Moonlit Horizons
Chapter seven- in which we learn about Snape a bit more and Anna gets "rescued by a Malfoy."
By Dizmius.
A Remus Fic for a friend of mine
Hotel California belongs to the Eagles, I'm just letting Sirius voice his sing-y voice by using it, cuz it seems like a song he'd have liked. I love the thought of Snape hiding an unconscious Lucius Malfoy in an over-large cauldron in his cellar… hehehe… what an image…
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Grrrr, italics!!!!!!!
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"Now, you must take heed of what I am about to tell you as your pitiful existence will depend on it." Snape looked sideways at Lupin. "Lupin, are you listening to me at all?"
"I don't like the feel of being a Malfoy." Remus stated simply. That should annoy him.
"LUPIN!" Snape's nostrils flared angrily. "Do you want to become dragon fodder?"
"Would be an interesting end for me, please continue." Remus slyly grinned which looked ridiculous on Lucius Malfoy's face.
"As I was saying earlier, you're my superior in this place, therefore you have to act like my superior, is that clear?"
"Crystal." Remus nodded.
"Right." Snape looked uncomfortable about the whole idea of having Remus as his direct superior. "Well, since I have been re-acquainted with Voldemort, even though I have been accepted back into the fold, he still does not trust me, and rightly so." Snape stared at the ground for a minute, trying to collect his thoughts together. "I can't physically go down into the dungeons, not even if Malfoy were to ask me to accompany him, so I'm afraid you will be going in alone. You have the map, but if anybody were to see Lucius Malfoy reading a map to get around the dungeons, it would look highly suspicious, especially as Lucius drew the blueprints for the place. There are quite a few security gargoyles on some of the walls which check for intruders, they all have bright blue eyes, just tell them your name as you walk past, and for goodness sake say it like a Malfoy."
"I see." Remus ran over that information again in his head, security gargoyles with blue eyes, be quiet about the map, look imperious towards everybody.
"Now, about Lucius." Snape said in a conspiratorial tone. "The reason he's going down into the dungeons today is to check up on the Lestrange's child."
"They have CHILDREN?" This totally threw Remus off-pace.
"One son, he was blinded by an Auror when he was a baby. Voldemort keeps him down there to keep him out of the way, he is adequately cared for. You must bring him his eye-potion, he is in the first cell on your left, you will find that all doors will open automatically for you if you tell them your name in Lucius' voice, which I think you will find you have adopted along with his looks. You have the best part of an hour, but providing everything goes well, you should be out in under half that time."
They had reached the oak doors that opened as they walked through, Snape fell into step slightly behind and to the left of Remus, but not before he had hissed "First door on your left. Then fifth door to your right."
He certainly lives well. This place is better than the Gryffindor common room. But maybe it lacks the warm aura… look at those paintings on the walls. All of battles, and there's even a werewolf regiment on that tapestry over there…
"Mister Malfoy! Mister Malfoy!"
Remus turned abruptly to see a dark hooded figure approaching him. Seeing the look on Snape's face, he immediately started acting as Lucius' son Draco had done in all of his classes. "What do you want?" he drawled, flicking at a piece of dust on his sleeve, "I do have more important business to attend to."
"Yes, I'm sorry sir, but I've been ordered to give you this, it's from our Lord himself. He wishes for you to read it once you have visited Lestrange's cell." The young boy looked no older than sixteen, and frankly, looked terrified.
"Very well." Remus took the scroll and pocketed it. He turned round and kept walking, well aware that Snape was still shadowing him.
He opened the door heading left and stalked off down the corridor, occasionally looking across at those hooded death eaters who bowed as he passed.
It's a world entirely on its own. Remus thought to himself. Its' a world within a world.
Approaching a black door on the right, the fifth door, he turned the handle and it opened outwards.
"I must leave you here sir." Snape hissed, "I will be waiting for you in our Lord's chambers directly upstairs. I have been told to report to Wormtail."
Remus wondered whether there was an intended edge to Snape's voice when he had stared right at him and told him that. Perhaps a hidden message of somekind.
Remus pushed the thought out of his mind as he descended down the dimly lit steps.
~*~
"Who goes there?" A gruff voice stopped Remus dead as he approached the first set of chained doors.
"Lucius Malfoy." Remus tried to put an impressive drawl to his voice as he said it.
