Chapter 78: Closing a Chapter
Tugging up his high collar, Snape found himself cursing for the umpteenth time at the rash promise he had made. It never occurred to Snape that Potter's wedding would be set in the dead of winter, on the strike of the New Year.
It figured. Too impatient to wait for spring, yet still eager to set their date upon one that was notable.
Gryffindors had a way of subverting sense.
Never mind that Snape had just celebrated his anniversary mere days prior, proving he held just as little sense in these matters.
"Your hair, Sev. You don't get to kick up your feet just yet mister," Lily ordered from in front of the mirror in which she sat, already clad in beautiful swathing red robes. She was applying those powders and paints again, obscuring the pretty freckles that smattered her nose and cheeks and altering her eyes and lips in ways they did not need.
He wouldn't say the process detracted from her appearance. Rather, Lily was already a beautiful woman and nothing she did enhanced her appearance. All her efforts only served to alter her appearance in a way that caused Snape to instinctively avert his eyes as he would for any attractive stranger, lest he be thought to harbour lecherous thoughts.
Though Snape had never expressed this aloud, he had noticed that his wife took to her products far more sparingly. Whether it was in deference to her husband's neurosis or due to her own adapting style, Snape found this a comfortable compromise.
Stepping towards the waist-high cabinet mirror, and one that Snape often avoided, he emerged from behind Lily's shoulder to tidy his hair into their bundle. Lily's green eyes slid upwards from her own reflection to grace him with a painted smile.
"Well, look at you, Mr handsome," she chirped as she darkened the borders of her already beautiful eyes. An ironic observation to make as he stood side by side with her stunning reflection.
Unable to look at himself any longer, Snape stepped away and seated himself on the edge of his bed and resolved to wait patiently. His silver fingers worked their way around the like-coloured does embroidered into his sleeve. A gift from Dumbledore, both limb and garment had been. A literal manifestation of the debts he had accumulated with every step of this life.
Snape could not help the sigh that loosened from his lips. No doubt the prospect of wasting a day of his precious new life on Potter had manifested itself in cynicism.
"Well? What do you think?" Lily asked, allowing her flowing red robes to swirl about her feet as she stood.
Snape drew out of his misery to turn an obedient eye to her beauty. She had her crimson mane trussed up into a loose bun, its neatness offset by mischievous strands she had allowed to dangle on either side before her ears. He could still see her freckles lightly beneath her powder, her eyes drawn large by the thickening of the lining of her eyes. Her full lips painted a crimson that was only a shade darker than the silk of her robes.
"Like a dream manifest," he finally answered, unable to fight the smile that threatened his day of planned misery.
"Always have to one up me in the poetics, huh?" Lily mused as she summoned her cloak with a gesture. She had bought a thick fur-lined red-hooded winter's cloak that Snape had thought looked rather Christmas-themed. Given her timing, he rather thought it was on purpose.
Resigned to his fate, Snape did the same, summoning his black cloak with a flick of the wand he held aloft in his new limb, savouring the ease of the magic he evoked. A feeling he had once thought lost.
He caught the cloak with his shining hand and swept it about his shoulders, fastening the clasp firmly as he done so, revelling in the nimbleness of motion he had regained. He felt a gentle touch upon those ethereal fingers, a gentle hand laid upon his, pulling him close. He acquiesced, drawn into her offered kiss. Her fingers gripped in his. Her thoughts lay with his own, as too did her relief.
"Severus?" he heard her whisper.
He drew away to meet her wide green eyes, watching that nervous smile flit across her features. "Umm… I just remembered. Makeup stains everything it touches so umm..."
Snape glanced to the mirror and scowled at his darkened lips, now painted askew, and reaffirming his long-held belief that red was not his colour- no matter the context in which he wore it.
The Potter's estate was everything Snape had expected from the wealthy and spoiled. To have a housing estate with lands attached expansive enough to host a wedding and reception.
Snape scowled down the ceremonial hall that could only have been conjured from the floor up for this very purpose, for surely even the Potter were not so ostentatious as to have their own purpose-built ceremony hall fitted to their land.
The long gilded pews were slowly filling in around Snape, who was forced to sit alone amongst crowds of those he barely knew the names of. His wife stood at the foot of the ceremonial tier across from that obnoxious Black, both in conversation with a wizard in a ceremonial garb of white. Preparation for their roles as Best Man and Maid of Honour. An arrangement that forced awkwardness to Snape's already rather regrettable day.
