Chapter Twenty-Two: Twisted
A child was screaming. The hair on the back of Severus' neck prickled, and his heart was bursting in his chest as he sprinted towards the sound of the screams. His breath came out in visible puffs; this dungeon part of the castle was freezing during November.
He halted at the scene and nearly cast all three Unforgivables.
"Amycus!" he shouted, interrupting the dark wizard's concentration and whatever curse he was casting on the helpless first year. Florence Jones, Severus thought, though he never paid close attention to any of the first years, especially the young Hufflepuffs who never made any trouble. He took in the scene in front of him—Draco stood to one side, hands tightly clenched together while the little girl with the fluffy brown hair was curled up on the ground. Something in his chest tightened at the sight of her hair.
"What is going on here?" he hissed. A torch near his head exploded.
"This filthy half-blood isn't showing proper respect to her betters, so I was teaching her a lesson," Amycus said with a leer, pointing between the child and Draco. "A little Crucio now and then never hurts, does it?" he laughed at his own joke. No one else was laughing.
Severus thought fast. "I think it's time that the students learned to cast these curses, don't you think, Amycus?" Severus asked smoothly.
Draco became ghost white and looked as if he was about to hurl.
"Come now, Draco. I think you know how to do this one. It's all about intent," Severus said, urging Draco to understand his meaning. He was not sure if Draco understood, but he doubted that Draco could cast a very strong Crucio regardless, as his wand hand was shaking uncontrollably.
"C-crucio," said Draco.
The first year student began to whimper.
"Are you sure you're doing it right?" Amycus said, stepping closer to the child. "I want that child screaming."
"You don't have to be brave," Severus said to the child, but the child was still not screaming.
Amycus was rapidly losing patience with Draco, and moved to push him out of the way. Severus felt as if he was observing the scene from outside his body. He cast a wordless Imperio at the small child and thought scream; immediately the little Hufflepuff unleashed an unearthly wail. Severus tried not to flinch at the sound, a sound that he had never been able to get used to—the sound of utter fear and panic from small children—but he did not have to hear it for long as Draco dropped his wand in shock and Severus had to lift his Imperio as to not give himself away.
The girl was still screaming, and did not stop until she began to cry.
"Turns out you're good for something after all," Amycus said, leering at Malfoy.
Draco looked shaken, but said nothing. Severus caught his eye and twitched his wand hand, hoping that the Malfoy scion would understand what he did. Draco didn't look less shaken but he stood up taller, and drew his face into a sneer. "Of course I'm good. I've been punishing people for the Dark Lord, after all. Do you think he would accept anything less than the best?"
Before Amycus could continue on with more Death Eater posturing, Severus intervened. He held out a hand for the first year girl to take and she shakily took it.
"I hope you wouldn't mind if I took Draco aside for some pointers, do you?" he asked, gripping Draco's shoulder hard with one hand. Without waiting for a response, he pulled Draco and the girl out of the room.
He looked at the girl, who was shivering uncontrollably in the dungeon. "Take her to the Hospital Wing and then meet me back in my office," he said to Draco. The girl's eyes grew wide at this and she let out a whimper, but she let Draco lead her away by hand.
By the time Draco finished his task and sat down in front of him in the Headmaster's Office, Severus had developed a headache, and a plan.
"Tell me, how good are your nonverbal Imperios?" he asked Draco.
A light seemed to go off in the blond's head. He inhaled shakily. "Not that good, but probably well enough to make small children scream," he said.
"Good," said Severus. "You're a Slytherin. I trust you to think like one and make sure the rest of the house acts accordingly," he said. He had drilled the importance of watching over the younger years and watching out for each other into his house over the years, and hoped that the children still remembered these lessons.
"Of course, Headmaster," said Draco. "Is there anything else?"
"Keep an eye out for any subversive materials, and become familiar with what they are saying," Severus said. "Go now, I have much to do this afternoon."
"Thank you," Draco inclined his head in a bow and left the office.
Severus stared thoughtfully at the dark stone doorway through which Draco had left. He had noticed that the other Slytherins looked to Draco a lot less for leadership, but they still listened to him. Severus wondered how far he could push Draco to organize resistance against the Carrows.
After a night of sleep on the lumpy ground and waking to frigid morning air—her warming charms never quite lasted six hours—Hermione found herself less upset than the night before, if only because she was exhausted.
