The Lyrics to Your Tune
Chapter One
...sometimes the magic of the past is all we've got.
Elton John, 'Mansfield'.
"Minerva," said Professor Severus Snape, "I'm going to have a bath."
"Good for you." Replied Minerva McGonagall, headmistress of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, without looking up from the papers she was hunting through.
"A long, hot, *private* bath." Snape emphasised, frowning. "Which means I do *not* wish to be disturbed for the next couple of hours."
"Why would I want to watch you bathing?" McGonagall muttered into her papers. Snape ignored this remark, but continued to hover over the headmistress' desk.
"Severus, please go away and have your bath, or whatever it is you plan to do, and stop looming over me. It is most disconcerting, and I'm not even halfway through the evening's owls."
Snape flashed her a look from beneath the bat's wing of greasy hair which framed his thin, sallow face.
"Are you sure you don't need any help?"
"I told you this morning, this afternoon, and twice this evening that I am more than capable of doing my job."
"But there's so much paperwork..."
"Go and do your own paperwork!" McGonagall snapped. "I'm tired of your nasty little asides implying that I'm inadequate in my position as headmistress of this school. I suppose you think you could do a better job? Do you plan to get rid of me the way you did professor Murzle?" Professor Murzle had been one of the school's short-lived Defence Against the Dark Arts teachers, who had stayed for less than a term, over two decades ago, and left in a hurry after coming down with a mysterious illness. It had been a very mild poison and a small dose at that, but Manfred Murzle had learned from the experience that one does not tangle with irate potions masters who feel they have nothing to lose.
It was not unusual for McGonagall to make reference to Snape's various cunning - and sometimes less subtle - methods of removing competition for his much sought-after DADA position. And it was entirely the norm for the two to bicker over nothing at the slightest provocation; Professor Hagrid, the Care of Magical Creatures teacher and onetime gamekeeper, had remarked more than once that the only time Snape and McGonagall weren't arguing was when they weren't speaking to one another at all. Most of the other teachers were used to the bantering, and found it at best amusing and at worst rather childish. Professor Flitwick, always a romantic at heart, was of the opinion that the chronic low-level arguments represented nothing less than deep-seated attraction, a sort of adult equivalent of pulling the girl's pigtails or running off with the boy's schoolbag.
In truth, both Snape and McGonagall enjoyed the bantering, finding it far the easiest way to talk to one another, effectively minimising the inevitable frustration which occurs when two very powerful and somewhat similar personalities clash. The two had much in common; they were both strict and humourless in the classroom, reserved and private among friends; both appreciated solitude and yet were affected by loneliness; both had unexpected and rarely revealed vulnerabilities. Despite the difference in their ages they shared many similar tastes. And yes, there were a number of rumours spreading rapidly among both staff and pupils that McGonagall and her deputy headmaster were 'carrying on'.
In view of all this, which might be best summarised as a special understanding between the two, Snape was not surprisingly concerned by McGonagall's uncharacteristically angry behaviour, which (he admitted freely to himself) was far closer to his own irritable mien than McGonagall's sometimes impatient, but invariably fair, attitude. She had snapped at him before, even accused him of trying to poison her before, halfheartedly, but this furious paranoia was completely out of character for Minerva. Snape, who himself was unusually quiet and placid during the tirade, wondered whether he and she were rubbing off on one another after all those years of warring.
"Minerva," he said, using his smooth, hypnotic voice to its full effect, "is something wrong? Are you ill?"
He was startled by the vehemence of her response. She threw down her quill, thrust back her chair, and shouted right in his face,
"Just what are you implying?"
"Nothing!" He took a step backwards, not appreciating having his own tried-and-true intimidation methods thrown back at him by McGonagall, of all people. It was a favourite technique of Snape's to speak in a low voice, almost a whisper, while on the other side of the room from someone - and then, if their behaviour warranted it, to walk right up to them, stand nose-to-nose, and roar. It was a sort of verbal adaptation of the fencing move known as the [????], whereby the aggressor leaps forward and slams their feet on the floor, not to inflict any harm but simply to startle their opponent and thrown them off balance.
McGonagall's {????} certainly had the desired effect on Snape. He almost fell over a chair.