He tore his eyes from his wife lest his stares became too needy. With a wary eye, Snape glanced about the decorated hall, all white marble floors and plaster-of-Paris walls. Stone pillars reached upwards to a ceiling that, for all intents and purposes, must have been modelled off the Hogwarts Great Hall, for the clear blue sky stretched forth but winter's wind was kept well away.
The winter in the West Country was several degrees less desolate than that of the harsh Scottish mountains. The snow that swathed the countryside could not have been more than an inch thick. Even so, no snow laid upon the grounds on which the ceremony was held. No doubt the result of an enormous effort by the swarming force of serving elves tending to the event.
Even now, those elves dressed in little bedsheets tied and painted to look like tuxedos, stood at the door to the venue. As the guests came in, the elves led them to pews on either side of the aisle depending on whether they were family and friends of the bride or groom.
It seemed the McKinnons were a traditional Scottish family, right down to the size of their extended family. The bride's side of the hall had filled with the young and old alike and tartan as far as the eye could see, spilling over to the groom's side. As a result, Snape was forced to sit on the side of Potter's guests, where his family and friends should have been.
Potter's mother and father sat quietly at the front-most pews, a bubblehead charm encasing their heads. The bubble itself had been tinged opaque, no doubt to obscure the ghastly green tinge symptomatic of their Dragon Pox affliction. Beside them were the more distant cousins of the McKinnon clan, mostly the healthy adults who feared little of Dragon Pox's bane.
Behind them, friends of the couple were arranged, most of which were shared between the bride and the groom. Pettigrew slumped behind a towering Scotsman, too timid to ask for a better viewing position. Lupin's absence was starkly evident in Pettigrew's isolation, and seemingly deeply felt by how often the rat of a boy would throw fervent expectant glances sideways as if to catch his friend making a surprise visit by exception of this special day. Of course, he would be doing no such thing.
Lupin had been sent to spy within the werewolf packs, his place bringing opportunities to hear snippets of rumours from within the ranks of darkness. But werewolves among the Death Eaters, as with all society, civilised or otherwise, could only exist among the fringes. Most of the intel that Lupin could gather would be fairly low-valued, as who would go out of the way to share anything with creatures they barely saw as humans? But in their ability to be overlooked lay Lupin's opportunity, if the boy had half the brains to make the most of it. As an adult, Lupin had been wise enough to capitalise on this fact. Snape had never been sure how successful the younger version had been.
Snape ensured he sat a distance away from the Marauder, placing as many buffering bodies between him and the snivelling coward. Team members from their Quidditch days filled in the gaps, as good as strangers to someone as non-sport-minded as Snape and thankfully not interested in striking up conversation with those that haunted the library more often than the grass and fields. But Snape's peace and quiet could not last forever, especially when Marlene and Lily's mutual friends began appearing.
"Hello Severus. You remember me, right?" A female voice sounded in his ear as a body set itself down on the seat beside him. "I'm Mary, a friend of Lily's."
"I recall," Snape answered politely, recalling the muggle-born girl from Lily's flock of friends. Slimmer than he remembered, and a whole lot more tanned. As she had always been polite and reasonable, Snape had never found a reason to dislike her. It wasn't such a bad deal to have her sitting beside him.
"What's been happening with you and Lily? The two of you still good?" she asked, a vastly reasonable question and vastly better than doubting the alternative.
Snape answered with a polite nod and words only meant half in sarcasm. "I'm certainly not here for either of the Potters."
Another voice sounded from further down the pew. "They're technically not Potters yet. Not both of them anyway. I mean, James is still a Potter."
"Pandora!" Mary cried with delight, whipping about in her seat to pull her friend into an embrace. "And you brought a date? Isn't he Xylo…?" She paused in half-remembered recognition. "Umm… sorry, I only know him as Nutty-philius."
"Xenophilius Lovegood. Good to meet you," the foppish blond wizard greeted her, taking her hand in an exuberant handshake as he did for many a confused wizard lining the pew. As eccentric as Snape remembered, he waded through the limited space between pews to personally shake the hand of everyone in the row, starting from those who weren't part of the current conversation.
Snape internally cringed when the man's attention turned to him. There were a hundred different reasons he did not wish to contribute into this man's character narrative, first and foremost being to avoid the man's fanciful notions that bordered on delusional.
"Ah, I see your hand has become infested by Fluorescent Bushwongles," the man uttered inexplicably when Snape refused to extend his glowing hand. "They're a glowing parasite from the land of Australia," as if by ways of explanation. "I had been introduced to them on my trip to the red country. Found them dotting the walls of a mossy cave. Shy little things."