The glimmering blue eyes of the gargoyle lit up as Remus started talking, and flapped its' stone wings, letting Remus pass safely. He was reaching out to touch the door when it swung open of its own accord.
"Ah." Remus muttered. He was in a circular room with eighteen doors around the edge. "The eye potion." He pulled out a vial of a shimmering grey liquid. "First door on the left."
"Malfoy!" Remus sounded impressive as the thick metal door clanged open to reveal a small child curled up on a tatty bed.
"Please sir! I've done no wrong sir! Will you tell my mother that I'm alright?" The boy's eyes darted round wildly as if trying to locate Remus' form.
"I've brought you your eye-potion." Remus handed the boy his vial. "Anything else?"
"No sir, that's very kind of you sir." Lestrange took his potion and curled up on his bed again as Remus turned to leave. "Master Malfoy?" He asked cautiously.
Remus stopped in his tracks, "Yes?"
"Will you… Will you let me see my mother? She would want to know I was all right… She worried about me going out."
Remus closed his eyes briefly. What had Lucius been telling this poor child? How can I tell him his parents are in Azkaban and in no fit mental state? "I shall… I shall see what can be done, child." Remus had to try hard to stop his voice from cracking as he closed the heavy door behind him.
The note that young messenger had given me.
Remus pulled out the now crumpled piece of parchment and read it to himself.
Lucius, I am beginning to doubt the loyalty of Severus Snape, I am leaving it in your hands to ascertain the truth. He is too valuable a pawn in my final plan to be lost to the opposition at so early a stage. Perhaps your son might be of help in the matter once term recommences at Hogwarts. V.
So Lucius really was Voldemort's right hand man. Remus put the note in his robe's inner pocket making a mental note to show this to both Snape and Dumbledore once he got back.
If I get back.
~*~
Remus followed the map he had been given by Snape, and soon found himself standing outside a thickly barred gate. Curled up in a corner of the dark and dank cell was a barely recognisable figure. By the way her shoulders were shaking Remus would jump to the conclusion that she had been subjected to some of Voldemort's more painful interrogation techniques in the recent past.
"Malfoy!"
The gate swung open and Remus hurried in, rushing straight over to Anna.
"Anna? Is that you? Can you hear m…" Remus was thrown back and landed with a thud against the wall.
Anna stood up, clutching her fist, which she'd just punched Remus with. "You!" She croaked, "I told you to stay away from me… I don't know what you want from me, but you're not going to get it."
Remus rubbed his sore shoulder, "I'm not who I look like." He muttered, suddenly realising she thought he was Malfoy, and obviously not Remus.
"Oh! Of course you're not. You're going to tell me that actually you're a kind sensitive being who's going to get me out of here." Anna hit the sarcasm right on the note.
"Well." Remus stood up, "yes, actually." He felt rather sheepish saying this. "It's not Malfoy, I'm Remus, you remember me? I was talking to you about magic when you got taken away? I'd just introduced Sirius to you?"
Anna looked curiously at him. "Why do you look like him?"
"Polyjuice potion, it makes you take on the appearance of anybody you like if you have a hair of theirs." Remus extended his hand to her. "I have no idea how we're going to get out of here, this is going to look rather odd."
Anna looked at the door cautiously, "I met someone called Snape. She said there were exits at the end of the dungeon passage, that led out of the building."
"SHE? Don't you mean Severus Snape? He's a man, right?"
"No, her name wasn't Severus, Drazzic or something like that. She took me back down here after they told me what I was." Anna frowned, "They told me I was a creature that could help them on the way to greatness."
"A Phaerren." Remus mumbled, "Is not a creature, it's the name given to a human bearing a certain rare magical trait." He sounded distressed about something, "Don't let anybody call you a creature, you're human and that's paramount."
"Draezyc said she'd help me, she told me that they wanted me to harbour a vicious creature that could suck out people's souls… Can creatures do that?"
"Yes." Remus nodded. "Some can." He peered round the corner of the cell, and pulled out his map. "They're called Dementors."
"Why do you sound so surprised about her name?" Anna asked curiously.
"I've never heard of another Snape." Remus furrowed his brows, and tucked the map away in a pocket. "Severus isn't exactly a nice person, and any family associated with him was never really discussed between us. We all just assumed he was a solitary figure, no friends and no family."
"You know they change guards in this place every hour?"
