Well another chapter crawls from the woodwork! Thank you very much to
Kbear, Tegan and RADKA for their lovely reviews and to Laura Beth for beta
reading. You are all wonderful people!
Unlike the people you are just about to read about.
Chapter 21 - Dreams and Nightmares
Snape got very drunk the night after the accident. He sat in his chair and drank glass after glass of brandy. When the bottle was finished he didn't feel humiliation or embarrassment or shame. He felt pleasantly numb and cosseted in some nice spinning, fluffy world.
Unfortunately that world soon took a dark turn and he spent two hours chucking up everything he had drunk earlier. Shivering on the bathroom floor he was all too aware of the humiliation, embarrassment and shame the accident had caused. He also became aware that green and silver make a nice pattern for bathroom tile, but not when they're spinning.
The only plus side he could find in the next few days was that spending the night being sick meant he didn't have a headache in the morning.
Friday came around again. And he had to see Faith because Blackthorn thought he had found a candidate for their coup d'etat. It was all very exciting. Faith was insisting on having this meeting in her rooms, and he had decided to get there early. If avoiding her was an option then he would have just done that, but they were going to be forced together till Christmas at least, and some sort of apology had to be made.
That really grated. He hated apologising. Apologising went against his whole upbringing, ethos and world view, but she had possibly had the glimmerings of a point when she stormed out. Saying thank you for helping before commenting on the shirt probably would have been more polite. Although he was really annoyed about that shirt.
He was annoyed about the whole situation though. He didn't make mistakes like that! Exploding cauldrons did not happen to him! It was like the time he'd got a C in transfiguration. He'd just stared at the paper in disbelief, things like this did not happen to him.
To make it worse he still wasn't entirely sure what happened.
And it had to be Faith who saw it. He hated being attracted to her. Hated the dreams, the desire, hated the longing. It wouldn't be quite so bad if he'd developed these feelings for someone else, but Faith just. She couldn't be dominated, she couldn't be crushed, she couldn't be controlled. Well he didn't think so anyway. And she knew he was a vulnerable human being, that was the worst bit.
As he dried his hair before going to her rooms he remembered just why she knew he was vulnerable.
Faith had been a strange student. She had been cold and quiet, and had had most of the school scared of her by the time she left. Although oddly she had been sort of friends with a few of the Slytherins. The chilly numbness that surrounded her had worried the staff, but none, apart from him, had realised just how terrible she felt.
He had been much more unstable then. The crippling bouts of guilt and depression were longer, more frequent and more intense. Voldemort had been gone seven years, but he had carried the pain and memories round inside him like a knife being twisted in his heart. He probably wouldn't have been able to survive in the outside world.
The Summer term of Faith's second and final year of Hogwarts had been coming to a close, she was seventeen years old and Dumbledore was still vainly hoping her father would allow her to remain there for the last year to finish her education. But Snape didn't really care, he was going through an acute period of depression and Faith Llewllyn was of very little consequence to him.
He had found a hiding place from it all though. A room on top of a deserted and probably creaking tower. It had probably been beautiful once, torn silk drapes hung from the walls and ornate but broken furniture was still in place. The windows had been smashed in at some point leaving everything was stained and discoloured. He felt at home there.
One night he had walked up and been astonished to find Faith up there. He had felt worse then than he could remember feeling for a long time, he was never sure afterwards whether he'd been going up there to fling himself from the broken window frames, but he couldn't say he definitely wouldn't have done.
But she had been there. He'd called her name out in surprise and she had turned round. Her face had been horrible. And he'd realised that if he had come a few seconds later she'd probably have jumped. It was the first time in years he'd looked into someone's eyes and felt like he was looking into a mirror.
Someone felt the same as him. He had been stunned. For what may have been minutes, or may have been hours, they had stared at each other, each thinking the same, "Someone else knows, someone else feels, I'm not alone." They had edged closer to each other and then somehow the words came out, pain, fear, numbness, loneliness.. He forgot she was a student, forgot everything apart from the fact that he wasn't alone any more, that someone else understood the ache in his chest that would never, ever leave. Someone else who had come back through hell and wished they hadn't managed to.
He wasn't sure exactly how they ended up sitting on the sofa, their hands clinging together and the rain sleeting across their faces. He wasn't sure who it was that lent forward first in some desperate attempt to feel something, anything. The one thing he was sure of was the feel of her breath on his cheek had made him realise this was real, it was actually happening, and she was a student and he was supposed to be a teacher, in a position of trust. He pulled away and stood up, suddenly panicking and feeling sick. Her eyes had shut down, the mask falling over her face again, and she had walked past him out of the room. Then he had heard her feet clattering on stone as she raced down the stairs.