In a rare show of tact for the younger McGonagall, she hushed her companion with a hand on his shoulder and a firm statement of fact. "Severus' hand has been lost. I am doubtful they are Bushwongles."
"Oh. So a prosthetic then," Lovegood nodded with a grating understanding. "You have chosen a marvellous aesthetic for your misplaced hand."
Mary whipped around, eyes wide in genuine surprise. "What? What happened?"
"Severus fought You-Know-Who. You don't get news in America?" Pandora asked quite earnestly.
"They don't tend to televise much on European issues in America," Mary confirmed but stared at Snape's silver fixture in concern. "I hadn't heard. I'm sorry."
Snape felt a flicker of gut-wrenching fear. Sweat prickled his brows by the mere grace of that memory. By pure habit, he tucked his conjured hand into the folds of his gilded robes and stifled the glow. Hiding it as if he feared it would be taken from him again. The most socially savvy of Lily's friends, the muggle-born girl drew back, seeming aware that Snape needed a moment, and willing to respect it.
"What does televise mean?" Pandora thankfully interjected, her curiosity overcoming any misplaced sense of unwelcome concern.
Mary, all too happy to turn her attention elsewhere, leaned into this new turn in conversation. "Televise. It means, broadcast to television. It's a muggle thing. A box with moving pictures."
"Oh, right. My grandfather's got one. He calls it the telly, though," Pandora mused with a knowing nod. "Though I don't think You-Know-Who ends up on the telly over here, either."
"My bad. I used it in the wrong context," Mary said with a wry smile. "I've spent a lot of time with No-Majs over the past year. It's hard to keep to track of appropriate lingo."
"Again. What's a No-Majs?"
The conversation had thankfully moved away from Snape. He flexed his fingers under the cover of his thick robes, feeling his anxiety flicker. To be under the public eye, to have his life known and scrutinised, that had never been his way. And to be sitting outside the castle walls, so exposed, in attendance to a wedding that could not possibly be anything but public. This was his nightmare made manifest.
Snape pulled himself upright, forcing his breathing to steady. Across the room those green eyes met his, concern held within. His discomfort was clear as day from the altar it seemed, for even Black was shooting him quizzical looks.
Snape turned away, willing himself to pull together. He had learned long ago that fear was infectious and his wife did not need to suffer this day as he would. But his wife had always had a way of shrugging off the demons of the world. Fear did not stick with her the way it marked him. Her vivacious heart refused any darkness that tried to cling to it.
Perhaps that was the mark of a Gryffindor. That willingness to live life, despite the shadow that hung overhead.
Snape forced his mind to return to the company at hand, pulling himself from the dark corners in his mind and focusing on the inane conversation.
"Really? They call muggles No-Maj?" Pandora uttered with amusement to her tone. "Rolls off the tongue, doesn't it? Americans always have to be different."
"They don't call them muggles either in Australia," the foppish Lovegood interjected.
Both girls turned to him. "What do they call them?" Pandora humoured her date.
"Mugg-ohs."
Pandora smiled again, oddly doting for a female of such grounded stock. "Again, typical."
"Ooh. Someone's in lo-ove," Mary crooned in a teasing tone that was so reminiscent of the teenaged jeers that set Snape's teeth on edge. Though irritating, this was still a thousand times more preferable than allowing himself to dwell on the trauma gnawing at his mind.
"What's this? Pandora's got a flame?" Another female voice joined the chattering to Snape's eternal exasperation. The witch that stepped into view, however, was not dolled up like the other party guests.
Alice Longbottom dressed in dark leathers as typical of her vocation. Her wand-sheath was strapped to her leg and the crest of the Ministry was fixed to her breast. Official business, then. By her side stood her husband, the second doomed Longbottom. Dressed too for battle, rather than leisure. The Potters were not fools, it seemed, and certainly had the connections and coin to be able to secure an official guard for their function.
The girls stood to embrace, jostling Snape who was sat awkwardly between the parties. "Alice. It's good to see you. You look well!"
"That's because you haven't seen me with my collar down," Alice replied as she drew from the group hug, "I got a curse scar on my shoulder that creeps up my neck. It's really unattractive."
"Nonsense. You're beautiful," Frank Longbottom insisted as he threw an arm about his wife and peppered her with kisses in an overt show of public affection.
"You people have no shame." A shrill voice sounded from behind Snape, gilded with humour. Misfortune had drawn all of Lily's school friends into seating positions around him, it seemed. He internally sighed at the prospect of being surrounded by tittering girls.
"Susan!" Mary greeted as she turned completely in her seat. "It's so good to see you. How have you been doing?"
