Potter to the Dark Lord himself. This disobeying of orders didn't seem to faze the Dark Lord much until Draco elaborated slightly to describe how he had cornered Potter and his friends in the Room of Hidden Things. When he saw the way the Dark Lord's eyes flashed at the mention of that mysterious room, I think Draco wished sorely that he had kept his answers monosyllabic.
"Crabbe couldn't control the Fiendfyre he'd summoned and it … it consumed him. Goyle and I barely got away. There was nothing we could do, my Lord," Draco said in a rush. His attempt to explain how he hadn't been at fault for letting Potter escape seemed to only fuel the Dark Lord's ire. However, I highly doubted Draco was aware how furious he was making his master. He had not spent nearly as much time in the monster's presence as I had and therefore was nowhere near as proficient at reading his volatile and oftentimes nearly imperceptible mood swings.
"Did Potter happen to mention what he'd been doing in that room before that stupid boy destroyed the entire place and allowed Potter to slip through your fingers?" the Dark Lord demanded icily. Draco recoiled even further into himself. Perhaps he'd been expecting some sort of empathy from the Dark Lord for the loss of his friend, since the Dark Lord had also lost a loyal (though practically useless) servant. However, it was plain the Dark Lord couldn't care less about Vincent Crabbe's horrific death.
"He said he was looking for some sort of … some sort of diadem … or something," Draco stammered. I could barely even hear him, standing right next to him.
"Did he find it?" The sudden nonchalance the Dark Lord wrapped around his words made me certain beyond any doubt that this diadem, whatever it was, was invaluable to him. I suddenly recalled the rage he'd been unable to suppress the night of his rebirth when I'd reported to him how Professor Dumbledore had destroyed the mysterious diary he'd entrusted to Lucius years ago. Heaven help the Malfoys if Draco ended up being responsible for the loss of yet another priceless Dark artefact.
"I … I don't know, my Lord. I mean, he found it, but then he dropped it. I'm not sure if he found it again before the Fiendfyre destroyed the room. I think it's most likely … I mean, if I had to guess, I'd say that the diadem, or whatever it is, was destroyed too."
If I could have somehow gotten inside Draco's head again without the Dark Lord knowing, I would have erased that memory before he was allowed to speak it, but obviously I couldn't, and the damage was already done. The Dark Lord merely laughed coldly for several heartbeats at Draco's reckoning that this diadem had been obliterated. I knew Draco would soon find himself on the wrong end of a punishment similar to the one inflicted on his father recently if I wasn't able to throw him a lifeline. The petrified boy was drowning himself in his ignorance.
"My Lord," I said, calling on all my courage and stepping forward, "allow me to help remedy Draco's mistake. Please, grant me leave to return to the castle and find Potter to see if this diadem is still in his possession. I might be able to bring both of them to you, unharmed, before another catastrophic accident like Crabbe's kills the idiotic boy before you are able to face him yourself."
The Dark Lord almost seemed to consider my offer for a moment, studying my face with a calmness that belied the intense fury that was raging inside him, but then he said, "No. I have already said it several times, Severus, and I will not say it again. The boy will come to me tonight. Of his own volition. There can be no other way."
I stepped back, allowing myself a moment of frustration by gritting my teeth when the Dark Lord turned his back on us. I'd barely had time to take a deep breath and clear my mind of all my anger when the Dark Lord spun back towards us with his wand held out. Draco started visibly at the motion, but I was careful not to flinch. After all, the Dark Lord was holding his wand with the tip pointed at the ceiling as if displaying it for our benefit, not point it at one of us threateningly.
"Do you know what this is, Draco?" the Dark Lord asked. His voice was suddenly dripping with renewed patience. I was reminded of Dolores Umbridge when she'd been about to announce with relish another one of her totalitarian decrees.
Draco offered with a lame half-shrug, "A wand, my Lord?" He obviously had never paid much attention to the wands of anyone besides his own before.
"Surely you must recognise it, Severus. I noticed you eyeing it discreetly earlier."
"I think it is the reason you visited me here at the school in March, my Lord," I said carefully.
"Indeed." The Dark Lord dragged the fingers of his right hand over the slender piece of wood in a loving caress. He then focused his attention back on Draco. "I would hate for any of your education to be lacking, so I will enlighten you. This, Draco, is the Elder Wand. It used to belong to the man you killed, your school's previous headmaster before Severus took the helm. You must have heard of the Elder Wand before, Draco. Surely Narcissa read you all sorts of delightful tales as a child."