He jabbed his finger with a pin on his cloak and came abruptly back to the present. There had been no follow up. She hadn't returned next year and he had been both relieved and sad. He watched the blood well up in the pinprick and groaned. She knew just how vulnerable he was, one moment years ago proved he had feelings. For all he desired her he hated her for this.
And now he had to go and see her.
**************************************
"I apologise for not being properly receptive of your attentions the other day. It was inconsiderate, although I believe fairly understandable considering I was in some shock."
He breathed out, fairly painless.
She stared up at him incredulously for a moment then opened the door to allow him to come in.
He glanced round the messy room. It looked reluctantly homely, a room someone expected to be temporary and has got stuck with for longer than they wanted. There were overflowing boxes in the corners and the books on the bookshelf looked like they had been flung on at random.
He heard the door click shut and then she spoke.
"I'm sorry too. For shouting, it was as you said, the situation. Very stressful."
An apology almost as frosty as his, impressive!
"Would you like a glass of wine?"
"Yes, please."
She moved over to a the drinks cabinet and he heard clinking bottles and glasses as he stood by the window. It was a huge bay window that was filled with the evening Sun. There was an absolutely fantastic view of the forest, he could see the trees were beginning to turn copper and orange. He'd like a view like this, but had to stay with his Slytherins. He looked down and realised in surprise it looked out over the garden he worked in.
"Wine's on the table, I'll just clear out the chair."
He took a moment to realise what she meant. But one of the chairs by the fireplace was covered in newspapers, books and clothes. She shrugged at him as she chucked them onto the sofa.
He sat down opposite her and an awkward silence fell over them. He looked into the wine, the fireplace, out of the window... Anything to avoid looking at her, but his eyes were inevitably dragged back towards her. She was wearing those bloody jeans again and a grey polo neck jumper that made her face look surprisingly small and elfin. He realised she was looking at him quizzically and he searched for something, anything, to attract her attention.
"You play the violin?" There was a violin case propped up against the sofa.
He realised instantly he had picked the wrong topic. Her face quite literally lit up, a glow seemed to spread through it as she reached for the case. The years seemed to fall away.
"Yes, since I was eight. I'm quite good now."
He attempted to put her down, to wipe that irritating, stupid, beautiful smile off her face.
"It takes years to learn the violin. It seems pointless."
"Pointless? Making music?"
The wrong tactic again. Her eyes were mischievous suddenly, sparkling like he'd never seen them do before.
"We shall see."
And before he could protest she began to play. And her playing took away his ability to protest.
She played with her heart he realised. Her eyes were closed and the instrument seemed to meld into her, to become part of her. It was outrageously sexual the way she cradled and tended to it. The music was simply gorgeous. A very simple piece that was dignified and heartbreakingly beautiful. She seemed to be able to make a piece of wood sing of pain, love, loss and happiness in a way mere words could never begin to explain. It was all there in the music pouring out of her.
He could have sat there forever. The setting Sun was behind her and shadowed parts of her face, but lit her hair so it seemed to have gold strands running through it. She seemed so young now, so light, and it was impossible to believe she was the same person as the acid tongued bitch who stalked the castle. She went through all the variations of the piece and he just drank in the sight and the sound. It would physically hurt if it ended and yet surely she couldn't sustain this?
One of his weakness was beauty. Beauty like this, in art, literature, music. And the music set about knocking down the walls so painstakingly constructed round his heart.
Eventually she finished. The music trailed and she languidly opened her eyes.
"Pointless, Severus?"
He could only shake his head.
"I think that piece of music is one of the most beautiful ever written. It's Pachebel's Cannon. Terribly unromantic name for a piece I can't begin to do justice to."
"You do."
"I do what?"
"Do it justice."
She seemed too surprised to respond to the compliment and practically leapt up to answer the door when Blackthorn knocked on it.
He desperately tried to use the meeting to distract himself from her, from everything she brought about. Bloody mysterious violinists! But the possible annihilation of the world seemed insignificant when placed next to whatever the hell it was he was feeling. He kept glancing up at her, in some small way to check she was real or to see if that frustrating mask would crack again so he could see the glimpse of the girl who had played the violin. That didn't happen.
But Blackthorn's news was good. There was a fairly young and very popular Ministry Elect member who had been going around, telling anyone who would listen of the necessity for immediate change. He seemed perfect, and it was agreed that Snape should arrange a meeting with him to sound him out. If he hadn't been distracted by the way Faith had been playing with her wine glass he would probably have protested more about this.
When Blackthorn left he used her pictures of violent sea storms as an excuse to stay for awhile longer, lingering by them and feigning reluctance when she pushed another glass of wine into his hands.
"How are you by the way? After the accident?"
Oh the bitch just had to bring that up!
"Fine." He said frostily and turned his back on her.
"I was only asking!"
