A/N: This Fanfiction may show similarities to others as you will notice I borrow some fandom plot devices such as: Wards, Family Houses, House Elf Magic, and Goblin Magic. A portion of the first chapter is directly from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows though told from the point of view of Severus Snape. The rest of the story is all of my making. Pairings will be HarryXHermione, SiriusXSeverus.
May 2nd, 1998
The Battle of Hogwarts was dying down after yet another horcrux had been destroyed. The cup of Helga Hufflepuff by Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger then Rowena Ravenclaw's Diadem shortly after at the hands of Harry Potter.
Voldemort felt the two pieces of his soul leave this world as he was becoming even closer to being mortal once again.
The infuriated Dark Lord grimaced as he looked down at the Elder Wand in his hand. Throughout the battle, he could feel the wand was not responding to him as it should. He racked his brain to discern the reason. The previous owner was no more, he thought. Dumbledore has been gone for the better part of a year. The wand shouldn't be resisting my commands. He thought harder then his eyes widened in understanding, Severus, was all he thought before he apparated away to the Shrieking Shack.
Severus Snape had been summoned to the Dark Lord by Lucius Malfoy…he knew what was coming, Severus Snape was not a fool.
Throughout the battle, he had noticed the Dark Lord's agitation at the Elder Wand and the way it responded to him. He knew the Dark Lord was going to confront him about the wand's allegiance. He thought calmly that he must simply try to appease the Dark Lord. But, if all his plans failed, he would accept his fate. There was absolutely no way he could fend off an attack from the Dark Lord. He knew this and prepared mentally to join his sweet Lily.
Severus entered the Shrieking Shack and approached his "Master". "My Lord, you asked for me?" he questioned calmly.
The Dark Lord smirked when Severus spoke. "Yes, we have a matter to discuss."
"But my Lord, their resistance is crumbling."
" And it is doing so without your help," said Voldemort in his high, clear voice. "Skilled wizard though you are, Severus, I do not think you will make much difference now. We are almost there...almost."
"Let me find the boy. Let me bring you Potter. I know I can find him, my Lord. Please."
His 'Master' stood up, "I have a problem, Severus," he said softly.
"My Lord?" said Severus.
The Dark Lord raised the Elder Wand, holding it as delicately and precisely as a conductor's baton.
"Why doesn't it work for me, Severus?"
"My…my lord?" said Severus blankly. "I do not understand. You… you have performed extraordinary magic with that wand."
"No," said his 'Master'. "I have performed my usual magic. I am extraordinary, but this wand...no. It has not revealed the wonders it has promised. I feel no difference between this wand and the one I procured from Ollivander all those years ago." His 'Master's" tone was musing and calm. "No difference," he said again.
Severus did not speak. He sensed the danger and was trying to find the right words to reassure his master.
The Dark Lord started to move around the room, speaking in that same measured voice, "I have thought long and hard, Severus...do you know why I have called you back from battle?"
Severus kept eyes fixed upon the coiling snake in its enchanted cage.
"No, my Lord, but I beg you will let me return. Let me find Potter." Severus pleaded again.
"You sound like Lucius. Neither of you understand Potter as I do. He does not need finding. Potter will come to me. I knew his weakness you see, his one great flaw. He will hate watching the others struck down around him, knowing that it is for him that it happens. He will want to stop it at any cost. He will come." The Dark Lord smiled slightly at that thought.
"But, my Lord, he might be killed accidentally by someone other than yourself…"
"My instructions to the Death Eaters have been perfectly clear. Capture Potter. Kill his friends…the more, the better…but do not kill him."
"But it is of you that I wished to speak, Severus, not Harry Potter. You have been very valuable to me. Very valuable."
"My Lord knows I seek only to serve him. But…let me go and find the boy, my Lord. Let me bring him to you. I know I can…" Severus was trying his best to convince his 'Master'.
"I have told you, no!" said the Dark Lord. He turned again, and the swishing of his cloak was like the slithering of a snake. "My concern at the moment, Severus, is what will happen when I finally meet the boy!"
