He entered the dark hallway, dressed in a set of presentable robes. Lyle
met him, his face looking even grimmer outside of the firelight.
"Thank you for coming." He said, before motioning him to follow.
The halls seemed to loom with their minimal lighting, intended to subdue the guilty with fear. They were mildly disturbing even to him.
He was lead down to the celled section where the inmates and suspects were kept.
Suddenly, Lyle's back tensed in anger.
"Get those awful things away from her." Lyle yelled at some lower ranking officer.
Five dementor-shaped shadows quickly fled the scene. Albus hid the shudder that went down his spine at the sight of them as best he could. Lyle had thrown open the cell door, to crouch beside the figure curled up on the floor.
He followed after Lyle, eventually taking the weakly struggling Severus from his arms. There was hurt on Lyle's face at her reaction to him.
"Severus." He called softly, running fingers over sweaty hair. Her eyes were glazed, as if she were hallucinating.
"Gngh." she moaned, and fell back limply into her arms. Her lips were tinged green with some digestible sedative, perhaps the only reason she hadn't been shrieking with five dementors feasting upon her agony.
"Do you, perhaps, have somewhere a bit sunnier for her to awake in?"
"I'll help you carry her." Lyle offered, picking up her feet, and Dumbledore was given déjà vu from the last time he'd been in such a situation with Severus, nearly five years ago. It seemed like ages from then to now, even in his ancient mind.
They brought her up to Lyle's personal office, which was graced with a couch. Laying her out, his stomach knotted as he noticed the blood on the front of her dark gray dress. Lyle looked uncomfortable, and he made his decision.
"Floo over and fetch some of Jamie's things, she'll tell you what to bring, being more versed in women's garments than you or I, and send them back over here, you are tired, and you need to rest after such a night. I can manage Severus."
Lyle nodded again, relief once again evident to get away from the prescence of his ex-girlfriend.
As Lyle disappeared, Albus fetched up a bowl of water and a rag with a swish of his wand. He began the process of cleaning her salt-streaked face and soothing the eyes swollen from too many tears. He wondered how many times Severus had allowed herself cry previous to this moment, and guessed not very many.
Dark eyes suddenly flickered open, and stared at him with confusion. A soft smile suddenly graced her face, surprising him. She was still in the grips of the sedative it appeared.
"Grandfather?" She said in a soft voice, reaching out to him with a faint hand.
"No," He said, taking her thin hand and enveloping it in his own. "It's Professor Dumbledore."
Her face became confused as she stared at him for a moment, before gazing at the ceiling. Her hand went limp and he let it fall.
She continued to stare at the ceiling for at least another hour. Her face was blank, and she did not even seem to notice Lyle's entrance and exit. Her breath was shallow, rasping against her teeth at a steady rate.
When she did stir, it startled Albus, who had begun to doze off. She had stood, and retrieved the set of robes from the top of Lyle's desk. She looked at him with a raised eyebrow, and he quickly turned away so she could dress.
He could hear the rustles, as numerous small pearl buttons were undone. There was a 'wmph', as the wool dress fell to the floor. Then came minute clicks as hooks and eyes were separated, and the creak of the stiff fabric of a corset was relaxed.
When he felt it was safe, he turned around. The robe was made for Jamie, and on Severus, a much taller woman, it looked more like a knee-length muggle dress. If it weren't for the wide sleeves it probably would have passed in the muggle world.
It was odd to see Severus in any colors outside of blacks, whites, and grays. The bright cherry red looked out of place on her, and even more so on this occasion. She returned to the couch and sat, and stared at him.
"I can get you inside the Death Eaters." She said after a moment. There was a steel-like quality to her face now, her eyes as sharp as diamond, and deadly.
He was stunned, to say the least, at the proposition. He had expected tears. howls of agony for the child that she had so painfully produced whose life had ended too soon.
However, he realized, this was Severus.