"I know."
"Oh I won't even bother trying to nice you in future. It's really petty to be upset by it anyway, accidents happen to everyone."
"What do you mean?" He spun round and glared at her, "It wasn't my fault."
She looked at him in disgust and kicked at a chair leg.
"Well it certainly wasn't mine."
"It wouldn't have happened if you hadn't been there."
"Oh really? Why do I have trouble believing that? You made a mistake, deal with it!"
"You were a distraction."
"How the hell was I distracting!"
"Just by being there! By annoying and interrupting me, just by being there!"
"That's pathetic! I know for a fact other staff members must go and see you!"
"Yes but they aren't you!"
He realised instantly he shouldn't of said that. They had somehow ended up standing very close to each other, he could see her chest rising and falling and the angry flush in her cheeks. But her eyes had suddenly seemed baffled by what he said and she frowned at him in confusion.
He turned to stalk out of the room before she could say anything, but hit his knee on the table. As he did so he glanced down and saw today's paper.
The headline yelled ONE MONTH ON!!! Below it was a picture of Graham and Tempest Lestrange. He just stared. They had died a month ago today. A month ago today.
He heard Faith's voice speaking softly over her shoulder.
"You knew them didn't you?"
He just nodded. Tempest's picture was laughing, Graham's utterly blank, he looked like a broken man. A few hours later they had been locked in Azkaban.
"Would you like to take it?" Faith moved round him and carefully lifted up the paper and held it out to him. He took it equally carefully and folded it away in his robes. He felt the weight of the paper, or maybe the weight of the words, hit something else in his pocket. His fingers closed on the small bottle of calming potion he had brought for Faith's nightmares.
He took it out and held it out to her. She smiled softly and lifted it from his hand, her fingers wrapped round his for a few seconds, the only tiny bit of comfort she could afford to give and he could afford to take.
"Thank you."
He nodded and walked silently out of her rooms.
Once back in his own he sat down at the table in his bedroom and folded out the paper. The ink stained his fingers, but he couldn't bear to wash it off. He read the article very, very slowly.
It was really dedicated to slating the ministry for not having killed more Death Eaters, but it was the last bit that grabbed him by the throat.
They hadn't been buried. They were still in the morgue. The policy for Death Eaters bodies was an unmarked grave in a secret location. But Tempest had been a member of the Neros, one of the Eight Families. Antony Nero, the Head of the family was demanding that they were buried in the family plot in Westminster. When they were asked why they wanted two serial killers to be so publicly associated with the family, Antony had replied that there were no moral absolutes and it was not for him to call judgement on anyone, including serial killers. Family, however, was family.
Snape couldn't believe they weren't buried! That there really weren't maggots and worms crawling through there flesh, they were still relatively uncorrupted!
He smiled as he opened the secret compartment in his floor and placed the paper inside. He hesitated for a minute, but then he pulled out a photograph lying carelessly amongst the rest of the debris of his life.
Graham and Tempest on their wedding day. Tempest wearing robes of gold silk, her hair bound up in gold net. She was smiling, laughing wildly and clinging to her new husband's arm. Graham was smiling more softly, but there was no disguising the leaping joy and pride in his eyes. He was swathed in navy blue velvet and had earrings with sapphire drops.
Tempest had dared him to get his ears pierced.
Snape stroked their faces for a moment before letting the photograph fall. The best friend's he ever had. He'd betrayed them and condemned them, but had never ever stopped missing them.
He knew he never would.
He let the lid of the compartment fall shut, and tried not to notice the candle light flickering on the silver mask. He kicked the rug over the stone, another layer of protection against the past.
***************************************************
It felt the same way the other dreams had. A slow dawning of consciousness, but being very aware it was still a dream. He was gently pulled out of his bed and turned around a few times. Then he was marched straight through the walls to the Slytherin common room. As he drifted through the dormitories he saw moonlight glinting on skin and hair, but he didn't dare look at the faces in the beds.
The gentle, but insistent tug dragged him into the Common room. He stumbled slightly on a chair leg and looked up.
The ghost of Tempest Lestrange sat in one of the armchairs. The room was lit by candlelight, but she hovered like a cold stain in the light. She froze the warmth in the room.
He wasn't surprised to see her. He was more surprised she wasn't being burnt, and that maggots weren't pouring out of her mouth.
She flicked her wrist towards the chair opposite hers.
"Sit down Severus."
He did so. She leant back in her chair, and he could see the curling ivy pattern flickering behind her.
"I've dreamed of you before."
She shook her head. "This isn't exactly a dream."
"Oh?"
"Ghosts, which I am, can enter people's minds. However it is generally considered very bad form and is virtually never attempted." She smiled "This doesn't bother me very much.
"Your psyche provides the place, a context you can both connect with, in this instance the Slytherin common room.
