Algolagnia

Chapter 8

~

Author's note: Albus Dumbledore channeled for your pleasure by Vardya.

~

"Really, Severus, while I can't complain about your results, I have to wonder about your methods. Couldn't you have foreseen that this would have a profound effect on him?"

"I think that this was the only way to reach him. Lucius surrounded himself so capably with lies, and insulated himself with the knowledge that his studies granted him. You forget, sir, that he attempted to do the same to me."

"Exactly, Severus. I can appreciate your feelings - but if he sees only black despair, he is not alive anywhere. Not to Voldemort and certainly not to us. How do we re-ignite the spark and find Lucius Malfoy again?"

"He has to remember himself for himself, Albus. We cannot remember for him. I knew him, as a younger lover knows an older, but I believe that he can be brought back."

"And have you a grand design, then? I would ask just one thing of you: a little gentleness, Severus. We are, after all, attempting to show him that there is a world outside of Voldemort and outside of treachery. He could be so valuable to us, and to himself, if he could only find himself again and use the finding well."

"No. Grand designs are not my forte. Headmaster, I do love him, I will protect him to my last breath, even from himself. If there was another way to have broken his walls, I would have, especially as it involved the breaking of mine in turn."

"Yes, I see; I see that you love him, and I think that that love may buoy him back. However, bear in mind that in your zeal to recreate you do not push too hard and topple him again and yourself behind him. And mind you this as well: I have loved you long and well, my son, and there is room for him. If you are uncertain then step slowly, and please ask if you feel I can assist in any way. I want you well, Severus, and him too. There is much that one such as Lucius could do with us, were he willing. I would do as much as I could to have him willing."

"As you will, Albus. I will be as careful with Lucius as you were with me, so long ago. You will hear from me if I have doubts - as usual."

"I have never doubted you, my boy. I am concerned for you often, as you very well know, but I have never doubted you. But be sure of yourself and know your strength, because we do not seek to destroy but to support, and to encourage those who work with us to do so at their very best. I will not have him think that he has traded one demon for another."

"He will not. Though at times you might think him one - he is single-minded when working on a subject. I... value... very much… your faith in me. Thank you."

"It is well-placed, dear boy. It is well-placed. I will anticipate working with both you and Lucius in the future. And now go, you have work to do."

"Good night, sir. Sleep well."

"And you, Severus."

~

"But he will be well again, Severus?"

"As well as I can make him, Narcissa."

~

HIGH MINISTRY OFFICIAL FOUND DEAD

Walden Macnair, age 38, Director of the Committee for the Disposal of Dangerous Creatures, was found dead this morning in his office in the Department of Magical Creatures. It appears that the death is a suicide, with the deceased ingesting a plate of poisonous mushrooms….

~

Lucius slept, but his dreams consisted only of the past.

When he woke, even after sleeping for ten hours, his mind was never rested. On one occasion, he thought that he saw Evan and Charles, but as they were not there when he was fully awake, he thought it might have been a waking dream. Even with knowing what was happening to him, he was powerless to stop it. The removal of one stone was causing everything to crumble.

He could manage to navigate Severus' rooms for a short time before the rising panic would drive him back to the bed, leaving him shaking and sweating. Simply contemplating the door that would take him out of here was enough to reduce him to tears. Lucius found it galling that in all of his studies, the one mind he had skipped over having a good look at was his own.

The fatal flaw was something he had studied very closely in his subjects. Being able to masquerade virtue as vice and vice as virtue was all a matter of presentation. How terrible to find such flaws in himself – pride, jealousy, even love used against himself and…

Damn it.

He tried to summon anger at Severus for bringing him to this point, but he really couldn't. Not with his own part in events.

All the events.

The past refused to stay in his sleeping hours, now it was trying to scratch its way out of memory and stand before him.

Severus came in with a goblet in hand.

"Lord, no. Not again?"

"Unless you can eat something and keep it down."

Lucius grimaced. Mind-body connection. Bloody fucking hell. He knew and still…!

Accepting the goblet, he drank it down and set it empty on the nightstand. "I'm always surprised at how good nutrient potions taste. Do you put something in it to calm the stomach, as well?"

Severus leaned on the bedpost. "They have to taste good, otherwise the people who need them on a regular basis would never drink them. I did put in something for the inflammation and to relax the stomach, yes."

