Chapter 73: Longstanding Regrets
{A/N: Here's Another Update....}
My Thanks To All My Readers And Reviewers...Enjoy-S.S.
{"It hurts to breathe...Well every time that you're not next to me...Her mind's made up, the girl is gone...And now I'm forced to see...I think I'm on my way...Oh, it hurts to live today...Oh and she says, "Don't you wish you were dead like me?"..."} Santa Monica, Theory Of A Deadman
Cemetery, Cokeworth England, Muggle World...
Heavy rain poured upon the various rows of gray headstones sticking up out of the ground close in their layouts. A lone figure moved about in the darkness of the semi-night sky. The forest green and silver trim over black school robes had been quite evident as the figure stopped at a particular tombstone, a sorrowful expression filed across his unseemly pale face. Emerald green eyes filled with agony scanned the name of the deceased as a trembling pale hand moved across the water slick stone.
One by one images of a life long passed filled his mind from the first encounter to the last night of harsh drunken criticism in the wake of a broken heart. The time Severus Snape spent with his long suffering muggle wife had replayed in full view for the youngest Potter boy as if he had been reliving each and every moment in that instant.
"Elaine..." said the voice of a seemingly saddened thirteen year old wizard as he appeared to be in mourning.
The images of a woman with sorrowful brown eyes and tears streaming down her cheeks when last he saw her returned. He had been unbelievably cruel to her and to their thought to have been only surviving child until he had come in contact with a young and already badly emotionally damaged Lucius Arcturus.
His second born son had still been alive and twisted by the foul treatment of that idiot Igor Karkaroff and loathsome school. The thirteen year old balled his fists as he reflected on how that smug bastard had smiled in his face during the Tri-Wizard Tournament knowing full well that he had in possession of his second born and no doubt ensured the boy suffered.
Arcturus had Elaine's eyes and her borderline "hero-worship" opinion of him that seemed to have no end.
Regulus had been reduced to living in darkness following his false imprisonment at the hands of the idiotic Harry Potter.
Everything seemed to be spiraling out of control all over again and this time the youngest born son of the fallen wizard had been at the helm. Albus Severus sighed growing tired of the chaos even in this life, his sons deserved better than to be painted as monsters by the world that had taken so much from them even before they were born.
His past mistakes seemed to have been passed down to them as well as the hatred he garnered before his demise via the despot's serpent. The slow and agonizing death he suffered two months after the war's end with only a disgruntled and emotionally jilted Arcturus for company had only made his mistakes all the more real to him.
Still overwhelmed by his own thoughts and subsequent memories, Albus Severus continued to kneel before the tombstone of the late Mrs. Severus Snape. He owed her so much...and yet had given her so little in return for her love and devotion. In the end he had taken it upon himself to break her heart rather than admit how he truly felt about her and how he would never again get to see her due to the way the war had taken a turn for the worst as far as he had been concerned.
His cold and cruel words to her continued to ring in his ears as the rain beat down on him.
Unbeknownst to the preoccupied boy, another thirteen year old wizard had escaped the confines of Hogwarts castle and followed close behind him in a bid to understand the strange goings on that pertained to the rather solitary wizard.
As if sensing the intrusion, the green eyed boy drew his wand not in the mood to deal with anyone outside of the need for brute force as he became rather defensive of the deceased woman's grave site.
"Come out...spying isn't your strong suite..." he growled tightening his grip on his wand.
Realizing that he'd been caught, Scorpius Malfoy made himself known to the defensive fellow Slytherin boy known as Albus Severus Potter.
"No need to do anything rash, Severus..." he said raising his hands in the air to illustrate that he meant no harm. "I was simply curious as to why you'd venture to such a place."
"You should not be here." growled Albus Severus narrowing his emerald eyes at his apparent best friend.
"Neither should you, all things considered." replied Scorpius. "Yet here we are...in a muggle cemetery...at the grave of a muggle woman might I add."
"Leave." warned Albus Severus in a rather dangerous tone. "I do not wish for company."
"Sev...tell me what's going on." said Scorpius concerned. "You've been acting stranger by the minute...I don't understand why you had to break out of school to come all the way to this place..."
"STUPEFY!" shouted Albus Severus knocking the unsuspecting Malfoy wizard out cold.
Scorpius Malfoy collapsed onto the ground as rain continued to pelt the small muggle town soaking his face and robes in the process.
"You're getting to be as nosy as Draco." replied Albus Severus before turning his attention back to the grave of Elaine Prince. "Our boys are lost...and it is my doing...I may not have been able to keep my promises to you before but I will not fail in this...I will find a way to reach them."
Touching the stone one last time, the now tearful young wizard made his peace with the death of the woman from his past, the woman whom had been his wife and the mother of his twin sons Regulus and Lucius named for his two very best friends from his youth.
Albus Severus Potter carefully lifted the unconscious son of his former godson Draco Malfoy off the hard wet ground and carried him back to Hogwarts Castle.