WARNING: dark
Book Club: How The King of Elfhame Learned to Hate Stories
Prompts:
(title) Heart of Stone
Word Count: 650
The first time Severus killed someone, he Apparated back to his house and threw up on his doorstep. His stomach heaved as he emptied it, gagging at the bitter taste and the scent of blood still permeating his clothes.
He clenched his fingers around his robes, getting rid of them as fast as he could. Yanking them over his head, he threw them on the dirty couch, stumbling over to the bathroom.
The bathroom walls were grimy, but Severus didn't care. He didn't have time to clean his house when he had better things to do—like think about the woman he'd just murdered exactly twenty minutes ago.
Just the thought of the black-haired woman and the terror evident in her eyes when she had seen Severus standing there caused bile to rise in Severus' throat. To please the Dark Lord, Severus had slit the woman's throat with a blunt knife to make it even more painful.
The woman's ear-splitting screams had turned to low gurgles as the life had left her eyes. Severus dropped to his knees in the bathtub, turning on the water and trying to scrub his hands as best as he could. Even though he had cleaned his hands after he had killed her, he could still feel the blood seeping through his fingers.
He was reminded of Lady Macbeth, from Lily's favourite Shakespeare play, and the irony made him throw his head back and laugh maniacally. The laughter soon turned to pitiful sobs as he thought of how Lily would react to his betrayal, and his heart wrenched at the image of her screaming and running away from him.
No, Lily had made her choice, and it wasn't him. It was that Potter brat she'd decided to give her heart to, and Severus had no way of getting her back. He closed his eyes and rested his forehead against the cool wall, thinking of their marriage announcement he had seen in the Daily Prophet that morning.
Funnily enough, everyone assumed he was already a Death Eater. But no one knew that he had joined the Dark Lord that very evening. His initiation had gone off without a hitch, and when the Dark Lord had asked him for his unwavering loyalty, Severus had hardened his heart and offered Lord Voldemort his left arm without hesitation.
The pain of receiving the Dark Mark was nothing compared to the agony Severus had felt when he had seen the photograph of Potter and Lily in the newspaper. The image seemed to be burned in Severus' mind.
Lily beamed up at Potter, her emerald-green eyes shining with delight as he said something to make her laugh. He twirled her around and dipped her backwards.
The utter joy evident on her face was enough to shatter Severus' heart into innumerable pieces. The sound of Lily's joyful laughter seemed to echo in Severus' ears, overlapping with the dead woman's screams.
"Make it stop," he whispered, covering his ears as he curled up in a ball. The water muffled his pleas, but it couldn't silence his intrusive thoughts.
Every time he closed his eyes, he could see the dead woman begging him to spare her. And in his mind's eye, the woman's face started to morph into Lily's. The thought of killing his beloved Lily while she pleaded with him to let her go made him harden his heart.
In his line of 'work', he knew he couldn't afford to feel any emotions. That would only make him weak and vulnerable. And he couldn't let that happen.
He straightened out of his crouch, squaring his shoulders to feel a bit more confident. As the water washed over him, he got to his feet and decided that he would never let any emotions penetrate his heart ever again.
How was he to know the next body he would find himself crying over would be Lily's?