It sounded as if his friend was speaking from personal experience.

Lucius regarded the man, purple circles under his dark eyes, gone from slender to gaunt in the time that Lucius had been here. "You look like hell."

"You must be my advance guard, then." Severus snapped.

Sheer stroppy temper. Severus was a thorny one at best, but when he was not well rested he could make a nettle's sting seem a lover's kiss.

"You're tired. Come lie down with me." Lucius patted the bed. He knew he was engaging in avoidance behavior, but that was fine with him. "Just for a while, you've not been sleeping well."

Severus hesitated.

"How are you going to keep an eye on me if you're not well rested? Oh, come now! If you haven't been in touch with Albus Dumbledore to tell him that Lucius Malfoy has cracked and is sleeping in your bed, I'll box your ears. I taught you better." Sighing, the black-haired man slipped off his shoes, but did not attempt to deny the quasi-accusation. While Severus was a man of considerable talents, he could not tell an outright untruth. "You don't expect to sleep in your shirt and trousers, do you?"

A black eyebrow arched, but the shirt and trousers and socks followed, hung or folded with meticulous care over the railing of the bed. "Why do I suspect an ulterior motive?"

Lucius made no attempt to deny it. "Because you know me so very well?"

No, no doubt that even falling-down tired, the dark-haired man was good to the eyes – and judging from the rise developing in his shorts Severus might not actually be that tired.

"You are incorrigible."

"Mm-hmm." Delicious. A feast for the senses. Smooth skin, slicked with salty sweat in the throes of passion. No finer music than the words and sounds that flowed from his tongue like a river of the finest velvet.

"Lucius, you've been… ill."

Lucius lifted the covers invitingly, "Then get into bed and stop jabbering at me. I need my rest."

With a look that might quell his students – but one that had no effect whatsoever on Lucius – Severus slid under the quilts. With his back to Lucius he lay his head on the pillow, the very image of determined virtue.

Oh, good. More fun that way.

Lucius slithered close, spooning himself around Severus' back.

"Lucius."

"Yes?" He could not resist a long, lingering kiss on the fourth vertebra.

"Sleep, remember?"

"Rest. Lying down. I did not actually specify sleep."

Sleep later. Good, dreamless deep shagged -until-drowned–in-endorphins sleep. He slid one hand down Severus' side, relishing the gasp that told him Severus was still ticklish in certain spots.

What a delightful toy boy Sev had been! Lucius once alternated tickling with intense fellatio and got the boy's body so confused that Severus had come violently with Lucius mercilessly licking the backs of his young lover's knees.

"Was that, 'Please don't! Stop!' Severus? Or was it, "Please don't stop!' Enunciate!"

"Ahh! Bastard! Ahhh! I… ohh… I'm... Uhnnn…!"

"Lucius..."

"It will help you to sleep." He wrapped an arm over and began play with the other head with which Severus was losing the argument – and losing badly if his state of arousal was any indication.

"I… don't need any help… stop that… with getting… to… tickle me and you will not only be a sick man but an injured one, Lucius!" Severus whipped over and pinned him to the bed and proceeded to kiss him until just enough blood remained in Lucius' head to minimally operate his brain.

Lips, tongues, teeth – who would think that something so common as mouths, so simple as kissing could send one skittering to the edge of release?  There wasn't enough of Severus touching him. Lucius wanted as much skin as possible on his and sought to rid his lover of his shorts - wrapping his fingers around and slowly stroking the flesh that seemed to nudge so eagerly at his hand.

Severus moaned, dropping that wonderful, sinful mouth to Lucius' neck to bite and suck in time with his strokes.

"See? I don't think that you would be able to sleep when you're this worked up." Lucius congratulated himself on a complete sentence before he lost the ability to formulate rational thought. Severus was returning the favor – with interest.

Those fingers were… so very talented. So knowing. After all, Lucius had taught him everything he knew about pleasure and it was so gratifying to find that his teaching had not gone unappreciated.

"Keeper or Chaser?" Lucius murmured.

"Flip you for it."

"You cannot be… hey!" Lucius found himself face down on the bed, contemplating this delightful aggression as Severus removed Lucius' pyjama bottoms.