"Severus, you are going to conduct this conversation exactly as you would if you were awake, and you will remember it perfectly."
"I'm not sure that's reassuring."
She rolled her eyes at him and said acidly,
"It wasn't supposed to be."
"Can I leave?"
"When I let you."
"Oh. Good."
"Sill the same sarcastic bastard you always were."
There was a pause and he looked up at her. It was strange, and horrible. He had last seen her when she was 23, but here she was, frozen at the age of 39. She was changed, terribly changed. Even assuming that being a ghost did nothing for a person's complexion, she looked drawn and hollow. She used to have a figure that the word voluptuous could have been invented for. But now her flesh looked like it was hanging off her bones, her heavy lidded eyes were sunken into her face and the Death Eater robes hung off her body.
She met his eyes and said softly,
"Fourteen years in Azkaban can change a person."
He nodded stiffly.
She smiled and said,
"You've changed too. You used to be attractive."
"There are many kinds of dementor."
Her eyes narrowed and she gazed round the common room.
"Still looks the same."
"Yes."
"Oh the memories Sevvie, oh the memories."
He bit down the urge to tell her not to call him that pathetic nickname, and watched her drift up and wander over to the fire place.
"Particular memories of here." Her foot scraped the rug.
"Don't."
"Oh dear Severus, I'm sure he didn't mind all that much. He rather seemed to be enjoying it." She shrugged. "You certainly were at any rate."
"How did you know I was thinking of that?"
"This is your head, I can sense things."
He shifted and asked, "Why are you here Tempest?"
She sighed and floated back down.
"Because I'm bored. And you are the only one of us left who is worth visiting."
"Really?"
"Oh indeed. I mean Paris Wilkes is dead, as is Evan Rosier." She stared at him for a moment, but he didn't flinch. "There is of course Avery, but, well quite the honestly the little worm is as exasperatingly sycophantic as ever!"
She stared back at the hearth rug for a moment and then spat out,
"Why couldn't you have betrayed that little wretch properly?"
Snape was stuck for a minute and muttered out,
"I did my best."
"The little rat went to the Ministry only hours after our Lord fell! Hours!"
"I know. I can still remember the day he joined us, I was so angry at Voldemort for letting him in."
"Us? You still think in terms of us?" Her voice was a like a whip crack and he froze.
"You betrayed us. All of us. You helped destroy our Lord, and you still think in terms of us?"
He didn't reply. She smiled and glided up to him, he could feel the coldness pouring off her, and he could feel the jagged ice running through the veins to his heart.
"You set up Rosier and Wilkes didn't you?"
"Yes."
"To die?"
"Yes. Or be captured. Preferably captured, probably, I don't know."
"Did you feel guilty?"
"No. I was beyond guilt. I felt very little of anything."
She stared at him and her expression slowly seemed to soften, then she moved away from him and floated round the room, looking at curtains, books, chairs. Snape closed his eyes, hoping that he would wake up if he tried hard enough.
He heard her sigh softly and looked up at her again. Her face was hidden by a curtain of grey hair. He realised someone was missing.
"Where's Graham?"
"Graham isn't a ghost."
He couldn't think of anything to say to that. It was impossible to think of Tempest without Graham. They had been linked, connected. The magic created by the moment they joined on their wedding day had created such light and power that all the doors and windows in the hall had been blown to smithereens. He could remember the music in the air.
She winced as though he had hit her and whispered,
"Please don't think of that."
"Sorry."
"I died before he did," her voice seemed to come from a long way away. "And my last thought was that I couldn't leave him. I wanted to stay with him so much I returned.
"But you see he saw me die. So he thought he would be going to join me. Which means he's wherever he is, and I'm still here."
He felt some desperate urge to console her, but said nothing.
"I can't find any love in your head."
"I've never been in love."
"You've never lived."
"Oh I did. I lived between the ages of seventeen and twenty two. I lived so much I wanted to die."
She spun round in a fury,
"Don't! Don't say that! No one should choose death, no one! If you knew, oh Gods if you knew."
"You should give counselling sessions to people with a morbid fear of dying."
She didn't seem to have heard him.
"You don't feel blood. You don't feel it when it's pumping around inside you. But when it stops. Don't wish for this Severus."
"Why aren't you angrier with me."
"What? Oh I am. But you see being dead gives you perspective."
She shrugged and a smile that could almost have belonged to the girl he once knew flashed across her face.
"And anyway you could easily live another hundred years. I have a lot time for you Severus, a lot of time."
She walked to the door and stopped.
"You'll remember all this. As I said, its not exactly a dream, because of this I thought I would give you some homework. Something fun to dwell on.
"You say you are beyond guilt. I say you're not. The curling twists of your mind are riddled with it. So, for next time I come, want you to have relived the first time you tasted blood.