Draco nodded hastily but still kept his chin dipped almost to his chest. I felt a coldness creep over my limbs. The Elder Wand. I had never believed in the past that it was a factual relic. It was, after all, the subject of a fairy story as the Dark Lord had said. Being vaguely familiar with the tale, though, I knew my own questions of its authenticity were irrelevant. All that mattered was that it was obvious, from the smug look of satisfaction I'd been seeing flit on and off the Dark Lord's face all night, that he believed it was real, and it was currently in his possession.
"There have only ever been two wizards foolish enough to dare and defy me," the Dark Lord said, raising two of the bony fingers of his right hand. His other hand still held the supposed Elder Wand, tipping back and forth like a metronome while the Dark Lord stared unblinkingly at Draco, as though trying to hypnotise him.
"One of them was Dumbledore. I will deign to admit that it vexed me to no end how Dumbledore was able to continuously stand against me over the years while everyone else eventually succumbed to my mastery of my Art. I was forced to come to the conclusion that it was due to his advanced age, that he was twice as old as I was and therefore had twice as long to perfect his own magic. I couldn't think of any other explanation for his unbreakable fortitude. However, in the end not even he could stand against me. I have both you and Severus to thank for that." The Dark Lord graced the pair of us with a magnanimous nod. While Draco appeared to draw a small bit of confidence from the Dark Lord's praise, it only increased my own trepidation. I couldn't help it. Any time the conversation touched on the subject of Professor Dumbledore's death in the Dark Lord's presence, I got nervous.
The Dark Lord dropped his middle finger, leaving his index finger pointed up at the cobweb-infested rafters.
"The second wizard to ever stand against me, though I am loathe to grant him the courtesy of that respected title, is of course Harry Potter. 'The Boy Who Lived,'" the Dark Lord sneered, "though it soon came out that his supposed defeat of me was only the result of a freak accident. Once I identified the ancient magic protecting him, I was able to easily circumvent it and, moreover, take its power into my body to increase my own strength. However, even with that obstacle removed, there remained the issue of his wand. At first I thought that problem would be simple to remedy. Ollivander confessed after diligent application of the Cruciatus Curse that as fate would have it, Potter and I share an almost identical core of our wands. He was certain that the use of another's wand, in this case your father's, Draco, would prove an easy solution. He came to regret that he was wrong. Somehow, Potter's wand still repulsed my attempts to best him. It became instantly apparent I needed to find an even stronger wand for myself, a wand that no other could hope to surpass. It was then that I focused my attention on threads of myth and whispered rumours of the greatest wand of all. Some call it the Deathstick, others the Wand of Destiny."
The Dark Lord started making a slow circuit around Draco and me, the rustle of his robes dragging across the ragged floorboards keeping us apprised of his exact location in relation to us. The more the Dark Lord talked, the more apprehensive I was becoming. I felt like there was an integral piece of a puzzle I was missing in my mind. My mother must have read me tales that contained mention of the Elder Wand as a child myself, but I could remember none of the details now. All I felt was an instinctual wariness that told me I didn't want to hear any more about this fabled instrument. This wariness increased as the Dark Lord continued to circle Draco and me like a curious shark.
"Two thorns in my side," the Dark Lord's voice sounded from right behind us again. "Two questions that never ceased to plague me: the source of Dumbledore's inexplicable strength and the reason why Potter, a child with no extraordinary powers whatsoever, continued to survive all of my attempts to destroy him. You can imagine my immense joy therefore when, after scouring the continent for information this past year, I discovered the answer to the first question that coincidentally presented a perfect solution to the second."
The Dark Lord stopped his restless pacing directly in front of us again. It was impossible to imagine the Dark Lord feeling any joy whatsoever when viewing the stony mask his face was set in at the moment. He stood tall and straight as an emperor, his wand concealed beneath the silken folds of his crossed arms.
"The reason Dumbledore appeared undefeatable for so long was not because of any inherent strength of his own, but merely because he possessed the Elder Wand. He won it from Grindelwald, the strongest Dark wizard before me, when I was but a schoolboy. Having ultimately defeated Dumbledore, the wand is rightfully mine. So I took it. However, I soon grew to suspect that the wand was withholding most of its powers from me. It did not work astonishing magic when I wielded it, as it had for Dumbledore. As hard as I tried, I simply could not subjugate it to my will. I started to search for more answers as to why this was so, until out of nowhere the answer came to me instead. I had been overanalysing. All I had needed to do was to return to the source, to the children's tale. The reason the wand does not work for me is because I am not, after all, its true master."