Warm, wet tongue traced his spine, moving inexorably down to where Severus was employing his hands to thoroughly massage, plunder and debauch Lucius' willing arse. Moaning into the pillow, Lucius arched his back, begging wordlessly for more. A whimper of unalloyed sexual bliss clawed its way from Lucius' throat as a spit-slicked finger breached him and made him endlessly – if incoherently - grateful to have been born male.

"Good?"

Slow massage inside of him. Heavy, roiling heat in his loins making him ache.

"Ohfuckyes." His hips rolling with each stroke, arching to meet, to take more.

"Turn your head, I want to see you. You're a fallen angel when you're like this – so beautiful, so debauched. I used to force myself to keep my eyes open when we fucked, just to see you like this, Lucius."

Ecstatic pleasure winding his spine tight and the need to thrust – the very feel of cotton against his sex inflaming his senses, and Severus' words blowing them into conflagration. Air like hot treacle, so heavy it was hard to breathe, hard to think of anything except Severus kissing his way back up his spine whispering more silken wickedness in Lucius' ear as he pressed into him so deep so good!

"Hard," the pleading whisper was a voice Lucius could scarcely recognize as his own. "Do it hard. Give me all of you."

Severus groaned, wrapping himself around Lucius, burying himself again and again as Lucius fought to move, to meet him, to be split apart and fucked to ragged bits. Lucius begged, demanded, swore revenge and begged again as Severus pounded into his body with enough passion to burn them both to ashes.

Writhing together, the intensity built until there was only the desperate need for completion.

"Fuck me love me kill me with it damn you I love you always love you come for me lose it for me fall to pieces for me Severus oh shit oh fuck come for me come with me do it ahh now now oh yes fucking yes...!"

Quick spastic jerks of Lucius' hand on his prick brought an orgasm that felt like an explosion of molten steel. Severus shuddered, thrusting as if both their lives depended on it and cried out hoarsely as he took his pleasure, then moaned against Lucius' neck as each aftershock wrung a little more from him.

Lucius felt himself sinking into the bed as endorphins sluiced through his body. He could not move as Severus tucked and rolled them both onto their sides, lassitude on the tail of the endorphins. A few kisses and murmured endearments and Severus' breathing altered into that of sleep. Lucius was only seconds behind him.

~

It was his study, but the whole thing has been twisted out of true somehow, lending the room a wrongness hard to define but inimical. Though the scene outside of the leaded glass windows was one of summer, the room was cold – freezing actually. Lucius got up from his chair, a glass of a good red wine in one hand, and went to the fireplace where a bonfire fit for Samhain was burning in the grate.

The cold was numbing his hands and feet, and no warming charm worked, though he could cast them all from memory.

"More fuel, I need more fuel."

Setting the wine on the mantel, he bent to the hod and began to toss more tinder into the maw of flames. No change for the warmer, but a tracing of frost was creeping around the edges of the windowpanes. Baffled, Lucius picked up his glass and tipped it up.

And spit out a mouthful of salty, coppery red - coughing and spitting in disgust.

"Blood? I'll have elf-hide slippers for this!"

Throwing the glass into the fireplace, the flames seemed to hiss in satisfaction at this kindling – yet the room grew even colder. Frost muted the colors of summer to vague, sickly pastels and the shadows in the room seemed to move oddly in the dying light.

Perplexed, Lucius reached for another bit of tinder. Cool, heavy and smooth it came to his hand – so unlike wood that he had to look down and see…

Gleaming white bone. A fleshless and pristine femur dropped from his numb grip to clatter to the hearthstone.

In the hod, there was no seasoned oak or fatty pine; but it was instead heaped with tibiae, ulnae, ribs and skulls.

Lucius stumbled back, suddenly dripping sweat in the brutal cold of the room, his guts knotting slickly.

"What's going on here?" he breathed out white fog, the cold eating into him by the second. "What is hell is going on…"

"You won't be warm until we are."

Lucius pivoted on one heel and nearly choked on his own spit. In the darkness, populating every shadow, were faces he knew. Some he killed, some he had seen their lives ended, and some he never saw except as object lessons left for the Ministry to find. All of them were frozen blue - cold in layers of aquamarine and sapphire.