Judging by the look on Ron and Harry's faces, the mystical Lost Woods had not shown up while she was sleeping.
They ate their breakfast of plain porridge in silence, and then Harry and Ron went back to sleep at Hermione's urging. They looked tired from their watch and needed their wits about them if they were to visit the Lestrange Estate.
The short Apparation to the woods near the Lestrange Estate passed uneventfully, but it still made her porridge sit heavily in her stomach. Even though it had only been three months since she last saw Bill, he looked as if he had aged years in the time since.
"Hey," he greeted, looking quite Muggle in his jeans, and dragonhide jacket and boots.
"Hey," Harry said quietly. "Glad you could make it."
"So what's this about coins?" Bill asked in a low voice. "You haven't been making any, have you? The goblins won't like that."
Hermione laughed nervously. "They're fake, yes, but weigh differently and are slightly thicker so people who have them will know they're counterfeits—"
Bill's eyebrows drew together. "Hermione, if the goblins found out—"
"That's not why we asked you here. We need you to help us break some wards," she said in a rush.
Bill, to his credit, did not look surprised or reluctant to hear this. "Where?"
"The old Lestrange Estate," she said. "It's abandoned."
Bill whistled. "I'm not going to ask why you want to break into the Lestrange Estate, but that's going to be tough," he said. "Do you three have any protective gear?"
"Protective gear?" Hermione echoed faintly.
Bill blew air out his lips. "I think we'd better go to Shell Cottage—Fleur's got some spare things and my old things should more or less fit you two," he said to Ron and Harry. "We're going to have to prepare a little if we're going to break into an old, heavily-warded Pureblood home."
Hermione tried not to feel resentful that she could not join the men in breaking into the Lestrange estate. There was not enough protective clothing, and Bill refused to allow her in when she was so poorly protected.
She rotated her arms and tried to get used to the constrictive feel of the dragonhide jacket that she was wearing. Fleur had insisted that she keep the jacket for future purposes—it had been hers from when she first started curse-breaking at Gringotts—and apologised profusely that she did not have dragonhide boots that would fit Hermione, or dragonhide trousers that would fit past Hermione's hips. It didn't make her feel much better about not being able to go in with Harry, Bill, and Ron.
Ron had gone soppy around Fleur, as he always did, and it angered her again, but not for the same reasons as before. How had she never noticed how fickle Ron had always been?
It would have been nice to stay at Shell Cottage longer, but Severus had warned them that sometimes the Lestrange brothers would return at nightfall for duelling practice, so they were on a tight timeline.
Hermione shivered in the winter air. The jacket she wore had been tight, so she could not wear a jumper underneath, and it was impervious to temperature charms but not changes in natural weather; Bill had explained that hexes to rapidly raise or decrease blood temperature were common in wards, leaving the intruders boiling or frozen.
The grounds of the Lestrange Estate were massive and sprawling, but she could not see most of it as it was covered in a dense, dark forest. They approached the gated entrance cautiously, and from behind it they could make out the ancient manor house, which was covered in ivy. Several of the windows were broken, and parts of the roof were missing.
"Stay back," Bill said, and began casting several probing charms at the gates. Hermione was fascinated and moved closer to get a better look at what Bill was casting. Some of the spells she knew, but some she could only guess at. Brightly coloured runes lit up the air as Bill cast his spells. There was a particular set of runes that she had never seen before, and she stepped even closer to look at it. She reached her wand out to take a closer look at one of them when Bill whirled around to face her.
"Hermione, stay back. We need you well and alive to keep watch."
She huffed and returned to her place where she was taking watch. It felt like hours had passed in silence before Bill declared them ready to go in, and then Hermione was watching their backs as they slowly made their way across the grounds, and then stalled by the door while Bill unwarded the front doors.
Hermione conjured herself a chair, and spent hours waiting for the men to emerge, waiting for the crack of Apparition, waiting for her anger at Ron to run itself out, waiting for her mind to stop circling back to the words the Hocrux had thrown at her.
"Do you think you could hide your feelings for him forever? He would be disgusted."
She knew the Horcrux had been trying to make her weak, but it had been such a shock to hear the words. Because she did have feelings for him. It was just her luck that she would realise that she had feelings for a man the day she learned that he was still in love with the memory of a dead woman. Not that there would have been any hope even if he was not.