"If you got the Daily Prophet in America, you would know," Susan's shrill voice replied as the clamour of bodies beside Snape suggested the girls were back to their routine of overly tactile greetings.
Mary's voice sounded muffled as she replied, as if she had done so mid-hug. "Oh honey, I wouldn't touch that litany of journalistic degeneracy even if it were available in the States."
Oddly, Susan laughed, not at all wounded by such a pointed assertion. "Believe it or not, since Skeeter's decided to do in-depth field coverage of the Death Eater movement, our factual integrity has been much improved. Or at least, we don't get taken to Wizengamot as often."
"Really? That blood-sucking gossip-monger is doing real journalism?" Mary dropped back into her seat, still turned completely backwards in her chair.
"I know, right? And guess who gets to fill the void left in the gossip columns?" Somehow, Susan sounded proud of her title as the newly crowned gossip queen.
The two Aurors who had been hovering at the aisle by Snape's side bade their goodbyes with another round of hugs. "Got to get back to my post before old Edgar gets an aneurysm," said Alice. "And who knows what Moody's got up to without Frank to act the voice of reason."
"Oh he doesn't listen to me, I assure you," Frank insisted as he hovered awkwardly by his wife's side, as husbands tended to when submitting to socialisation not of their own volition.
The thought of the likes of Edgar Bones and Alastair Moody being stationed at the site of this festive target eased Snape's worry by a fraction. Few could slip by Mad-Eye unnoticed, fewer still could take him in a duel. Perhaps the only man that could was Edgar Bones, as disciplined a fighter as ever there was. Though the two Aurors snipped at each other like a married couple, there were few that could command the battlefield as they did. If their presence did not give any potential attacker pause, at the very least nobody could take the concourse by surprise. Seconds was all Snape needed to Apparate his wife away from harm.
The seat behind Snape creaked dangerously followed by a curious silence from the previously chittering women. After a beat of silence, Susan's spoke again. If embarrassment was a tone, her voice was ladened with it. "What? I was permitted to bring a plus one."
Snape felt a heavy tap upon his shoulder, as if from an individual who knew not how to pull his punches. Snape turned to come face to face with a man he did not immediately recognise until the man unstuck his wide jaws to speak. "Snape. It is you. It's hard to tell with your hair all combed up neat."
"Mulciber?" Snape's eyes widened with genuine surprise. Never mind his own grooming, Mulciber looked a different man with his full beard cropped close and neat as his hair. Though always on the heavy-side, Mulciber leaned into his brutish build, it seemed, gaining more heft to his shoulders and belly. Off-the-rack Wizardwear evidently did not cater for his particular bulk as his dress-robes stretched tellingly in places. Wizards, more often than not, tended towards the slighter side.
Snape stared down this irregular sight. Not just of the face-altering effects of a beard, but the sight of robes evidently not tailored. The Mulciber family were not that rich as pureblood families went, but they were proud, and they had means enough to dress as their lineage decreed.
"You look like you've seen a ghost or something," Snape's fellow Slytherin stated with all the self-assured smugness of a man who knew full well he would get received with naught but surprise.
Snape grimaced, too proud to smile and give away exactly how relieved he felt to not be cast adrift in this sea of Gryffindors. The Slytherin extended a hand as if he expected a handshake, but his widening eyes told Snape that he was well aware of what a faux pas he had committed. Before Mulciber could catch up with his lapse of mind, Snape extended his silver hand to take the offered hand in a firm grasp. "Now who looks as if they've seen a ghost?"
The pews that had lined the chapel vanished by means of efficient elf spell-work come close of the ceremony. The space was quickly and efficiently converted into a reception hall by industrious elves and the utility of magic. Snape had a brief respite in the company of his wife while finger food rotated about their elbows, born on platters held aloft by elves clothed in black-tie sheets. A lifetime of associating with the very rich had taught Snape that they tended to treat food as a form of entertainment rather than sustenance.
The thousand things that could have gone wrong no longer hounded his mind once Aurors became visible among the guests. Most of the security force had stood outside in the freezing cold during the ceremony, acting as a lookout and a highly visible deterrent. With vows exchanged and the ceremony ceased, their numbers trickled in to line the doors, taking turns to soak up the heat and, in some cases, mingle.
Even Bones stepped inside for a moment, partaking in a bite of sausage roll that came cruising by his elbow and a sip of warm drink before returning to his post. Moody, as expected, did not show his scarred face once among the festivities. The man made his own meals and did not trust food or drink that had so much as left his sight, much less prepared by another hand entirely.