"Are you suggesting," she went on, in a low, sinister voice - yet another of Snape's pet techniques, he thought, affronted - "that I'm incapable of doing my job? I know you, you'll have everyone convinced I'm losing my mind and I'll be sent off to St. Mungo's while you set yourself up as headmaster! Well, I'm not fooled." She added, and then, abruptly, sank down into her chair again, burying her face in her hands. Snape was horrified. He hated to see McGonagall cry, partly because she was such a strong woman that any situation severe enough to reduce her to public tears must be bad indeed. Snape wondered helplessly what could have happened to distress the steadfast McGonagall so much.
"Minerva," he said, trying to sound comforting and accessible while carefully keeping his distance, and keeping an eye on her wand, which rested on the desk, "*are* you losing your mind?"
"Is that supposed to be a joke?" She demanded, though she spoke more quietly now in a voice roughened with tears.
"It is a perfectly reasonable question under the circumstances." He lectured her, attempting to inject some normality into this bizarre situation. To his distress she gave a smothered sob.
"What on earth's the matter?" He spoke as gently as possible, forgetting to be offended and patting her awkwardly on the shoulder.
"Oh, Severus!" She grabbed his hand. He jumped, never having enjoyed comforting distressed people; he also rather disliked being touched without fair warning. Or indeed at all.
"Yes, what?" He asked, continuing to rub her shoulder with his free hand in what he hoped was a soothing manner.
"I'm sorry." Came the whispered response.
"Oh. Forget it. You've said far worse to me in the past." To his alarm this seemed to upset her even more. She sobbed.
"Oh, now, stop bleating...I mean, crying...you stupid woman - Minerva. Stop crying, Minerva. There's nothing to cry about." He flinched, aware of the mistake - genuinely made, he had never been good at this sort of thing - and waiting for another torrent of verbal blows. But to his surprise - and relief - she gave a tiny small through her tears, and squeezed his hand.
"Don't ever change." She murmured.
"Eh?"
But McGonagall simply shook her head, and, after a moment, leaned against his shoulder. He sat awkwardly on the arm of her chair. Silence blossomed, and deepened. After a few minutes, Minerva sat up and wiped her eyes briskly.
"How silly." She muttered, in a more normal tone. "And what a time to choose to be foolish - with all this paperwork to do..."
"Minerva..."
"Severus," she interrupted, "I'm very sorry for what I said to you. I haven't been feeling myself today. I'm a little under the weather but I'm sure it will pass. Now if you'll excuse me I really must get on with this - why don't you go and have your bath?"
"You're not fobbing me off that easily. What's the matter? Why won't you tell me?" McGonagall bit her lips, bending her head determinedly over her paperwork. Snape paced up and down, fretful and increasingly annoyed.
"You've been acting strangely for some time, now I come to think of it. You've missed dinner on several occasions recently."
"So have you!" She countered.
"That's because I can't stand moronic dinner table chatter." He replied, dryly. "It's unusual for you to miss meals in Hall - the headmistress is expected to be in attendance."
"Just because I don't have the luxury of getting away with what is really rudeness, pure and simple, by calling it eccentricity..."
Snape gave an internal sigh of relief. This was much more like a normal conversation.
"My point is," he pressed, "that in the last couple of months or so, you have regularly neglected the most basic of your duties..."
"How dare you!" McGonagall sat up, her eyes blazing, her lips compressing into an ever thinner line.
"I didn't mean it like that..." Snape growled back, losing his temper.
"Get out!"
"I beg your pardon...?"
"I said, get out. Leave. Go." McGonagall sighed; her anger seemed to dissipate, leaving only a sort of weary tension. "I don't want to discuss this with you, Severus. Please leave me alone."
"I think..."