He knew them, and sought to tear his eyes away before he saw…

Cold arms around him, squeezing. Lips like ice on his cheek. A fond, loving smile as Evan whispered, "You won't be warm until we are, Lucius. Not until we're warm again will you be free of the cold."

~

He awoke with a scream lunging up his throat and barely managed to throttle it down.

Severus had moved away from him in sleep and did not stir from the grip of deep slumber.

Ideas, images, and memories tumbled through Lucius' mind a cyclonic speed. What he had done, he had done and done willingly. Now he would do this last thing, a paltry thing, but the only thing that Lucius felt he could do. Just one act that would never come close to balancing the scales – the only act left.

Slipping out of bed, he pulled Severus' robe de chambre from a hook on one of the bedposts and put it on.

"Mmmf?" Severus stirred.

"Just going to shower. Right back." One last untruth.

"Mmmf." Severus dropped back into sleep and Lucius breathed a sigh of heartfelt relief.

In the bath, he shut the door, and cursed the fact that here was no way to lock the damned thing. He started the water and removed the robe, using his fingernails and teeth to pick apart the stitching that joined the sash to the robe. Tying one end to the shower curtain rail, Lucius wished for a real rope – the silk could not make a proper hangman's knot. It would get the job done, but it would be a much slower death by asphyxiation rather than by having one's neck snapped and losing all function below the third vertebrae.

Beggars could not be choosers, and he had meted out worse deaths himself.

Slipping his head in, he readied himself. It would take an enormous act of will to override the autonomic compulsion to struggle free of the noose and breathe. Why couldn't Severus have left a friendly drop somewhere? Even a simple sharp edge would make this easier by half.

Kneeling he leaned into the noose's embrace, let it constrict his airway. How often had he done this to some of his test subjects? He could surely manage it for himself – and without anybody to release the noose when he passed out from hypoxia, he would fall, the noose would tighten and that would be that.

Silver-rimmed black spots slipped into his vision one by one, then in a blizzard that dimmed light and thought. There was a roaring in his ears. He felt his knees strike the floor. All was dark, and Lucius went gladly into it.

….

….

"Breathe, damn it!"

No!

Despite all his will, Lucius did breathe - sucking air into his lungs and expelling it in a howl of pure fury. Red rage replaced the darkness so eagerly sought and he lashed out at Severus. He was aware of nothing other than the desire to taste blood, to obliterate the care that was worse than Cruciatus, to make sure that Severus would…

The wet snap of breaking bone and breathless gasping slammed into Lucius' mind, blasting the red rage to tatters. Severus knelt on the floor beside the tub, face grey and eyes unseeing as he struggled to stay conscious. One arm was folded flat to his ribcage, as if trying to hold in the pain of broken ribs.

Lucius backed away, mind blank in horror. Sick and shaking, he fled to the one place he could think of as safe.

~

It was unusual for someone so prompt as Severus to be late at all, much less late by this amount of time. Even if he hated meetings of the staff, Severus was always there.

Albus knocked briskly at the heavy oak door. "Severus?"

No answer.

A more insistent knock brought the Potions Master's voice on the other side of the door, which stayed firmly shut.

"Yes?" Short, guarded.

"Severus? The staff meeting? Everyone is waiting." There was a long silence. "Severus?"

"Headmaster, I have a… situation."

Oh, dear. Excessive formality. That was never a good sign with anyone, especially not with a Slytherin.

"I see. A 'situation' that precludes your attendance in the meeting? Just what sort of 'situation' would that be?" Albus crossed his arms and spoke sternly to the door, thinking it an apt metaphor for a good many of his dealings with Severus Snape.

There was a long silence. "A… situation, Headmaster."

This was alarming – formality coupled with a lack of words simply did not happen to the razor-witted Severus.

"Severus – are you ill?" Severus had a tendency to push himself very hard and had a personality that lent itself to the obsessive. If he had wrecked his health, Albus would drag him to Poppy Pomfrey by the ears.

"No. I… it is… my guest. He has reached a point of… crisis."

"Might I enquire as to the nature of this crisis? Shall I send for Madam Pomfrey?" No answer. "Severus," open this door." Silence as Albus counted to ten, then spoke in his steeliest tones, "Severus, you can open this door, or I will open this door."