My mind was racing, trying to think of something to say that would reassure the Dark Lord that he was indeed all powerful, that he was completely unsurpassable. The way the Dark Lord continued to focus his entire speech on Draco alone unnerved me. Draco, however, didn't appear any more apprehensive than he had when this unsolicited explanation had begun. He did not seem to share my increasingly anxious belief that one wrong move of his could result in a punishment far worse than some time spent under the Cruciatus Curse for allowing that diadem to be destroyed. But even as I tried to form a series of soothing, grovelling words in my head to distract the Dark Lord from his sinister focus on Draco, I had the sudden mental image of Avrille shaking her head with her lips pursed, bidding me with wordless urgency to remain silent as well.
While I debated my inner quandary, the Dark Lord continued, lacking any actual interruption from Draco or myself.
"I cannot wield the Elder Wand effectively because its true master is you, Draco," the Dark Lord stated definitively.
"M … Me, my Lord?" Draco stuttered. Even though I didn't want to draw any attention to myself at the moment, I risked the most shallow turning of my head towards Draco so I could better see his expression.
"You killed Dumbledore, after all," the Dark Lord said.
For a split second, Draco's silvery eyes, opened wide with disbelief at the Dark Lord's pronouncement, took on a glassy sheen. I felt ashamed when a shot of panic surged through me with the worry that the various Memory Charms I'd put on the boy wouldn't hold. There was an infinitely small possibility that an instance of primal fear could cause an instinctual jarring of his memory and force him to recall events as how they had truly played out that night almost a year ago. The potential damage that occurrence could wreak on both Draco and me was incalculable.
However, Draco proved the staying power of my own magic as he replied, with a slight squaring of his slender shoulders, "I … I did. I killed Dumbledore. I killed him, just as you ordered me to."
"You did kill him." The Dark Lord voiced the thought with an almost sad tilt of his head to the side as he studied the teenager before him, who was trying his best to act as proud and important as his supposed great act had been.
"You did kill him," the Dark Lord repeated, "as I had bade you to. You proved yourself a more faithful and deserving Death Eater than men five times your age. It is because of your loyalty and obedience that I know you will understand what I must do. I'm afraid there just simply is no other way. In order for our noble, pure-blooded cause to further advance, the obstacle Potter presents must be eliminated. When he and I finally face each other in a short while, no one can be allowed to doubt my ultimate supremacy. In order to do that, I need the Elder Wand and the entirety of its power. It is rightfully mine, after all, and only I can be its true master."
With his last words, horrific realisation seized my brain like an electric shock. I finally understood what the Dark Lord intended to do, the final act he needed to commit, in his mind, to win his war. I also knew at that moment that it was supposed to me. I was the one supposed to be standing where Draco was right now, confusion pinching his youthful features.
No! Not Draco! It wasn't Draco! I won't let a child die for me!
"My Lord!" I gasped, stepping forward, but I was too late.
"Avada Kedavra!" the Dark Lord roared at the same time.
As my outstretched foot made contact with the floor, Draco was blasted backwards from beside me in a jet of lethal green light. I closed my eyes and held my shallow gasp of breath as I heard his body skid and hit the wall behind me like a sack of hard-packed earth. I couldn't make myself move or breathe for several heartbeats. I knew the Dark Lord was watching me for a reaction. A single imprudent word or action of mine right now would result in me sharing Draco's fate. I couldn't let the boy's death be in vain. It was over. There was nothing I could do. I opened my eyes slowly to the sight of the Dark Lord watching me with the expression of a disobedient prince daring a lowly domestic to reprimand him.
"Do you disapprove, Severus?" the Dark Lord asked. There was no distinct tone in his voice, but I understood the taunt inferred by his words.
Of course you know I Goddamned well disapprove, but you also know there is nothing I can say about it. I quieted the roar of my outraged honour and morals. My mission for Professor Dumbledore continued to remain unfinished. If I wanted to punish this monster for his sociopathic evil, I had to give Potter the tools to bring him down. I could not stand against the Dark Lord alone. I had to keep to my role of an emotionless instrument of the resistance. The ease with which that familiar resignation settled on me made me utterly hate myself, and for that one moment, I hated Avrille too. She had known. Somehow, she had known that this would happen. A child lay dead behind me because of that damned oath she compelled me to make.
"It is not my place to approve or disapprove, my Lord," I said finally with measured neutrality. "Draco was your servant to use as you see fit, as am I. It was as you said; there was no other way. Sacrifices must sometimes be made for the greater good."
"'The greater good.' What an apt choice of words, Severus. You are right, as always. I knew I could count on you to understand. Draco's death was unfortunately required to ensure the righteous advancement of all the other pure-blooded children of our world, including your own."