"Go!" She almost moaned, pressing a hand feverishly to her forehead. Snape hesitated just a moment before turning on his heel and storming out of the room without another word, slamming the protesting door violently behind him. He might have stayed, might have attempted to draw out of her whatever the trouble was, if not for that one phrase, 'I don't want to discuss this with *you*'. Who was she talking to about her problems, then? Hermione? Flitwick? Sirius Black? Snape had throughout his life been continually prone to jealousy; it was a part of his character he had never been able to conquer, and one which led him ultimately to unhappiness. He hated the thought that Minerva might be confiding in Black instead of him. She *should* confide in Snape; they had been friends for years, he was the deputy headmaster, they had been through a great deal together. And yet when she was at her most troubled she turned to Black. Well, of course she would, wouldn't she? Black was another do-gooding Gryffindor, another bloody animagus, and he was generous, warm, accessible, a good listener, all things Snape was not. He was also attractive and charming. It wasn't surprising that Minerva preferred smooth-talking Sirius Black to the bitter, irascible, ugly head of Slytherin, tainted as he was with a dark past and darker associations. Wonderful, perfect Sirius Black, so maligned, so courageous, beloved hero of witches and wizards everywhere, just like his holier-than-though godson. To hell with all of them, Snape thought furiously. Damn the lot.
By the time he reached his office - the deputy headmaster's office, located in a tower room - Snape's temper had cooled a little. Unfortunately, however, the first thing he saw on opening the door was that blasted painting - the life size portrait of himself, presented to him by Dean Thomas last year. It was the only picture of himself Snape had ever liked; it was also the only picture in which he was smiling. Furious-Snape met the eyes of inexplicably-happy-Snape and glowered. Portrait-Snape's smile turned a little wry, and his left eyebrow lifted.
"Don't look at me like that, you ugly sod." Snape growled at himself.
"Charming." Replied the portrait, with a painted shrug.
"Just shut up." Snape told it. The painting obediently fell silent and still, allowing Snape to study it more carefully than he had since the first time he had seen it. He scrutinised the face; even smiling, it was very far from handsome. Not even average, he decided, grimly - bitterness and grief had left deep lines in the forehead, the cheeks were thin and sunken, the skin sallow and sickly looking. Even the smile, now he came to look at it closely, seemed twisted, as though portrait-Snape was sucking a lemon. It had never looked that way before. Snape usually refused to care about his appearance, deciding that such preoccupation would be immensely shallow and a waste of self-loathing, which could be far more usefully applied to derogating his lifestyle, personality, and past associations. But the thought of Sirius Black, with his charming, still-boyish smile, his clean dark hair falling fetchingly over the forehead, and wicked, come-hither eyes, was unbearable today. There had been a time in his youth when Snape would have killed to be Sirius Black - handsome, popular, confident and happy; indeed, Snape *had* killed to be him, in a very real sense. Voldemort had brought death, destruction and torment, but he had promised life, happiness, love. Promises that a friendless, universally disliked and hopelessly lonely young man might just be desperate enough to fall for. Black had always had everything Snape wanted; even beating him in schoolwork, the one thing Snape had always considered to be his only really positive contribution, the only thing he was really good at. Intellect had been and was Snape's only real weapon against the Sirius Blacks of the world; but even that had been ineffective, since Black just *had* to be an animagus, able to perform some of the most complex magic ever devised.
Snape suddenly had the urge to simply go down to Black's office and curse the mongrel into oblivion. He would watch Black die, and make him realise just why it had to happen before he was snuffed out forever. Then there would be the arrest, the trial, the questions he wouldn't bother to answer; Minerva's sorrow, perhaps guilt, realising that the whole thing had been her fault. There would be Azkaban, for life, an unending torment of misery, unredeemed by even the smallest happy thought. How was that any different to life at the moment? Snape wondered darkly. It would be worth it. If he couldn't have Black's perfect life, he didn't see why Black should have it, either. Hard on Minerva, perhaps, but then she deserved it. Over the last twelve months following the defeat of Voldemort, Snape had begun to build up a new life for himself; though his work changed little, his personal relationships had improved tremendously, as had his view of himself. For the first time since his youth, Snape felt that there might be some hope after all; perhaps there really was some kind of contentment waiting for him. Now, it was all gone. Reset to zero. Everything he had become, the painful personal growth he had gone through, the better, safer, more peaceful inner world he had begun to build, was destroyed in that single moment of Minerva's lack of trust in him. He half-expected to look down and find the Dark Mark had returned, as black as ever.