After a moment's hesitation, the locks were thrown and the wardspells relaxed. Severus opened the door about four inches and peered out, blocking Albus' view into the room with his body. Dark circles graced Severus' eyes, he had lost weight and seemed to be holding himself very stiffly.

"Much better. Now, the nature of this crisis?"

"You might remember the type of crisis – it precludes leaving him alone with things such as sharp objects and the like. Lucius has begun to… see, sir."

Albus felt a chill in his bones. " 'See,' Severus? What has Lucius begun to see that leads you to mistrust him in the presence of sharp objects? Are you in danger from him or is Lucius Malfoy in physical danger from himself?"

Severus took a breath, his face reflecting some inner turmoil. "If you will recall from my own… history; when clarity is attained and one cannot look at one's deeds though the fog of self deception, it can be…" He jerked his gaze away from Albus' and shrugged. "If you will recall, I tried to hang myself with the bedsheets."

Severus never fidgeted, so any extraneous movement from him was usually an indicator of significant distress. Albus was now truly alarmed. "What has happened? Has he injured himself, or you? It would not surprise me at all if you were to hide it. Tell me, Severus."

"If you would... if you have no other urgent business..." A quick shift of the shoulders and flicker in the steady gaze. "I might poultice the bruises, if you could... sit with him. He is under the covers of the bed and refuses to come out."

Oh… my. It was a very good thing that he had come down here.

"Perhaps from a school standpoint, we should approach this as if you were the one indisposed. I will return here after I dismiss the meeting. We will say, for the time, that you have taken ill." That would give him time to make a start at sorting things out.

Severus hesitated, he was loath to ask for any type of aid, inhibited by the Slytherin reflexes that made him so damnably hard to reach. "I am fine, sir. The bruises are… not big."

"Of course. But you are hesitant to leave him, are you not?" Albus prodded gently, continuing at Severus' nod. "So we will dismiss the staff for today. And then I will help you with him, if you wish it. I will be happy to 'sit with him' if it will be helpful."

The expression of relief on Severus' face was transfiguring. "It will. Thank you, Headmaster."

Albus made it a quick trip, dispersing the staff with a look and a few terse words before he headed back to the dungeons. The door wards were still down, so right on the heels of his knock, Albus let himself into Severus' domain. The dark-haired man stood in the doorway to the darkened bedchamber, but turned to face him.

"Well, Severus, I wish I could say your colleagues were disappointed in the sudden cancellation, but I fear that would be a rather heinous untruth. How is Lucius?"

"He is... clear on what he has done. He is..." Severus shook his head, "He is as it was with me, that time. He tried to hang himself with the sash of my robe. Right now he is under the covers of the bed alternately weeping and cursing, or just… trembling."

"Oh, Severus… how long?" How could he think to try to deal with this alone? Did Severus believe that he would refuse to aid Lucius? "When did this happen? Is he violent, now?"

"Last night. He became violent when I tried to stop him, a little Skele-Gro put my ribs right, but..." Severus chopped the words off and tried to look as if he'd said nothing of the sort.

"Last night? Skele-Gro." Albus gave the younger man a very sharp look. This one could be the most trying…! Deep breath. "And now? Is he controlled?"

"After a fashion. He's devastated that he hurt me and nothing I say will convince him to come out. I'd sleep, but he might..." Severus let his voice trail off and Albus could clearly hear 'help me, please?' in what went unsaid.

Albus was well and truly alarmed. "Take me to him. Now."

"It was only a little Skele-Gro, ribs are easy. It's Lucius I'm worried over." Severus led him to the door of the bedchamber, dimly lit by a soft lumos.

"I'll deal with you later. Where is Lucius?"

"He's in there, in the middle of the bed - and I'm fine. Truly." The assertion was spoiled by a jaw-creaking, watery-eyed yawn. "Just don't stick your arm under the blankets – he… bites."

Albus gave the manchild an intent gaze and Severus had the grace to blush. "Indeed. In a moment." Albus entered the bedchamber, calling gently, "Lucius? Lucius, it's Albus Dumbledore… can you hear me?" Making his way to the foot of the bed, he saw only a tight-curled lump trembling under the blankets. The sides rose and fell with breathing, and he sensed the trembling increase, but there was no other response. "Severus, have your tried to give him any potions? What happened?"