"How?" He asked, even though a part of him felt he was taking advantage of a vulnerable woman. She had offered, he told himself, and they desperately needed any help they could receive against the Death Eaters.
***(-I-)**(-I-)***
Her abdomen ached, even five days after giving birth to her only child. The troublesome pregnancy and the difficult labor made it dangerous for her to ever try to carry another child. They'd removed her ovaries as a form of prevention.
She didn't care for more children, she thought as she let Jairus suckle at her breast. Jairus filled the hole that had been her life. He was her light, and so she had named him.
She ran her fingers through his fine hair, admiring the silken feel of it.
Cassius had not been pleased, initially, at the thought of another child. He already had his heir, Lucius, and another child would only cause strife in the inheritance. He had made some hints her way of going out into the muggle world and having an abortion. However, when she'd mentioned that she was expecting at a tea party her mother had dragged her to, there was no way for him to dispose of it without scandal.
The pregnancy meant that she had received a reprieve from her duty as a wife for thirteen months, a relief worth the eight months of strict bed rest.
***(-I-)**(-I-)***
Her first duty was to return to Malfoy Manor. She had to arrange the funerals (although Jairus' would receive significantly more attention than Cassius'.), and prepare the manor for a meeting with Lord Voldemort.
She floo'ed over, despite Dumbledore's insistence that she rest up and give herself time to grieve. There was no time to grieve, not when there was so much to be done. She could grieve when the monsters that had started the machine that had killed her child were lying in their graves.
She came out in the fireplace in the rear entrance hall. She brushed the soot from Jennifer Potter's borrowed robe. It felt uncomfortable, not having the many layers she was used to, yet in a sense it was liberating, as it was less restrictive than what she usually wore.
Still, it would be best if she donned her accustomed garb. There would be less suspicion upon her acts if she wore the stifling corset and wool dress. She headed up the backstairs for no particular reason other than they were closer than the main staircase.
She entered the third floor where the room Cassius and she had shared lay. The only entrance on the west wing to the master bedroom was through the nursery. She almost contemplated walking all the way down to the east wing and entering from there, but told herself that this was no time to be weak. She had a duty.
She entered the nursery, trying not to look at the furniture that would remain empty from this day forth.
"Oh, you are back." Said a voice with a thick Slavic accent. She turned to see Narcissa, Lucius' betrothed, carefully placing Jairus' toys into a crate. A quick scan of the room revealed that the pictures had been removed from the walls and sent away somewhere.
House elves scurried about the room, magicking off the linens and clumsily disassembling the furniture.
Narcissa appeared lost and uncomfortable.
"Lucius say." Narcissa shook her head, "Lucius said that I should help the elves clean, maman."
Part of her burned to shriek at the stupid girl, to tell the fool to quit the sanctity of this cherished room, the other to plead with the innocent bride to run as far from this family as possible.
"I think the elves can handle it from here." She said frigidly, and Narcissa quickly left.
She felt her body tremble with emotions that demanded that she give in. She refused to give.
She heard someone crying, and she feared it was she for a split second, before identifying the origin of the sound emanating from the opposite corner.
She turned, and her eyes fixed upon the source of the disruption. A house elf huddled in the corner, bawling and clutching a bottle of butter beer that it had scrounged up from somewhere. She hated it immediately.
She stormed over to the corner, and the elf, named Noggy, looked at her and hiccupped. The currently drunken elf had been responsible for the care of Jairus after the blessing ceremony, and was grieving over the loss of the child. It infuriated her that the elf should grieve.
She snatched the bottle and smashed it against the wall, and the elf squeaked in fear.
"There will be no crying in this house." She hissed, each word measured and slow. "He's dead, and this is a fact of life. Tears can not change anything." He voice was rising in intensity and pitch, her body tensing as fury took over her thoughts. "If I can not cry then no one will!"
The elf 'meeped' in fear and disappeared with a crack. Her target lost, she wheeled upon the other elves that were frozen in their spots as they stared at her.