She nearly didn't notice the creeping warmth and tingling along her feet and legs until it was too late, and by the time she jumped on the conjured chair, she was stifling her screams.
Severus tried to contain his agitation. Hermione and the dunderheads (minus Bill Weasley, who was a passable sort of person) were infiltrating the Lestrange Estate, and he was running through all of the worst-case scenarios in case they got captured.
He was just running through the scenario in which they were brought for questioning before Voldemort—he would have to break cover because all their efforts to take down Voldemort would be over if Hermione were killed, and Potter of course—when he heard an odd sound.
Hermione's familiar was letting out strange clicking noises at his window. He looked outside briefly; there were a few sparrows on the window ledge outside—the feline was chirping at them—and then went back to planning for more worst-case scenarios. If Bellatrix found them. If it was Rastaban. If it was Rodolphus.
Crookshanks eventually stopped chirping at the birds and twined his body around Severus' legs before he jumped into his lap and butted his head against Severus' arm.
Severus quietly scolded the cat for interrupting his contingency-planning, but made sure to scratch the small beast behind his ears anyway. His other hand gripped the coin Hermione had given to him tightly until it finally warmed with the message Search done. All safe. No object.
He allowed himself to relax minutely until the cat left his lap, and then he focused on the paperwork in front of him.
There was so much paperwork involved as Headmaster of Hogwarts. No wonder the previous Headmaster had gone around the bend—he was very nearly there himself.
The Carrows didn't know what the term "classroom expenditure" meant. They tortured children and could not do simple maths, and he had never seen such a gross misuse of the school budget. When the war was over Severus was going to kill them; the Ministry probably wouldn't even throw him into Azkaban for it.
If he made it that long.
He had gone to Malfoy Manor over the weekend on the pretence of dropping by for tea and to give the Dark Lord an update, when really he had been looking for a trace of Nagini's shedded skin so he could use it in a dark ritual to kill the snake.
Predictably, he could not find a single shred of snakeskin; he could not kill the snake without expecting to be killed in turn as it never left the side of the Dark Lord, and Voldemort fed the snake personally to prevent it from being poisoned—in short, the snake was well protected and it was too soon to blow his cover to kill it. Severus had another plan but hoped that he would not have to resort to it.
The cat had returned to chirping at the window from his desk. Severus found himself absentmindedly patting the feline again while he contemplated other plans to kill Nagini. He would Obliviate anyone who saw him like that, but it was nice to have one presence in the castle who did not fear or loathe him, even if what he felt from the creature was mostly indifference.
Though. There was another presence—Luna Lovegood seemed as immune to his reputation and presence as ever, which had inspired him to ask for an audience with the Grey Lady. The library had surprisingly little information on any artefacts of Ravenclaw, except for her Lost Diadem; when he had asked the Bloody Baron for assistance on unearthly matters the Baron had pointed him the direction of the Grey Lady, who was actually Helena Ravenclaw, and had stolen the diadem from her mother and ran away until her unfortunate demise. Neither the Grey Lady nor the Bloody Baron enjoyed speaking to the living, unlike some of the other Hogwarts ghosts but as Headmaster of Hogwarts, he had certain powers over the castle and could at the very least threaten to exorcise a ghost if they did not comply.
He had not thought of a concrete plan on how to approach the Grey Lady when he approached Ravenclaw Tower that evening, but he found Luna Lovegood staring intensely at the wall across from the entrance to the tower.
"Hello Headmaster," she said before he drew in close enough for her to see. Severus bristled; rarely did anyone notice him when he wanted to approach unseen, but it appeared that Lovegood had this ability.
"Miss Lovegood," he greeted politely. "Please summon the Grey Lady for me."
Lovegood cocked her head to the side as she studied him with wide silvery eyes, and entered the tower after staring at the knocker for a moment.
Severus was still thinking through how Lovegood could have entered the tower without answering the riddle when the see-through outline of an elegantly robed woman emerged from the wall.
"Headmaster." The woman inclined her head and floated to settle at his side.
"I find myself in need of your knowledge, but would prefer this conversation remain private. Would you follow me?" Severus asked. The Grey Lady nodded her assent and followed him as Severus made his way to an unused turret.
"Speak freely Headmaster," the Lady said as she settled near an arrow slit offering a view of the Lake.
"I am in search of an artefact of Ravenclaw's," Severus began.