"No, sir, no potions. After… he went in there and would not come out. I wanted to be sure he had taken no harm, so I reached under the covers and… he... nipped me. A little."

"Well, I think something is called for. I'm going to put Requietum on him. He'll calm and lie quiet for a time - long enough for me to take a look at you." Albus paused very deliberately and gave Severus a long look. "And I do mean to have a look at you. Severus."

"I'm fine! Lucius needs the help, not me." Severus put on his stubbornness as he would his professor's robe.

"And he'll get it. You know what Requietum will do." Albus ached to remember the circumstances, but it was often the only thing that worked on someone being assaulted by their own mind. "It will calm his mind and enable him to rest from his body's autonomic responses to the terrors. He'll be more rational. It will help him, not harm him."

Severus nodded, responding to the persuasive reassurance. "As you think best, sir. Just... tell him first?"

"Of course, Severus, that was always my intention." These young ones had become accustomed to spells cast upon them without their consent and Albus refused to emulate a bad master. "Lucius? I'm going to place my hand here, on your head… can you feel that? I'm going to give you some calm, Lucius, some peace. I'm going to give you Requietum, and you'll rest for a while. All right?"

The shaking increased, now accompanied by the sound of muffled weeping.

If nothing else, Albus could wish for the luxury of allowing himself to hate Tom Riddle. Some of the best minds of a generation had been misled and shattered by an egotistical madman, quite outside the ones that were murdered out of hand. To see the strong and intelligent man who was Lucius Malfoy so completely destroyed… Albus would not even wish this kind of hell on his worst enemy.

He rested a hand on Lucius' head and spoke quietly, "There, Lucius, there, this won't be painful, and you'll sleep peacefully. When you awake, you'll be able to think a little straighter. Here we go…  Requietum!"

The form under the bedclothes shuddered once, went limp and relaxed, moving into a more natural posture for sleep. Albus suddenly felt every one of his hundred-and-fifty plus years. How had Nicholas Flammel ever handled over six hundred?

Severus was no longer behind him, Albus went out of the bedroom to find him at his desk, face buried in his hands. What kind of memories was this bringing back for Severus? What old wounds reopened? Severus sought forgiveness as a crusader sought the Grail, never knowing that he had it, Albus had granted it to him long ago. Could this undo the careful work of years it had taken to get Severus to believe in anything other than his own damnation?

Albus moved to stand silent behind him, resting his hands on Severus' shoulders.

"The Hell of all this is that I know how he feels, Albus." Severus whispered, lifting his head to stare across the room.

"I know. I know that you do," Albus said gently, "and you, if anyone, will be able to find a way through this, for both of you. But you will be able to do nothing if you allow yourself to be worn to death in the process. Show me those bruises."

"It is not so bad that you should concern yourself, Albus. All that's left is a few little bruises." Severus turned to face him, and the semantic chase was on.

Albus knew that Slytherins could talk rings around most barristers, and confuse the fanatic so badly that they tripped over their own dogma. Severus did not want to take off his shirt, there was a reason for that, and Albus would find out just what that reason was – by using his own methods.

Albus simply regarded the dark-haired with a steady, neutral stare man until…

"I took Skele-Gro. I'm fine."

Albus narrowed his eyes and adjusted the half-moon glasses on the bridge of his nose. "Must I insist? And I can insist, Severus."

Severus winced, probably remembering the last time his headmaster had insisted on something, and stood to unbutton his black wool coat. "I've had worse! Much worse! Many times. Even as far back as my Quidditch days."

Albus made no response. He simply crossed his arms over his chest, the very image of patient waiting, as Severus worked his way down the twenty buttons on his coat.

"I'm really fine!" He insisted, pausing halfway down.

Albus compressed lips slightly in impatience, but said nothing – the only way to win an argument with Severus was to refuse to be drawn into one. The rest of the buttons were undone and Severus turned his attention, very slowly, to the ten buttons running from wrist to elbow. Taking off the coat, Severus hung it carefully over the back of the chair. As the stubborn manchild removed the cufflinks from his white linen shirt, Albus could almost hear plans being formulated and discarded inside Severus' head.

Unbuttoning the shirt as far as the middle of his sternum, Severus looked at him and said, "Skele-Gro is really very efficacious."

Enough. "Severus. Remove. Your. Shirt." Albus spoke with the voice of He Who Is To Be Obeyed.