"Nighty night Severus."
Unlike the people you are just about to read about.
Chapter 21 - Dreams and Nightmares
Snape got very drunk the night after the accident. He sat in his chair and drank glass after glass of brandy. When the bottle was finished he didn't feel humiliation or embarrassment or shame. He felt pleasantly numb and cosseted in some nice spinning, fluffy world.
Unfortunately that world soon took a dark turn and he spent two hours chucking up everything he had drunk earlier. Shivering on the bathroom floor he was all too aware of the humiliation, embarrassment and shame the accident had caused. He also became aware that green and silver make a nice pattern for bathroom tile, but not when they're spinning.
The only plus side he could find in the next few days was that spending the night being sick meant he didn't have a headache in the morning.
Friday came around again. And he had to see Faith because Blackthorn thought he had found a candidate for their coup d'etat. It was all very exciting. Faith was insisting on having this meeting in her rooms, and he had decided to get there early. If avoiding her was an option then he would have just done that, but they were going to be forced together till Christmas at least, and some sort of apology had to be made.
That really grated. He hated apologising. Apologising went against his whole upbringing, ethos and world view, but she had possibly had the glimmerings of a point when she stormed out. Saying thank you for helping before commenting on the shirt probably would have been more polite. Although he was really annoyed about that shirt.
He was annoyed about the whole situation though. He didn't make mistakes like that! Exploding cauldrons did not happen to him! It was like the time he'd got a C in transfiguration. He'd just stared at the paper in disbelief, things like this did not happen to him.
To make it worse he still wasn't entirely sure what happened.
And it had to be Faith who saw it. He hated being attracted to her. Hated the dreams, the desire, hated the longing. It wouldn't be quite so bad if he'd developed these feelings for someone else, but Faith just. She couldn't be dominated, she couldn't be crushed, she couldn't be controlled. Well he didn't think so anyway. And she knew he was a vulnerable human being, that was the worst bit.
As he dried his hair before going to her rooms he remembered just why she knew he was vulnerable.
Faith had been a strange student. She had been cold and quiet, and had had most of the school scared of her by the time she left. Although oddly she had been sort of friends with a few of the Slytherins. The chilly numbness that surrounded her had worried the staff, but none, apart from him, had realised just how terrible she felt.
He had been much more unstable then. The crippling bouts of guilt and depression were longer, more frequent and more intense. Voldemort had been gone seven years, but he had carried the pain and memories round inside him like a knife being twisted in his heart. He probably wouldn't have been able to survive in the outside world.
The Summer term of Faith's second and final year of Hogwarts had been coming to a close, she was seventeen years old and Dumbledore was still vainly hoping her father would allow her to remain there for the last year to finish her education. But Snape didn't really care, he was going through an acute period of depression and Faith Llewllyn was of very little consequence to him.
He had found a hiding place from it all though. A room on top of a deserted and probably creaking tower. It had probably been beautiful once, torn silk drapes hung from the walls and ornate but broken furniture was still in place. The windows had been smashed in at some point leaving everything was stained and discoloured. He felt at home there.
One night he had walked up and been astonished to find Faith up there. He had felt worse then than he could remember feeling for a long time, he was never sure afterwards whether he'd been going up there to fling himself from the broken window frames, but he couldn't say he definitely wouldn't have done.
But she had been there. He'd called her name out in surprise and she had turned round. Her face had been horrible. And he'd realised that if he had come a few seconds later she'd probably have jumped. It was the first time in years he'd looked into someone's eyes and felt like he was looking into a mirror.
Someone felt the same as him. He had been stunned. For what may have been minutes, or may have been hours, they had stared at each other, each thinking the same, "Someone else knows, someone else feels, I'm not alone." They had edged closer to each other and then somehow the words came out, pain, fear, numbness, loneliness.. He forgot she was a student, forgot everything apart from the fact that he wasn't alone any more, that someone else understood the ache in his chest that would never, ever leave. Someone else who had come back through hell and wished they hadn't managed to.
He wasn't sure exactly how they ended up sitting on the sofa, their hands clinging together and the rain sleeting across their faces. He wasn't sure who it was that lent forward first in some desperate attempt to feel something, anything. The one thing he was sure of was the feel of her breath on his cheek had made him realise this was real, it was actually happening, and she was a student and he was supposed to be a teacher, in a position of trust. He pulled away and stood up, suddenly panicking and feeling sick. Her eyes had shut down, the mask falling over her face again, and she had walked past him out of the room. Then he had heard her feet clattering on stone as she raced down the stairs.
He jabbed his finger with a pin on his cloak and came abruptly back to the present. There had been no follow up. She hadn't returned next year and he had been both relieved and sad. He watched the blood well up in the pinprick and groaned. She knew just how vulnerable he was, one moment years ago proved he had feelings. For all he desired her he hated her for this.
