Severus
By Cuirinelle Flamyrre
Prologue
It was three o'clock in the morning. A cold gust of wind and snow blew into the room through the broken window, making the green flames under a cauldron flicker. The midwife sighed in exasperation, patting her shiny forehead with a flowered handkerchief. She turned around, her pink fleecy robes sweeping the floor with her. Her rosy cheeks blossomed into a deep pink, and a heavy crease formed between her brows.
"Mr. Snape, will you please find a way to shut your window? It feels a little hot for us, I know, but your wife is in labor, and you don't want her or the baby catching Winter's Kiss!"
"She's already sick. The baby's probably sick too." He grunted. Nevertheless, Pontius Snape took a few long strides towards the end of the room and shut the shutters, and then took a heavy gray volume to hold the shutters in place. He looked around, exasperated, and ran his fingers through his greasy, black hair. A bead of sweat ran down his sideburns. As if bored, he pulled a long, violet smoke pipe out of his robes and began to billow on it. Purple smoke began to settle on the wooden floor.
The midwife looked at Snape the senior in disgust. "Mr. Snape, if it is absolutely necessary to smoke Morad, I suggest you step outside. Must I repeat that you are not exactly providing healthy circumstances for the birth of your first child?" As if to punctuate the midwife's statement, the woman lying on the shabby mattress gave a small yelp of pain.
His eyes narrowed on her helpless form. Grunting, he swung open the door and walked out into the cold and starless night.
"He always does that..." The woman grunted, as if trying to get her breathing under control. A very small but very definite tear slid down the side of her face.
"Hush, now dear, these things happen, but they always get better. I mean, look at me and my husband, we couldn't be in the same room together without fighting or arguing over some petty disagreement or another, but now we're estranged, and life's much happier this way. Not that I'm saying you two should separate, but things always work out."
Silence. The midwife went over to the cauldron to stir the potion she was conjuring some more, when suddenly, light began to drift in through the windwos, though it was dark outside.
"Oh dear! Geneva, your babe's ready...Gather your energy, concentrate on your breathing, relax..." The midwife looked sympathetically down at the woman. She shot a jet of orange light over her shoulder at the cauldron simmering in the corner.
"Yes, but it's so hard..."
"Mhhmm, I know...Now, dear, are you ready? Close your eyes..."
"Y-yes..."The woman grunted with difficulty.
The midwife straightened up and put her hand on the woman's enlarged belly. A spectrum suddenly exploded from the end of her wand and the whole room was suddenly filled with light. Every corner of the dark and dingy room seemed to be revitalized, but the light slowly began to dim.
The woman on the bed was panting and was crying very quietly, her face shining with sweat.
There was a heavy silence for a while where nothing could be heard except the woman's quiet weeping and the crackling of the logs under the cauldron. All of a sudden, a bay's wail broke the silence. The woman closed her eyes in relief and said a silent prayer.
"It's alright honey, aw, how cute!" The midwife was mumbling sweet nothings as she cleaned the newly born person in her arms. After a moment of adoring the child's face she shuffled over the woman in the bed.
"Geneva, I give to you your first...er...son. It's a boy. Take the potion in the cauldron over there in the corner every half and hour and you'll be healthy and walking around in no time. I wish I could stay, dear, but I'm afraid there are many other parents out there who need me too. Keep in touch, I'll want to know how you and the baby are doing"
Conjuring a fleecy blanket out of nowhere, the midwife swaddled the baby with terrific speed and tucked it into his mothers waiting arms. She pecked the woman's cheek, and then, with a loud crack, she was gone.
Geneva Snape heard what the midwife was saying, but only barely so. For the first time in her life, she held her son.