Etiquette dictated he congratulated the bride and groom. A testament to the cooling of tensions between them. It was not so long ago Snape would have wished the boy naught but ill, but there was nothing ill upon Snape's mind this day. For the woman that stood beside Potter was not Lily. Not this lifetime.
Snape hovered by his wife as long as politeness decreed, but he could only keep up for so long with a practiced extrovert as she. As expected, a swarm of women swept her away, leaving Snape to breathe a sigh of relief as he peeled away into the background and away from overfriendly strangers. He dodged a close call with Xenophilius Lovegood, who was keen on telling everyone who would listen about this new cryptozoological creature that he had been told of but had never seen himself. According to him, several unrelated Australian wizards had sworn up and down that they had encounters with a rarely sighted and poorly named creature called the Drop Bear. A species that seemed to solely exist within their thin flammable forests to prey upon gullible travellers such as himself.
After successfully avoiding contact with the crowd surrounding the beaming groom, it was a relief to find Mulciber, mercifully bereft of a crowd. Out of all the evils, his company seemed by far the lesser.
True to form, Mulciber was sat at a table in the corner, already two plates in to what was sure to be a test for the wedding planner's logistics. Snape pulled up a chair that hopped over on its animated legs from the edge of the room. The space was made to be a mingling area with no set tables or chairs. Another daft idea born out of rich minds.
Snape glared away the elf that attempted to approach him with platter in hand. Caviar and pate did not tickle Snape's fancy, nor did the rich rustic fare that was no doubt selected by those of a mind for Scottish cuisine. "Coffee," he barked to a passing elf, sending the little creature scrambling away to do his bidding.
"Not gonna eat 'nything?" Mulciber asked, spraying crumbs in every direction. His table manners hadn't improved a whit, it seemed, and that thought was somehow comforting.
"I'll have a sandwich when I leave," Snape grumbled as he tried to shut out all the light, noise and merriment. A wedding wholly unlike his own. One that he could not give Lily, no matter the lifetimes he lived.
Snape scowled at the extravagance of it all, feeling a sliver of jealousy that had plagued him in his youth. The riches required for the decorations alone put Snape's entire life's effort to shame, both times over. Potter's wedding was one where price was no issue, while Snape's own was funded out of the change in his wife's pockets.
"Y'know the stuff's free right?" Mulciber asked, stuffing another caviar-topped dandy into his mouth.
"I'll thank you not to imply that I'm still impoverished," Snape hissed, incensed by his own mired thoughts as a cup of coffee appeared before him, served in a clear glass upon a crystal saucer.
Mulciber scoffed, as if he thought Snape's rebuff was in jest. "I kind'a get it now. Money and good money habits are important. Susan's dad taught me that bringin' me into his business. I'm a barman now in his pub."
Snape glanced at him, his eyebrows raised, "How middle-class of a choice in employment. What would your parents say to know that you're employed in a role of such low influence?"
"Can't be worse than what they'll say when they realise it's also a muggle pub," Mulciber said with a chuckle, acknowledging the humour, no doubt, for the odd situation. One such that Snape had never envisioned, but in introspect, this was no stranger than the turn Snape's own life had taken.
"How does a wizard end up serving spirits to the non-magical?" Snape asked. Though having spent a good portion of his life living alongside such of their kind, Snape had never for one moment considered joining their world. Foremost of which, he realised how difficult keeping in line with the statute of secrecy would be when having to navigate around those who were forbidden to know. He never understood people of magical roots that held a perverse fascination in crossing that cultural barrier, not in the least because of the risk they ran in contravening magical law.
Mulciber finished chewing before he spoke, a rare glimpse of manners from a boy who once, and still did, devour without sparing any space in his cheeks. "Magic's useful for runnin' a business, y'know. I could keep the dishes washed and the floors clean from spilt drinks without skippin' a beat with serving drinks from the bar. And after a certain amount of drinks, the patrons won't even notice if their glasses disappear from the table without a wait staff and their ashtrays freshened. When produce and kegs need to be moved, no need to break a sweat."
"What a cleverly indirect way you've been trained into a homemaker," Snape uttered, though not in malice or mockery.
Mulciber chuckled in a rare display of self-deprecating humour. "I prefer the term business man."
"Are you also magically able to balance the books?"
"Hey, I ain't perfect yet."
It was an odd feeling to sit across the table, conversing with a man Snape had once known very differently. A man who should have found his vocation and strengths in turning the minds of others against their wills. The Imperius Curse, counter-intuitively was a spell more commonly wielded by those of a brutish disposition. For they were the ones without the patience and cunning to turn minds by wits alone.