And now he had to go and see her.
**************************************
"I apologise for not being properly receptive of your attentions the other day. It was inconsiderate, although I believe fairly understandable considering I was in some shock."
He breathed out, fairly painless.
She stared up at him incredulously for a moment then opened the door to allow him to come in.
He glanced round the messy room. It looked reluctantly homely, a room someone expected to be temporary and has got stuck with for longer than they wanted. There were overflowing boxes in the corners and the books on the bookshelf looked like they had been flung on at random.
He heard the door click shut and then she spoke.
"I'm sorry too. For shouting, it was as you said, the situation. Very stressful."
An apology almost as frosty as his, impressive!
"Would you like a glass of wine?"
"Yes, please."
She moved over to a the drinks cabinet and he heard clinking bottles and glasses as he stood by the window. It was a huge bay window that was filled with the evening Sun. There was an absolutely fantastic view of the forest, he could see the trees were beginning to turn copper and orange. He'd like a view like this, but had to stay with his Slytherins. He looked down and realised in surprise it looked out over the garden he worked in.
"Wine's on the table, I'll just clear out the chair."
He took a moment to realise what she meant. But one of the chairs by the fireplace was covered in newspapers, books and clothes. She shrugged at him as she chucked them onto the sofa.
He sat down opposite her and an awkward silence fell over them. He looked into the wine, the fireplace, out of the window... Anything to avoid looking at her, but his eyes were inevitably dragged back towards her. She was wearing those bloody jeans again and a grey polo neck jumper that made her face look surprisingly small and elfin. He realised she was looking at him quizzically and he searched for something, anything, to attract her attention.
"You play the violin?" There was a violin case propped up against the sofa.
He realised instantly he had picked the wrong topic. Her face quite literally lit up, a glow seemed to spread through it as she reached for the case. The years seemed to fall away.
"Yes, since I was eight. I'm quite good now."
He attempted to put her down, to wipe that irritating, stupid, beautiful smile off her face.
"It takes years to learn the violin. It seems pointless."
"Pointless? Making music?"
The wrong tactic again. Her eyes were mischievous suddenly, sparkling like he'd never seen them do before.
"We shall see."
And before he could protest she began to play. And her playing took away his ability to protest.
She played with her heart he realised. Her eyes were closed and the instrument seemed to meld into her, to become part of her. It was outrageously sexual the way she cradled and tended to it. The music was simply gorgeous. A very simple piece that was dignified and heartbreakingly beautiful. She seemed to be able to make a piece of wood sing of pain, love, loss and happiness in a way mere words could never begin to explain. It was all there in the music pouring out of her.
He could have sat there forever. The setting Sun was behind her and shadowed parts of her face, but lit her hair so it seemed to have gold strands running through it. She seemed so young now, so light, and it was impossible to believe she was the same person as the acid tongued bitch who stalked the castle. She went through all the variations of the piece and he just drank in the sight and the sound. It would physically hurt if it ended and yet surely she couldn't sustain this?
One of his weakness was beauty. Beauty like this, in art, literature, music. And the music set about knocking down the walls so painstakingly constructed round his heart.
Eventually she finished. The music trailed and she languidly opened her eyes.
"Pointless, Severus?"
He could only shake his head.
"I think that piece of music is one of the most beautiful ever written. It's Pachebel's Cannon. Terribly unromantic name for a piece I can't begin to do justice to."
"You do."
"I do what?"
"Do it justice."
She seemed too surprised to respond to the compliment and practically leapt up to answer the door when Blackthorn knocked on it.
He desperately tried to use the meeting to distract himself from her, from everything she brought about. Bloody mysterious violinists! But the possible annihilation of the world seemed insignificant when placed next to whatever the hell it was he was feeling. He kept glancing up at her, in some small way to check she was real or to see if that frustrating mask would crack again so he could see the glimpse of the girl who had played the violin. That didn't happen.
But Blackthorn's news was good. There was a fairly young and very popular Ministry Elect member who had been going around, telling anyone who would listen of the necessity for immediate change. He seemed perfect, and it was agreed that Snape should arrange a meeting with him to sound him out. If he hadn't been distracted by the way Faith had been playing with her wine glass he would probably have protested more about this.
When Blackthorn left he used her pictures of violent sea storms as an excuse to stay for awhile longer, lingering by them and feigning reluctance when she pushed another glass of wine into his hands.
"How are you by the way? After the accident?"
Oh the bitch just had to bring that up!
"Fine." He said frostily and turned his back on her.
"I was only asking!"
"I know."
"Oh I won't even bother trying to nice you in future. It's really petty to be upset by it anyway, accidents happen to everyone."