"I will not help you find it."
"I beg your pardon?"
The Lady affected a sniff. "If you find yourself unable to handle the mental difficulties of being Headmaster—"
His nostrils flared. "Listen to me. I do not need the Diadem of Ravenclaw to run this school. I do not want the Diadem of Ravenclaw. What I want to know is if perhaps a charming young man in the past fifty years enchanted you into disclosing its location and perverted it beyond nature so that I can fix it."
The Grey Lady froze. Her robes still flowed around her with the force of an unearthly wind. "How did you know?"
"I made an educated guess. But thank you for the confirmation."
"You're just like him," she said lowly. Severus assumed she meant the Bloody Baron, and not the Dark Lord.
"Perhaps, perhaps not. I am sure you have heard of the madness in the wizarding world and how the castle's children suffer. I am trying to end this," Severus implored.
"How am I to believe you? You carry that mark. You are a murderer."
Severus hated honesty, but felt it the best approach to deal with Ravenclaw's ghost, who was much more emotional than he had thought she would be. "And I suffer for it every day. My soul is torn and in agony for the act that I had to follow on Albus' orders, so that I might keep the children safe from harm. I have rended my soul for this cause and I ache with regret for my actions—I am sure as a spirit you can sense it. Take a moment to feel it," he snapped, grinding his teeth.
The Grey Lady fell silent for a moment.
"I see. Your soul is torn; it is restless. And as you might know, damaged souls cannot find peace. This is why ghosts are cursed to haunt the living forever. Though, you've the luck of the living, as there are ways that souls can mend," she said, almost conversationally, as if Severus had not blown his entire cover to her in the span of one minute.
"Really." Severus wondered if he was cursed to become a ghost now.
"You have to feel remorse for your victim, though it seems that you already knew this." She raised an eyebrow when Severus muttered tell me something I don't know. "But there is another way...love heals all wounds of the spirit, after all."
"I never took the ghost of Ravenclaw for a romantic," said Severus, feeling his momentary hopes dashed the moment that she had finished speaking.
"Did I say anything about romantic love?" Ravenclaw's ghost sneered.
"Of course not. Pardon me." Severus took a step back. "And is it just that simple? You fall in love and all the ailments of your soul will be healed?" Severus asked, beyond skeptical.
"If it was that simple then there would be no ghosts," the Grey Lady snarled. "Love—reciprocated love—is the one thing that will heal the soul, because just as your soul reaches out for another's when you love them, so does theirs reach back for yours. Nothing can heal if all your soul does is endless reaching. But if your soul is touched by another...a loving soul…" Here, her lips twisted as if she had said something distasteful. "...it will ease your pain, and help heal the damage."
"I see." There was nothing else he could say to that. It seemed as if his soul was doomed forever then, as he was too angry with Albus to completely feel remorse for his actions, and the chances of him receiving love, even of the non-romantic variety, were now nil.
Severus took a step towards an arrow slit, and observed the snow capped mountains in the distance. "Why have I never heard the other ghosts speak of this?"
"I'm a ghost of Ravenclaw, of course I would know this where others would not," she said with a sniff.
"Of course," said Severus. "Back to the topic at hand—do you know what happened to the Diadem?"
"It was perverted beyond nature, as you already know," the Grey Lady said reluctantly.
"Where is it? I know you are very good at finding things," Severus said, hoping a bit of flattery would assist him.
"It's within these castle walls, where many unwanted items are deposited."
"Ah. The Room of Hidden things. Thank you very much for your time, my Lady," Severus said, sketching out a shallow bow. "Please do keep this conversation private. I assume you understand the possible consequences of this information becoming public."
"It has been an interesting conversation, Headmaster. You are a different man from the previous schoolmaster. I will not speak of this to any other being, living or not, you have my word. I tire of being away from my tower, so I must bid thee adieu now," she lifted her skirts with one hand, and began to drift in the direction of the Ravenclaw Tower.
"Goodbye," Severus said, watching her faint glow dim as she went further down the hallway until he could not see her light.
AN: Thank you to itmightbenatalie and GlitterGrump for joining my beta team (I know I've named a lot of people but currently it's only three people haha). Continued thanks to turtlewexler for enabling my definitely not worst fic making tendencies!
Thanks to everyone for reading and reviewing-hope you all have a great weekend this week!