"As you say, my Lord. What do you wish to be done with the body?" I asked.
"Leave it for the time being. We will return to give Draco his proper rites after the battle has concluded. Until that time, I do not wish for Narcissa or Lucius to learn of this turn of events. The final stage of my plan is now at hand, and I cannot have any secondary matters complicating it."
I wasn't surprised he said that. It wasn't hard to imagine many of his other Death Eaters feeling the same levels of disgust and disquiet as me if they learned the Dark Lord had just murdered the teenage, sole son and heir of one of their most prominent families.
"And me, my Lord? Do you wish for me to return to the battle now? I have a feeling my role here is done." Yes, my role, I thought bitterly. My role as a distraction for Draco. A sense of false security. The Dark Lord knew Draco trusted me only second to his parents. He would not refuse to appear before the Dark Lord and pay his ultimate price with me leading him to the sacrifice like a shepherd with a trusting lamb.
"No, you will accompany me to the Forbidden Forest immediately. I will be withdrawing all of our forces, now that the Elder Wand is finally mine to wield fully. The Forest is where Potter will come to me, and where he will meet his end. I want you by my side when he does, in your rightful place of honour."
I nodded curtly, not trusting myself to utter any more deferential words calmly. Strangled rage was burning and tearing at my insides like a wounded dragon. The only tiny bit of comfort I could draw from the abominable situation was that assuming this Elder Wand truly was an unsurpassable weapon, the Dark Lord still wasn't its master. I had been the one, after all, to kill its previous owner. I secretly wondered if that had been another secret facet of Professor Dumbledore's plan, that I was supposed to be the one to inherit his wand. I wished he had simply told me, as I wished Avrille had included me in the decision to save my own life. I was tired of disasters occurring around me because I simply didn't possess all of the facts beforehand.
I had been unable to save Draco. I was now being rendered unable to fulfil my promise to Professor Dumbledore and prepare Potter for his fate. There was almost nothing I could do, but I was able to do one thing. I was able to break one order with care and be the one to let Narcissa know she had lost the most important thing in the world to her tonight. The Dark Lord didn't know she last saw her son alive in my company. When I returned without him, she would question his absence. Worst case, she would be hopeful I had moved Draco to a safe location. I wouldn't allow that false hope to turn into a festering canker later when she learned the truth. Narcissa had a right to know there was no hope left. She had a right to know I'd been unable to save her son. She had the right to start hating me immediately.
"There is one thing, my Lord," I said in an offhand manner. "Draco was carrying Narcissa's wand. It might be prudent to return it to her. Without her wand, she will be as useless as Lucius. I can fulfil that task, if you wish, and with discretion."
The Dark Lord considered my proposal while tapping his own accursed wand on the tip of his chin. "Yes, you may do so. I will speak to Narcissa personally once all of this is done. I'm sure she will understand, when presented with all of the facts. She is a rational woman, after all. She will most likely take comfort in the fact that it was because of her son that I was able to vanquish all of our enemies and save our world. When her time of mourning has concluded, she can have many more pure-blooded children to replace the one she lost. She is still quite young, after all."
As before, I nodded wordlessly. Even though I hated him with all of my being, I pitied the Dark Lord slightly right then. He honestly had no idea of the incomparable grief the loss of a child inflicts on a parent, that he had slaughtered Narcissa's heart tonight as surely as he had slaughtered her son. To him, children were like wands; objects that could be created anew when the old one was lost or damaged. He would never know Narcissa's depthless sorrow because he would never know the boundless love that spawned it.
"Fetch the wand then report to the Forest. I shall be awaiting you, Severus." With that, the Dark Lord turned with a swish of black silk and vanished, taking Nagini in her crystal sphere with him. I stood immobile for a moment to ensure he was truly gone then pivoted in place to face the inevitable. It was time to fully appreciate the sin I had been an unwilling part of.
Relief mixed with a further wash of guilt when I saw Draco's body had come to rest on its stomach with the face averted. I would have enough penance to serve after tonight; I didn't need the image of Draco's lifeless stare imprinted in my mind, judging me, for the rest of my life. I stepped with slow reverence across the room until I stood beside the corpse of my former student. The only constant light was the single gas-lamp the Dark Lord had lit, though intermittent flashes brightened the dingy room every few seconds; the battle still raged fiercely up at the castle. Shadows draped the motionless form at my feet like a burial shroud.