"Back to your regular duties! All of you." She shouted, and her orders were quickly obeyed, the clatter of the gate of the crib the only sign that they had been there at all.
She stormed into the master bedroom, slamming the door behind her.
***(-I-)**(-I-)***
She entered the parlor later that night, where Lucius sat casually sipping brandy. He thought himself an adult now, nearly eighteen, and with his father gone. He was still a callow youth in her opinion. She may have been only three years older than him physically, but she felt ancient.
"Severus." He acknowledged absently, not bothering to even look up from the Evening Prophet.
She took a seat by the fireside, trying not to think of yesterday night when she had sat before the fire, her savior dozing in her arms.
There was an image of Malfoy Manor on the front page, and gaudy headlines screamed about the innocent Auror slaughtered by the vicious Malfoy family. Only concern for this young junior auror, not a comment of the innocent child he had murdered. She shook herself. This would need to be taken care of, and Lucius was a natural choice. He was charming, and his charm would be the only way to protect the Malfoy fortune and standing.
She would rather leave the Malfoy family to rot in its doings, but the Snape line was entwined with the Malfoy's fate through her, and out of tribute to her grandfather, she would find some way to cement the Snape family into history. She could not do so through heirs, and it would be a sorry way to end the line with her.
For this, she would need Lucius' help.
"They'll take everything, won't they?" she asked, feigning the fear of a foolish woman that she was supposed to be. Everything she couldn't be.
Lucius folded the paper grimly, before looking to her.
"Undoubtedly. If in the unlikely event they do not, then we stand to lose our position in the social world." He sighed.
Lucius needed admirers; he needed to be fawned upon, and the loss of his social stature would be a devastating blow to his ego. Things were going well so far.
"We'll have to delay the wedding, it would be inappropriate from many stand points." She said softly, and Lucius nodded in agreement, as he gazed absently into the fire.
"You'll obviously have to renounce your father's actions, and Voldemort's cause. I'm sure he'll understand."
Lucius stared at her, but she looked at him with naivety. He had supposed her ignorant of the Malfoy's more covert dealings, and she used his shock to her advantage.
"Your father's will is null, naturally, and you'll be under suspicion."
"It is not to late to transfer a considerable bulk of the money out of country." Lucius mused drearily.
"It would only convince the public of our guilt." She said quietly.
He glared at her hatefully, and she did not feign innocence this time. He knew what she had left unspoken, and he resented the fact that it would be the only way to come out with minimal damage.
"You know I'm right, and you know that the trustees at Gringotts will say the same." She said, leaning back into the chair, and dropping the fragile façade that she'd held for the last few years.
"Regretfully." He gritted out.
"For you." She said mildly. "I stand to gain quite a lot." She gave a casual shrug. "I care little for what you choose to spend your allowance upon. Go about your usual business. I only demand two things; one, you let me go about my business equally uninterrupted." She let the sentence taper off; the enormity of what she was about to ask immobilized her tongue.
"And?" He snapped impatiently as the silence dragged on.
"Secondly, I want a meeting with Lord Voldemort."
Anger shook Lucius' normally resolute features.
"You cannot just demand --" He began softly, his voice harsh.
"Invite him here for dinner, he is flesh and blood."
"Not by much." Lucius muttered.
"Still, he must hunger." She said nonchalantly. "And he will undoubtedly want to be assured of our position at his side after the remarks you will make to the Daily Prophet."
"Crazy bint, you can't even own a wand, what gives you the right ---" Lucius snarled.
"You forget yourself, Lucius," She snapped, glaring at him. Her lips curled up into a smirk, "You will watch your tone and your words with me, lest you like the idea of **working** for a living." She said smugly, enjoying the rage she saw on his face.
He glowered at her fiercely for a moment, before looking towards the fire and resuming the sipping of his brandy.
