The graveyard is empty and dark. The leaves are crusting under the heavy man's boots covered in someone's blood not so long ago. The wind is howling in the brunches of an old willow-tree growing right at the very white marble gravestones. He smiles at the irony.
The irony is bitter and gilded with guilt.
He rubs his hands feeling the cold and dampness of this November night and lets out a heavy, shuddering sigh. Shame arises from the depth of his soul intending to swallow him whole, and he would be glad if this could happen.
He kneels at the tombstone, reaches his freezing fingers as if to touch the white marble, but stops in the midair. He cannot. He wouldn't. He feels his cheeks burning with shame, his breathing choking from guilt and his eyes prickling with unshed tears.
His left forearm burns in agony. He knows that his service is over; his Master is dead but his life stops midair. He doesn't know how to go on and he has no intention to find out. One by one his brethren is dying, fading, dissolving, soon it will be only he who is left, so he has come here. As if to say goodbye. As if to find some miraculous reason. As if to die pathetically on her grave. Her grave. He wonders absentmindedly could one Avada himself? He's never been pathetic before.
He throws himself upon her gravestone and howls into the deep and dark November twilight. The tears won't come but his eyes are burning with raging hatred, pain and desperation. He begged his Masters to save her, rolling in the mud at their feet, he offered the only valuable thing that was left – his life, but none wanted his life. He was a traitor. A coward. A useless being. Now he embraces this knowledge, howling into the night with unshed tears.
He hears someone's heavy footsteps and reaches for his wand almost out of mere reflex, not that he cares about his safety anymore. Old habits die hard. He hears someone's heavy breathing, someone's dark muttering, and a child's gurgling. What idiot brings a baby to the cemetery? Oh, he knows this idiot too well for his own damn! He turns around abruptly and gets a wand out of his pocket.
He stops midair.
"Hey, Snivey, stop sniveling for Merlin's sake and listen to me!"
"What are you doing here, Black?"
"Came looking for you", Black shrugs bouncing the child on his hip.
"What bloody for?"
"I need your spying skills, your Potion Master's craft and simply your assistance"
"Black, are you out of your bloody mind?" he snaps in response and turns his gaze to Harry.
Flashback explodes in his mind.
He sees their cozy little house again. The very essence of well-being and love, full of light, fresh-baked bread and laughter. The gates of Paradise where his Angel was destined to another fate. He moves across the hall, stumbling at his enemy's dead body. The stupid deer didn't even reach for his wand… and his wide-open eyes are staring into the darkness. He takes one more step up the stairs. His heart freezes inside as if someone's cold fingers clawed around it. He knows what he will find upstairs. He knows who. He keeps moving.
He keeps moving just to freeze at the doorstep. To lose his tracks. To feel the Hell open inside him. To reach for Her. To stop midair.
The baby starts crying, swallowing his tears, choking sobs, reaching for comfort. He gives up. He walks to the crib and grips his wand in search for healing spells. The baby is his enemy's son. The baby represents all good that is lost and all bad that ever has been in the life of the spy. The baby is his Unforgivable curse. The baby is Hers. He looks into the emerald eyes and scoops the baby into his arms. The baby doesn't need healing spells, it just needs comfort.
"Shhhh, Harry, we don't want to wake your Mum up, shhh"
Harry stops crying and reaches his hands to pull him on the nose.
"Shh, Harry, I'm here"
And after, that he puts him back to the crib and hides behind the front door to wait for someone. To make sure that this wretched Black will take care of Her son. And to kill everyone who will try to take at least one step towards Harry's direction. And Black comes and stops midair just the same, and howls in the dark autumn twilight, and clutches Harry to himself, and disappears just after.
"I knew you were there, Snape, stop pretending, I smelled you. And I knew you took care of Harry. And now I need you"
"What for, I ask you again!"
"My family is falling apart, my friends are dead, my brother is dead, my cousin is going crazy and my friend is a traitor. I need to find him. I must take care of my family!" Black snaps angrily. Snape raises his eyebrow.
"And what do you need me for? To wipe your nose off?"
"To take care of Harry, you idiot! Stop looking at me like that, I am not happy either! Lily's will! You were her bloody friend, and she left you Harry's second guardian!"
"But you are the first" Snape mumbles at this tirade.
"I am. But I need to take care of my family first, to strengthen Blacks politically, to find Peter, to trap him and not get myself killed in the process. I need your skills, both as the spy and the Master. I know you are on our side and I don't care about your damn Mark! You are walking death among Death Eaters and you won't let Harry get killed, either I hate you or not!"
"But…he is…"
"Shut up and listen to me: you will take the boy, you will bring him to Hogwarts, I know Dumbledore offered you a job, and you will save him from everything and everyone, including Headmaster's manipulations. He intends taking him to Lily's sister, we won't let this happen"
Snape clutched his hands into fists, remembering the horse of Lily's sister.
"Lily's son won't live with Muggles!"
Sirius smiles at that.
"I knew you would say that. The boy, after all, is Her son"
And Black puts Harry into Snape's arms and rushes away from the cemetery.
Harry stops crying and reaches for Snape's long nose, smiling.
"I'm here, Harry, I'm here".