I dropped to a knee to complete the necessary distasteful task first. As unobtrusively as I could, I reached into the outer pockets of Draco's robes and located his mother's wand. With my own wand, I closed Draco's eyelids and flipped him gently onto his back. I dropped both wands into a pocket of my cloak. With reverent care I folded Draco's hands over his chest then pulled the hood of his robes up and over his face to cover it as best I could. I knew I only had seconds. The Dark Lord was waiting for me. Still on one knee, I bowed my head over Draco's body and held a moment of silence for the boy who so foolishly placed all of his trust in me. I was no longer harbouring any anger towards my wife. I could only assume she'd experienced some sort of premonition of this night two years ago when she'd forced me to make my oath to her. However, I was certain she hadn't known this would happen instead. As terrified as she would have been at the thought of me possibly dying, she never would have attempted to change the future if she'd known a student would be murdered in my place. We had both been blind to the inevitable outcome of our mucking about with fate.
A prickle of irritation distracted me as I tried to focus all of my attention on the horrible event I had wrought. Even with him gone, I could still feel the faintest trace of the Dark Lord's baneful magic in the air. Couldn't I have but a moment's peace and relief from him?!
But then I snapped my eyes open. No, this was something else. It was not the Dark Lord's magic I was feeling. It was younger, and rawer. There was just as much anger seeped in it, but it was anger stemming from righteousness and a desire for vengeance, not the soulless desire to destroy everything standing in its path. I stretched out a few mental feelers until I located the source of the mysterious disturbance. With extreme care to not give myself away, I brushed up against another mind, only a few feet away from me, directly behind where I still crouched, completely motionless.
No. It can't be … but … it is!
The odds of it had to be astronomical. It was the chance occurrence of one in a lifetime. I don't know how it had happened this way, but I wasn't going to question it. Perhaps the universe decided I deserved a break for once after all. Somehow, I had no idea why, but Harry Potter was hiding in the tunnel leading to the Whomping Willow, directly behind the crate I myself had moved to block the entrance. He had witnessed the whole scene with Draco and was currently staring at my back as though wishing he could drive a dagger into it.
With deliberate purpose so I wouldn't startle him, I reached into my robes and pulled out my wand and Narcissa's again. I placed them on the floor beside me before rising slowly to my feet and turning around to face the hidden passage. I couldn't see anything in the gloom and behind the obstacle of the crate, but I was positive I was meeting the gaze of Potter's emerald eyes. Lily's eyes. Probably squinted in a furious glare the way she'd been wont to doing the few times I outdid her in a Potions exam. Imagining I was staring into the eyes of my former best friend, I raised a finger of one hand to my lips while I reached in through the neck of my armour to pull out the delicate flask I'd kept protected against my heart. The glass was warm in my cupped palm. Pinching the vial, I held it out so Potter would be able to see what it was. Even in the low light, the silvery mist inside emitted its own glow, making the half-floating, half-sloshing contents unmistakable.
I don't know what he must have been thinking right then; I didn't want to antagonise him further by attempting to brush my own thoughts against his. I knew no verbal explanation would suffice, not that I had the time to offer one. The Dark Lord was still waiting for me. Potter wouldn't hear anything I said anyway. The continuing pulse of his incensed magic made it plain he wanted me just as dead as Draco. The memories I was offering would have to be self-explanatory. I'd selected each one with the most diligent prudence, stretching all the way back from my own boyhood, when I'd met a shy, bookish girl named Lily Evans on my first train-ride to school, to just a few weeks ago, when I'd led a ghost of Lily's Patronus to help guide her son in a moment of need. Together they presented a highly condensed biography of who I truly was and why I had committed the acts I had over the past twenty years.
I couldn't leave without any acknowledgement of the unfortunate situation we both found ourselves in. Therefore I raised the vial like I was offering a toast to Potter while gesturing with the open palm of my other hand to Draco's body lying in repose slightly behind me and to my left. Tipping the vial ever so slightly in Potter's direction, I said, "For this," and acknowledging Draco, "and this, I am so deeply sorry."
Look at me, I added silently. Look at me and see the truth. See that this was not what I wanted. See me as your mother used to. Look and see that I have ever only had the best intentions, despite my failures.
I dipped lower to the ground and rolled the vial gently across the space separating Potter and me. It bumped over a warped floorboard and came to a rest almost exactly halfway between us.
"Take it. View it. Please," I said while staring down the invisible teenager in front of me like a wild animal. Still crouched, I carefully picked up the two wands and instantly deposited them in my pocket so he would know I had no intention of using them on him.
"I am just so sorry," I whispered before spinning and Disapparating.