The world began to seem like a giant conspiracy again, the way it had before. They all hated him, were in league against him, wanted to destroy him - Minerva, Black, Potter, all of them. Perhaps they had plotted it all along; after all, if anyone deserved to suffer, it was Snape. Why couldn't they just leave him alone to crawl under a rock and die somewhere? Hadn't he made penance enough? Apparently not. He shook his head. Apparently not. It never occurred to him, in his intense ruminations about conspiracies, that he might be overreacting. It never occurred to him that if Minerva was indeed suffering some kind of trouble, she would be most unlikely to confide in Sirius Black. It never occurred to him that, although they had things in common, Minerva and Black were entirely unalike, and while perfectly amiable towards one another, had no particular liking for each other.
Perhaps fortunately for Snape, a knock on the door broke his train of thought. He realised that he had been sitting at his desk, staring at the portrait, for over fifteen minutes.
"Come!" He snapped.
The door slowly opened, and a small, neatly dressed creature with goggling eyes and enormous bat-like ears peeped into the room. It was Winky, Snape's House-Elf.
"What do you want?" He demanded.
"Winky was wondering whether Professor Snape would like some supper." The elf said timidly, picking up on her wizard's grim mood.
"No." Snape said coldly. "But there is something you can do for me."
Winky perked up at the thought of carrying out a task.
"Yes, sir?"
"This picture," Snape waved a dismissive hand at it, "I want it removed."
"Professor Snape wants his portrait hung somewhere else?"
"No, imbecile, I want you to get rid of it. Burn it, break it up, throw it out, whatever you wish, just get it away from me."
Winky was aghast.
"But...but it is a *nice* portrait, sir!"
"I'm not interested in your opinion. You're a house-elf, not an art critic, and you will do as I tell you. I want that picture gone in the morning."
Winky was downcast, but did not argue.
"Professor Snape would like something else hung in its place?"
"Yes, yes, if you so wish, I don't care."
He left the room, leaving Winky staring unhappily at inexplicably-happy-Snape... whose gentle smile had faded.
A/N I'd really welcome reviews, comments, any kind of remark. This is turning out to be a Dark!Snape fic, quite unexpectedly. Still it might prove interesting. You know as much as I do about the plot ;-) Thoughts so far?
Chapter One
...sometimes the magic of the past is all we've got.
Elton John, 'Mansfield'.
"Minerva," said Professor Severus Snape, "I'm going to have a bath."
"Good for you." Replied Minerva McGonagall, headmistress of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, without looking up from the papers she was hunting through.
"A long, hot, *private* bath." Snape emphasised, frowning. "Which means I do *not* wish to be disturbed for the next couple of hours."
"Why would I want to watch you bathing?" McGonagall muttered into her papers. Snape ignored this remark, but continued to hover over the headmistress' desk.
"Severus, please go away and have your bath, or whatever it is you plan to do, and stop looming over me. It is most disconcerting, and I'm not even halfway through the evening's owls."
Snape flashed her a look from beneath the bat's wing of greasy hair which framed his thin, sallow face.
"Are you sure you don't need any help?"
"I told you this morning, this afternoon, and twice this evening that I am more than capable of doing my job."
"But there's so much paperwork..."
"Go and do your own paperwork!" McGonagall snapped. "I'm tired of your nasty little asides implying that I'm inadequate in my position as headmistress of this school. I suppose you think you could do a better job? Do you plan to get rid of me the way you did professor Murzle?" Professor Murzle had been one of the school's short-lived Defence Against the Dark Arts teachers, who had stayed for less than a term, over two decades ago, and left in a hurry after coming down with a mysterious illness. It had been a very mild poison and a small dose at that, but Manfred Murzle had learned from the experience that one does not tangle with irate potions masters who feel they have nothing to lose.
It was not unusual for McGonagall to make reference to Snape's various cunning - and sometimes less subtle - methods of removing competition for his much sought-after DADA position. And it was entirely the norm for the two to bicker over nothing at the slightest provocation; Professor Hagrid, the Care of Magical Creatures teacher and onetime gamekeeper, had remarked more than once that the only time Snape and McGonagall weren't arguing was when they weren't speaking to one another at all. Most of the other teachers were used to the bantering, and found it at best amusing and at worst rather childish. Professor Flitwick, always a romantic at heart, was of the opinion that the chronic low-level arguments represented nothing less than deep-seated attraction, a sort of adult equivalent of pulling the girl's pigtails or running off with the boy's schoolbag.