It was an admittance of defeat, and victory for her.
***(-I-)**(-I-)***
"Thank you for coming." He said, before motioning him to follow.
The halls seemed to loom with their minimal lighting, intended to subdue the guilty with fear. They were mildly disturbing even to him.
He was lead down to the celled section where the inmates and suspects were kept.
Suddenly, Lyle's back tensed in anger.
"Get those awful things away from her." Lyle yelled at some lower ranking officer.
Five dementor-shaped shadows quickly fled the scene. Albus hid the shudder that went down his spine at the sight of them as best he could. Lyle had thrown open the cell door, to crouch beside the figure curled up on the floor.
He followed after Lyle, eventually taking the weakly struggling Severus from his arms. There was hurt on Lyle's face at her reaction to him.
"Severus." He called softly, running fingers over sweaty hair. Her eyes were glazed, as if she were hallucinating.
"Gngh." she moaned, and fell back limply into her arms. Her lips were tinged green with some digestible sedative, perhaps the only reason she hadn't been shrieking with five dementors feasting upon her agony.
"Do you, perhaps, have somewhere a bit sunnier for her to awake in?"
"I'll help you carry her." Lyle offered, picking up her feet, and Dumbledore was given déjà vu from the last time he'd been in such a situation with Severus, nearly five years ago. It seemed like ages from then to now, even in his ancient mind.
They brought her up to Lyle's personal office, which was graced with a couch. Laying her out, his stomach knotted as he noticed the blood on the front of her dark gray dress. Lyle looked uncomfortable, and he made his decision.
"Floo over and fetch some of Jamie's things, she'll tell you what to bring, being more versed in women's garments than you or I, and send them back over here, you are tired, and you need to rest after such a night. I can manage Severus."
Lyle nodded again, relief once again evident to get away from the prescence of his ex-girlfriend.
As Lyle disappeared, Albus fetched up a bowl of water and a rag with a swish of his wand. He began the process of cleaning her salt-streaked face and soothing the eyes swollen from too many tears. He wondered how many times Severus had allowed herself cry previous to this moment, and guessed not very many.
Dark eyes suddenly flickered open, and stared at him with confusion. A soft smile suddenly graced her face, surprising him. She was still in the grips of the sedative it appeared.
"Grandfather?" She said in a soft voice, reaching out to him with a faint hand.
"No," He said, taking her thin hand and enveloping it in his own. "It's Professor Dumbledore."
Her face became confused as she stared at him for a moment, before gazing at the ceiling. Her hand went limp and he let it fall.
She continued to stare at the ceiling for at least another hour. Her face was blank, and she did not even seem to notice Lyle's entrance and exit. Her breath was shallow, rasping against her teeth at a steady rate.
When she did stir, it startled Albus, who had begun to doze off. She had stood, and retrieved the set of robes from the top of Lyle's desk. She looked at him with a raised eyebrow, and he quickly turned away so she could dress.
He could hear the rustles, as numerous small pearl buttons were undone. There was a 'wmph', as the wool dress fell to the floor. Then came minute clicks as hooks and eyes were separated, and the creak of the stiff fabric of a corset was relaxed.
When he felt it was safe, he turned around. The robe was made for Jamie, and on Severus, a much taller woman, it looked more like a knee-length muggle dress. If it weren't for the wide sleeves it probably would have passed in the muggle world.
It was odd to see Severus in any colors outside of blacks, whites, and grays. The bright cherry red looked out of place on her, and even more so on this occasion. She returned to the couch and sat, and stared at him.
"I can get you inside the Death Eaters." She said after a moment. There was a steel-like quality to her face now, her eyes as sharp as diamond, and deadly.
He was stunned, to say the least, at the proposition. He had expected tears. howls of agony for the child that she had so painfully produced whose life had ended too soon.
However, he realized, this was Severus.