"I don't have an hour left." Remus worriedly ran a hand through his hair. "The potion will wear off before then, come, we must be quick." They headed out into the dark corridors and followed the path right to the end, where a dark figure was leaning against an ornately carved alcove in the rock.
"Told me I'd be seeing you soon enough." She stood up straight. "I suggest you leave as quickly as possible. Take her far away before it's realised that she is missing. I'm sure to be blamed so I'd like to spend time running away myself."
She opened up a rock door at the bottom f the alcove and ushered Anna down into the tunnel.
"You're Draezyc, aren't you?" Remus asked,
"I am." She nodded, meeting his gaze for an instant. "And you're the wolf. Pleasantries over, get out of here before you lose Malfoy's hair colour entirely."
Remus looked at a long strand of Lucius' blonde hair and discovered that it was losing it's blond colour and was beginning to return to Remus' familiar brown colouring. He hoisted himself through the door and heard a thud behind him, Draezyc had followed them and had closed the door, enveloping them into darkness.
"Lumos!" Remus watched as the tunnel was bathed in the light from his wand. "Anna, can you see any light up ahead?"
"Nothing yet…" Anna's voice was still croaky, far up ahead.
"She's a stubborn thing." Draezyc commented quietly, "It took a lot for Lucius and his band of merry men to get her to admit she knew you and Sirius. Albeit only for a brief period of time."
"You were there?"
"Of course." Draezyc nodded almost imperceptibly in the shadows. "Whole tribe gathering, if you want to call it that."
"Are you… Are you Severus' sister?" Remus asked inquisitively, though she looked nothing like him, apart from the black hair and thin profile.
Her laughter echoed through the tunnel. "No!" She almost choked, "How many people have asked me that… I'm losing count. I'm his wife."
Remus almost fell over when she told him that. He's married! Severus Snape is married. Married to someone so unlike him… And she looks so happy about it. Amazing, wait 'til Padfoot hears this.
"And before you ask it, yes he's very capable of being human when he wants to." Draezyc added with a hint of a grin. "Come on, its not that much farther."
~*~
After so long in the darkness, the sudden light of the trapdoor being opened on the other side assaulted Remus' eyes. He shielded himself with his hand. They were back in the dense forest, very close to where Remus had left Sirius earlier. But Sirius was no longer there.
"Draezyc?" Snape's silkly voice came from where he was leaning casually against a tall oak tree. "I see you brought them back without any trouble. I obliviated Malfoy, and filled him in on what he's just one. He's now wandering the castle like the insane man that he is."
"You know, I quite liked the look of him unconscious in my cauldron. I'm sure he'd prove useful for some potion or another."
Remus almost fell over for the second time that day when he saw Snape lean in for a kiss.
"They're sweet aren't they." Anna smiled slightly.
"How can I put No, in a better form of words?" Sirius came running up to greet them, a look of complete horror on his face. "You realise we went to school with her, don't you."
"I don't remember a Draezyc." Remus shook is head.
"Not a Draezyc, per se." Draezyc had heard them. "More of a Draeliana Tealamon. Slytherin prefect and high class snob I believe you've been heard to describe me as." She said pointedly to Sirius who grinned widely.
"You forgot stuck up."
A wave of Draezyc's hand and Sirius was thrown back against the nearest tree, he slid down its trunk and landed in a heap at the bottom.
"Very nicely done." Snape commented, "but I don't hesitate in telling you all that it's probably very perilous for you to be in the vicinity."
"Dumbledore." Sirius immediately said from his position at the bottom of the tree.
"I'm so glad you've learnt people's names, Black, but now isn't the time to recite them at random." Snape snarked. (yes he snarKed)
"Where are we going to go, if they know where we all live?" Anna asked looking up at Remus anxiously. "The horses…"
Snape rolled his eyes. "You don't do things properly at all do you."
"And what was that supposed to mean?" Sirius stood up and asked menacingly.
"What he's saying is…" Draezyc pushed Sirius back a few feet. "Is that you should have formulated a better plan before coming here on such a mission."
"Two Snapes… I'm going to have a nervous breakdown." Sirius whined.
"I think that maybe we should go to Hogwarts." Remus muttered, "if not to stop you bickering, to at least alert Dumbledore."
"Dumbledore already knows." Sirius looked up, "What? You didn't think I was just going to sit there and let you go be heroic?"
"Very well." Remus nodded, "To Hogwarts it is."
TBC