In truth, both Snape and McGonagall enjoyed the bantering, finding it far the easiest way to talk to one another, effectively minimising the inevitable frustration which occurs when two very powerful and somewhat similar personalities clash. The two had much in common; they were both strict and humourless in the classroom, reserved and private among friends; both appreciated solitude and yet were affected by loneliness; both had unexpected and rarely revealed vulnerabilities. Despite the difference in their ages they shared many similar tastes. And yes, there were a number of rumours spreading rapidly among both staff and pupils that McGonagall and her deputy headmaster were 'carrying on'.
In view of all this, which might be best summarised as a special understanding between the two, Snape was not surprisingly concerned by McGonagall's uncharacteristically angry behaviour, which (he admitted freely to himself) was far closer to his own irritable mien than McGonagall's sometimes impatient, but invariably fair, attitude. She had snapped at him before, even accused him of trying to poison her before, halfheartedly, but this furious paranoia was completely out of character for Minerva. Snape, who himself was unusually quiet and placid during the tirade, wondered whether he and she were rubbing off on one another after all those years of warring.
"Minerva," he said, using his smooth, hypnotic voice to its full effect, "is something wrong? Are you ill?"
He was startled by the vehemence of her response. She threw down her quill, thrust back her chair, and shouted right in his face,
"Just what are you implying?"
"Nothing!" He took a step backwards, not appreciating having his own tried-and-true intimidation methods thrown back at him by McGonagall, of all people. It was a favourite technique of Snape's to speak in a low voice, almost a whisper, while on the other side of the room from someone - and then, if their behaviour warranted it, to walk right up to them, stand nose-to-nose, and roar. It was a sort of verbal adaptation of the fencing move known as the [????], whereby the aggressor leaps forward and slams their feet on the floor, not to inflict any harm but simply to startle their opponent and thrown them off balance.
McGonagall's {????} certainly had the desired effect on Snape. He almost fell over a chair.
"Are you suggesting," she went on, in a low, sinister voice - yet another of Snape's pet techniques, he thought, affronted - "that I'm incapable of doing my job? I know you, you'll have everyone convinced I'm losing my mind and I'll be sent off to St. Mungo's while you set yourself up as headmaster! Well, I'm not fooled." She added, and then, abruptly, sank down into her chair again, burying her face in her hands. Snape was horrified. He hated to see McGonagall cry, partly because she was such a strong woman that any situation severe enough to reduce her to public tears must be bad indeed. Snape wondered helplessly what could have happened to distress the steadfast McGonagall so much.
"Minerva," he said, trying to sound comforting and accessible while carefully keeping his distance, and keeping an eye on her wand, which rested on the desk, "*are* you losing your mind?"
"Is that supposed to be a joke?" She demanded, though she spoke more quietly now in a voice roughened with tears.
"It is a perfectly reasonable question under the circumstances." He lectured her, attempting to inject some normality into this bizarre situation. To his distress she gave a smothered sob.
"What on earth's the matter?" He spoke as gently as possible, forgetting to be offended and patting her awkwardly on the shoulder.
"Oh, Severus!" She grabbed his hand. He jumped, never having enjoyed comforting distressed people; he also rather disliked being touched without fair warning. Or indeed at all.
"Yes, what?" He asked, continuing to rub her shoulder with his free hand in what he hoped was a soothing manner.
"I'm sorry." Came the whispered response.
"Oh. Forget it. You've said far worse to me in the past." To his alarm this seemed to upset her even more. She sobbed.
"Oh, now, stop bleating...I mean, crying...you stupid woman - Minerva. Stop crying, Minerva. There's nothing to cry about." He flinched, aware of the mistake - genuinely made, he had never been good at this sort of thing - and waiting for another torrent of verbal blows. But to his surprise - and relief - she gave a tiny small through her tears, and squeezed his hand.
"Don't ever change." She murmured.
"Eh?"
But McGonagall simply shook her head, and, after a moment, leaned against his shoulder. He sat awkwardly on the arm of her chair. Silence blossomed, and deepened. After a few minutes, Minerva sat up and wiped her eyes briskly.