"What do you mean?" He spun round and glared at her, "It wasn't my fault."
She looked at him in disgust and kicked at a chair leg.
"Well it certainly wasn't mine."
"It wouldn't have happened if you hadn't been there."
"Oh really? Why do I have trouble believing that? You made a mistake, deal with it!"
"You were a distraction."
"How the hell was I distracting!"
"Just by being there! By annoying and interrupting me, just by being there!"
"That's pathetic! I know for a fact other staff members must go and see you!"
"Yes but they aren't you!"
He realised instantly he shouldn't of said that. They had somehow ended up standing very close to each other, he could see her chest rising and falling and the angry flush in her cheeks. But her eyes had suddenly seemed baffled by what he said and she frowned at him in confusion.
He turned to stalk out of the room before she could say anything, but hit his knee on the table. As he did so he glanced down and saw today's paper.
The headline yelled ONE MONTH ON!!! Below it was a picture of Graham and Tempest Lestrange. He just stared. They had died a month ago today. A month ago today.
He heard Faith's voice speaking softly over her shoulder.
"You knew them didn't you?"
He just nodded. Tempest's picture was laughing, Graham's utterly blank, he looked like a broken man. A few hours later they had been locked in Azkaban.
"Would you like to take it?" Faith moved round him and carefully lifted up the paper and held it out to him. He took it equally carefully and folded it away in his robes. He felt the weight of the paper, or maybe the weight of the words, hit something else in his pocket. His fingers closed on the small bottle of calming potion he had brought for Faith's nightmares.
He took it out and held it out to her. She smiled softly and lifted it from his hand, her fingers wrapped round his for a few seconds, the only tiny bit of comfort she could afford to give and he could afford to take.
"Thank you."
He nodded and walked silently out of her rooms.
Once back in his own he sat down at the table in his bedroom and folded out the paper. The ink stained his fingers, but he couldn't bear to wash it off. He read the article very, very slowly.
It was really dedicated to slating the ministry for not having killed more Death Eaters, but it was the last bit that grabbed him by the throat.
They hadn't been buried. They were still in the morgue. The policy for Death Eaters bodies was an unmarked grave in a secret location. But Tempest had been a member of the Neros, one of the Eight Families. Antony Nero, the Head of the family was demanding that they were buried in the family plot in Westminster. When they were asked why they wanted two serial killers to be so publicly associated with the family, Antony had replied that there were no moral absolutes and it was not for him to call judgement on anyone, including serial killers. Family, however, was family.
Snape couldn't believe they weren't buried! That there really weren't maggots and worms crawling through there flesh, they were still relatively uncorrupted!
He smiled as he opened the secret compartment in his floor and placed the paper inside. He hesitated for a minute, but then he pulled out a photograph lying carelessly amongst the rest of the debris of his life.
Graham and Tempest on their wedding day. Tempest wearing robes of gold silk, her hair bound up in gold net. She was smiling, laughing wildly and clinging to her new husband's arm. Graham was smiling more softly, but there was no disguising the leaping joy and pride in his eyes. He was swathed in navy blue velvet and had earrings with sapphire drops.
Tempest had dared him to get his ears pierced.
Snape stroked their faces for a moment before letting the photograph fall. The best friend's he ever had. He'd betrayed them and condemned them, but had never ever stopped missing them.
He knew he never would.
He let the lid of the compartment fall shut, and tried not to notice the candle light flickering on the silver mask. He kicked the rug over the stone, another layer of protection against the past.
***************************************************
It felt the same way the other dreams had. A slow dawning of consciousness, but being very aware it was still a dream. He was gently pulled out of his bed and turned around a few times. Then he was marched straight through the walls to the Slytherin common room. As he drifted through the dormitories he saw moonlight glinting on skin and hair, but he didn't dare look at the faces in the beds.
The gentle, but insistent tug dragged him into the Common room. He stumbled slightly on a chair leg and looked up.
The ghost of Tempest Lestrange sat in one of the armchairs. The room was lit by candlelight, but she hovered like a cold stain in the light. She froze the warmth in the room.
He wasn't surprised to see her. He was more surprised she wasn't being burnt, and that maggots weren't pouring out of her mouth.
She flicked her wrist towards the chair opposite hers.
"Sit down Severus."
He did so. She leant back in her chair, and he could see the curling ivy pattern flickering behind her.
"I've dreamed of you before."
She shook her head. "This isn't exactly a dream."
"Oh?"
"Ghosts, which I am, can enter people's minds. However it is generally considered very bad form and is virtually never attempted." She smiled "This doesn't bother me very much.
"Your psyche provides the place, a context you can both connect with, in this instance the Slytherin common room.
"Severus, you are going to conduct this conversation exactly as you would if you were awake, and you will remember it perfectly."