"Yes, sir." With a sigh of defeat, Severus slid off his shirt to reveal a ribcage as colorful as a tropical sunset. "They are little bruises, it's just that there are good many of them."

Albus ignored that ridiculousness completely, gasping as his ribs ached in sympathy. If this was mostly healed, the pain must have been beyond excruciating! "Ah, Severus! My dear boy! You will need that poultice, on those. Is there pain when you breathe?"

"Not from the ribs. No. As I said Skele-Gro-"

Another Skele-Gro advertisement. It was time to put his foot down.

"Enough! Do not temporize with me! I asked you if there was pain when you breathe. If not from the ribs, then from what? How much?"

Severus studied the floor. "From the muscles. Just some. Not much."

The man could try the patience of a saint and make an angel curse!

"I can understand your desire for privacy in this, Severus, but I will not have you endangering yourself, nor neglecting yourself. Have you the things on hand to properly deal with this?"

"Yes, but they will make me drowsy."

"And this would be a problem how?" Albus' voice was only slightly tart.

"I can't sleep too much, Albus. Lucius might need me."

He smiled at Severus' glare. "Prepare what is necessary, Severus, and we will deal with this. You will sleep. I will sit with him, and with you."

"But-!"

Albus held up his finger and glared at his Potions Master.

"Yes, Headmaster. Right away."

"That's my boy." Albus allowed himself a little chortle as Severus left the room. It was not so often that a victory was so unequivocal.

Severus returned, glaring and muttering something about one day winning an argument. Albus pretended to be deaf.

The arnica poultices were prepared, and Severus required help to wrap them firmly. The cotton wrappings also supported the badly bruised musculature and allowed Severus to breathe more easily.

In the act of mixing a potion, Severus paused and looked at Albus. "If I use hawthorne instead of opiate, I won't sleep for as long a time."

"I want you to rest well, Severus. I will not permit you to cripple yourself in your zeal, my boy, understand that!" And if Severus were left to it, he would, as he seemed unable to do anything by halves. "You are simply too important. To me."

Severus ducked his head over the potion, his face distinctly pink, and muttered something along the lines of, "Mutual."

It was as much as he would ever get out of the taciturn Severus, but it was more sincere than hundreds of flowery paeans from anyone else. It quite literally warmed Albus' heart.

Holding up the cup of potion, Severus made a last ditch effort. "I'm not that tired. I could skip the potion and read instead."

"I will not even dignify that with a reply, Severus. Do you have extra blankets? Or shall I summon a House Elf?"

"I have extra blankets." Severus hesitated, then said, "I should sleep beside Lucius, he becomes... unsettled if he wakes alone."

Albus raised an eyebrow, but acquiesced. He had many questions for both men, but answers needs must wait until both were stronger in mind and body. "That will make my own task easier, certainly. And I will be able to see for myself that you sleep, and sleep well." Albus gestured firmly to the bedchamber and shooed a foot-dragging Severus in ahead of him.

There was another minor tussle as to pyjamas versus sleeping in trousers. Albus wound up fetching the blankets whilst Severus changed – the Slytherin could really carry image too far; if he could, he'd have everyone thinking that he roosted upside down with the bats.

Severus, scowling, lay himself down carefully and pulled up the blankets. "This potion takes about twenty minutes to work and should put me under for eight hours or so. How long should the Requietum keep Lucius out?"

"Twelve hours is usually the minimum, but I can renew the spell if need be." Albus summoned a deep armchair and ottoman to the bedside, rested his hand for a moment on Lucius' head under the blankets, and sat down. "Drink it down, lad."

Severus tipped the goblet and drained it to the bottom, setting the empty vessel on the night table.

"You'll wake me if there is need, Albus?" Severus raised his head just before it hit the pillow.

"Of course."

In a few minutes, before the potion could properly have had a chance to work, Severus was asleep. Albus rose and adjusted the blankets over the man; he had been far more exhausted than he had let on.

Under the covers, Lucius stirred, sought, and found Severus, moving close before quieting again.

Albus shook his head silently, stood, and adjusted the blankets about Severus' shoulders. Returning to his chair, he summoned a House Elf to bring tea; he was hoping for a long vigil.

~

Next: Epilogue