"How?" He asked, even though a part of him felt he was taking advantage of a vulnerable woman. She had offered, he told himself, and they desperately needed any help they could receive against the Death Eaters.
***(-I-)**(-I-)***
Her abdomen ached, even five days after giving birth to her only child. The troublesome pregnancy and the difficult labor made it dangerous for her to ever try to carry another child. They'd removed her ovaries as a form of prevention.
She didn't care for more children, she thought as she let Jairus suckle at her breast. Jairus filled the hole that had been her life. He was her light, and so she had named him.
She ran her fingers through his fine hair, admiring the silken feel of it.
Cassius had not been pleased, initially, at the thought of another child. He already had his heir, Lucius, and another child would only cause strife in the inheritance. He had made some hints her way of going out into the muggle world and having an abortion. However, when she'd mentioned that she was expecting at a tea party her mother had dragged her to, there was no way for him to dispose of it without scandal.
The pregnancy meant that she had received a reprieve from her duty as a wife for thirteen months, a relief worth the eight months of strict bed rest.
***(-I-)**(-I-)***
Her first duty was to return to Malfoy Manor. She had to arrange the funerals (although Jairus' would receive significantly more attention than Cassius'.), and prepare the manor for a meeting with Lord Voldemort.
She floo'ed over, despite Dumbledore's insistence that she rest up and give herself time to grieve. There was no time to grieve, not when there was so much to be done. She could grieve when the monsters that had started the machine that had killed her child were lying in their graves.
She came out in the fireplace in the rear entrance hall. She brushed the soot from Jennifer Potter's borrowed robe. It felt uncomfortable, not having the many layers she was used to, yet in a sense it was liberating, as it was less restrictive than what she usually wore.
Still, it would be best if she donned her accustomed garb. There would be less suspicion upon her acts if she wore the stifling corset and wool dress. She headed up the backstairs for no particular reason other than they were closer than the main staircase.
She entered the third floor where the room Cassius and she had shared lay. The only entrance on the west wing to the master bedroom was through the nursery. She almost contemplated walking all the way down to the east wing and entering from there, but told herself that this was no time to be weak. She had a duty.
She entered the nursery, trying not to look at the furniture that would remain empty from this day forth.
"Oh, you are back." Said a voice with a thick Slavic accent. She turned to see Narcissa, Lucius' betrothed, carefully placing Jairus' toys into a crate. A quick scan of the room revealed that the pictures had been removed from the walls and sent away somewhere.
House elves scurried about the room, magicking off the linens and clumsily disassembling the furniture.
Narcissa appeared lost and uncomfortable.
"Lucius say." Narcissa shook her head, "Lucius said that I should help the elves clean, maman."
Part of her burned to shriek at the stupid girl, to tell the fool to quit the sanctity of this cherished room, the other to plead with the innocent bride to run as far from this family as possible.
"I think the elves can handle it from here." She said frigidly, and Narcissa quickly left.
She felt her body tremble with emotions that demanded that she give in. She refused to give.
She heard someone crying, and she feared it was she for a split second, before identifying the origin of the sound emanating from the opposite corner.
She turned, and her eyes fixed upon the source of the disruption. A house elf huddled in the corner, bawling and clutching a bottle of butter beer that it had scrounged up from somewhere. She hated it immediately.
She stormed over to the corner, and the elf, named Noggy, looked at her and hiccupped. The currently drunken elf had been responsible for the care of Jairus after the blessing ceremony, and was grieving over the loss of the child. It infuriated her that the elf should grieve.
She snatched the bottle and smashed it against the wall, and the elf squeaked in fear.
"There will be no crying in this house." She hissed, each word measured and slow. "He's dead, and this is a fact of life. Tears can not change anything." He voice was rising in intensity and pitch, her body tensing as fury took over her thoughts. "If I can not cry then no one will!"
The elf 'meeped' in fear and disappeared with a crack. Her target lost, she wheeled upon the other elves that were frozen in their spots as they stared at her.