"I'm not sure that's reassuring."
She rolled her eyes at him and said acidly,
"It wasn't supposed to be."
"Can I leave?"
"When I let you."
"Oh. Good."
"Sill the same sarcastic bastard you always were."
There was a pause and he looked up at her. It was strange, and horrible. He had last seen her when she was 23, but here she was, frozen at the age of 39. She was changed, terribly changed. Even assuming that being a ghost did nothing for a person's complexion, she looked drawn and hollow. She used to have a figure that the word voluptuous could have been invented for. But now her flesh looked like it was hanging off her bones, her heavy lidded eyes were sunken into her face and the Death Eater robes hung off her body.
She met his eyes and said softly,
"Fourteen years in Azkaban can change a person."
He nodded stiffly.
She smiled and said,
"You've changed too. You used to be attractive."
"There are many kinds of dementor."
Her eyes narrowed and she gazed round the common room.
"Still looks the same."
"Yes."
"Oh the memories Sevvie, oh the memories."
He bit down the urge to tell her not to call him that pathetic nickname, and watched her drift up and wander over to the fire place.
"Particular memories of here." Her foot scraped the rug.
"Don't."
"Oh dear Severus, I'm sure he didn't mind all that much. He rather seemed to be enjoying it." She shrugged. "You certainly were at any rate."
"How did you know I was thinking of that?"
"This is your head, I can sense things."
He shifted and asked, "Why are you here Tempest?"
She sighed and floated back down.
"Because I'm bored. And you are the only one of us left who is worth visiting."
"Really?"
"Oh indeed. I mean Paris Wilkes is dead, as is Evan Rosier." She stared at him for a moment, but he didn't flinch. "There is of course Avery, but, well quite the honestly the little worm is as exasperatingly sycophantic as ever!"
She stared back at the hearth rug for a moment and then spat out,
"Why couldn't you have betrayed that little wretch properly?"
Snape was stuck for a minute and muttered out,
"I did my best."
"The little rat went to the Ministry only hours after our Lord fell! Hours!"
"I know. I can still remember the day he joined us, I was so angry at Voldemort for letting him in."
"Us? You still think in terms of us?" Her voice was a like a whip crack and he froze.
"You betrayed us. All of us. You helped destroy our Lord, and you still think in terms of us?"
He didn't reply. She smiled and glided up to him, he could feel the coldness pouring off her, and he could feel the jagged ice running through the veins to his heart.
"You set up Rosier and Wilkes didn't you?"
"Yes."
"To die?"
"Yes. Or be captured. Preferably captured, probably, I don't know."
"Did you feel guilty?"
"No. I was beyond guilt. I felt very little of anything."
She stared at him and her expression slowly seemed to soften, then she moved away from him and floated round the room, looking at curtains, books, chairs. Snape closed his eyes, hoping that he would wake up if he tried hard enough.
He heard her sigh softly and looked up at her again. Her face was hidden by a curtain of grey hair. He realised someone was missing.
"Where's Graham?"
"Graham isn't a ghost."
He couldn't think of anything to say to that. It was impossible to think of Tempest without Graham. They had been linked, connected. The magic created by the moment they joined on their wedding day had created such light and power that all the doors and windows in the hall had been blown to smithereens. He could remember the music in the air.
She winced as though he had hit her and whispered,
"Please don't think of that."
"Sorry."
"I died before he did," her voice seemed to come from a long way away. "And my last thought was that I couldn't leave him. I wanted to stay with him so much I returned.
"But you see he saw me die. So he thought he would be going to join me. Which means he's wherever he is, and I'm still here."
He felt some desperate urge to console her, but said nothing.
"I can't find any love in your head."
"I've never been in love."
"You've never lived."
"Oh I did. I lived between the ages of seventeen and twenty two. I lived so much I wanted to die."
She spun round in a fury,
"Don't! Don't say that! No one should choose death, no one! If you knew, oh Gods if you knew."
"You should give counselling sessions to people with a morbid fear of dying."
She didn't seem to have heard him.
"You don't feel blood. You don't feel it when it's pumping around inside you. But when it stops. Don't wish for this Severus."
"Why aren't you angrier with me."
"What? Oh I am. But you see being dead gives you perspective."
She shrugged and a smile that could almost have belonged to the girl he once knew flashed across her face.
"And anyway you could easily live another hundred years. I have a lot time for you Severus, a lot of time."
She walked to the door and stopped.
"You'll remember all this. As I said, its not exactly a dream, because of this I thought I would give you some homework. Something fun to dwell on.
"You say you are beyond guilt. I say you're not. The curling twists of your mind are riddled with it. So, for next time I come, want you to have relived the first time you tasted blood.
"Nighty night Severus."