"What about you?" Mulciber asked after a brief pause to devour another hefty bite. "You still teachin'?"
Snape bit back the grimace of annoyance that threatened. His skin was thin against any implication he was in any way less successful. "I've not been laid off due to my injury, if that's what you're implying."
"Thought they'd just say the curse got you and just call it a day," Mulciber remarked, his smirk painting his words as jest.
Snape a chastisement in a half-sarcastic quip, "It's a jinx, not a curse. Learn the difference already."
"You're not my professor."
This had never been how Snape envisioned any of their futures would play out. To be sitting across from one another at a Gryffindor wedding, chatting like friends rather than conspirators. A lifetime ago they had both been bearers of that fanatical mask. Mulciber, already enshrined in the inner circle owing to his father's connections, and Snape, conspiring to reach the same heights.
The irony being, Mulciber would never know how close to a doomed life he had sailed.
"Well, Snape. Glad things worked out," Mulciber offered, a sentiment most unexpected. "Your new hand's mighty fancy. Sort'a matches your personality. All pompous and stuff."
"I'll not hear any accusations of pompousness from a son of the old blood."
Mulciber actually winced. Even with his mouth pouched with semi-chewed solids, Snape could see he had unintentionally struck a nerve. "Yeah well, son no longer. I've been disowned," he muttered after the food cleared his swallow. "It turns out my parents had a lot to say about my choices in life."
This was news not unexpected. Regardless, "I am sorry to hear that."
Mulciber grimaced, but in a most good-natured way. "Aww, don't be. They weren't ever gonna like Susan, being a half-blood and all. They don't even know about her yet."
"Probably a good idea not to fill them in on it," Snape agreed, finally taking a sip of his drink. The dark bitter brew had a floral bite. Even the coffee served was too fancy for Snape's tastes.
Mulciber waved over an elf bearing little cups of lobster bisque, then promptly took carriage of half the platter. "I'm still doin' good by comparison. I heard Lester's moved to Africa with his parents. Said, visitin' family, but he never got a return time. Similar from Avery. Hiding, but I don't got tabs on where he buckled down. Not much to say about Rosier. Not heard much from him."
"We've met since. He was there the day I had to choose between my wife and my hand," Snape muttered, his silver fingers curling at the memory.
Mulciber winced as he emerged from his beard-involving sip of lobster. "He didn't get away…"
"He's old enough to know what he's doing," Snape returned, not in the mood to feel at all sympathetic.
"But it's still not easy, cutting ties to your family and leaving behind the only life you know."
It was an odd age indeed when Mulciber was the more reasonable of the two of them. "A woman in your life has softened you, Mulciber."
"Or business experience, you know. Gotta keep a level head when dealing with sloshed up customers," he explained as he filled his plate with another passing of pasties. "Speakin' of levelled heads. You hear what Urquart's up to?"
"No," Snape's interest piqued as he glanced over to his conversation partner over the rip of his clear coffee cup.
"He's gone and joined the Aurors," Mulciber scoffed. "In the middle of this mess."
"Not exactly the most Slytherin of decisions," Snape agreed, his nihilistic conclusions forming within his mind. There was always a reason why Snape had never been close to Urquart in his previous lifetime despite being purebloods, even if the latter was from a bloodline considered blood traitors. Even if Urquart had been female, perhaps especially due to that fact, scandal would have rocked the cloistered pureblood community. Snape had always assumed that the reason he had no impression of this Slytherin youth equivalent of a duck out of water was because she had met a young demise within the chaos of the current political climate. Now Snape felt he knew for certain. Aurors did not live for long in this era, and the young and inexperienced would soon die by droves.
"I would not have picked you for one to keep tabs on your friends and associates," Snape said, his memories of another lifetime. Of standing before a Mulciber from the inner circle who could not even give the time of day for the young man whose liberally shared homework had been the only reason the great oaf could obtain even scrape a few passing NEWTs.
"Can't get away from it, considerin' who I'm dating," Mulciber offered with a short bark of laughter, quickly stifled with a bite of open-faced salmon and caviar pastry.
"The next person to comment about me in a dress will be hexed," Marlene warned when Lily approached, her smile lopsided and jovial.
A cluster of girlfriends gathered about the newly wed, all titters and giggles. No doubt the sight of the unrepentant tomboy all gowned up and effeminate was a great cause of clucking among the hens. She was frocked up in a flowing white dress, all silks and satin, blond hair pinned up and set upon another layer of her flowing locks. Her lips were touched with red and her eyes touched by shadow, looks far at odds with her ordinarily unadorned appearance.