"How silly." She muttered, in a more normal tone. "And what a time to choose to be foolish - with all this paperwork to do..."
"Minerva..."
"Severus," she interrupted, "I'm very sorry for what I said to you. I haven't been feeling myself today. I'm a little under the weather but I'm sure it will pass. Now if you'll excuse me I really must get on with this - why don't you go and have your bath?"
"You're not fobbing me off that easily. What's the matter? Why won't you tell me?" McGonagall bit her lips, bending her head determinedly over her paperwork. Snape paced up and down, fretful and increasingly annoyed.
"You've been acting strangely for some time, now I come to think of it. You've missed dinner on several occasions recently."
"So have you!" She countered.
"That's because I can't stand moronic dinner table chatter." He replied, dryly. "It's unusual for you to miss meals in Hall - the headmistress is expected to be in attendance."
"Just because I don't have the luxury of getting away with what is really rudeness, pure and simple, by calling it eccentricity..."
Snape gave an internal sigh of relief. This was much more like a normal conversation.
"My point is," he pressed, "that in the last couple of months or so, you have regularly neglected the most basic of your duties..."
"How dare you!" McGonagall sat up, her eyes blazing, her lips compressing into an ever thinner line.
"I didn't mean it like that..." Snape growled back, losing his temper.
"Get out!"
"I beg your pardon...?"
"I said, get out. Leave. Go." McGonagall sighed; her anger seemed to dissipate, leaving only a sort of weary tension. "I don't want to discuss this with you, Severus. Please leave me alone."
"I think..."
"Go!" She almost moaned, pressing a hand feverishly to her forehead. Snape hesitated just a moment before turning on his heel and storming out of the room without another word, slamming the protesting door violently behind him. He might have stayed, might have attempted to draw out of her whatever the trouble was, if not for that one phrase, 'I don't want to discuss this with *you*'. Who was she talking to about her problems, then? Hermione? Flitwick? Sirius Black? Snape had throughout his life been continually prone to jealousy; it was a part of his character he had never been able to conquer, and one which led him ultimately to unhappiness. He hated the thought that Minerva might be confiding in Black instead of him. She *should* confide in Snape; they had been friends for years, he was the deputy headmaster, they had been through a great deal together. And yet when she was at her most troubled she turned to Black. Well, of course she would, wouldn't she? Black was another do-gooding Gryffindor, another bloody animagus, and he was generous, warm, accessible, a good listener, all things Snape was not. He was also attractive and charming. It wasn't surprising that Minerva preferred smooth-talking Sirius Black to the bitter, irascible, ugly head of Slytherin, tainted as he was with a dark past and darker associations. Wonderful, perfect Sirius Black, so maligned, so courageous, beloved hero of witches and wizards everywhere, just like his holier-than-though godson. To hell with all of them, Snape thought furiously. Damn the lot.
By the time he reached his office - the deputy headmaster's office, located in a tower room - Snape's temper had cooled a little. Unfortunately, however, the first thing he saw on opening the door was that blasted painting - the life size portrait of himself, presented to him by Dean Thomas last year. It was the only picture of himself Snape had ever liked; it was also the only picture in which he was smiling. Furious-Snape met the eyes of inexplicably-happy-Snape and glowered. Portrait-Snape's smile turned a little wry, and his left eyebrow lifted.
"Don't look at me like that, you ugly sod." Snape growled at himself.
"Charming." Replied the portrait, with a painted shrug.