"Back to your regular duties! All of you." She shouted, and her orders were quickly obeyed, the clatter of the gate of the crib the only sign that they had been there at all.
She stormed into the master bedroom, slamming the door behind her.
***(-I-)**(-I-)***
She entered the parlor later that night, where Lucius sat casually sipping brandy. He thought himself an adult now, nearly eighteen, and with his father gone. He was still a callow youth in her opinion. She may have been only three years older than him physically, but she felt ancient.
"Severus." He acknowledged absently, not bothering to even look up from the Evening Prophet.
She took a seat by the fireside, trying not to think of yesterday night when she had sat before the fire, her savior dozing in her arms.
There was an image of Malfoy Manor on the front page, and gaudy headlines screamed about the innocent Auror slaughtered by the vicious Malfoy family. Only concern for this young junior auror, not a comment of the innocent child he had murdered. She shook herself. This would need to be taken care of, and Lucius was a natural choice. He was charming, and his charm would be the only way to protect the Malfoy fortune and standing.
She would rather leave the Malfoy family to rot in its doings, but the Snape line was entwined with the Malfoy's fate through her, and out of tribute to her grandfather, she would find some way to cement the Snape family into history. She could not do so through heirs, and it would be a sorry way to end the line with her.
For this, she would need Lucius' help.
"They'll take everything, won't they?" she asked, feigning the fear of a foolish woman that she was supposed to be. Everything she couldn't be.
Lucius folded the paper grimly, before looking to her.
"Undoubtedly. If in the unlikely event they do not, then we stand to lose our position in the social world." He sighed.
Lucius needed admirers; he needed to be fawned upon, and the loss of his social stature would be a devastating blow to his ego. Things were going well so far.
"We'll have to delay the wedding, it would be inappropriate from many stand points." She said softly, and Lucius nodded in agreement, as he gazed absently into the fire.
"You'll obviously have to renounce your father's actions, and Voldemort's cause. I'm sure he'll understand."
Lucius stared at her, but she looked at him with naivety. He had supposed her ignorant of the Malfoy's more covert dealings, and she used his shock to her advantage.
"Your father's will is null, naturally, and you'll be under suspicion."
"It is not to late to transfer a considerable bulk of the money out of country." Lucius mused drearily.
"It would only convince the public of our guilt." She said quietly.
He glared at her hatefully, and she did not feign innocence this time. He knew what she had left unspoken, and he resented the fact that it would be the only way to come out with minimal damage.
"You know I'm right, and you know that the trustees at Gringotts will say the same." She said, leaning back into the chair, and dropping the fragile façade that she'd held for the last few years.
"Regretfully." He gritted out.
"For you." She said mildly. "I stand to gain quite a lot." She gave a casual shrug. "I care little for what you choose to spend your allowance upon. Go about your usual business. I only demand two things; one, you let me go about my business equally uninterrupted." She let the sentence taper off; the enormity of what she was about to ask immobilized her tongue.
"And?" He snapped impatiently as the silence dragged on.
"Secondly, I want a meeting with Lord Voldemort."
Anger shook Lucius' normally resolute features.
"You cannot just demand --" He began softly, his voice harsh.
"Invite him here for dinner, he is flesh and blood."
"Not by much." Lucius muttered.
"Still, he must hunger." She said nonchalantly. "And he will undoubtedly want to be assured of our position at his side after the remarks you will make to the Daily Prophet."
"Crazy bint, you can't even own a wand, what gives you the right ---" Lucius snarled.
"You forget yourself, Lucius," She snapped, glaring at him. Her lips curled up into a smirk, "You will watch your tone and your words with me, lest you like the idea of **working** for a living." She said smugly, enjoying the rage she saw on his face.
He glowered at her fiercely for a moment, before looking towards the fire and resuming the sipping of his brandy.
It was an admittance of defeat, and victory for her.
***(-I-)**(-I-)***