"You look beautiful, regardless," Lily couldn't help but offer quite sincerely.
No makeup could hide the glare that elicited, though those red lips smiled paradoxically. "I'd have worn a dress for your wedding, Lil's. You lost your chance to comment."
"Try and stop me," Lily retorted, sticking her tongue out in a childish manner but then breaking out into a fit of giggles alongside her friends.
She hadn't realised how much she had missed her friends until she saw all of their familiar faces gathered. So too, perhaps, it was owing to her own self-imposed exile under the protective wards of Hogwarts. She hadn't seen the outside world in true for near on two months and counting. A day of celebration in a place she'd never been, meeting friends she had missed so dearly turned her inside out with joyous giddiness.
"Heya girls, enjoying the spread?" James asked, strutting into the circle cockily with a ruffle of his hair. His hand immediately drawing about the waist of his newly wed wife.
"They can't be. None of them's got drinks in their hands," Sirius remarked as he appeared alongside his friend, a floating tray of champagne accompanying his appearance.
Lily accepted a glass graciously alongside her pack of giggling friends, well and truly taken by the celebratory atmosphere. Black winked when Mary reached for hers, a little too suggestively. A seductive sentiment the outgoing muggle-born witch seemed to reciprocate with a long-drawn sip of her champagne funnel.
"One for the happy groom too," Black continued, handing a much taller glass to his best mate and clinking with his own equivalent drink.
James grinned. "Sorry, Marly. Getting sloshed with the boys."
"I'll beat you to it," she retorted, slamming her drink down in one gulp to the cheers of the girls in attendance.
Lily sipped her drink as she glanced back at her own husband. He had found a quiet corner table to hunker down at. At the very least he wasn't alone, finding his old schoolmate Mulciber to sit with. The introvert's corner appears to be established; Lily doubted her husband would shift from there for the rest of the day.
"If you girls don't mind, I'll be borrowing the man of the hour. Can't have him stuck to his wife all afternoon when she already booked him for all evening," Black proclaimed with a lewd wink after draining his own glass. "I'll return him before the first dance, of course," he quickly reassured the bristling Marlene. "Mostly intact."
Marlene shook off her embarrassment rather quickly for the normally sensitive girl, "Nobody get killed." A gracious line to draw for a tent full of Gryffindors.
As James disappeared into the body of revellers, Mary turned to Susan. "So? Spill, Susan," she prodded with a vicious smile. "How did you and big ol' Mulciber hook up?"
Lily didn't know what she expected from Susan, perhaps indignant spluttering, but certainly not a level-headed and unabashed reply. A testament to personal growth. "I just met him in the Prophet's offices in London. He was putting in an application for some menial roles there. We got to talking and I found out his family disowned him for stepping out of line."
"It's the Gryffindor in you. Couldn't resist a rebel," Marlene added as she downed a second glass. At least the second, as far as Lily knew.
"Or a scandal," Lily added with a smirk, ready to rub it in as hard as she got. "A Slytherin, really?"
Susan sipped her glass daintily as if tasting for flavours unknown to Lily. "Well Daddy's always been asking me to introduce magical folk to employment in his bar. He likes the convenience of magic and Mum can't keep being the only wand to keep the place running. And I'm not setting foot in there, not with all those tasteless drunk muggles. Goodness no."
Pandora interjected quizzically, "Magic in a muggle bar? Wouldn't that violate several sections in the Statute of Secrecy?"
"Not if the patrons and workers never find out. Dad's got provisions since he's married into magic," Susan explained.
"And if you're careful, it's easy to mingle magic and muggle without anyone finding out," Mary interjected. "They're quick to find explanations for things they don't understand and just as quick to dismiss what they can't explain. I had an odd job at a taco truck in California. They never found out how I could do all the prep work every morning just by getting there ten minutes before opening."
"What's a taco truck?" asked Pandora, always concerned about the important things in life.
"Think of a restaurant on wheels with a much more relaxed take on the health code."
The light of day was fading fast. Daylight hours were held hostage in the midst of winter's grasp. A rather inebriated James appeared by Marlene, supported on one side by his devil's advocate of a best friend. Marlene, unsurprisingly, still held quite firmly together despite the abundance of empty glasses she had tallied to her count.
"I totally f'got. W-we were s'posed t'dance," James said as he struggled to find his feet. How he had managed to spiral so quickly was a talent no doubt learnt from his poor influence of friends.