"My Lord, there can be no question, surely…?"
"…but there is a question, Severus. There is."
The Dark Lord halted, and he slid the Elder Wand through his white fingers, staring at Severus.
"Why did both the wands I have used fail when directed at Harry Potter?"
"I…I cannot answer that, my Lord."
"Can't you?"
Severus could feel the Dark Lord's rage emanating from him. This caused his own face to grow extremely pale.
"My wand of yew did everything of which I asked it, Severus, except to kill Harry Potter. Twice it failed. Ollivander told me, under torture, of the twin cores and told me to take another's wand. I did so, but Lucius's wand shattered upon meeting Potter's."
"I…I have no explanation, my Lord."
Severus was not looking at the Dark Lord at all. His dark eyes were still fixed upon the coiling serpent in its protective sphere.
"I sought a third wand, Severus. The Elder Wand, the Wand of Destiny, the Deathstick. I took it from its previous master. I took it from the grave of Albus Dumbledore."
And now Severus looked at his 'Master', and his face was like a death mask. It was marble white and so still.
"My Lord…let me go to the boy…"
"All this long night when I am on the brink of victory, I have sat here," said the Dark Lord, his voice barely louder than a whisper, "wondering, wondering, why the Elder Wand refuses to be what it ought to be, refuses to perform as legend says it must perform for its rightful owner...and I think I have the answer."
Severus did not speak.
"Perhaps you already know it? You are a clever man, after all, Severus. You have been a good and faithful servant, and I regret what must happen."
"My Lord…"
"The Elder Wand cannot serve me properly, Severus, because I am not its true master. The Elder Wand belongs to the wizard who killed its last owner. You killed Albus Dumbledore. While you live, Severus, the Elder Wand cannot truly be mine."
"My Lord!" Severus protested, raising his wand.
"It cannot be any other way," said the Dark Lord. "I must master the wand, Severus. Master the wand, and I master Potter at last."
And his 'Master' swiped the air with the Elder Wand. It did nothing to Severus, who for a split second, seemed to think he had been reprieved: but then his 'Master's' intention became clear. The snake's cage was rolling through the air, and before Severus could do anything more than yell, it had encased him, head and shoulders, and Voldemort spoke in Parseltongue.
"Kill."
Severus let out a terrible scream. His face lost the little color it had left; it whitened as his black eyes widened, as the snake's fangs pierced his neck as he failed to push the enchanted cage off himself, as his knees gave way and he fell to the floor.
"I regret it," said the Dark Lord coldly.
He turned away; there was no sadness in him, no remorse. It was time to leave this shack and take charge, with a wand that would now do his full bidding. He pointed it at the starry cage holding the snake, which drifted upward, off Severus, who fell sideways onto the floor, blood gushing from the wounds in his neck. Voldemort swept from the room without a backward glance, and the great serpent floated after him in its huge protective sphere.
Severus laid there shaking, his legs trembling. Suddenly he heard a voice, "Harry!" breathed the voice of the muggle born Gryffindor Hermione Granger. A crate lifted an inch into the air and drifted sideways silently. There was a quiet shuffling and then, Harry Potter appeared before him after removing the invisibility cloak and looked down upon the man he hated. Severus's eyes widened at the sight of Harry. He tried to speak. Harry bent over him, and Severus seized the front of boys robes and pulled him close.
A terrible rasping, gurgling noise issued from Severus's throat.
"Take...it...Take...it..."
Something more than blood was leaking from Severus. Silvery blue, neither gas nor liquid, it gushed form his mouth and his ears and his eyes. Hermione, the young Muggle born who reminded him so much of his precious Lily, conjured a flask from thin air and thrusts it into the boys shaking hand. Harry lifted the silvery substance into it with his wand. When the flask was full to the brim, and Severus looked as though there was no blood left in him, his grip on Harry's robes slackened.
"Look...at...me..." he whispered.
The green eyes found the black, but after a second, something in the depths of the dark seemed to vanish, leaving them fixed, blank, and empty. The hand holding Harry thudded to the floor, and Severus moved no more…or so they all thought.