"Just shut up." Snape told it. The painting obediently fell silent and still, allowing Snape to study it more carefully than he had since the first time he had seen it. He scrutinised the face; even smiling, it was very far from handsome. Not even average, he decided, grimly - bitterness and grief had left deep lines in the forehead, the cheeks were thin and sunken, the skin sallow and sickly looking. Even the smile, now he came to look at it closely, seemed twisted, as though portrait-Snape was sucking a lemon. It had never looked that way before. Snape usually refused to care about his appearance, deciding that such preoccupation would be immensely shallow and a waste of self-loathing, which could be far more usefully applied to derogating his lifestyle, personality, and past associations. But the thought of Sirius Black, with his charming, still-boyish smile, his clean dark hair falling fetchingly over the forehead, and wicked, come-hither eyes, was unbearable today. There had been a time in his youth when Snape would have killed to be Sirius Black - handsome, popular, confident and happy; indeed, Snape *had* killed to be him, in a very real sense. Voldemort had brought death, destruction and torment, but he had promised life, happiness, love. Promises that a friendless, universally disliked and hopelessly lonely young man might just be desperate enough to fall for. Black had always had everything Snape wanted; even beating him in schoolwork, the one thing Snape had always considered to be his only really positive contribution, the only thing he was really good at. Intellect had been and was Snape's only real weapon against the Sirius Blacks of the world; but even that had been ineffective, since Black just *had* to be an animagus, able to perform some of the most complex magic ever devised.
Snape suddenly had the urge to simply go down to Black's office and curse the mongrel into oblivion. He would watch Black die, and make him realise just why it had to happen before he was snuffed out forever. Then there would be the arrest, the trial, the questions he wouldn't bother to answer; Minerva's sorrow, perhaps guilt, realising that the whole thing had been her fault. There would be Azkaban, for life, an unending torment of misery, unredeemed by even the smallest happy thought. How was that any different to life at the moment? Snape wondered darkly. It would be worth it. If he couldn't have Black's perfect life, he didn't see why Black should have it, either. Hard on Minerva, perhaps, but then she deserved it. Over the last twelve months following the defeat of Voldemort, Snape had begun to build up a new life for himself; though his work changed little, his personal relationships had improved tremendously, as had his view of himself. For the first time since his youth, Snape felt that there might be some hope after all; perhaps there really was some kind of contentment waiting for him. Now, it was all gone. Reset to zero. Everything he had become, the painful personal growth he had gone through, the better, safer, more peaceful inner world he had begun to build, was destroyed in that single moment of Minerva's lack of trust in him. He half-expected to look down and find the Dark Mark had returned, as black as ever.
The world began to seem like a giant conspiracy again, the way it had before. They all hated him, were in league against him, wanted to destroy him - Minerva, Black, Potter, all of them. Perhaps they had plotted it all along; after all, if anyone deserved to suffer, it was Snape. Why couldn't they just leave him alone to crawl under a rock and die somewhere? Hadn't he made penance enough? Apparently not. He shook his head. Apparently not. It never occurred to him, in his intense ruminations about conspiracies, that he might be overreacting. It never occurred to him that if Minerva was indeed suffering some kind of trouble, she would be most unlikely to confide in Sirius Black. It never occurred to him that, although they had things in common, Minerva and Black were entirely unalike, and while perfectly amiable towards one another, had no particular liking for each other.
Perhaps fortunately for Snape, a knock on the door broke his train of thought. He realised that he had been sitting at his desk, staring at the portrait, for over fifteen minutes.
"Come!" He snapped.
The door slowly opened, and a small, neatly dressed creature with goggling eyes and enormous bat-like ears peeped into the room. It was Winky, Snape's House-Elf.
"What do you want?" He demanded.
"Winky was wondering whether Professor Snape would like some supper." The elf said timidly, picking up on her wizard's grim mood.
"No." Snape said coldly. "But there is something you can do for me."
Winky perked up at the thought of carrying out a task.
"Yes, sir?"
"This picture," Snape waved a dismissive hand at it, "I want it removed."
"Professor Snape wants his portrait hung somewhere else?"
"No, imbecile, I want you to get rid of it. Burn it, break it up, throw it out, whatever you wish, just get it away from me."
Winky was aghast.
"But...but it is a *nice* portrait, sir!"
"I'm not interested in your opinion. You're a house-elf, not an art critic, and you will do as I tell you. I want that picture gone in the morning."
Winky was downcast, but did not argue.
"Professor Snape would like something else hung in its place?"
"Yes, yes, if you so wish, I don't care."
He left the room, leaving Winky staring unhappily at inexplicably-happy-Snape... whose gentle smile had faded.
A/N I'd really welcome reviews, comments, any kind of remark. This is turning out to be a Dark!Snape fic, quite unexpectedly. Still it might prove interesting. You know as much as I do about the plot ;-) Thoughts so far?