"Wow. You cannot hold your drink," Marlene sighed as she watched her husband struggle to stand. Reaching for her newly-wed husband's unclaimed arm, Marlene sighed. "Oh no, Jamie-boy. You're in no condition to stand, let alone dance. Looks like we'll have to sit this one out."
"What?" Susan uttered aghast. "You're the newlyweds. You have to lead the first dance."
"Not with James like this, I don't," Marlene replied, not seeming in the least bothered by the idea her wedding might not go the direction tradition demanded. Marlene probably didn't want to try her lucky waltzing in heels, having never worn them in all the years Lily had known her, and had been stumbling inexpertly around on them all day. A fact that had nothing in the least to do with the dozen or so glasses of alcoholic beverages that the newly wedded girl imbibed, attesting to her Scottish blood.
"Noo Marly. I c'n still…" James slurring words trailed off.
Black grimaced a guilty grimace, as he should. "Hey," he had the audacity to utter. "He's not dead."
"It's the Maid of Honour to the rescue, it seems," Lily uttered with an overly dramatic sigh. From her handbag came a bottle of violet liquid. One of several bottles she had prepared in anticipation for the day. "I knew there was going to be at least one casualty in need of sobering up."
With a slurring cheer, James accepted the bottle, downing it like one of his many ill-thought-out-choices. James' eyes immediately fell back into focus as with a hiccup, he straightened himself and his bowtie, and swept his frazzled hair with an expert sweep of his hands.
Black grinned. "Can I reserve one of those for later? Not for the fun. For the hangover, y'know."
Lily gave a counter-offer. "Suffer."
Black flashed his white teeth as he barked in laughter. "It's not just packing potions that the Snapes have in common."
Marlene sighed as she took James' offered hand. "Let's get this over with."
"Don't sound too enthusiastic," James retorted as he magically smoothed away the sauce stains he had acquired down his front.
"I'm saving that all for later," Marlene said with a wicked grin, not in the least abashed about having said it in public.
James grinned his wicked grin and with a wave to Lily he stepped forth onto the floor newly cleared of patrons. "Save another bottle for us, will you?"
Lily tilted her head to indicate the human embodiment of bad influence standing among them. "I'll give you the one that your best man wants."
But if Sirius Black heard her words at all he gave no indication. Rather, he was already busy chatting up Mary with another flute of champagne clutched in his massive paws.
Almost as if this were the signal to disperse, Lily turned to find her friends gravitating to their significant others. Pandora drew away that oddball Xenophilius from his conversations, perhaps to the relief of the wizard on the receiving end. How the straitlaced Pandora had found herself dating a man that could only be generously described as "quite batty" was anyone's guess. Perhaps living her life too overly sensibly felt a tad droll.
Susan, too, had floated away, picking her way across the room to where Mulciber sat. Another casualty of the unexpected. But who was Lily to comment? For who had been the first to take a leap of faith on the path of the unknown and taken a chance on a boy that no one else believed in. She learned of his boundless love and devotion. And how unjust life could be.
Lily watched as Mulciber stood and brushed the crumbs off his dress-robes. He stepped forward without hesitation, taking Susan's hand and stepping towards the dance floor, joining the slow waltz as the bride and groom finished their first dance. Across from Mulciber, the chair where Lily's husband should have sat stood empty. It figured. He had the patience of a Slytherin for anything but social obligations.
With a sigh, Lily turned back, only to find even Sirius and Mary had left. They weren't headed for the dance, but goodness knows, Lily didn't want to follow where they were going.
But through one reason or another, each of her friends had drifted apart. An allegory for their lives. But this was all expected. They couldn't stay as close as they were when they had all been sharing the same dorm room. They all had their own lives to lead now.
"Would you do me the honour of a dance?" Lily gasped as a voice sounded by her shoulder and a silver hand took her own and spun her about.
"Severus!" she gasped through her surprised laughter.
A smile came, easy to him now. Still shy, but no longer shrinking away as if the eyes of the world judged him for his existence. His silver hand held hers, its ethereal light glinting fiercely off her enchanted wedding band. A testament to the life they had forged together, and the sacrifices he had made to keep it.
A/N: I'd like to think that even among wizards, Australian-culture of messing with the foreigner still holds true. That being said, as an Australian, I am obliged to say that Drop Bears are real and that they exclusively hunt the naïve tourist. Never walk under an eucalyptus tree without checking for one up in the branches.
A thank you to my Beta readers Sattwa100 and cookeroach for your work on this chapter.
Next Update: Saturday 15th February 2019
Chapter 79: A Lifeline he Never Had
Disclaimer: I do not own the Harry Potter universe and do not seek to profit in any way, shape or form from this fan work.